LOCHIEL.

Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling seer! Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear,

Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight,

This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.

WIZARD.

Ha! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn? Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn! Say, rush'd the bold eagle exultingly forth,

From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north? Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode Companionless, bearing destruction abroad;

But down let him stoop from his havoc on high!

Ah! home let him speed-for the spoiler is nigh.

Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast,
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?
'Tis the fire-shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven
From his eyrie, that beacons the darkness of heaven.
Oh, crested Lochiel! the peerless in might,
Whose banners arise on the battlements' height,
Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn;
Return to thy dwelling! all lonely return!

For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it stood,
And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing brood.

LOCHIEL.

False Wizard, avaunt! I have marshalled my clan: Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are one! They are true to the last of their blood and their

breath,

And like

reapers descend to the harvest of death.

Then welcome be Cumberland's steed to the shock!

Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the

rock!

But woe to his kindred, and woe to his cause, When Albin her claymore indignantly draws; When her bonnetted chieftains to victory crowd, Clamanald the dauntless, and Moray the proud, All plaided and plum'd in their tartan array―

WIZARD.

-Lochiel, Lochiel, beware of the day!

For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal,
But man cannot cover what God would reveal:
'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore,
And coming events cast their shadows before.

I tell thee, Culloden's dread echoes shall ring
With the blood-hounds, that bark for thy fugitive

king.

Lo! anointed by heaven with the vials of wrath,
Behold, where he flies on his desolate path!

Now, in darkness and billows, he sweeps from my

sight:

Rise! rise! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight! 'Tis finished. Their thunders are hushed on the

moors;

Culloden is lost, and my country deplores.
But where is the iron-bound prisoner? Where?
For the red eye of battle is shut in despair.

Say, mounts he the ocean-wave, banish'd, forlorn,
Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and

torn?

Ah no! for a darker departure is near;

The war drum is muffled, and black is the bier; His death-bell is tolling; oh! mercy, dispel

Yon sight, that it freezes my spirit to tell!

Life flutters convuls'd in his quivering limbs,

And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims.
Accurs'd be the faggots, that blaze at his feet,

Where his heart shall be thrown, ere it ceases to

beat,

With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale

LOCHIEL.

-Down, soothless insulter! I trust not the tale: For never shall Albin a destiny meet,

So black with dishonour, so foul with retreat.

Though my perishing ranks should be strew'd in their

gore,

Like ocean-weeds heap'd on the surf-beaten shore, Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains,

While the kindling of life in his bosom remains,