In the Manner of a Child of Seven Years Old

Ah ! woe betide my bonny bride,
For war is in the land,
And far and wide the foemen ride
With ruthless bloody brand.

Still as a dream the purple beam
Of eve is on the river,
But ghastly bright, at the dead of night,
A blood-red flame will quiver.

Fair in the skies the sun will rise
As ever sun was seen,
But never again our window pane
Shall back reflect his sheen:

For the warrior stern our cot will burn,
And trample on the bower;
It grew for years of smiles and tears,
'Twill perish in an hour.

Those firs were old, our grandsires told,
In their good fathers' days,
And my soul it grieves that their needle leaves
Must crackle in the blaze.

Beneath their shade how oft we played!
There was our place of wooing:—
But now we're wed, and peace is fled,
And we shall see their ruin.

In battle plain shall I be slain,
And never would I shrink,
Oh! were that all, what may befall
To thee, I dare not think.

And our sweet boy, our baby joy,
He'll for his mother cry,
Till the hot smoke, his voice shall choke,
And then my bird will die.

Green are the graves, and thick as waves,
Within our holy ground—
And here, and there, an hillock fair,
An infant's grave is found.

Our fathers died, their whole fireside
Is laid in peace together,
But vile as stones, our bleaching bones
Must brave the wind and weather.

Nay, love, let's fly, to the hill so high,
Where eagles build their nest,
Among the heather we'll couch together,
As blithely as the best.

We'll leave the bower and tender flower
That we have nursed with care;
But the wild blue bell shall bloom as well
Beside our craggy lair.

We shall not die, for all birds that fly
Shall thither bring us food,
And come the worst, w'ell be help'd the first,
Before the eagle's brood.

The must beneath, that curls its wreath
Around the hill-top hoar,
There will we hide, my bonny bride,
And ne'er be heard of more.
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