By Arthur M. Forrester. (1889)
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.
Ireland's Lore and Tales 