THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL
Sir Walter Scott

Introduction

THE way was long, the wind was cold,
The Minstrel was infirm and old;
His wither'd cheek, and tresses gray,
Seem'd to have known a better day;
The harp, his sole remaining joy,
Was carried by an orphan boy.
The last of all the Bards was he,
Who sung of Border chivalry;
For, welladay! their date was fled,
His tuneful brethren all were dead;
And he, neglected and oppress'd,
Wish'd to be with them, and at rest.
No more on prancing palfrey borne,
He caroll'd, light as lark at morn;
No longer courted and caress'd,
High placed in hall, a welcome guest
He pour'd to lord and lady gay
The unpremeditated lay:
Old times were changed, old manners gone;
A stranger fill'd the Stuarts' throne;
The bigots of the iron time
Had call'd his harmless art a crime.
A wandering Harper, scorn'd and poor,
He begg'd his bread from door to door,
And tuned, to please a peasant's ear,
The harp a king had loved to hear.

    He pass'd where Newark's stately tower
Looks out from Yarrow's birchen bower:
The Minstrel gazed with wishful eye;
No humbler resting-place was nigh;
With hesitating step at last
The embattled portal arch he pass'd,
Whose ponderous grate and massy bar
Had oft roll'd back the tide of war,
But never closed the iron door
Against the desolate and poor.
The Duchess mark'd his weary pace,
His timid mien, and reverend face,
And bade her page the menials tell
That they should tend the old man well:
For she had known adversity
Though born in such a high degree;
In pride of power, in beauty's bloom,
Had wept o'er Monmouth's bloody tomb!

    When kindness had his wants supplied,
And the old man was gratified,
Began to rise his minstrel pride
And he began to talk anon
Of good Earl Francis, dead and gone,
And of Earl Walter, rest him, God!
A braver ne'er to battle rode;
And how full many a tale he knew
Of the old warriors of Buccleuch:
And, would the noble Duchess deign
To listen to an old man's strain,
Though stiff his hand, his voice though weak,
He thought even yet, the sooth to speak,
That, if she loved the harp to hear,
He could make music to her ear.

    The humble boon was soon obtain'd;
The aged Minstrel audience gain'd.
But, when he reach'd the room of state,
Where she with all her ladies sate
Perchance he wish'd his boon denied:
For, when to tune his harp he tried,
His trembling hand had lost the ease
Which marks security to please;
And scenes long past, of joy and pain
Came wildering o'er his aged brain---
He tried to tune his harp in vain!
The pitying Duchess prais'd its chime
And gave him heart, and gave him time,
Till every string's according glee
Was blended into harmony.
And then, he said, he would full fain
He could recall an ancient strain
He never thought to sing again.
It was not framed for village churls,
But for high dames and mighty earls;
He had play'd it to King Charles the Good,
When he kept court in Holyrood;
And much he wish'd, yet fear'd, to try
The long-forgotten melody.
Amid the strings his fingers stray'd,
And an uncertain warbling made,
And oft he shook his hoary head.
But when he caught the measure wild
The old mall rais'd his face, and smil'd
And lighten'd up his faded eye
With all a poet's ecstasy.
In varying cadence, soft or strong,
He swept the sounding chords along:
The present scene, the future lot,
His toils, his wants, were all forgot;
Cold diffidence, and age's frost,
In the full tide of song were lost;
Each blank, in faithless memory void,
The poet's glowing thought supplied;
And, while his harp responsive rung,
'Twas thus the latest minstrel sung.


CANTO FIRST

THE feast was over in Branksome tower,
And the Ladye had gone to her secret bower;
Her bower that was guarded by word and by spell,
Deadly to hear, and deadly to tell---
Jesu Maria, shield us well!
No living wight, save the Ladye alone,
Had dared to cross the threshold stone.

The tables were drawn, it was idlesse all;
     Knight, and page, and household squire,
Loiter'd through the lofty hall
     Or crowded round the ample fire:
The stag-hounds, weary with the chase,
     Lay stretch'd upon the rushy floor,
And urg'd in dreams, the forest race
     From Teviot-stone to Eskdale-moor.

Nine-and-twenty knights of fame
     Hung their shields in Branksome hall;
Nine-and-twenty squires of name
     Brought them their steeds to bower from stall
          Nine-and-twenty yeomen tall
          Waited, duteous, on them all:
          They were all knights of mettle true,
          Kinsmen to the bold Buccleuch.

Ten of them were sheath'd in steel
With belted sword, and spur on heel:
They quitted not their harness bright,
Neither by day, nor yet by night:
          They lay down to rest,
          With corslet laced,
Pillow'd on buckler cold and hard
          They carv'd at the meal
          With gloves of steel
And they drank the red wine through the helmet barr'd.

Ten squires, ten yeomen, mail-clad men,
Waited the beck of the warders ten:
Thirty steeds, both fleet and wight
Stood saddled in stable day and night,
Barb'd with frontlet of steel, I trow
And with Jedwood-axe at saddlebow;
A hundred more fed free in stall:
Such was the custom of Branksome Hall.

Why do these steeds stand ready dight?
Why watch these warriors, arm'd, by night?
They watch to hear the blood-hound baying:
They watch to hear the war-horn braying;
To see St.George's red cross streaming,
To see the midnight beacon gleaming:
They watch gainst Southern force and guile,
     Lest Scroop, or Howard, or Percy's powers,
     Threaten Branksome's lordly towers,
From Warkworth, or Naworth, or merry Carlisle.

Such is the custom of Branksome Hall.
          Many a valiant knight is here;
But he, the chieftain of them all,
His sword hangs rusting on the wall
          Beside his broken spear.
     Bards long shall tell
     How Lord Walter fell!
     When startled burghers fled, afar
     The furies of the Border war;
     When the streets of high Dunedin
     Saw lances gleam, and falchions redden,
     And heard the slogan's deadly yell---
     Then the Chief of Branksome fell.

Can piety the discord heal,
     Or stanch the death-feud's enmity?
Can Christian lore, can patriot zeal,
     Can love of blessed charity?
No! vainly to each holy shrine,
     In mutual pilgrimage, they drew;
Implor'd in vain the grace divine
     For chiefs their own red falchions slew:
While Cessford owns the rule of Carr,
     While Ettrick boasts the line of Scott,
The slaughter'd chiefs, the mortal jar,
The havoc of the feudal war,
     Shall never, never be forgot!

In sorrow o'er Lord Walter's bier
     The warlike foresters had bent;
And many a flower and many a tear
     Old Teviot's maids and matrons lent:
But o'er her warrior's bloody bier
The Ladye dropp'd nor flower nor tear!
Vengeance, deep-brooding o'er the slain,
     Had lock'd the source of softer woe;
And burning pride and high disdain
     Forbade the rising tear to flow;
Until, amid his sorrowing clan,
     Her son lisp'd from the nurse's knee---
"And if I live to be a man
     My father's death reveng'd shall be!"
Then fast the mother's tears did seek
To dew the infant's kindling cheek.

All loose her negligent attire,
     All loose her golden hair,
Hung Margaret o'er her slaughter'd sire,
     And wept in wild despair.
But not alone the bitter tear
     Had filial grief supplied;
For hopeless love and anxious fear
     Had lent their mingled tide:
Nor in her mother's alter'd eye
Dar'd she to look for sympathy.
Her lover, 'gainst her father's clan,
     With Carr in arms had stood,
When Mathouse-burn to Melrose ran
     All purple with their blood;
And well she knew, her mother dread,
Before Lord Cranstoun she should wed,
Would see her on her dying bed.

