_And yet, I see the sun set a-down the Western skies And glimpse within the wonderness my mother’s pleading eyes; And yet I hear the West wind sob softly in the trees, That vainly cloaks her broken call far o’er the distant seas; And still when shine the dim stars my wander heart would go Away and back to her side, and dreams of long ago._ IRELAND, MOTHER OF PRIESTS BY SHANE LESLIE The fishwife sits by the side Of her childing bed, Her fire is deserted and sad, Her beads are long said; Her tears ebb and flow with the sea, Her grief on the years, But little she looks to the tide, And little she hears: For children in springtime play round Her sorrowing heart, To win them their feeding she loves To hunger apart; Her children in summer she counts Awhile for her own; But winter is ever the same, The loved ones are flown. Far over the sea they are gone, Far out of her ken They travel the furthest of seas As fishers of men. Yet never a word to her sons To keep them at home, And never a motherly cry Goes over the foam; She sits with her head in her hands, Her eyes on the flame, And thinks of the others that played, Yet left her the same, With vesture she wove on the loom Four-coloured to be, And lanterns she trimmed with her hair To light them to sea. Oh, far have the living ones gone, And further the dead, For spirits come never to watch The fisherwife’s bed; And sonless she sits at the hearth, And peers in the flame, She knows that their fishing must come As ever it came-- A fishing that never set home, But seaways it led, For God who has taken her sons Has buried her dead. THE HUNTERS BY RUTH TEMPLE LINDSAY “The Devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour.” The Lion, he prowleth far and near. Nor swerves for pain or rue; He heedeth nought of sloth nor fear, He prowleth--prowleth through The silent glade and the weary street, In the empty dark and the full noon heat; And a little Lamb with aching feet-- He prowleth too. The Lion croucheth alert, apart-- With patience doth he woo; He waiteth long by this shuttered heart, And the Lamb--He waiteth too. Up the lurid passes of dreams that kill, Through the twisting maze of the great Untrue, The Lion followeth the fainting will-- And the Lamb--He followeth too. From the tickets dim of the hidden way Where the debts of Hell accrue, The Lion leapeth upon his prey: But the Lamb--He leapeth too. Ah! loose the leash of the sins that damn, Mark Devil and God as goals, In the panting love of a famished Lamb, Gone mad with the need of souls.