save him; they hurried to the pinnace for that purpose-he rose once, and then sank to rise no more, and the bubbles that came up told that his brave spirit had departed!

The English did not long remain in that melancholy spot, for a wind springing up, they unfurled their sails and stood out to sea. Not a man on board but was concerned for the fate of the unhappy outlaw, and Alice remembered him with regret, for he had preserved her husband.

I have often visited on a calm summer's evening, when the sunbeams seem to pant upon the waters, this romanticaly situated castle---the entire of which exists as yet. It distinctly views its own image on the little Archipelago that lies before it, on the isles of which I have often sat, and mused on the days that are gone by. The peasants who live near it, never pass without muttering a prayer for the departed soul of the lady who died there, and for the chieftain who sleeps beneath the wave. There is a piece of timber shewn, in which is pointed out the hole made by the ball that killed her: and they yet retain a superstition concerning the room in which she was a prisoner; the purport of this is, that if any two persons enter at the same time this apartment, one of them will shortly die.---It has obtained the appellation of "uaig na muyden"---or "the virgin's grave."

Though this is probably untrue, yet I have not heard of any person who attempted to perpetrate this dangerous chamber. I was often tempted to transgress the precept, but I confess something like terror precluded my entrance---I have been more than once lingering on the old staircase in the wall, but could never summon resolution enough to go farther

SONG.

There is an eye of azure blue;

"Tis thine, if thou canst gaze, my love! (Sotto Voce.) There is a cheek of rosy hue;

"Tis thine, if thou canst praise, my love! (Sotto Voce.)

There is a hand of snowy white?

'Tis thine, if thou canst sue, my love! (Sotto Voce.)

Then, this earth to a love-lighted shrine would be changed,
And mankind would bow as one brotherhood there;
Nor would peace with her censer of sweets be estrang'd,
Nor the bright eye of faith be suffus'd by a tear.

Then-then, thro' the clouded horizon of hope,

The glow of thy truth in its splendour would beam, And her own pensive smile which in sorrow awoke,

On the pale cheek of Patience more bright would be seen.

THE BATTLE OF CLONTARF,

A Report of a Meeting of the Eccentric Club.

"And who are the eccentrics?" My good sir, that is a question which to ask "argues yourself unknown," but in pity for your ignorance I will afford you an opportunity of becoming acquainted with our illustrious society, not by regularly sketching their characters à la mode de Bruyere, but by allowing them to describe themselves, for what saith an ancient author? Even this plain sentence, "speak that I may know thee."

The society having met for the dispatch of business, on reference to the order book, it was found that the first business for the night was to take into consideration Mr. O'Donnel's poem on the battle of Clontarf, which he had promised to submit to the criticism of the members. Mr. O'Donnel having been called on by the president, took his seat in the poets's corner, and commenced to read as follows;

"Twas on the plains of Clontarf

That the Danes and Norwegians their neighbours

Had so numerous a clan,

That the Irishmen ran

here the poet was suddenly stopped by a roar from Mr. Hooloohoo, that would, if delivered in the vicinity of a churchyard, have effectively dispelled the slumbers of all that reposed there,-"Oh, Mr. President," said he, and stopped for a moment, as if overwhelmed in a flood of indignation, or rather as if his words in their hurry to get out had jammed each other at the portals of his ponderous lips, "oh tempora, oh mores, cead milh dhiaoul, what words or what language can describe."-" Upon my word," said captious Conway, you have tried three languages already, and unless you take Greek or Hebrew, I know not what language can satisfy you"-" the horrible, atrocious and false charge," continued Mr. Hooloohoo, (regardless and probably unconscious of interruption,) "the groundless and absurd imputation cast on the valor of my native land,

Look all around this lovely isle,

Its fields that with such verdure smile,

Each bubbling fount, each rolling river:
Could cowards such a land defile-

The very earth exclaims no-never.

shall then Mr. O'Donnel in verse as contemptible as the insinuation, dare to assert in the teeth of history, that at Clontarf the sons of green Erin fled like-like"

"Like dogs with tin cannisters tied to their tails,

Down, down, down derry, down,"

sung Mr. Cooke, "I see friend you want a simile," but Hooloohoo frowning at such unworthy aid, continued his speech, "I call on Mr. O'Donnel in the name of outraged truth and justice, to retract his unworthy and ma

T

licious assertion, I call on him to vindicate his abused countrymen frome a charge that was never made!" said O'Donnel, gravely reading the verse through

"Twas on the plains of Clontarf

That the Danes and Norwegians their neighbours

Had so numerous a clan,

That the Irishmen ran

To cut down the foes with their sabres.