Of noble race the Ladye came;
Her father was a clerk of fame,
     Of Bethune's line of Picardie:
He learn'd the art that none may name,
     In Padua, far beyond the sea.
Men said he changed his mortal frame
     By feat of magic mystery;
For when, in studious mood, he pac'd
     St. Andrew's cloister'd hall
His form no darkening shadow trac'd
     Upon the sunny wall!

And of his skill, as bards avow,
     He taught that Ladye fair,
Till to her bidding she could bow
     The viewless forms of air.
And now she sits in secret bower,
In old Lord David's western tower,
And listens to a heavy sound
That moans the mossy urrets round.
Is it the roar of Teviot's tide,
That chafes against the scaur's red side?
Is it the wind that swings the oaks?
Is it the echo from the rocks?
What may it be, the heavy sound,
That moans old Branksome's turrets round?

At the sullen, moaning sound
     The ban-dogs bay and howl;
And, from the turrets round
     Loud whoops the startled owl.
In the hall, both squire and knight
     Swore that a storm was near,
And looked forth to view the night;
     But the night was still and clear!

From the sound of Teviot's tide,
Chafing with the mountain's side,
From the groan of thewind-swung oak,
From the sullen echo of the rock,
From the voice of the coming storm,
     The Ladye knew it well!
It was the Spirit of the Flood that spoke,
     And he call'd on the Spirit of the Fell.

RIVER SPIRIT
"Sleep'st thou, brother?"

MOUNTAIN SPIRIT
                                      "Brother, nay---
On my hills the moon-beams play.
From Craik-cross to Skelfhill-pen,
By every rill, in every glen,
     Merry elves their morris pacing,
          To aerial minstrelsy,
     Emerald rings on brown heath tracing,
          Trip it deft and merrily.
     Up, and mark their nimble feet!
     Up, and list their music sweet!"

RIVER SPIRIT
"Tears of an imprison'd maiden
     Mix with my polluted stream;
Margaret of Branksome, sorrow-laden,
     Mourns beneath the moon's pale beam.
Tell me, thou, who view'st the stars,
When shall cease these feudal jars?
What shall be the maiden's fate?
Who shall be the maiden's mate?"

MOUNTAIN SPIRIT
"Arthur's slow wain his course doth roll
In utter darkness round the pole;
The Northern Bear lowers black and grim;
Orion's studded belt is dim;
Twinkling faint, and distant far,
Shimmers through mist each planet star;
     Ill may I read their high decree!
But no kind influence deign they shower
On Teviot's tide and Branksome's tower
     Till pride be quell'd and love be free."

The unearthly voices ceast,
     And the heavy sound was still
It died on the river's breast,
     It died on the side of the hill.
But round Lord David s tower
     The sound still floated near
For it rung in the Ladye's bower
     And it rung in the Ladye's ear.
She raised her stately head,
     And her heart throbb'd high with pride:---
"Your mountains shall bend,
And your stream ascend,
Ere Margaret be our foeman's bride!"

The Ladye sought the lofty hall,
     Where many a bold retainer lay,
And, with jocund din, among them all,
     Her son pursued his infant play.
A fancied moss-trooper, the boy
     The truncheon of a spear bestrode,
And round the hall, right merrily,
     In mimic foray rode,
Even bearded knights, in arms grown old,
     Share in his frolic gambols bore,
Albeit their hearts of rugged mould
     Were stubborn as the steel they wore.
For the gray warriors prophesied,
     How the brave boy, in future war,
Should tame the Unicorn's pride,
     Exalt the Crescent and the Star.

The Ladye forgot her purpose high,
     One moment, and no more;
One moment gaz'd with a mother's eye
     As she paus'd at the arched door:
Then from amid the armed train,
She call'd to her William of Deloraine.

A stark moss-trooping Scott was he,
As e'er couch'd Border lance by knee:
Through Solway sands, through Tarras moss,
Blindfold, he knew the paths to cross;
By wily turns, by desperate bounds,
Had baffled Percy's best blood-hounds;
In Eske, or Liddel, fords were none,
But he would ride them, one by one;
Alike to him was time or tide,
December's snow, or July's pride;
Alike to him was tide or time,
Moonless midnight, or matin prime:
Steady of heart, and stout of hand,
As ever drove prey from Cumberland;
Five times outlawed had he been,
By England's King, and Scotland's Queen.

"Sir William of Deloraine, good at need,
Mount thee on the wightest steed;
Spare not to spur, nor stint to ride,
Until thou come to fair Tweedside;
And in Melrose's holy pile
Seek thou the Monk of St. Mary's aisle.
     Greet the Father well from me;
     Say that the fated hour is come,
     And to-night he shall watch with thee,
To win the treasure of the tomb:
For this will be St. Michael's night,
And, though stars be dim, the moon is bright;
And the Cross, of bloody red,
Will point to the grave of the mighty dead.

"What he gives thee, see thou keep;
Stay not thou for food or sleep:
Be it scroll, or be it book,
Into it, Knight, thou must not look;
If thou readest, thou art lorn!
Better had'st thou ne'er been born."

"O swiftly can speed my dapple-grey steed
     Which drinks of the Teviot clear;
Ere break of day," the Warrior 'gan say,
     "Again will I be here:
And safer by none may thy errand be done,
     Than, noble dame, by me;
Letter nor line know I never a one,
     Were't my neck-verse at Hairibee."

Soon in his saddle sate he fast,
And soon the steep descent he past,
Soon cross-d the sounding barbican,
And soon the Teviot side he won.
Eastward the wooded path he rode,---
Green hazels o'er his basnet nod;
He pass'd the Peel of Goldiland,
And cross'd old Borthwick's roaring strand -
Dimly he view'd the Moat-hill's mound,
Where Druid shades still flitted round;
In Hawick twinkled many a light;
Behind him soon they set in night,
And soon he spurr'd his courser keen
Beneath the tower of Hazeldean.

The clattering hoofs the watchmen mark:
"Stand, ho! thou courier of the dark."
"For Branksome, ho!" the knight rejoin'd,
And left the friendly tower behind.
     He turn'd him now from Teviotside,
          And, guided by the tinkling rill,
     Northward the dark ascent did ride,
          And gained the moor at Horslie-hill;
Broad on the left before him lay,
For many a mile, the Roman way.

A moment now he slack'd his speed,
A moment breathed his panting steed;
Drew saddle-girth and corslet-band,
And loosen'd in the sheath his brand.
On Minto-crags the moonbeams glint,
Where Barnhill hew'd his bed of flint;
Who flung his outlaw'd limbs to rest,
Where falcons hang their giddy nest,
Mid cliffs, from whence his eagle eye
For many a league his prey could spy;
Cliffs, doubling, on their echoes borne,
The terrors of the robber's horn;
Cliffs, which, for many a later year,
The warbling Doric reed shall hear,
When some sad swain shall teach the grove,
Ambition is no cure for love!

Unchalleng'd, thence pass'd Deloraine,
To ancient Riddel's fair domain,
     Where Aill, from mountains freed,
Down from the lakes did raving come;
Each wave was crested with tawny foam,
     Like the mane of a chestnut steed.
In vain! no torrent, deep or broad,
Might bar the bold moss-trooper's road.

At the first plunge the horse sunk low,
And the water broke o'er the saddle-bow;
Above the foaming tide, I ween,
Scarce half the charger's neck was seen;
For he was barded from counter to tail,
And the rider was arm'd complete in mail:
Never heavier man and horse
Stemm'd a midnight torrent's force.
The warrior's very plume, I say,
Was daggled by the dashing spray;
Yet, through good heart, and Our Ladye's grace,
At length he gain'd the landing-place.

