THE VIRGIN MARY'S BANK
The evening star rose beauteous above the
fading day,
As to the lone and silent beach the Virgin came
to pray,
And hill and wave shone brightly in the moon-
light's mellow fall;
But the bank of green where Mary knelt was
brightest of them all.
Slow moving o'er the waters, a gallant bark
appear'd,
And her joyous crew look'd from the deck as to
the land she near'd;
To the calm and shelter'd haven she floated like
a swan,
And her wings of snow o'er the waves below
in pride and beauty shone.
The master saw our Lady as he stood upon the
prow,
And mark'd the whiteness of her robe and the
radiance of her brow;
Her arms were folded gracefully upon her stain-
less breast,
And her eyes look'd up among the stars to Him
her soul lov'd best.
He show'd her to his sailors, and he hail'd her
with a cheer,
And on the kneeling Virgin they gazed with
laugh and jeer;
[Original]
And madly swore, a form so fair they never saw
before;
And they curs'd the faint and lagging breeze
that kept them from the shore.
The ocean from its bosom shook off the moon-
light sheen,
And up its wrathful billows rose to vindicate
their Queen;
And a cloud came o'er the heavens, and a dark-
ness o'er the land,
And the scoffing crew beheld no more that Lady
on the strand.
Out burst the pealing thunder, and the light'ning
leap'd about,
And rushing with his watery war, the tempest
gave a shout,
And that vessel from a mountain wave came
down with thund'ring shock,
And her timbers flew like scatter'd spray on
Inchidony's rock.
Then loud from all that guilty crew one shriek
rose wild and high.
But the angry surge swept over them and
hush'd their gurgling cry;
And with a hoarse exulting tone the tempest
passed away,
And down, still chafing from their strife, the
indignant waters lay.
When the calm and purple morning shone out
on high Dunmore,
Full many a mangled corpse was seen on Inchi-
dony's shore;
And to this day the fisherman shows where the
scoffers sank,
And still he calls that hillock green, "the
Virgin Mary's bank."
——J. J. Callanan.