﻿182
AN GAODHAL.
THE MIDNIGHT MASS.
From "Songs For Freedom", by Father McHale.
Here in the gloom of the grim December
Let us ponder a little on Penal times;
We do forgive, but we still remember
Those fateful days, with their fearful crimes.
High upon the mountains rim,
When the midnight moon was shining,
You might see like spectres dim
People round the hillside twining,
Having traversed miles of heather,
In the wild December weather,
Miles of moor and bleak morass,
Flocking up to the midnight Mass!
Round range of rugged hills
There were bound some memories bitter,
Of Penal days and cruel ills
Than men would suit the demons fitter ;—
Ills for Motherland and Faith,
Borne steadfastly to death,
When our fathers nobly stood
And stained each mountain pass with blood!
Through the mountain gorge a stream
White as silver thread ran leaping,
And the starlights' lonely gleam
On the placid lake lay sleeping ;
You heard the boatman's muffled oar
Splash the water on its shore,
Land his people, heard him pray :—
God would guard them till the day!
Well he knew such prayer was meet,
In those days of desolation,
To rise and plead around God's feet
For an anguish-stricken nation,
That held its life as wild beasts hold
In fearful strife, in storm and cold,
Hunted, madened, shot at slain,
Through fierces agonies of pain!
Well might prayers on high ascend
For that people humbly kneeling,
For on earth they had no friend,
Save the Priest their souls anealing;
And pleading for them at the Altar,
With a love that ne'er did falter,
In caverns lone, on altars rude,
When others fied, he always sued
God's mercy on the multitude!
There amid the mountains lone,
With the angels round them soaring,
Before the rude-cut altar stone
Knelt the people, God adoring;
The heather was their altar-stair,
Their beads their only book of prayer,
Their canopy mountain air,
Their cathedral mountains bare:
Yet, O Lord, Thy throne was there!
There amid the vapours gray,
Round it in the darkness stealing,
Rose the Cross, as on that day
It stood Christ's power revealing,
Unblessed by chant of psalm or hymn,
Save unheard strains of cherubim,
Smiting still far down beneath
Infernal powers of sin and death!
Ah! greatness of the Irish soil,
Blessed by God above all others;
Scourged and scared by fierce turmoil
Still you stood, oh, men, my brothers,
Adamantine as the rock,
Proof against the earthquake's shock ;
In storms of smoke, and shot, and blood;
Still true to faith and land you stood.
O God! It was a sight to see
Priest and people knelt together,
In a land that should be free,
In that bleak December weather,
Praying up to Him Who saw
All the curse of the Penal law,
Praying from St. Patrick's sod
As stealthy worshippers to God!
Kyrie Eleison! Lord, look down
On a land so sorely striken!
Christe Eleison! Tyrants frown,
And the spent, starved people sicken;
Pleading for our daily meal,
Here before Thy throne we kneel,
Here we make our last appeal:
Save the children Thou didst cherish,
Save us, Lord, or else we perish !
Gloria in Excelsis! Hear
Our strong cries to Thee ascending;
Lend us all The Father's ear;
Praise to Thee Thy poor befriending;
Here upon this mountain slope
In Thee is our only hope,
Round Thy holiest throne we gather,
Thou wilt spare us, God our Father?
Sanctus! Sanctus! Dearest Lord,
When our lives were sore with weeping,
When our blood made red the sward,
Thou didst hold the Isle in keeping ;
If our martyrs nobly died
Thou didst rank them sanctified;
If so it be Thy sacred Will
We will die and praise Thee still!
Agnus Dei ! O Lord, once slain,
Thou who knowest our direst needing
Wild agonies of heart and brain —
Prostrate here before Thee pleading;
Thou knows what Calvary really saw
Jude's foules Penal law !
Except in Thee, no hope beside,
Spare us, save us, CRUCIFED!