Now Bowden Moor the march-man won,
     And sternly shook his plumed head,
As glanc'd his eye o'er Halidon:
     For on his soul the slaughter red
Of that unhallow'd morn arose
When first the Scott and Carr were foes;
When royal James beheld the fray; .
Prize to the victor of the day;
When Home and Douglas, in the van,
Bore down Buccleuch's retiring clan,
Till gailant Cessford's heart-blood dear
Reek'd on dark Elliot's Border spear.

In bitter mood he spurred fast,
And soon the hated heath was past;
And far beneath, in lustre wan,
Old Melros' rose, and fair Tweed ran:
Like some tall rock with lichens grey,
Seem'd dimly huge the dark Abbaye.
When Hawick he pass'd, had curfew rung,
Now midnight lauds were in Melrose sung.
The sound, upon the fitful gale,
In solemn wise did rise and fail,
Like that wild harp whose magic tone
Is waken'd by the winds alone.
But when Melrose he reach'd, 'twas silence all:
He meetly stabled his steed in stall,
And sought the convent's lonely wall.

HERE paus'd the harp; and with its swell
The Master's fire and courage fell;
Dejectedly and low he bow'd,
And, gazing timid on the crowd,
He seem'd to seek in every eye
If they approv'd his minstrelsy;
And, diffident of present praise,
Somewhat he spoke of former days,
And how old age and wand'ring long
Had done his hand and harp-some wrong.
The Duchess and her daughters fair,
And every gentle lady there,
Each after each in due degree,
Gave praises to his melody;
His hand was true, his voice was clear,
And much they long'd the rest to hear
Encourag'd thus, the aged man,
After meet rest, again began.


CANTO SECOND

IF thou would'st view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild, but to flout, the ruins grey.
Where the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruin'd central tower;
When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem fram'd of ebon and ivory;
When silver edges the imagery,
And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave
And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave
Then go---but go alone the while---
Then view St. David's ruin'd pile;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!

Short halt did Deloraine make there;
Little reck'd he of the scene so fair:
With dagger's hilt, on the wicket strong,
He struck full loud, and struck full long
The porter hurried to the gate---
"Who knocks so loud, and knocks so late?"
"From Branksome I," the warrior cried;
And straight the wicket open'd wide:
For Branksome's Chiefs had in battle stood,
     To fence the rights of fair Melrose;
And lands and livings, many a rood,
     Had gifted the shrine for their souls' repose.

Bold Deloraine his errand said;
The porter bent his humble head;
With torch in hand, his feet unshod,
And noiseless step, the path he trod;
The arched cloister, far and wide,
Rang to the warrior's clanking stride,
Till, stooping low his lofty crest,
He enter'd the cell of the ancient priest,
And lifted his barred aventayle,
To hail the Monk of St. Mary's aisle.

"The Ladye of Branksome greets thee by me;
     Says, that the fated hour is come,
And that to-night I shall watch with thee,
     To win the treasure of the tomb."
From sackcloth couch the Monk arose,
     With toil his stiffen'd limbs he rear'd;
A hundred years had flung their snows
     On his thin locks and floating beard.

And strangely on the Knight look'd he,
     And his blue eyes gleam'd wild and wide;
     "And dar'st thou, Warrior! seek to see
     What heaven and hell alike would hide?
My breast, in belt of iron pent,
     With shirt of hair and scourge of thorn;
For threescore years, in penance spent,
     My knees those flinty stones have worn;
Yet all too little to atone
For knowing what should ne'er be known.
     Would'st thou thy every future year
          In ceaseless prayer and penance drie,
     Yet wait thy latter end with fear---
          Then, daringWarrior, follow me!"

"Penance, father, will I none;
Prayer know I hardly one;
For mass or prayer can I rarely tarry,
Save to patter an Ave Mary,
When I ride on a Border foray.
Other prayer can I none;
So speed me my errand, and let me be gone."

Again on the Knight look'd the Churchman old,
And again he sighed heavily;
For he had himself been a warrior bold,
And fought in Spain and Italy.
And he thought on the days that were long since by
When his limbs were strong, and his courage was high:
Now, slow and faint, he led the way,
Where, cloister'd round, the garden lay;
The pillar'd arches were over their head
And beneath their feet were the bones of the dead.

Spreading herbs, and flowerets bright,
Glisten'd with the dew of night;
Nor herb, nor floweret, glisten'd there,
But was carv'd in the cloister-arches as fair.
     The Monk gazed long on the lovely moon,
          Then into the night he looked forth;
     And red and bright the streamers light
          Were dancing in the glowing north.
     So had he seen, in fair Castile,
          The youth in glittering squadrons start,
     Sudden the flying jennet wheel,
          And hurl the unexpected dart.
He knew, by the streamers that shot so bright,
That spirits were riding the northern light.

By a steel-clench'd postern door,
     They enter'd now the chancel tall;
The darken'd roof rose high aloof
     On pillars lofty and light and small:
The key-stone, that lock'd each ribbed aisle
Was a fleur-de-lys, or a quatre-feuille
The corbells were carv'd grotesque and grim;
And the pillars, with cluster'd shafts so trim,
With base and with capital flourish'd around,
Seem'd bundles of lances which garlands had bound.

Full many a scutcheon and banner riven,
Shook to the cold night-wind of heaven,
     Around the screened altar's pale
And there the dying lamps did burn,
Before thy low and lonely urn
O gallant Chief of Otterburne!
     And thine, dark Knight of Liddesdale!
O fading honors of the dead!
O high ambition, lowly laid!

The moon on the east oriel shone
Through slender shafts of shapely stone
     By foliaged tracery combin'd;
Thou would'st have thought some fairy's hand
'Twixt poplars straight the ozier wand
     In many a freakish knot, had twin'd;
Then fram'd a spell, when the work was done
And chang'd the willow-wreaths to stone .
The silver light, so pale and faint,
Shew'd many a prophet, and many a saint
     Whose image on the glass was dyed
Full in the midst, his Cross of Red
Triumphant Michael brandished
And trampled the Apostate's pride.
The moon-beam kiss'd the holy pane
And threw on the pavement a bloody stain

They sate them down on a marble stone
     (A Scottish monarch slept below):
Thus spoke the Monk, in solemn tone:
     "I was not always a man of woe;
For Paynim countries I have trod
And fought beneath the Cross of God:
Now, strange to my eyes thine arms appear,
And their iron clang sounds strange to my ear.

"In these far climes it was my lot
To meet the wondrous Michael Scott
     A wizard, of such dreaded fame,
That when, in Salamanca's cave
Him listed his magic wand to wave,
     The bells would ring in Notre Dame!
Some of his skill he taught to me
And, Warrior, I could say to thee
The words that cleft Eildon hills in three,
     And bridled the Tweed with a curb of stone:
But to speak them were a deadly sin
And for having but thought them my heart within
     A treble penance must be done.

'"When Michael lay on his dying bed,
His conscience was awakened:
He bethought him of his sinful deed,
And he gave me a sign to come with speed.
I was in Spain when the morning rose
But I stood by his bed ere evening close.
The words may not again be said,
That he spoke to me, on death-bed laid
They would rend this Abbaye's massy nave,
And pile it in heaps above his grave.

"I swore to bury his Mighty Book,
That never mortal might therein look;
And never to tell where it was hid,
Save at his Chief of Branksome's need:
And when that need was past and o'er
Again the volume to restore.
I buried him on St. Michael's night,
When the bell toll'd one, and the moon was bright,
And I dug his chamber among the dead
When the floor of the chancel was stained red,
That his patron's cross might over him wave,
And scare the fiends fromthe Wizard's grave.

