SONG OF AN EXILE.

New Zealand Tablet, 4 March 1920, Page 37

SONG OF AN EXILE.

. [Subsequent to the Rebellion of 1798„ James Orr, the Bard of Ballycarry, was proscribed by* the minions of Government. For a short period he skulked from covert to covert; but, conscious of his own innocence, at last surrendered himself. He was for a considerable time doomed to pine in captivity; but his enemies, unable to prove any overt act of treason against him, which would have furnished a sufficient pretext for sacrificing his life, granted him the favor (for such it was then considered) of transporting himself to America. On his outward passage, he composed the following verses, on the Banks of Newfoundland.] In Ireland ’tis evening from toil my friends hie all, And weary walk home o’er the dew-spangled lea; The shepherd in love tunes his grief-soothing viol, Or visits the maid that his partner will be; The blithe milkmaid trips to the herd that stands lowing; The west richly smiles, and the landscape is glowing; The sad-sounding curfew, and torrent fast-flowing, Are heard by my fancy, though far, far at sea! What has my eye seen since I left the green valleys, But ships as remote as the prospect could be? Unwieldy, huge monsters, as ugly as malice, And floats of some wreck, which with sorrow I see? What’s seen but the fowl, that its lonely flight urges, The lightning, that darts through the sky-meeting surges, And the sad-scowling, sky, that with bitter rain scourges This cheek care sits drooping on, far, far at sea? How hideous the hold is!Here, children are screaming— There, dames faint through thirst, with their babes'"on their knee ! Here, down every hatch the big breakers are streaming, ( And there, with a crash, half the fixtures break free! Some court, some contend, some sit dull stories tolling; The mate’s mad and drunk, and the tars tasked and yelling; What sickness and sorrow pervade my rude dwelling!— ’ A huge, floating lazar-liouse, far, far at sea! How changed ail may be when 1 seek the sweet village: A hedge-row may bloom where its street used to be; The floors of my friends may be tortured by tillage. And the upstart be served by the fallen grandee; The axe may have humbled the grove-that I haunted, And shades be my shield that as yet are unplanted, Nor one comrade live who repined when ho wanted The sociable sufferer that’s far, far at sea! In Ireland ’tis nighton the flowers of my sotting A parent may kneel, fondly praying for me;— The village is smokeless —the red moon is getting That hill for a throne which I hope yet to see. If innocence thrive, many more have to grieve for; Success, slow but sure, I'll contentedly live for: es, Sylvia, we’ll meet, and your sigh cease to heave for The swain your fine image haunts, far, far at sea! —James Orr.