The Abbey walls, the burial-ground
with crosses ghostly white;
Under a weary weight of years
he bow'd upon his staff,
Perusing in the present time
the former's epitaph;
For, gray and wasted like the walls,
a figure full of woe,
This man was of the blood of them
who founded Asaroe.

From Derry to Bundrowas Tower,
Tirconnell broad was theirs;
Spearmen and plunder, bards and wine,
and holy abbot's prayers;
With chanting always in the house
which they had builded high
To God and to Saint Bernard,--
where at last they came to die.
At worst, no workhouse grave for him!
the ruins of his race
Shall rest among the ruin'd stones
of this their saintly place.
The fond old man was weeping;
and tremulous and slow
Along the rough and crooked lane
he crept from Asaroe.