"It was a night of woe and dread,
When Michael in the tomb I laid!
Strange sounds along the chancel pass'd,
The banners wav'd without a blast"---
---Still spoke the Monk, when the bell toll'd one!---
I tell you, that a braver man
Than William of Deloraine, good at need,
Against a foe ne'er spurr'd a steed
Yet somewhat was he chill'd with dread,
And his hair did bristle upon his head.

"Lo, Warrior! now, the Cross of Red
Points to the grave of the mighty dead;
Within it burns a wondrous light,
To chase the spirits that love the night:
That lamp shall burn unquenchably
Until the eternal doom shall be."
Slow mov'd the Monk to the broad flag-stone,
Which the bloody cross was trac'd upon:
He pointed to a secret nook;
An iron bar the Warrior took;
And the Monk made a sign with his wither'd hand,
The grave's huge portal to expand.

With beating heart to the task he went;
His sinewy frame o'er the grave-stone bent
With bar of iron heav'd amain,
Till the toil-drops fell from his brows, like rain.
It was by dint of passing strength,
That he moved the massy stone at length.
I would you had been there, to see
How the light broke forth so gloriously,
Stream'd upward to the chancel roof
And through the galleries far aloof!
No earthly flame blazed e'er so bright:
It shone like heaven's own blessed light,
And, issuing from the tomb,
Show'd the Monk's cowl, and visage pale,
Danc'd on the dark-brow'd Warrior's mail,
And kiss'd his waving plume.

Before their eyes the Wizard lay,
As if he had not been dead a day.
His hoary beard in silver roll d,
He seem'd some seventy winters old;
     A palmer's amice wrapp'd him round
     With a wrought Spanish baldric bound
          Like a pilgrim from beyond the sea:
     His left hand held his Book of Might;
     A silver cross was in his right;
          The lamp was placed beside his knee:
High and majestic was his look,
At which the fellest fiends had shook,
And all unruffled was his face:
They trusted his soul had gotten grace.

Often had William of Deloraine
Rode through the battle's bloody plain,
And trampled down the warriors slain,
     And neither known remorse nor awe;
Yet now remorse and awe he own'd;
His breath came thick, his head swam round,
     When this strange scene of death he saw.
Bewilder'd and unnerv'd he stood,
And the priest pray'd fervently and loud:
With eyes averted prayed he;
He might not endure the sight to see,
Of the man he had lov'd so brotherly.

And when the priest his death-prayer had pray'd,
Thus unto Deloraine he said:---
"Now, speed thee what thou hast to do,
Or, Warrior, we may dearly rue;
For those thou may'st not look upon
Are gathering fast round the yawning stone!"
Then Deloraine, in terror, took
From the cold hand the Mighty Book,
With iron clasp'd, and with iron bound:
He thought, as he took it, the dead man frown'd;
But the glare of the sepulchral light,
Perchance, had dazzled the warrior's sight.

When the huge stone sunk o'er the tomb,
The night return'd in double gloom
For the moon had gone down, and the stars were few,
And, as the Knight and Priest withdrew,
With wavering steps and dizzy brain,
They hardly might the postern gain.
'Tis said, as through the aisles they pass'd,
They heard strange noises on the blast;
And through the cloister-galleries small,
Which at mid-height thread the chancel wall
Loud sobs, and laughter louder, ran,
And voices unlike the voice of man
As if the fiends kept holiday,
Because these spells were brought today.
I cannot tell how the truth may be
I say the tale as 'twas said to me.

"Now, hie thee hence," the Father said,
"And when we are on death-bed laid
O may our dear Ladye, and sweet St. John
Forgive our souls for the deed we have done!"
     The Monk return'd hirn to his cell,
          And many a prayer and penance sped;
     When the convent met at the noontide bell---
          The Monk of St. Mary's aisle was dead!
Before the cross was the body laid
With hands clasp'd fast, as if still he pray'd.

The Knight breath'd free in the morning wind,
And strove his hardihood to find:
He was glad when he pass'd the tombstones grey,
Which girdle round the fair Abbaye;
For the mystic Book, to his bosom prest,
Felt like a load upon his breast
And his joints, with nerves of iron twin'd,
Shook, like the aspen leaves in wind.
Full fain was he when the dawn of day
Began to brighten Cheviot grey;
He joy'd to see the cheerful light,
And he said Ave Mary, as well as he might.

The sun had brighten'd Cheviot grey,
     The sun had brighten'd the Carter's side;
And soon beneath the rising day
     Smil'd Branksome towers and Teviot's tide.
Thewild birds told theirwarbling tale,
     And waken'd every flower that blows;
And peeped forth the violet pale,
     And spread her breast the mountain rose.
And lovelier than the rose so red,
     Yet paler than the violet pale,
She early left her sleepless bed,
     The fairest maid of Teviotdale.

Why does fair Margaret so early awake,
     And don her kirtle so hastilie
And the silken knots, which in hurry she would make,
     Why tremble her slender fingers to tie;
Why does she stop, and look often around,
     As she glides down the secret stair;
And why does she pat the shaggy blood-hound,
     As he rouses him up from his lair;
And, though she passes the postern alone
Why is not the vatchman's bugle blown?

The Ladye steps in doubt and dread,
Lest her watchful mother hear her tread;
The Ladye caresses the rough bloodhound
Lest his voice should waken the castle round
The watchman's bugle is not blown,
For he was her foster-father's son;
And she glides through the greenwood at dawn of light
To meet Baron Henry, her own true knight.

The Knight and Ladye fair are met,
And under the hawthorn's boughs are set.
A fairer pair were never seen
To meet beneath the hawthorn green.
He was stately, and young, and tall;
Dreaded in battle, and lov'd in hall:
And she, when love, scarce told, scarce hid,
Lent to her cheek a livelier red;
When the half sigh her swelling brest
Against the silken ribbon prest;
When her blue eyes their secret told,
Though shaded by her locks of gold---
Where would you find the peerless fair,
With Margaret of Branksome might compare!

And now, fair dames, methinks I see
You listen to my minstrelsy;
Your waving locks ye backward throw,
And sidelong bend your necks of snow:
Ye ween to hear a melting tale,
Of two true lovers in a dale;
     And how the Knight, with tender fire
          To paint his faithful passion strove;
     Swore he might at her feet expire,
     But never, never cease to love;
And how she blush'd, and how she sigh'd
And, half consenting, half denied,
And said that she would die a maid;---
Yet, might the bloody feud be stay'd,
Henry of Cranstoun, and only he,
Margaret of Branksome's choice should be.

Alas! fair dames, your hopes are vain!
My harp has lost the enchanting strain;
     Its lightness would my age reprove:
My hairs are grey, my limbs are old,
My heart is dead, my veins are cold:
     I may not, must not, sing of love.

Beneath an oak, moss'd o'er by eld,
The Baron's Dwarf his courser held,
     And held his crested helm and spear:
That Dwarf was scarce an earthly man,
If the tales were true that of him ran
     Through all the Border, far and near.
'Twas said, when the Baron a-hunting rode
Through Reedsdale's glens, but rarely trod,
     He heard a voice cry, "Lost! lost! lost!"
     And, like tennis-ball by racket toss'd,
          A leap, of thirty feet and three,
     Made from the gorse this elfin shape,
     Distorted like some dwarfish ape,
          And lighted at Lord Cranstoun's knee.
     Lord Cranstoun was some whit dismay'd;
     'Tis said that five good miles he rade,
          To rid him of his company;
But where he rode onemile,the Dwarf ran four,
And the Dwarf was first at the castle door.

