Glen-Avin

Beyond the grizzly cliffs which guard
The infant rills of Highland Dee,
Where hunter's horn was never heard,
Nor bugle of the forest bee ;
'Mid wastes that dern and dreary lie,
One mountain rears his mighty form.

Disturbs the moon in passing bye,
And smiles above the thunder-storm.

There Avin spreads her ample deep,
To mirror cliffs that brush the wain ;
Whose frigid eyes eternal weep,
In Summer suns and Autumn rain.

There matin hymn was never sung ;
Nor vesper, save the plover's wail ;
But mountain eagles breed their young,
And aerial spirits ride the gale.

An hoary sage once lingered there,
Intent to prove some mystic scene ;
Though cavern deep, and forest sere,
Had whooped November's boisterous reign.

That noontide fell so stern and still,
The breath of nature seemed away ;
The distant sigh of mountain rill
Alone disturbed that solemn day.

Oft had that seer, at break of morn,
Beheld the fahm glide o'er the fell ;
And 'neath the new moon's silver horn,
The fairies dancing in the dell ;
Had seen the spirits of the Glen,
In every form that Ossian knew ;
And wailings heard for living men,
Were never more the light to view.

But, ah ! that dull foreboding day,
He saw what mortal could not bear ;
A sight that scared the erne away,
And drove the wild deer from his lair.

Firm in his magic ring he stood,
When, lo! aloft on gray Cairn-gorm,
A form appeared that chilled his blood, —
The giant Spirit of the Storm.

His face was like the spectre wan,
Slow gliding from the midnight isle ;
His stature, on the mighty plan
Of smoke-tower o'er the burning pile.

Red, red and grisly were his eyes ;
His cap the moon-cloud's silver gray ;
His staff the writhed snake, that lies
Pale, bending o'er the milky way.

He cried, " Away, begone, begone!

Half-naked, hoary, feeble form !
How dar'st thou seek my realms alone,
And brave the Angel of the Storm T —
" And who art thou," the seer replied,
" That bear'st destruction on thy brow?

Whose eye no mortal can abide ;
Dread mountain Spirit ! what art thou v'
" Within this desert, dank and lone,
Since rolled the world a shoreless sea,
I've held my elemental throne,
The terror of thy race and thee.

" I wrap the sun of heaven in blood,
Veiling his orient beams of light ;
And hide the moon in sable shroud,
Far in the alcove of the night.

" I ride the red bolt's rapid wing,
High on the sweeping whirlwind sail,
And list to hear my tempests sing
Around Glen-Avin's ample wale.

" These everlasting hills are riven ;
Their reverend heads are bald and gray ;
The Greenland waves salute the heaven,
And quench the burning stars with spray.

" Who was it reared those whelming waves ?

Who scalped the brows of old Cairn- Gorm
And scooped these ever-yawning caves ?

'Twas I,— the Spirit of the Storm !

" And hence shalt thou, for evermore,
Be doomed to ride the blast with me ;
To shriek, amid the tempest's roar,
By fountain, ford, and forest tree."

The wizard cowered him to the earth,
And orisons of dread began :
" Hence, Spirit of infernal birth !

Thou enemy of God and man !"

He waved his sceptre north away,
The arctic ring was rift asunder ;
And through the heaven the startling bray
Burst louder than the loudest thunder.

The feathery clouds, condensed and curled,
In columns swept the quaking glen ;
Destruction down the dale was hurled,
O'er bleating flocks and wondering men.

The Grampians groaned beneath the storm ;
New mountains o'er the correis leaned ;
Ben-Nevis shook his shaggy form,
And wondered what his Sovereign meaned.

Even far on Yarrow's fairy dale,
The shepherd paused in dumb dismay ;
There passing shrieks adown the vale
Lured many a pitying hind away.

The Lowthers felt the tyrant's wrath ;
Proud Hartfell quaked beneath his brand ;
And Cheviot heard the cries of death
Guarding his loved Northumberland.

But, O ! as fell that fateful night,
What horrors Avin wilds deform,
And choke the ghastly lingering light !
There whirled the vortex of the storm.

Ere morn the wind grew deadly still,
And dawning in the air updrew
From many a shelve and shining hill,
Her folding robe of fairy blue.

Then, what a smooth and wondrous scene
Hung o'er Loch-Avin's lonely breast !

Not top of tallest pine was seen,
On which the dazzled eye could rest
But mitred cliff, and crested fell,
In lucid curls her brows adorn,
Aloft the radiant crescents swell,
All pure as robes by angels worn.

Sound sleeps our seer, far from the day,
Beneath yon sleek and wreathed cone I
His spirit steals, unmissed, away,
And dreams across the desert lone.

Sound sleeps our seer ! the tempests rave,
And cold sheets o'er his bosom fling ;
The moldwarp digs his mossy grave :
His requiem Avin eagles sing.

Why howls the fox above yon wreath
That mocks the blazing Sum Tier sun ?

Why croaks the sable bird of death,
As hovering o'er yon desert dun ?

When circling years have past away,
And Summer blooms in Avin- Glen,
Why stands yon peasant in dismay,
Still gazing o'er the bloated den ?

Green grows the grass ! the bones are white !

Not bones of mountain stag they seem !
There hooted once the owl by night,
Above the dead-light's lambent beam !

See yon lone cairn, so gray with age,
Above the base of proud Cairn- Gorm :
There lies the dust of Avin's sage,
Who raised the Spirit of the Storm.

Yet still at eve, or midnight drear,
When Wintry winds begin to sweep,
When passing shrieks assail thine ear,
Or murmurs by the mountain steep ;
When from the dark and sedgy dells
Come eldritch cries of wildered men.

Or wind-harp at thy window swells,—
Beware the sprite of Avin-Glen !