




































192 FLORAL POESY. 
the broom than were the Stuarts of their thistle; and 
princes of the royal house were wont to wear the Claus- 
au-pheidh, as it is called in Gaelic, with all the respect 
that its presumed antique and honorable history en- 
titled it to. The poets of Scotland are ever ready to 
pay it homage, and the following thoroughly charac- 
teristic poem, to be found in Hogg’s ‘ Jacobite Relies,’ 
is supposed to have been written by the Ettrick Shep- 
herd himself : 
ARCS 
** Let them boast of the country gave Patrick his fame, 
Of the land of the ocean and Anglian name, 
With the red blushing roses and shamrock so green ; 
Ivar dearer to me are the hills of the North, 
The land of blue mountains, the birthplace of worth ; 
Those mountains where Freedom has fixed her abode, 
Those wide-spreading glens where no slave ever trod, 
Where blooms the red heather and thistle so green, 
‘*« Though rich be the soil where blossoms the rose, 
And barren the mountains and covered with snows 
Where blooms the red heather and thistle so green ; 
Yet for friendship sincere, and for loyalty true, 
And for courage so bold which no foe could subdue, 
Unmatched is our country, unrivaled our swains, 
And lovely and true are the nymphs on our plains, 
Where rises the thistle, the thistle so green. 
‘** War-famed are our sires in the battles of yore, 
And many the cairnies that rise on our shore 
O’er the foes of the land of the thistle so green : 
And many a cairnie shall rise on our strand, 
Should the torrent of war ever burst on our land; 
Let foe come on foe, as wave comes on wave, 
We'll give them a welcome, we’ll give them a grave 
Beneath the red heather and thistle so green. 
“** Oh! dear to our souls as the blessings of Heaven 
Is the freedom we boast, is the land that we live in, 