Use lessens marvel, it is said:
This elvish Dwarf with the Baron staid
Little he ate, and less he spoke,
Nor mingled with the menial flock:
And oft apart his arms he toss'd,
And often mutter'd "Lost! lost! lost!"
     He was waspish, arch, and litherlie,
     But well Lord Cranstoun served he:
And he of his service was full fain;
For once he had heen ta'en or slain,
     An it had not been for his ministry.
All between Home and Hermitage,
Talk'd of Lord Cranstoun's Goblin-Page.

For the Baron went on pilgrimage,
And took with him this elvish Page,
     To Mary's Chapel of the Lowes:
For there, beside our Ladye's lake,
An offering he had sworn to make,
     And he would pay his vows.
But the Ladye of Branksome gather'd a band
Of the best that would ride at her command:
     The trysting place was Newark Lee.
Wat of Harden came thither amain,
And thither came John of Thirlestane,
And thither came William of Deloraine;
     They were three hundred spears and three.
Through Douglas-burn, up Yarrow stream
Their horses prance, their lances gleam.
They came to St. Mary's lake ere day;
But the chapel was void, and the Baron away.
They burn'd the chapel for very rage,
And curs'd Lord Cranstoun's Goblin-Page

And now, in Branksome's good greenwood,
As under the aged oak he stood,
The Baron's courser pricks his ears,
As if a distant noise he hears
The Dwarf waves his long lean arm on high,
And signs to the lovers to part and fly;
No time was then to vow or sigh
Fair Margaret through the hazel grove,
Flew like the startled cushat-dove:
The Dwarf the stirrup held and rein;
Vaultedthe Knight on his steed amain,
And, pondering deep that morning's scene,
Rode eastward through the hawthorns green.

WHILE thus he pour'd the lengthen'd tale,
The Minstrel's voice began to fail:
Full slyly smiled the observant page,
And gave the wither'd hand of age
A goblet, crown'd with mighty wine,
The blood of Velez' scorched vine.
He raised the silver cup on high,
And, while the big drop fill'd his eye,
Pray'd God to bless the Duchess long,
And all who cheer'd a son of song.
The attending maidens smiled to see
How long, how deep, how zealously,
The precious juice the Minstrel quaff'd;
And he, embolden'd by the draught,
Look'd gaily back to them, and laugh'd.
The cordial nectar of the bowl
Swell'd his old veins, and cheer'd his soul;
A lighter, livelier prelude ran,
Ere thus his tale again began.


CANTO THIRD

AND said I that my limbs were old,
And said I that my blood was cold,
And that my kindly fire was fled,
And my poor wither'd heart was dead,
     And that I might not sing of love ---
How could I to the dearest theme,
That ever warm'd a minstrel's dream
     So foul, so false a recreant prove!
How could I name love's very name,
Nor wake my heart to notes of flame!
In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed;
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed;
In halls, in gay attire is seen;
In hamlets, dances on the green.
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And men below, and saints above;
For love is heaven, and heaven is love.

So thought Lord Cranstoun, as I ween,
While, pondering deep the tender scene,
He rode through Branksome's hawthorn green.
     But the Page shouted wild and shrill,
          And scarce his helmet could he don,
     When downward from the shady hill
          A stately knight came pricking on.
That warrior's steed, so dapple-gray,
Was dark with sveat, and splashed with clay;
     His armor red with many a stain
He seem'd in such a weary plight,
As if he had ridden the live-long night;
     For it was William of Deloraine.

But no whit weary did he seem,
When, dancing in the sunny beam,
He mark'd the crane on the Baron's crest;
For his ready spear was in his rest.
     Few were the words, and stern and high,
          That mark'd the foemen's feudal hate;
     For question fierce, and proud reply,
          Gave signal soon of dire debate.
Their very coursers seem'd to know
That each was other's mortal foe,
And snorted fire, when wheel'd around
To give each foe his vantage-ground.

In rapid round the Baron bent;
     He sigh'd a sigh, and pray'd a prayer:
The prayer was to his patron saint,
     The sigh was to his ladye fair.
Stout Deloraine nor sigh'd nor pray'd,
Nor saint, nor ladye, call'd to aid;
But he stoop'd his head, and couch'd his spear,
And spurred his steed to full career.
The meeting of these champions proud
Seem'd like the bursting thunder-cloud.

Stern was the dint the Borderer lent!
The stately Baron backwards bent;
Bent backwards to his horse's tail
And his plumes went scattering on the gale;
The tough ash spear, so stout and true,
Into a thousand flinders flew.
But Cranstoun's lance, of more avail
Pierc'd through, like silk, the Borderer's mail;
Through shield, and jack, and acton, past,
Deep in his bosom broke at last.---
Still sate the warrior saddle-fast
Till, stumbling in the mortal shock,
Down went the steed, the girthing broke,
Hurl'd on a heap lay man and horse.
The Baron onward pass'd his course;
Nor knew---so giddy rolled his brain---
His foe lay stretch'd upon the plain.

But when he rein'd his courser round,
And saw his foeman on the ground
     Lie senseless as the bloody clay,
He badehis page to stanch the wound,
     And there beside the warrior stay,
And tend him in his doubtful state,
And lead him to Brauksome castle gate:
His noble mind was inly moved
For the kinsman of the maid he loved.
"This shalt thou do without delay:
No longer here myself may stay;
Unless the swifter I speed away
Short shrift will be at my dying day."

Away in speed Lord Cranstoun rode;
The Goblin-Page behind abode;
His lord's command he ne'er withstood,
Though small his pleasure to do good.
As the corslet off he took,
The Dwarf espied the Mighty Book!
Much he marvell'd a knight of pride,
Like a book-bosom'd priest should ride:
He thought not to search or stanch the wound
Until the secret he had found.

The iron band, the iron clasp,
Resisted long the elfin grasp:
For when the first he had undone
It closed as he the next begun.
Those iron chlsps, that iron band,
Would not yield to unchristen'd hand
Till he smear'd the cover o'er
With the Borderer's curdled gore;
A moment then the volume spread,
And one short spell therein he read:
It had much of glamour might;
Could make a ladye seem a knight;
The cobwebs on a dungeon wall
Seem tapestry in lordly hall;
A nut-shell seem a gilded barge,
A sheeling seem a palace large,
And youth seem age, and age seem youth:
All was delusion, nought was truth.

He had not read another spell,
When on his cheek a buffet fell,
So fierce, it stretch'd him on the plain
Beside the wounded Deloraine.
From the ground he rose dismay'd,
And shook his huge and matted head;
One word he mutter'd, and no more,
"Man of age, thou smitest sore!"
No more the Elfin Page durst try
Into the wondrous Book to pry;
The clasps, though smear'd with Christian gore,
Shut faster than they were before.
He hid it underneath his cloak.
Now, if you ask who gave the stroke,
I cannot tell, so mot I thrive;
It was not given by man alive.

Unwillingly himself he address'd,
To do his master's high behest:
He lifted up the living corse,
And laid it on the weary horse;
He led him into Branksome hall,
Before the beards of the warders all;
And each did after swear and say
There only pass'd a wain of hay.
He took him to Lord David's tower,
Even to the Ladye's secret bower;
And, but that stronger spells were spread,
And the door might not be opened,
He had laid him on her very bed.
Whate'er he did of gramarye
Was always done maliciously;
He flung the warrior on the ground,
And the blood well'd freshly from the wound.

As he repass'd the outer court,
He spied the fair young child at sport:
He thought to train him to thewood;
For, at a word be it understood,
He was always for ill, and never for good.
Seem'd to the boy, some comrade gay
Led him forth to the woods to play;
On the drawbridge the warders stout
Saw a terrier and lurcher passing out.

