3. On the Rock of the Raven, that looks o'er the flood, All scathed with the cannon, all stained with the

blood,

Had old Invergarry long baffled the snows,

The gales of the mountain, the league of its foes:
And sternly its bulwarks 'confronted the tide,
And safely the skiff in their shadow could ride;
For upwards and downwards, as far as the sight,5
That castle commanded the vale and the height,

From its eyrie, the Rock of the Raven.

4. But woe for Duke William! his doom shall be bale When against him in judgment upriseth the Gael; When they cry how green Albyn lay weltering in

gore

6

From western Loch Linnhe to Cromarty's shore;8 How the course of the victor was marked on the

cloud,

By the black wreathing smoke hanging down like a shroud

O'er the hut of the 'vassal, the tower of his lord; For the fire worketh swifter than carbine or sword, And giveth more joy to the Raven.

9

5. Then downcast was Colla, sore smitten with dread, And hunted for sport with the fox and the gled;10 While old Invergarry, in silence forlorn,

•Resounded no longer the pipe and the horn.

But the Raven sat flapping his wings in the brake, When the troops of Duke William marched down by

the lake:

Their march was at sunset-at dawning of day
In smouldering heaps were those battlements gray,
And the castle was left to the Raven.

6. From mountain and loch hath departed its sway,
Yet still the old fortress defieth decay:

The name of Duke William is foul with disgrace,
But the bastions he fired are firm in their place;
And the clansmen he scattered are gathered again,
The song and the dance are restored to the glen;
And the chief of Glengarry hath builded his halls11
On the low woody beach, in the shade of those walls
That frown from the Rock of the Raven.

7. And still hath Macdonell the soul of his sires,
And still hath Clan Colla the old Gaelic fires;
For the pulse beateth strongly for honour and pride,
As it throbbed in their breasts who for loyalty died.
With peace and with plenty the valleys rejoice,
And the wind hath forgotten the slogan's dread voice,
And the home of the Gael is as tranquil and bright
As Loch Oich when it sleeps on a blue summer's
night

bale, misery.

bast-ions, walls.

At the foot of the Rock of the Raven.

blast-ing, destructive.

bûl-warks, walls; fortifications.
car-bine, gun.

clay-more, broadsword.
con-front-ed, opposed.
dis-band-ed, dismissed from service.

1 Invergar'ry. The prefix Inver means, in Gaelic, at the mouth of a river, or at the meeting of two streams. Aber is the corresponding prefix in Cymric, as in Aberdeen. The river Garry flows into Loch Oich from the west. The valley is called Glengarry, whence the name of the clan, and also of a well-known Scottish bonnet. Loch Oich is between Loch Ness and Loch Lochy, and is thus part of the Caledonian Canal.

MRS. D. OGILVIE.

ey-rie (i'-ray), nest.

for-ay, fighting.

for-mi-da-ble, powerful.
ir-ri-tat-ed, angry; provoked.
re-sound-ed, echoed.
tryst, meeting-place.
tur-bu-lent, disorderly.
vas-sal, servant; follower.

2 Duke William of Cumberland. -Second son of George II., who commanded the royal army at Culloden.

3 The intended scapegoat for the family.-The family were prepared to sacrifice the second son, in order that the rest might escape.

4 Red burning cross.-The "fiery cross" sent round to gather the clansmen for war. It consisted of any light wood. Its extremities were burned, and were dipped in the blood of a goat slain

for the occasion.

Whoever received | ray Firth, the outlet of the Caledonian
Canal on the east coast.

the cross was bound to carry it to the next habitation.

5 As far as the sight.-As far as the eye could reach.

6 Albyn.-Scotland.

7 Loch Lin'nhë (Lin'-nay).—An arm of the sea in Argyleshire; the outlet of the Caledonian Canal on the west coast. 8 Crom'arty's shore.-At the Mo

9 Colla.-The Macdonell clan. 10 The gled.-The kite, a kind of hawk or falcon found in Scotland.

11 Hath builded his halls. - The modern house of Glengarry lies lower down on the bank of the lake, and contrasts strikingly with the gloomy Rock.

35.-GEORGE II. (PART II.)

1756

A.D.

1. The war with France had come to an end; but a fresh 'dispute arose (the Seven Years' War), and fighting by land and by sea was carried on between the English and the French in all parts of the world, though chiefly in India and North America.

1757

A. D.

2. The French tried to destroy the English 'settlements in both quarters; but in India all their efforts were made fruitless by the bravery of Lord Clive, who took away all the French possessions in that part of the world. By the great Battle of Plassey1 he conquered Bengal, and founded the English Empire in India. Shortly before that, the native prince of Bengal had 'suffocated one hundred and twenty-three English prisoners by shutting them up for a whole night in the Black Hole of Calcutta.

1759

A.D.

3. In North America, Quebec 2 was taken by the English under General Wolfe, and the whole of Canada came into the hands of England. Wolfe was killed in battle on the Heights of Abraham.

1760

A.D.

4. George the Second died suddenly of heart disease, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. He was a good king, and his homely manners and kindly ways made him a favourite with his people. His eldest son, Frederick, had died from the stroke of a cricket ball some years before, leaving nine children, the eldest of whom came next to the throne as George the Third.

5. Important Events. In this reign Whitefield and the two Wesleys separated from the Established Church of England, and founded the Society of Wesleyan Methodists.-The Porteous riot made a great stir in Scotland: a 'smuggler named Wilson was being executed at Edinburgh: the hangman and the soldiers were pelted by the mob, which also. made a rush to get Wilson out of their hands: Captain Porteous fired on the crowd, and several were killed; for which he was seized by the enraged mob, and hanged on a dyer's pole (1736).

6. Towards the end of this reign, the famous William Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, became leader of the House of Commons (1756). Other leading statesmen of the time were Charles James Fox and Edmund Burke.

dis-pute', quarrel.
fruit-less, vain; of no use.
quarters, parts of the world.
set-tle-ments, places where English
people had settled.

1 Plas'sey. In the province of Bengal, on the west bank of the Hoogly, the branch of the Ganges on which Calcutta stands; 90 miles north of Calcutta.

smug-gler, man who brought articles
into the country without paying a
tax on them.
suf-fo-cat-ed, smothered; caused to
die for want of air.

2 Quebec'.-The oldest city in Canada, then the capital of the French possessions there. It stands on the north bank of the St. Lawrence.

36. THE EXPLOITS OF CLIVE.

1. The pranks of the boy, who was once the terror of the shopkeepers of Market-Drayton in Shropshire, foreshowed a firmness and a daring which can be clearly discerned in the ripe manhood of Robert Lord Clive. On one occasion, while he was engaged with a troop of idle boys in damming up a dirty stream with turf for the purpose of turning its course into the shop of a hostile tradesman, the bank of turf gave way. The toil of an hour seemed likely to be destroyed in a moment by the gushing water. But Clive flung his body across the breach, and blocked the way, until his playmates had made a heap of sods sufficiently high to stop the flow. At last he became so great a torment to the neighbours, and to his parents, that a writership in the East India Company's service was obtained for him, and he was shipped off to Madras.

2. His life as clerk was wearisome to him; and the debts into which his scanty pay forced him grew very heavy. Vexed and disheartened, he locked himself into his own room one day for the purpose of committing suicide. Twice he raised the flint pistol to his head and pulled the trigger; twice it snapped without going off!

3. He laid down the pistol and sat brooding over his troubles, when a friend knocked at the door. Clive let him in. The pistol was lying on the table. "Take it and fire it out of the window," said the 'desponding clerk. The friend took it up, drew the trigger, and the report echoed through the room.