Elves and Heroes | Page 4

the deep
That wallowed, labouring in pain--
And Conn
stared back with cold disdain.
Pondering, he sat alone behind
The broad sail swallowing the wind,

As over the hollowing waves that leapt

And snarled with foaming
lips, and swept
Around the bows in querulous fray,
And tossed in
curves of drenching spray,
The belching ship with ardour drove;


Then like a lordly elk that strove
Amid the hounds and, charging, rent

The pack asunder as it went,
It bore round and in beauty sprang--

The sea-wind through the cordage sang
With high and wintry
merriment
That stirred the heart of Conn, intent
On vengeance, and
for battle keen--
So hard, so steadfast, and serene.
Then Ossian, sweet of speech, spake low,
With musing eyes upon the
foe,
"Is Conn more noble than The Red,
Whom Goll in battle
vanquished?"
"The Red was fiercer," Conan cried--
"Nay, Conn is
nobler," Finn replied,
"More comely, stalwart, mightier far--
What
sayest thou, Goll, my man of war?"
Then Goll made answer on the
steep,
Nor ceased to gaze on Conn full deep--
"His equal never
came before
Across the seas to Alban shore,
Nor ever have I peered
upon
A nobler, mightier man than Conn"
The ship flew seaward, tacking wide,
Contending with the wind and
tide,
And when upon the broad stream's track
It baffled hung, or
drifted back,
With grunt and shriek, like battling boars,
The shock
and swing of bladed oars
Came sounding o'er the sea
The dusk
Grew round the twilight, like a husk
That holds a kernel
choice, and keen,
Cold stars impaled the sky serene,
When Conn's
ship through the slackening tide
Drew round the wistful bay and wide,

Behind the headlands high that snout
The seas like giant whales,
and spout
The salt foam high and loud
Then sighed
The gasping men who all day plied
Their oars in
plunging seas, with hands
Grown stiff, and arms, like twisted bands

Drawn numbly, as they rose outspent,
And staggering from their
benches went
The sail napped quarrelling, and drank
The wind in
broken gasps, and sank
With sullen pride upon the boards,
And
smote the mast and shook the cords
Darkly loomed that alien land,
And darkly lowered the Fian band,


For hovering on the shoreland grey
The ship they followed round the
bay
Nor sought the sheltering woods until
The shadows folded o'er
the hill
Full heavily, and night fell blind,
And laid its spell upon the
wind
The swelling waters sank with sip
And hollow gurgle round the ship,

The long mast rocked against the dim,
Soft heaven above the
headland's rim
But while the seamen crouched to sleep,
Conn sat alone in reverie
deep,
And saw before him in a maze
The mute procession of his
days,
In gloom and glamour wending fast--
His heart a-hungering
for the past--
Again he leapt, a tender boy,
To greet his sire with
eager joy,
When he came over the wide North Sea,
Enriched with
spoils of victory--
Then heavily loomed that fateful morn
When
tidings of his fall were borne
From Alban shore ... Again he saw

The youth who went alone with awe
To swear the avenging oath
before
The smoking altar red with gore.
Ah! strange to him it seemed to be
That hour was drawing nigh when
he
Would vengeance take ... And still more strange,
O sorrow! it
would bring no change
Though blood for blood be spilled, and life

For life be taken in fierce strife;
'Twill ne'er recall the life long sped,

Or break the silence of the dead.
But when he heard his mother's wail,
Once more uplifted on the gale,

Moaning The Red who ne'er returned--
His cheeks with sudden
passion burned;
And darkly frowned that valiant man,
As through
his quivering body ran
The lightnings of impelling ire
And
impulses of fierce desire,
That surged, with a consuming hate

Against a world made desolate,
Unceasing and unreconciled,

And
ever clamouring ... like wild,
Dark-deeded waves that stun the shore,

And through the anguished twilight roar
The hungry passions of
the wide
And gluttonous deep unsatisfied.

II.
The shredding dawn in beauty spread
Its shafts of splendour,
golden-red,
High over the eastern heaven, and broke
Through
flaking clouds in silvern smoke
That burst aflame, and fold o'er fold,

Let loose their oozing floods of gold,
Splashed over the foamless
deep that lay
Tremulous and clear. In fiery play
The rippling beams
that swept between
The sea-cleft Sutor crags serene,
Broke
quivering where the waters bore
The soft reflection of the shore.
The pipes of morn were sounding shrill
Through budding woods on
plain and hill,
And stirred the air with song to wake
The
sweet-toned birds within the brake.
The Fians from their sheilings came,
With offerings to the god
a-flame,
And round them thrice they sun-wise went;
Then
naked-kneed in silence bent
Beside the pillar stones ...
But now
Brave Conn upon the ship's high prow
Hath raised his
burnished blade on high,
And calls on Woden and on Tigh
With
boldness, to avenge the death
Of his great sire ... In one deep breath

He drains the hero's draught that burns
With valour of the gods;
then turns
His long-sought foe to meet ... Great Conn
Sweeps,
stooping in a boat, alone.
Shoreward, with rapid blades and bright,

That shower the foam-rain pearly white,
And rip the waters, bending
lithe,
In hollowing swirls that hiss and writhe
Like adders, ere they
dart away
Bright-spotted with the flakes of spray.
When, furrowing the sand, he drew
His boat the shallowing water
through,
A