Burial at Iona.

SLOW and silent o'er the ocean,
On the heaving billow's crest,
The dark ship bore, in his slumber,
The lone corpse unto his rest.

Lonely, lonely 'mid the blue waves
Of the wild Atlantic spray,
Stands the blessed isle of burial,
With its old cathedral gray.

When the cloister bell was tolling
On Iona's fitful breeze,

'Twas but answered by the rolling
And the surging of the seas.

Round the hillside dark and hoary, Each gray cross upreared its head, Marking out the Straide na marabh,

The wild footpath of the dead.

And upon the lonely sea-beach
The sad coronach was sung,
And the funeral psalms were chanted
In the holy Latin tongue.

Then the shrouded corpse was carried, And right duteously laid down,

Till the pious prayers were over,

By St Martin's Cross of stone.

In the grave all duly hallowed,
Long and deep would be his rest;

In the arms of the Atlantic,
Upon wild Iona's breast.

Cradled 'mid the ocean billows, Sung to rest by prayer and hymn, And o'erwatched by angel guardians Of those ancient cloisters dim.

No need for him to tremble,
Though ills foretold might be
And though the distant lands around
Should sink beneath the sea.

For still Columba's blessing shields

Iona of his love;

And o'er the flood its towers shall rise,*
Pointing to heaven above.

Oh! ye dead of Inishona,

I would turn aside a while
From the turmoil and the hurry
Of this life of care and toil.

I would rest my heart aweary
Upon blest Columba's shore ;
In thy holy Reilig Orain

Might I sleep for evermore !

* Ancient Erse prophecy :

66 Seven years before that awful day,
When time shall be no more,
A watery deluge shall o'ersweep
Hibernia's mossy shore.

"The green clad Isla, too, shall sink,
While with the great and good,
Columba's happy isle shall rear
Her towers above the flood."

Black's Picturesque Tourist of Scotland, p. 472.

The Haddock.

FAR in the depths of the dark blue waves, Swimming and darting so free,

'Mid the coral vaults of the ocean caves, Merry a fish's life must be !

Down where the tempered sunbeams steal,

To its pure sands of gold,

Where the dark sea palms no depths reveal Of their shadowy groves so cold.

The sea is at times like a sapphire bright,
Sometimes like a chrysoprase,
And again, 'tis a field of silver light,
Or of opal moonstone's rays.

Fair is the whiting with pearly tail,
The mackerel in coat of green;

But the tiny herring, in gleamy mail,
Is the fairest of all, I ween.

Yet best do I love the haddock still,
For it bears St Peter's mark;
Unfadingly stamped beneath its gill
Is the grasp of a finger, dark.

And glancing away through the crystal waves,
Swimming and darting so free ;

A blessing it bears for the mark it wears,
And the token we love to see.

If e'en on a humble fish's skin,
This sacred sign is laid;

A holier stamp, thy soul within,

Hath thy Christian baptism made.

Then bear it on, through life's stormy sea:
St Peter's fish art thou,

And bright will it shine eternally,

As a glory around thy brow.