The Danes stood before them in pride,

Former conquests of new hopes creative;
They had conquered all Shetland,

And England and Scotland

"The devil they had," said Conway, "why, Mr. Chairman, the poet is resolved to be full as great a conqueror as any of the heroes whose prowess he describes, his victories over history will require another poet to celebrate them. The Scotch, sir, were never conquered by any invaders; the Irish were indeed subdued by the northern pirates.

"What, not in the days of Turgesius?—No, that history is an allegorical description of fat pigs." Here a roar of laughter loud and long astounded our Irish antiquarian, who, however, without altering a muscle, proceeded thus to the proof of his point.---" A Danish vessel laden with acorns, was shipwrecked on the south coast of Ireland, near a monastery; the monks used the acorns to feed their pigs, and as they fattened on this diet, the monks called the year annus Turgesius from turgeo to swell and sus a sow," but I grant Mr. O'Donnel to be in error when he says, that even the illegitimate descendants of the Irish, which the Scotch indisputably are, could be conquered by the vagabond Danes.

Mr. O'Donnel who looked unutterable astonishment at the Turgesian theory, stated without entering into irrelevant controversy that it would be found that what he had stated respecting the conquests of the Danes was precisely true, for--

They had conquered all Shetland
And England and Scotland,

Except what was kept by the native.

Here Conway again rose, and was beginning a new philippic, with, "Mr. Chairman, in Murray's English Grammar, page"---when a unanimous cry of “read—read”—sent him in a furious rage to his seat, Mr. O'Donnel continued,--

They joined in a desperate strife,

For the slain many mothers lamented,
Arrows, javelins were thrown,
And the bayonet and gun—

"Mr. Chairman," said Conway, "I must be heard! was there ever such a glaring anachronism as the introduction of fire arms at the battle of Clontarf? Sins against grammar and metre our society seems disposed to tolerate, but I must raise my feeble voice," and he roared like the Homerie Stentor "I say, I must raise my feeble voice."—

"Not another note higher," interrupted Cooke, "if you do not wish to destroy my sense of hearing for ever.'

"And protest against this monstrous violation of historic truth."

"I will save the learned member's lungs," said O'Donnel, "for had he but kept his temper for a single moment he would have found the violation of historic truth to exist merely in his own mind,—

Arrows, javelins were thrown,

And the Bayonet and gun

Were not yet used, because not yet invented,
The bravest from sweet Munster came

With Brian Boru at their head sir,
And from Morven's high hall
The gallant Fingal---

Hooloohoo and Conway both rose together, but the chairman decided in favour of the latter, who to the utter astonishment of the meeting opened on us with a parody on Pope's Homer,

Fingal! Fingal! oh! at the very name

My rage re-kindles and my sou'ls on flame;
'Tis generous anger and becomes the brave,
Dup'd by the stories of a fool or knave.

There never was such a hero-he only exists in the lying legends of Macpherson, or the still more apocryphal and interminable tales with which the Irish antiquarians amuse, or rather abuse the public.

Hooloohoo is perfectly mad on every subject connected with Irish Antiquities in reply to Conway, delivered a speech which we are completely unable to report-he spouted seven hundred lines of Ossian in Irish, which be asserted surpassed Homer in mellifluence and grandeur, and contained history to the full as true, and far more accurate than the works of Tacitus and Livy, and in conclusion, abused poor O'Donnel most unmercifully for having thrown a doubt on the existence of Fingal, by bringing him down to so late a period; to this O'Donnel replied by completing the stanza Erom Morven's high hall

The gallant Fingal

Would have come but alas! he was dead sir;

For Brian then tune the loud harp,

And relate of his courage the story¿

Who after the strife

Led a very long life

"he was killed on the field of battle," whispered Hooloohoo;

Led a very long life

In verse and the annals of glory,

said Mr. O'Donnel closing the paper and coming over to the table Just at this moment our reporter was called away, and on his return he found the meeting about to adjourn, having resolved that the business of the next night should be the receiving of Mr. Cooke's essay on burlesque poetry, and the conferring the degrees Bachelor of Merriment on Mr. O'Donnel,, and Doctor of Merriment on Mr Cooke. The proceedings of this meeting shall be forwarded by an carly opportunity. SERTORIUS.