He led the boy o'er bank and fell,
     Until they came to a woodland brook
The running stream dissolv'd the spell,
     And his own elvish shape he took.
Could he have had his pleasure vilde
He had crippled the joints of the noble child;
Or, with his fingers long and lean,
Had strangled him in fiendish spleen:
But his awful mother he had in dread,
And also his power was limited;
So he but scowl'd on the startled child,
And darted through the forest wild;
The woodland brook he bounding cross'd,
And laugh'd, and shouted, "Lost! lost! lost!"

Full sore amaz'd at the wondrous change,
     And frighten'd, as a child might be,
At the wild yell and visage strange,
     And the dark words of gramarye,
The child, amidst the forest bower,
Stood rooted like a lily flower;
     And when at length, with trembling pace,
          He sought to find where Branksome lay,
     He fear'd to see that grisly face
          Glare from some thicket on his way.
Thus, starting oft, he journey'd on,
And deeper in the wood is gone,---
For aye the more he sought his way,
The farther still he went astray,---
Until he heard the mountains round
Ring to the baying of a hound.

And hark! and hark! the deep-mouth'd bark
     Comes nigher still, and nigher:
Bursts on the path a dark blood-hound;
His tawny muzzle track'd the ground,
     And his red eye shot fire.
Soon as the wilder'd child saw he,
He flew at him right furiouslie.
I ween you would have seen with joy
The bearing of the gallant boy,
When, worthy of his noble sire,
His wet cheek glow'd 'twixt fear and ire!
He faced the blood-hound manfully,
And held his little bat on high;
So fierce he struck, the dog, afraid,
At cautious distance hoarsely bay'd
     But still in act to spring;
When dash'd an archer through the glade,
And when he saw the hound was stay'd,
     He drew his tough bow-string;
But a rough voice cried, "Shoot not, hoy!
Ho! shoot not, Edward; 'tis a boy!"

The speaker issued from the wood,
And check'd his fellow's surly mood,
     And quell'd the ban-dog's ire:
He was an English yeoman good,
     And born in Lancashire.
Well could he hit a fallow-deer
     Five hundred feet him fro;
With hand more true, and eye more clear,
     No archer bended bow.
His coal-black hair, shorn round and close,
     Set off his sun-burn'd face:
Old England's sign, St. George's cross,
     His barret-cap did grace;
His bugle-horn hung by his side,
     All in a wolf-skin baldric tied;
And his short falchion, sharp and clear,
Had pierc'd the throat of many a deer.

His kirtle, made of forest green,
     Reach'd scantly to his knee;
And, at his belt, of arrows keen
     A furbish'd sheaf bore he;
His buckler, scarce in breadth a span,
     No larger fence had he;
He never counted him a man,
     Would strike below the knee:
His slacken'd bow was in his hand,
And the leash that was his blood-hound's band.

He would not do the fair child harm,
But held him with his powerful arm,
That he might neither fight nor flee;
For when the Red-Cross spied he,
The boy strove long and violently.
"Now, by St. George," the archer cries,
"Edward, methinks we have a prize!
This boy's fair face, and courage free,
Show he is come of high degree."

"Yes! I am come of high degree,
     For I am the heir of bold Buccleuch
And, if thou dost not set me free,
     False Southron, thou shalt dearly rue!
For Walter of Harden shall come with speed,
And William of Deloraine, good at need,
And every Scott, from Esk to Tweed;
And, if thou dost not let me go,
Despite thy arrows and thy bow
I'll have thee hang'd to feed the crow!"
"Gramercy for thy good-will, fair boy!
My mind was never set so high;
But if thou art chief of such a clan,
And art the son of such a man
And ever comest to thy command
     Our wardens had need to keep good order;
My bow of yew to a hazel wand
     Thou'lt make them work upon the Border.
Meantime, be pleased to come with me
For good Lord Dacre shalt thou see;
I think our work is well begun,
When we have taken thy father's son."

Although the child was led away
In Branksome still he seem'd to stay,
For so the Dwarf his part did play;
And, in the shape of that young boy,
He wrought the castle much annoy.
The comrades of the young Buccleuch
He pinch'd, and beat, and overthrew;
Nay, some of them he wellnigh slew.
He tore Dame Maudlin's silken tire
And, as Sym Hall stood by the fire
He lighted the match of his bandelier,
And wofully scorch d the hackbuteer.
It may be hardly thought or said,
The mischief that the urchin made,
Till many of the castle guess'd,
That the young Baron was possess'd!

Well I ween the charm he held
The noble Ladye had soon dispell'd;
But she was deeply busied then
To tend the wounded Deloraine.
     Much she wonder'd to find him lie
          On the stone threshold stretch'd along;
     She thought some spirit of the sky
          Had done the bold moss-trooper wrong;
Because, despite her precept dread
Perchance he in the Book had read;
But the broken lance in his bosom stood,
And it was earthly steel and wood.

She drew the splinter from the wound,
     And with a charm she stanch'd the blood;
She bade the gash be cleans'd and bound:
     No longer by his couch she stood;
But she has ta'en the broken lance,
     And wash'd it from the clotted gore
     And salved the splinter o'er and o'er.
William of Deloraine, in trance
     Whene'er she turn'd it round and round,
     Twisted as if she gall'd his wound.
          Then to her maidens she did say
     That he should be whole man and sound
          Within the course of a night and day.
Full long she toil'd; for she did rue
Mishap to friend so stout and true.

So pass'd the day; the evening fell,
'Twas near the time of curfew bell;
The air was mild, the wind was calm,
The stream was smooth, the dew was balm;
E'en the rude watchman on the tower
Enjoy'd and bless'd the lovely hour.
Far more fair Margaret lov'd andbless'd
The hour of silence and of rest.
On the high turret sitting lone,
She waked at times the lute's soft tone;
Touch'd a wild note, and all between
Thought of the bower of hawthorns green.
Her golden hair stream'd free from band,
Her fair cheek rested on her hand
Her blue eyes sought the west afar
For lovers love the western star.

Is yon the star, o'er Penchryst Pen,
That rises slowly to her ken,
And, spreading broad its wavering light,
Shakes its loose tresses on the night?
Is yon red glare the western star?
O, 'tis the beacon-blaze of war!
Scarce could she draw her tighten'd breath,
For well she knew the fire of death!

The Warder view'd it blazing strong,
And blew his war-note loud and long,
Till, at the high and haughty sound,
Rock, wood, and river rung around.
The blast alarm'd the festal hall,
And startled forth the warriors all;
Far downward, in the castle-yard,
Full many a torch and cresset glared;
And helms and plumes, confusedly toss'd,
Were in the blaze half-seen, half-lost;
And spears in wild disorder shook,
Like reeds beside a frozen brook.

The Seneschal, whose silver hair
Was redden'd by the torches' glare,
Stood in the midst with gesture proud,
And issued forth his mandates loud:
"On Penchryst glows a bale of fire,
And three are kindling on Priest-haughswire;
          Ride out, ride out,
          The foe to scout!
Mount, mount for Branksome, every man!
Thou, Todrig, warn the Johnstone clan
          That ever are true and stout;
Ye need not send to Liddesdale,
For when they see the blazing bale,
Elliots and Armstrongs never fail.
Ride, Alton, ride, for death and life!
And warn the Warder of the strife.
Young Gilbert, let our beacon blaze,
Our kin, and clan, and friends to raise."

Fair Margaret from the turret head
Heard, far below, the coursers' tread,
     While loud the harness rung
As to their seats, with clamor dread,
     The ready horsemen sprung:
And trampling hoofs, and iron coat,
And leaders' voices mingled notes,
          And out! and out!
          In hasty route,
     The horsemen gallop'd forth;
Dispersing to the south to scout,
     And east, and west, and north,
To view their coming enemies,
And warn their vassals and allies.

