The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 534, February 18, 1832. Various

nobly bleed;

      Let his hawks and war-dogs share

      His glory, as they claimed his care.

SEMI-CHORUS

      Silent is his hall of shields

      In Rath-col's dim and woody fields,

      Night-winds round his lone hearth sing

      The fall of Prythian's warlike king!—

      Now his home of happy rest

      Is in the bright isles of the west;

      There, in stately halls of gold,

      He with the mighty chiefs of old,

      Quaffs the horn of hydromel

      To the harp's melodious swell;

      And on hills of living green,

      With airy bow of lightning sheen,

      Hunts the shadowy deer-herd fleet

      In their dim-embowered retreat.

      He is free to roam at will

      O'er sea and sky, o'er heath and hill,

      When our fathers' spirits rush

      On the blast and crimson gush

      Of the cloud-fire, through the storms,

      Like the meteor's brilliant forms,

      He shall come to the heroes' shout

      In the battle's gory rout;

      He shall stand by the stone of death,

      When the captive yields his breath;

      And in halls of revelry

      His dim spirit oft shall be.

GRAND CHORUS

      Shout, and fill the hirlass horn,

      Round the dirge-feast quaff till morn;

      Songs and joy sound o'er the heath,

      For he died the warrior's death!

      Garlands fling upon the fire,

      His shall be a noble pyre!

      And his tomb befit a king,

      Encircled with a regal ring

      Which shall to latest time declare,

      That a princely chief lies there,

      Who died to set his country free,

      Who fell for British liberty;

      His renown the harp shall sing

      To mail clad chief and battle-king,

      And fire the mighty warrior's soul

      Long as eternal ages roll!

      The Notes to each Tragedy are very abundant. Indeed, they are of the most laborious research. We quote an extract relative to "grinning skulls" as terrifically interesting:

      "The British warriors preserved the bones of their enemies whom they slew; and Strabo says of the Gauls (who were, as he informs us, far less uncivilized than the Britons, but still nearly resembled them in their manners and customs,) that when they return from the field of battle they bring with them the heads of their enemies fastened to the necks of their horses, and afterwards place them before the gates of their cities. Many of them, after being anointed with pitch or turpentine, they preserve in baskets or chests, and ostentatiously show them to strangers, as a proof of their valour; not suffering them to be redeemed, even though offered for them their weight in gold. This account is also confirmed by Diodorus. Strabo says that Posidonius declared he saw several of their heads near the gates of some of their towns,—a horrid barbarism, continued at Temple-bar almost down to the present period."

      Lastly, Speaking and Moving Stones:

      "Girald Cambrensis gives an account of a speaking-stone at St. David's in Pembrokeshire. 'The next I shall notice is a very singular kind of a monument, which I believe has never been taken notice of by any antiquarian. I think I may call it an oracular stone: it rests upon a bed of rock, where a road plainly appears to have been made, leading to the hole, which at the entrance is three feet wide, six feet deep, and about three feet six inches high. Within this aperture, on the right hand, is a hole two feet diameter, perforated quite through the rock sixteen feet, and running from north to south. In the abovementioned aperture a man might lie concealed, and predict future events to those that came to consult the oracle, and be heard distinctly on the north side of the rock, where the hole is not visible. This might make the credulous Britons think the predictions proceeded solely from the rock-deity. The voice on the outside was distinctly conveyed to the person in the aperture, as was several times tried.'—Arch. Soc. Ant. Lond