LOCH BÚY

Dark, with shrouds of mist surrounded.

Rise the mountains from the shore,

Where the galleys of the Islesmen

Stand updrawn, their voyage o'er.

Horns this morn are hoarsely sounding

From Loch Búy's ancient wall,

While for chase the guests and vassals

Gather in the court and hall.

Hounds, whose voices could give warning

From far moors of stags at bay,

Quiver in each iron muscle,

Howl, impatient of delay.

Henchmen, waiting for the signal,

At their chiefs imperious word

Start, to drive from hill and corrie

To the pass the watchful herd.

Closed were paths as with a netting,

Vain high courage, speed, or scent;

Every mesh, a man in ambush

Ready with a crossbow bent.

“Eachan, guard that glade and copsewood,

At your peril let none by!”

Cries the chief, while in the heather

Silently the huntsmen lie.

Shouting by the green morasses

Where the fairies dance at night,

Yelling‘ mid the oak and birches

Come the beaters into sight.

And before them, rushing wildly

Speeds the driven herd of deer,

Whose wide antlers toss like branches

In the winter of the year.

Useless was the vassal's effort

To arrest the living flow;

And it passed by Eachan's passage

Spite of hound, and shout, and blow.

Hearing was with them obeying,

And the hunter's strong limbs lie

Bound with thongs from tawny oxen,

‘ Neath the chieftain's cruel eye.

“More than twoscore stags have passed him,

Mark the number on his flesh

With red stripes of this good ashwood,

Mend me thus this broken mesh!”

Ah, Loch Búy! faint and sullen

Beats the heart, once leal and free,

That had yielded life exulting

If it bled for thine and thee.

Deem'st thou that no honour liveth

Save in haughty breasts like thine?

Think'st thou men, like dogs in spirit,

At such blows but wince and whine?

Often in the dangerous tempest,

When the winds before the blast

Surging charged like crested horsemen

Over helm, and plank, and mast,

He, and all his kin before him,

Well have kept the clansman's faith,

Serving thee in every danger,

Shielding thee from harm and skaith.

‘ Mid the glens and hills, in combats

Where the blades of swordsmen meet,

Has he fought with thee the Campbells,

Mingling glory with defeat.

But as waters round Eorsa

Darken deep, then blanch in foam,

When the winds Ben More has harboured

Burst in thunder from their home,

So the brow fear never clouded

Blackens now‘ neath anger's pall,

And the lips, to speak disdaining,

Whiten at revenge's call!