The ready page, with hurried hand,
Awaked the need-fire's slumbering brand,
     And ruddy blush'd the heaven:
For a sheet of flame from the turret high
Wav'd like a blood-flag on the sky,
     All flaring and uneven;
And soon a score of fires, I ween,
From height, and hill, and cliff, were seen;
Each with warlike tidings fraught,
Each from each the signal caught;
Each after each they glanc'd to sight
As stars arise upon the night.
They gleam d on many a dusky tarn,
Haunted by the lonely earn;
On many a cairn's grey pyramid,
Where urns of mighty chiefs lie hid
Till high Dunedin the blazes saw
From Soltra and Dumpender Law,
And Lothian heard the Regent's order
That all should bowne them for the Border.

The livelong night in Branksome rang
     The ceaseles sound of steel;
The castle-bell, with backward clang
     Sent forth the larum peal;
Was frequent heard the heavy jar,
Where massy stone and iron bar
Were piled on echoing keep and tower,
To whelm the foe with deadly shower
Was frequent heard the changing guard,
And watch-word from the sleepless ward;
While, wearied by the endless din,
Blood-hound and ban-dog yell'd within.

The noble Dame, amid the broil
Shared the grey Seneschal's high toil,
And spoke of danger with a smile;
     Cheer'd the young knights, and council sage
Held with the chiefs of riper age.
No tidings of the foe were brought
Nor of his numbers knew they aught,
Nor what in time of truce he sought.
     Some said that there were thousands ten;
And others ween'd that it was nought
     But Leven clans, or Tynedale men,
Who came to gather in black-mslil;
And Liddesdale, with small avail,
     Might drive them lightly back agen.
So pass'd the anxious night away,
And welcome was the peep of day.

CEAS'D the high sound. The listening throng
Applaud the Master of the Song;
And marvel much, in helpless age,
So hard should be his pilgrimage.
Had he no friend, no daughter dear,
His wandering toil to share and cheer;
No son to be his father's stay,
And guide him on the rugged way?
"Ay, once he had---but he was dead!"
Upon the harp he stoop'd his head,
And busied himself the strings withal
To hide the tear that fain would fall.
In solemn measure, soft and slow,
Arose a father's notes of woe.


CANTO FOURTH

SWEET Teviot! on thy silver tide
     The glaring bale-fires blaze no more;
No longer steel-clad warrior ride
     Along thy wild and willow'd shore
Where'er thou wind'st, by dale or hill
All, all is peaceful, all is still,
     As if thy waves, since Time was born
Since first they roll'd upon the Tweed,
Had only heard the shepherd's reed,
Nor started at the bugle-horn.

Unlike the tide of human time,---
     Which, though it change in ceaseless flow
Retains each grief, retains each crime
     Its earliest course was doom'd to know;
And, darker as it downward bears,
Is stain'd with past and present tears
     Low as that tide has ebb'd with me,
It still reflects to Memory's eye
The hour my brave, my only boy
     Fell by the side of great Dundee.
Why, when the volleying musket play'd
Against the bloody Highland blade,
Why was not I beside him laid!
Enough, he died the death of fame;
Enough, he died with conquering Graeme.

Now over Border dale and fell
     Full wide and far was terror spread;
For pathless marsh, and mountain cell,
     The peasant left his lowly shed.
The frighten'd flocks and herds were pent
Beneath the peel's rude battlement;
And maids and matrons dropp'd the tear,
While ready warriors seiz'd the spear.
From Branksome's towers, the watchman's eye
Dun wreaths of distant smoke can spy,
Which, curling in the rising sun,
Show'd southern ravage was begun.

Now loud the heedful gate-ward cried---
     "Prepare ye all for blows and blood!
Watt Tinlinn, from the Liddel-side
Comes wading through the flood.
Full oft the Tynedale snatchers knock
At his lone gate, and prove the lock;
It was but last St. Barnabright
They sieg'd him a whole summer night,
But fled at morning; well they knew
In vain he never twang'd the yew.
Right sharp has been the evening shower
That drove him from his Liddel tower;
And, by my faith," the gate-ward said,
"I think 'twill prove a Warden-Raid."

While thus he spoke, the bold yeoman
Enter'd the echoing barbican.
He led a small and shaggy nag,
That through a bog, from hag to hag,
Could bound like any Billhope stag.
It bore his wife and children twain;
A half-clothed serf was all their train;
His wife, stout, ruddy, and dark-brow'd,
Of silver brooch and bracelet proud,
Laugh'd to her friends among the crowd.
He was of stature passing tall,
But sparely form'd, and lean withal
A batter'd morion on his brow;
A leather jack, as fence enow
On his broad shoulders loosely hung;
A border axe behind was slung;
His spear, six Scottish ells in length,
     Seem'd newly dyed with gore
His shafts and bow, of wondrous strength,
     His hardy partner bore.

Thus to the Ladye did Tinlinn show
The tidings of the English foe:
"Belted Will Howard is marching here,
And hot Lord Dacre, with many a spear,
And all the German hackbut men,
Who have long lain at Askerten:
They cross'd the Liddel at curfew hour,
And burn'd my little lonely tower:
The fiend receive their souls therefore!
It had not been burnt this year and more.
Barn-yard and dwelling, blazing bright,
Serv'd to guide me on my flight;
But I was chas'd the livelong night.
Black John of Akeshaw and Fergus Graeme
Fast upon my traces came,
Until I turn'd at Priesthaugh Scrogg,
And shot their horses in the bog,
Slew Fergus with my lance outright
I had him long at high despite---
He drove my cows last Fastern's night."

Now weary scouts from Liddesdale,
Fast hurrying in, confirm'd the tale;
     As far as they could judge by ken,
          Three hours would bring to Teviot's strand
     Three thousand armed Englishmen;
          Meanwhile, full many a warlike band,
From Teviot, Aill, and Ettrick shade,
Came in, their Chief's defence to aid.
     There was saddling and mounting in haste,
          There was pricking o'er moor and lea;
     He that was last at the trysting-place
          Was but lightly held of his gay ladye.

From fair St. Mary's silver wave,
     From dreary Gamescleugh's dusky height,
His ready lances Thirlestane brave
     Array'd beneath a banner bright.
The treasured fleur-de-luce he claims
To wreathe his shield, since royal James,
Encamp'd by Fala's mossy wave,
The proud distinction grateful gave,
     For faith 'mid feudal jars;
What time, save Thirlestane alone,
Of Scotland's stubborn barons none
     Would march to southern wars;
And hence, in fair remembrance worn,
Yon sheaf of spears his crest has borne
Hence his high motto shines reveal'd---
" Ready, aye ready" for the field.


An aged Knight, to danger steel'd,
     With manya moss-trooper came on;
And azure in a golden field,
     The stars and crescent graced his shield,
Without the bend of Murdieston.
Wide lay his lands round Oakwood tower
And wide round haunted Castle-Ower;
High over Borthwick's mountain flood
His wood-embosom'd mansion stood;
In the dark glen, so deep below,
The herds of plunder'd England low---
His bold retainers' daily food,
And bought with danger, blows, and blood.
Marauding chief! his sole delight
The moonlight raid, the morning fight;
Not even the Flower of Yarrow's charms,
In youth, might tame his rage for arms
And still, in age, he spurn'd at rest,
And still his brows the helmet press'd,
Albeit the blanched locks below
Were white as Dinlay's spotless snow;
     Five stately warriors drew the sword
          Before their father's band;
     A braver knight than Harden's lord
          Ne'er belted on a brand.

Scotts of Eskdale, a stalwart band,
     Came trooping down the Todshaw-hill;
By the sword they won their land,
     And by the sword they hold it still.
Hearken, Ladye, to the tale,
How thy sires won fair Eskdale.

