[41] The “Songs of Scotland,” by Allan Cunningham, vol. i. p. 247.
[42] The most complete collection of his poems appeared in a volume published under the following title:—“The Poetical Works of Alexander Wilson; also, his Miscellaneous Prose Writings, Journals, Letters, Essays, &c., now first Collected: Illustrated by Critical and Explanatory Notes, with an extended Memoir of his Life and Writings, and a Glossary.” Belfast, 1844, 18vo. A portrait of the author is prefixed.
CONNEL AND FLORA.
Dark lowers the night o’er
the wide stormy main,
Till mild rosy morning rise
cheerful again;
Alas! morn returns to revisit
the shore,
But Connel returns to his
Flora no more.
For see, on yon mountain,
the dark cloud of death,
O’er Connel’s
lone cottage, lies low on the heath;
While bloody and pale, on
a far distant shore,
He lies, to return to his
Flora no more.
Ye light fleeting spirits,
that glide o’er the steep,
Oh, would ye but waft me across
the wild deep!
There fearless I’d mix
in the battle’s loud roar,
I’d die with my Connel,
and leave him no more.
MATILDA.
Ye dark rugged rocks, that
recline o’er the deep,
Ye breezes, that
sigh o’er the main,
Here shelter me under your
cliffs while I weep,
And cease while
ye hear me complain.
For distant, alas! from my
dear native shore,
And far from each
friend now I be;
And wide is the merciless
ocean that roars
Between my Matilda
and me.
How blest were the times when
together we stray’d,
While Phoebe shone
silent above,
Or lean’d by the border
of Cartha’s green side,
And talk’d
the whole evening of love!