An Irish Schoolhouse
UPON the rugged ladder rungs—whose pinnacle is Fame—
How often have ambitious pens deep graven Harvard’s name;
The gates of glory Cambridge men o’er all the world assail,
And rulers in the realm of thought look back with pride to Yale.
To no such Alma Mater can my Muse in triumph raise
Its Irish voice in canticles of gratitude and praise;
Yet still I hold in shrine of gold, and until death I will,
The little schoolhouse, thatched with straw, that lay behind the hill.
When in the balmy morning, racing down the green boreen
Toward its portal, ivy-framed, our curly heads were seen,
We felt no shame for ragged coats, nor blushed for shoeless feet,
But bubbled o’er with laughter dear old master’s smile to meet;
Yet saw beneath his homespun garb an awe-inspiring store
Of learning’s fearful mysteries and academic lore.
No monarch wielded sceptre half so potent as his quill
In that old schoolhouse, thatched with straw, that lay behind the hill.
Perhaps—and yet ’tis hard to think—our boastful modern school
Might feel contempt for master, for his methods and his rule;
Would scorn his simple ways—and in the rapid march of mind
His patient face and thin gray locks would lag far, far behind.
No matter; he was all to us, our guide and mentor then;
He taught us how to face life’s fight with all the grit of men;
To honor truth, and love the right, and in the future fill
Our places in the world as he had done behind the hill.
He taught us, too, of Ireland’s past; her glories and her wrongs—
Our lessons being varied with the most seditious songs:
We were quite a nest of rebels, and with boyish fervor flung
Our hearts into the chorus of rebellion when we sung.
In truth, this was the lesson, above all, we conned so well
That some pursued the study in the English prison cell,
And others had to cross the seas in curious haste, but still
All living love to-day, as then, the school behind the hill.
The wind blows through the thatchless roof in stormy gusts to-day;
Around its walls young foxes now, in place of children, play;
The hush of desolation broods o’er all the country-side;
The pupils and their kith and kin are scattered far and wide.
But wheresoe’er one scholar on the face of earth may roam,
When in a gush of tears comes back the memory of home,
He finds the brightest picture limned by Fancy’s magic skill,
The little schoolhouse, thatched with straw, that lay behind the hill.