when the shadows are growing long, although the tops of the swelling uplands are bright, and the crows are winging home, and the swallows darting in the still air; or, in the winter evenings, when the candles are lighted in the kitchen, and busy fingers draw the woof, while the foot beats time to the whirring wheel, are very numerous, and generally of a higher order of merit than the patriotic songs. The pulses of the heart are freer and its utterance dearer in human love than in love of country. The beauties in which the Irish girls excel all others--the blooming cheeks, and brilliant eyes, and wealth of flowing hair, are the main objects of compliment, and are often transformed into personifications of endearment. {35} _Colleen_, the universal term for young maidens, seems but a corruption of _coolleen_, which means a head of curls or abundant tresses. Grey and blue eyes are especially objects of endearment, and even in the ancient Irish poems, _green_-eyed is not unfrequently used, which is not so unnatural as the English reader may suppose, the Irish word expressing the indefinable tint of some lighter blue eyes, being untranslatable into English. [Footnote 18] [Footnote 18: "Sweet emerald eyes."--Massinger. "How is that young and green-eyed Gaditana?" Longfellow's _Spanish Student_.] Although the modern love-songs are inferior to those in the Irish language, for the reason that has been mentioned, that English is not yet the language of the Irish heart, they often possess a simple power, and, though seldom sustained throughout, a touch of nature's genius, which the highest poet cannot reach with all his art. How exquisite is the following: "As Katty and I were discoursing, She smiled upon me now and then, Her apron string she kept foulding, And twisting all round her ring." Bits of poetry can be picked out of almost every love-ballad, as witness the following: "My love is fairer than the lilies that do grow, She has a voice that's clearer than any winds that blow." "With mild eyes like the dawn." "One pleasant evening, when pinks and daisies Closed in their bosoms one drop of dew." "His hair shines gold revived by the sun, And he takes his denomination from the _drien don_." "I wish I were a linnet, how I would sing and fly. I wish I were a corn-crake, I'd sing till morning clear-- I'd sit and sing to Molly, for once I held her dear." "'Twas on a bright morning in summer, That I first heard his voice speaking low, As he said to the colleen beside me, Who's that pretty girl milking her cow?" "The hands of my love are more sunny and soft Than the snowy sea foam." "My love will not come nigh me, Nor hear the moan I make; Neither would she pity me, Though my poor heart should break."