THE INVOCATION.

Fays, Fairies, Genii, Elves, and Demons, hear!

POPE.

Headless horses,-wandering ghosts,
Sheeted phantoms, spectral hosts,
Who cross my park, or quaff my pond,
Or roam the rath-crown'd hill beyond;
Freakish subjects of Finvar,

Who all around these precincts are,

From Croghan-keep, to Knocknashee,
From Ra'-hill,-Finian's well, to thee;
From the War-bush, once tinged with gore,
To haunted glades of Killenmore;
Cromwell's Soldiers, ages slain,
Who thrid the gloomings of Quin-lane,
Or by their helmet glimpses shown,
Or by faint clink of armour known,
And mid the grunts of startled hog,
Go join their bodies in the bog :*
Ban-dog, whose mute and noiseless round
Was ne'er combined with living sound,

While stalking dark as funeral pall,

The blind mole heard not thy foot fall;

Adjoining. In this bog, some bodies of armed soldiers have been found.

Phantoms approach; from blasted oak,
Storm-split and wither'd, I invoke,

While leaf-stript branches, o'er my head,
A lifeless canopy outspread.-
Behold, our guests are gathering fast,
Yon filmy figures gliding past ;-

"Hence, horrible shadow!" said Macbeth
To Banquo at his strange Banquēt:
"Let the Earth hide thee."-Thus cried he,
But fears like his become not me.

I greet you, goblins, great and small;
Hail! airy, gibbering visions all;

And welcome to a lang-syne place,
The old asylum of your Race:

Deem not the glen-field means to scout you;
It scarce would know itself, without you :
Then sail, or flit, or tramp, or whistle,*
Though many a fell of hair should bristle :
And hemming round in shadowy throng,
Banshee, Fay, Bogle, Revenant,
Chant forth your wild, unearthly song,
Mid whisper'd sigh, from conscious trees,
And chiding rill, and shuddering breeze,
And birds that hoot at Hecate's noon,
And dogs that bay the wandering moon.~~
Of living strain-reflection thin,

Like sun-beam in moon-mirror seen,

Or willow pale, our lake within,

* As the Ash-park apparition is, by some, alleged to do.

Let all a mingled echo seem,

Of laugh, wail, song, sob, gust, or stream,
Of corporal sound th' unsolid dream,

In mystic coronach hung o'er us ;

And be it nam'd "the Newtown Chorus."

If this Invocation should need to be explained, and be worth explaining,the keys will be found in the following Articles in this volume; viz.

The White Squadron-The Rencontre-The Ash-park Apparition-The Black Dog-The White Lady.

A TRUE STORY.

"Rise up, rise up," Miss Kitty cried;
"This bottle bear from me :
For you must bring it to the gate;
And bring it speedily."

"Oh ask me not, Miss Kate, to go!
Oh ask me not to-night!

I'll bring it with to-morrow's dawn;
With the earliest peep of light."

"To-morrow's dawn it will not do ;
It must be used to-night:

But Dempsey, why should you refuse,
And stare, with such affright ?"

"Miss Kate, Miss Kate, I dare not go :
Oh do not ask me that;

For I should meet the Man in black,
That wears the three cocked hat."

"Tut! nonsense, Boy! you cannot fear :
What idle stuff you talk!

No living persons wander here;
And spirits do not walk."

"Indeed, Miss Kate, I will not go,
Your bidding's all in vain;
For Captain Donovan would meet

Me, in the old Ash lane.*

“He walks with a stately marching tread,
And he never leaves a track :

With a three cocked hat upon his head,+
And all his apparel black.

"He sometimes tramps it on the road;
But most in the old Ash Park,

With a kind of light, all round about,
That shows him in the dark.

*The walk of another of the Newtown Apparitions.

+ This coiffure is not as ghostly as I might wish it: but so is the legend: ita lex scripta ; and I must obey and follow. In excuse for the language of this -shall I call it ballad?-I would remind the Reader, that it is" a true story;' and that it accordingly gives the words of Mick Dempsey, as far as the rules of Poesy, and demands of Metre, will admit.-For some inattention also, to the laws of rhyme, the Author would offer the same apology.

C

"His coat is black; his waistcoat's black;
And black silk stockings he wears:

His trousers are black; and shoe buckles black;
Whenever the Captain appears."

"If he only walk the Ashy Park,

The road, or the lone Ash Lane,
You may safely go by the carriage way,
Mick Dempsey," cried Miss Lane.

"Oh, no, Miss Kate, for tho' I know,
I might not meet him there,
I cannot, dare not, will not go;
For even there, I fear."

"What can you fear," Miss Kitty said;
"What think you, you can see?

Is it the horse without a head,

Or John Brien's white Lady?"

"'Tis not the horse without a head;
Tho' that was seen before:

Nor is it the white girl that walks
Before John Brien's door:

"'Tis not the fairy elves I fear,

That dance in the upper grounds :

'Tis Captain Smith ;* for oft, I hear,
He takes his nightly rounds."-

*Captain Smith has been said to be "a good travelling name," and our phantom ramblers may well be called travellers, although they be Revenans. The above verses (the true story) were not written by the Author of the preceding articles in this small volume.