“Ah! knowest thou not, my bride,” The holy Aodh said, “That the Saint whose form we stand beside Has for ages slept with the dead?” “He liveth, he liveth,” she said again, “For the span of his life tenfold extends Beyond the wonted years of men. He sits by the graves of well-loved friends That died ere thy grandsire’s grandsire’s birth; The oak is decayed with old age on earth, Whose acorn-seed had been planted by him; And his parents remember the day of dread When the sun on the cross looked dim, And the graves gave up their dead. “Yet preaching from clime to clime, He hath roamed the earth for ages, And hither he shall come in time When the wrath of the heathen rages, In time a remnant from the sword— Ah! but a remnant to deliver; Yet, bless’d be the name of the Lord! His martyrs shall go into bliss for ever. Lochlin,[94] appalled, shall put up her steel, And thou shalt embark on the bounding keel; Safe shalt thou pass through her hundred ships, With the Saint and a remnant of the Gael, And the Lord will instruct thy lips To preach in Innisfail.” The sun, now about to set, Was burning o’er Tiriee, And no gathering cry rose yet O’er the isles of Albyn’s sea, Whilst Reullura saw far rowers dip Their oars beneath the sun, And the phantom of many a Danish ship, Where ship there yet was none. And the shield of alarm[95] was dumb, Nor did their warning till midnight come, When watch-fires burst from across the mair From Rona and Uist and Skye, To tell that the ships of the Dane And the red-haired slayers were nigh. Our islesmen arose from slumbers, And buckled on their arms; But few, alas! were their numbers To Lochlin’s mailèd swarms. And the blade of the bloody Norse Has filled the shores of the Gael With many a floating corse, And with many a woman’s wail. They have lighted the islands with ruin’s torch, And the holy men of Iona’s church In the temple of God lay slain; All but Aodh, the last Culdee, But bound with many an iron chain, Bound in that church was he. And where is Aodh’s bride? Rocks of the ocean flood! Plunged she not from your heights in pride, And mocked the men of blood? Then Ulvfagre and his bands In the temple lighted their banquet up, And the print of their blood-red hands Was left on the altar cup. ’Twas then that the Norseman to Aodh said, “Tell where thy church’s treasure’s laid, Or I’ll hew thee limb from limb.” As he spoke the bell struck three, And every torch grew dim That lighted their revelry.