The minstrel's hands swept o'er the keys,
A magic gloom was in the tone;
He smiled as if a smile could ease
A soul from which sweet youth had flown.
The tears of sad regret now fill
His moist 'ning eye, his heart with pain;
He looks him to a flow'ry hill
That echo'd oft his harp's sweet strain -
And now his dying heart would fain
To make it echo once again.
Approaching death his spirit chills
And mars the joy which music gave;
And he whose harp did wake the hills
Shall vanish soon within the grave.
He sinks; he raves; he dies; he's gone!
Admidst a sorrowing people's wail;
And gone's a light that brightly shone
That spread its lustre o'er the vale.
His strains no more shall rouse the dale,
For gone's that human night-in-gale.