Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition

The Ruins of Donegal Castle (Author: James Clarence Mangan)

p.78

1. O mournful, O forsaken pile,
   What desolation dost thou dree!
   How tarnished is the beauty that was thine erewhile,
   Thou mansion of chaste melody!
2. Demolished lie thy towers and halls;
   A dark, unsightly, earthen mound
   Defaces the pure whiteness of thy shining walls,
   And solitude doth gird thee round.
3. Fair fort! thine hour has come at length,
   Thine older glory has gone by.
   Lo! far beyond thy noble battlements of strength,
   Thy corner-stones all scattered lie!
4. Where now, O rival of the gold
   Emania, be thy wine-cups all?
   Alas! for these thou now hast nothing but the cold,
   Cold stream that from the heavens doth fall!

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p.79

5. How often from thy turrets high,
   Thy purple turrets, have we seen
   Long lines of glittering ships, when summer-time drew nigh,
   With masts and sails of snow-white sheen!
6. How often seen, when gazing round,
   From thy tall towers, the hunting trains,
   The blood-enlivening chase, the horseman and the hound,
   Thou fastness of a hundred plains!
7. How often to thy banquets bright
   We have seen the strong-armed Gaels repair,
   And when the feast was over, once again unite
   For battle, in thy bass-court fair!
8. Alas! for thee, thou fort forlorn!
   Alas! for thy low, lost estate!
   It is my woe of woes this melancholy morn,
   To see thee left thus desolate!
9. Oh! there hath come of Connell's race
   A many and many a gallant chief,
   Who, if he saw thee now, thou of the once glad face
   Could not dissemble his deep grief.
10. Could Manus of the lofty soul
    Behold thee as this day thou art,
    Thou of the regal towers! what bitter, bitter dole,
    What agony would rend his heart!
11. He brought upon thee all this woe,
    Thou of the fair-proportioned walls,
    Lest thou shouldst ever yield a shelter to the foe,
    Shouldst house the black, ferocious Galls!

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p.80

12. Shouldst yet become in saddest truth
    A Dun-na-nGall²—the strangers own.
    For this cause only, stronghold of the Gaelic youth,
    Lie thy majestic towers o'erthrown.
13. It is a drear, a dismal sight,
    This of thy ruin and decay,
    Now that our kings, and bards, and men of mark and might,
    Are nameless exiles far away!
14. Yet, better thou shouldst fall, meseems,
    By thine own king of many thrones,
    Than that the truculent Galls should rear around thy streams
    Dry mounds and circles of great stones.
15. As doth in many a desperate case
    The surgeon by the malady,
    So hath, O shield and bulwark of great Coffey's race,
    Thy royal master done by thee!