What mean the mournful wailings heard 'mid Scotia's
mountains blue?
What mean the grievous groans that pass her twilight
valleys through?
The spirits of old heroes rose from forth their ancient
graves-
Heroes, who died as free men die-who could not live
as slaves.
The spectral warriors to the winds their bitter sorrows
told;
And thus, as rolls the billowy sea, their gloomy chorus
roll'd.
'Lift up, O injured land! lift up the voices of thy woe,
And free to Him who made the earth let all thy sor-
rows flow;
Our feeble hands He nerved with strength to burst a
tyrant's chain,
And in thy cause we fought and fell on Falkirk's fatal
plain;
We died; but by the shining steel, amid the battle's
shock;
He dies-the patriot Wallace lays his head upon the
block!
'The good, the brave, the chivalrous, whose deeds shall
never die,
Such deeds the power of time and all oblivion's dews
defy;
How oft he routed Scotland's foes-how many fields
he won-
Shall still descend in tale and song from father unto son,
That we who first of Scotland's hearts the sleep of
freedom broke,
Should fall, as guilty traitors fall, beneath a felon's
stroke!

'And thou, dark, stern, unfeeling man-ambitious
Edward-dread
The curses of an injured race-the curses of the dead,
Nor hope the crown that blood has won will long be
thine to wear,
Nor think the sceptre can control the workings of
despair;
We curse thee! and that curse shall cling about that
guilty heart,
Till for the dreadful judgment-seat thy spirit shall
depart.'

Such were the words methought I heard the warrior
spirit say,
Ere far in misty distance died their wild lament away.