My thoughts are sad and dark!—
I lament the forest where I loved to roam,
The secret corries, the haunt of hinds,
Where often I watched them on the hill!
Corrie-Garave! O that I was within thy bosom
Scuir-na-Làpaich of steeps, with thy shelter,
Where feed the herds which never seek for stalls,
But whose skin gleams red in the sunshine of the hills.
Great was my love in youth, and strong my desire,
Towards the bounding herds;
But now, broken, and weak, and hopeless,
Their remembrance wounds my heart.
To linger in the laich[24] I mourn,
My thoughts are ever in the hills;
For there my childhood and my youth was nursed—
The moss and the craig in the morning breeze was my delight.
Then was I happy in my life,
When the voices of the hill sung sweetly;
More sweet to me, than any string,
It soothed my sorrow or rejoiced my heart.
My thoughts wandered to no other land
Beyond the hill of the forest, the shealings of the deer,
Where the nimble herds ascended the hill,—
As I lay in my plaid on the dewy bed.
The sheltering hollows, where I crept towards the hart,
On the pastures of the glen, or in the forest wilds—
And if once more I may see them as of old,
How will my heart bound to watch again the pass!
Great was my joy to ascend the hills
In the cause of the noble chief,
Mac Shimé of the piercing eye—never to fail at need,
With all his brave Frasers, gathered beneath his banner.
When they told of his approach, with all his ready arms,
My heart bounded for the chase—
On the rugged steep, on the broken hill,
By hollow, and ridge, many were the red stags which he laid low.
He is the pride of hunters; my trust was in his gun,
When the sound of its shot rung in my ear,
The grey ball launched in flashing fire,
And the dun stag fell in the rushing speed of his course.