Narrative Poems, part 3, Barclay of Ury etc | Page 2

He suffereth long,?Shall I answer wrong with wrong,?Scoffing with the scoffer?
"Happier I, with loss of all,?Hunted, outlawed, held in thrall,?With few friends to greet me,?Than when reeve and squire were seen,?Riding out from Aberdeen,?With bared heads to meet me.
"When each goodwife, o'er and o'er,?Blessed me as I passed her door;?And the snooded daughter,?Through her casement glancing down,?Smiled on him who bore renown?From red fields of slaughter.
"Hard to feel the stranger's scoff,?Hard the old friend's falling off,?Hard to learn forgiving;?But the Lord His own rewards,?And His love with theirs accords,?Warm and fresh and living.
"Through this dark and stormy night?Faith beholds a feeble light?Up the blackness streaking;?Knowing God's own time is best,?In a patient hope I rest?For the full day-breaking!"
So the Laird of Ury said,?Turning slow his horse's head?Towards the Tolbooth prison,?Where, through iron gates, he heard?Poor disciples of the Word?Preach of Christ arisen!
Not in vain, Confessor old,?Unto us the tale is told?Of thy day of trial;?Every age on him who strays?From its broad and beaten ways?Pours its seven-fold vial.
Happy he whose inward ear?Angel comfortings can hear,?O'er the rabble's laughter;?And while Hatred's fagots burn,?Glimpses through the smoke discern?Of the good hereafter.
Knowing this, that never yet?Share of Truth was vainly set?In the world's wide fallow;?After hands shall sow the seed,?After hands from hill and mead?Reap the harvests yellow.
Thus, with somewhat of the Seer,?Must the moral pioneer?From the Future borrow;?Clothe the waste with dreams of grain,?And, on midnight's sky of rain,?Paint the golden morrow!
THE ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA.
A letter-writer from Mexico during the Mexican war, when detailing some of the incidents at the terrible fight of Buena Vista, mentioned that Mexican women were seen hovering near the field of death, for the purpose of giving aid and succor to the wounded. One poor woman was found surrounded by the maimed and suffering of both armies, ministering to the wants of Americans as well as Mexicans, with impartial tenderness.
SPEAK and tell us, our Ximena, looking northward?far away,?O'er the camp of the invaders, o'er the Mexican?array,?Who is losing? who is winning? are they far or?come they near??Look abroad, and tell us, sister, whither rolls the?storm we hear.?Down the hills of Angostura still the storm of?battle rolls;?Blood is flowing, men are dying; God have mercy?on their souls!?"Who is losing? who is winning?" Over hill?and over plain,?I see but smoke of cannon clouding through the?mountain rain."
Holy Mother! keep our brothers! Look, Ximena,?look once more.?"Still I see the fearful whirlwind rolling darkly?as before,?Bearing on, in strange confusion, friend and foeman,?foot and horse,?Like some wild and troubled torrent sweeping?down its mountain course."
Look forth once more, Ximena! "Ah! the smoke?has rolled away;?And I see the Northern rifles gleaming down the?ranks of gray.?Hark! that sudden blast of bugles! there the troop?of Minon wheels;?There the Northern horses thunder, with the cannon?at their heels.
"Jesu, pity I how it thickens I now retreat and?now advance!?Bight against the blazing cannon shivers Puebla's?charging lance!?Down they go, the brave young riders; horse and?foot together fall;?Like a ploughshare in the fallow, through them?ploughs the Northern ball."
Nearer came the storm and nearer, rolling fast and?frightful on!?Speak, Ximena, speak and tell us, who has lost,?and who has won??Alas! alas! I know not; friend and foe together?fall,?O'er the dying rush the living: pray, my sisters,?for them all!
"Lo! the wind the smoke is lifting. Blessed?Mother, save my brain!?I can see the wounded crawling slowly out from?heaps of slain.?Now they stagger, blind and bleeding; now they?fall, and strive to rise;?Hasten, sisters, haste and save them, lest they die?before our eyes!
"O my hearts love! O my dear one! lay thy?poor head on my knee;?Dost thou know the lips that kiss thee? Canst?thou hear me? canst thou see??O my husband, brave and gentle! O my Bernal,?look once more?On the blessed cross before thee! Mercy!?all is o'er!"
Dry thy tears, my poor Ximena; lay thy dear one?down to rest;?Let his hands be meekly folded, lay the cross upon?his breast;?Let his dirge be sung hereafter, and his funeral?masses said;?To-day, thou poor bereaved one, the living ask thy?aid.
Close beside her, faintly moaning, fair and young,?a soldier lay,?Torn with shot and pierced with lances, bleeding?slow his life away;?But, as tenderly before him the lorn Ximena knelt,?She saw the Northern eagle shining on his pistolbelt.
With a stifled cry of horror straight she turned?away her head;?With a sad and bitter feeling looked she back upon?her dead;?But she heard the youth's low moaning, and his?struggling breath of pain,?And she raised the cooling water to his parching?lips again.
Whispered low the dying soldier, pressed her hand?and faintly smiled;?Was that pitying face his mother's? did she watch?beside her child??All his stranger words with meaning her woman's?heart supplied;?With her kiss upon his forehead, "Mother!"?murmured he, and died!
"A bitter curse upon them, poor boy, who led thee?forth,?From some gentle, sad-eyed mother, weeping, lonely,?in the North!"?Spake the mournful Mexic woman, as she laid him?with her dead,?And turned to soothe the