EARL Morton was lord of that valley fair;
The Beattisons were his vassals there.
The Earl was gentle, and mild of mood;
The vassals vere warlike, and fierce, and rude;
High of heart, and haughty of word,
Little they reck'd of a tame liege lord.
The Earl into fair Eskdale came,
Homage and seignory to claim:
Of Gilbert the Galliard a heriot he sought,
Saying, "Give thy best steed, as a vassal ought."
"Dear to me is my bonny white steed,
Oft has he help d me at pinch of need;
Lord and Earl though thou be, I trow
I can rein Bucksfoot better than thou."
Word on word gave fuel to fire,
Till so highly blazed the Beattison's ire,
But that the Earl the flight had ta'en,
The vassals there their lord had slain.
Sore he plied both whip and spur,
As he urged his steed through Eskdale muir;
And it fell down a weary weight,
Just on the threshold of Branksome gate.
S
The Earl was a wrathful man to see,
Full fain avenged would he be.
In haste to Branksome's Lord he spoke,
Saying---"Take these traitors to thy yoke;
For a cast of hawks, and a purse of gold,
All Eskdale I'll sell thee, to have and hold:
Beshrew thy heart, of the Beattisons' clan
If thou leavest on Eske a landed man;
But spare Woodkerrick's lands alone,
For he lent me his horse to escape upon."
A glad man then was Branksome bold,
Down he flung him the purse of gold;
To Eskdale soon he spurr'd amain,
And with him five hundred riders has ta'en
He left his merrymen in the mist of the hill
And bade them hold them close and still;
And alone he wended to the plain,
To meet with the Galliard and all his train.

To Gilbert the Galliard thus he said
"Know thou me for thy liege-lord and head;
Deal not with me as with Morton tame,
For Scotts play best at the roughest game.
Give me in peace my heriot due,
Thy bonny white steed, or thou shalt rue.
If my horn I three times wind,
Eskdale shall long have the sound in mind."

Loudly the Beattison laugh'd in scorn;
"Little care we for thy winded horn.
Ne'er shall it be the Galliard's lot
To yield his steed to a haughty Scott.
Wend thou to Branksome back on foot
With rusty spur and miry boot."
He blew his bugle so loud and hoarse
That the dun deer started at fair Craikcross;
He blew again so loud and clear,
Through the grey mountain-mist there did lances appear;
And the third blast rang with such a din
That the echoes answer'd from Pentoun-linn
And all his riders came lightly in.
Then had you seen a gallant shock
When saddles were emptied and lances broke!
For each scornful word the Galliard had said
A Beattison on the field was laid.
His own good sword the chieftain drew,
And he bore the Galliard through and through;
Where the Beattisons' blood mix'dwith the rill,
The Galliard's-Haugh men call it still,
The Scotts have scatter'd the Beattison clan
In Eskdale they left but one landed man
The valley of Eske, from the mouth to the source
Was lost and won for that bonny white horse.

Whitslade the Hawk, and Headshaw came
And warriors more than I may name;
From Yarrow-cleugh to Hindhaugh-swair,
     From Woodhouselie to Chesterglen,
Troop'd man and horse, and bow and spear;
     Their gathering word was Bellenden.
And better hearts o'er Border sod
To siege or rescue never rode.
     The Ladye mark'd the aids come in,
          And high her heart of pride arose:
     She bade her youthful son attend,
     That he might know his father's friend,
          And learn to face his foes.
     "The boy is ripe to look on war;
          I saw him draw a cross-bow stiff,
     And his true arrow struck afar
          The raven s nest upon the cliff;
The red cross on a southern breast
Is broader than the raven s nest:
Thou, Whitslade, shalt teach him his weapon to wield,
And o'er him hold his father's shield."

Well may you think the wily page
Car'd not to face the Ladye sage.
He counterfeited childish fear
And shriekd, and shed full many tear,
     And moan'd and plain'd in manner wild.
          The attendants to the Ladye told
     Some fairy, sure, had chang'd the child,
          That wont to be so free and bold.
Then wrathful was the noble dame;
She blush'd blood-red for very shame:
"Hence! ere the clan his faintness view;
Hence with the weakling to Buccleuch!
Watt Tinlinn, thou shalt be his guide
To Rangleburn s lonely side.
Sure some fell fiend has cursed our line
That coward should e'er be son of mine!"

A heavy task Watt Tinlinn had,
To guide the counterfeited lad.
Soon as the palfrey felt the wight
Of that ill-omen'd elfish freight,
He bolted, sprung, and rear d amain,
Nor heeded bit nor curb, nor rein.
     It cost Watt Tinlinn mickle toil
     To drive him but a Scottish mile;
          But as a shallow brook they cross'd,
     The elf, amid the running stream,
     His figure chang'd, like form in dream,
          And fled, and shouted, "Lost! lost! lost!"
Full fast the urchin ran and laugh'd,
But faster still a cloth-yard shaft
Whistled from startled Tinlinn's yew
And pierc'd his shoulder through and through.
Although the imp might not be slain,
And though the wound soon heal'd again
Yet, as he ran, he yell'd for pain;
And Wat of Tinlinn, much aghast,
Rode back to Branksome fiery fast.

Soon on the hill's steep verge he stood,
That looks o'er Branksome's towers and wood;
And martial murmurs, from below,
Proclaim'd the approaching southern foe.
Through the dark wood, in mingled tone,
Were Border pipes and bugles blown;
The coursers' neighing he could ken,
A measured tread of marching men;
While broke at times the solemn hum
The Almayn's sullen kettle-drum;
    And banners tall of crimson sheen
        Above the copse appear;
    And, glistening through the hawthorns green,
        Shine helm, and shield, and spear.

Light forayers, first, to view the ground,
Spurr'd their fleet coursers loosely round;
    Behind, in close array, and fast,
        The Kendal archers, all in green,
    Obedient to the bugle blast,
        Advancing from the wood were seen.
To back and guard the archer band,
Lord Dacre's bill-men were at hand:
A hardy race on Irthing bred,
With kirtles vhite, and crosses red,
Array'd beneath the banner tall,
That stream'd o'er Acre's conquer'd wall;
And minstrels, ss they march'd in order,
Play'd "Noble Lord Dacre, he dwells on the Border."

Behind the English bill and bow,
The mercenaries, firm and slow,
    Moved on to fight, in dark array,
By Conrad led of Wolfenstein,
Who brought the band from distant Rhine,
    And sold their blood for foreign pay.
The camp their home, their law the sword,
They knew no country, own'd no lord :
They were not arm'd like England's sons,
But bore the levin-darting guns;
Buff coats, all frounc'd and 'broider'd o'er,
And morsing-horns and scarfs they wore;
Each better knee was bared, to aid
The warriors in the escalade;
All as they march'd, in rugged tongue,
Songs of Teutonic feuds they sung.

But louder still the clamour grew,
And louder still the minstrels blew,
When fom beneath the greenwood tree,
Rode forth Lord Howard's chivalry;
His men-at-arms, with glaive and spear,
Brought up the battle's glittenng rear.
There many a youthful knight, full keen
To gain his spurs, in arms was seen;
With favor in his crest, or glove,
Memorial of his ladye-love.
So rode they forth in fair array,
Till full their lengthen'd lines display;
Then call'd a halt, and made a stand,
And cried "St. George for merry England!"

Now every English eye intent
On Branksome's armed towers was bent;
So near they were, that they might know
The straining harsh of each cross-bow;
On battlement and bartizan
Gleam'd axe, and spear, and partisan;
Falcon and culver, on each tower,
Stood prompt their deadly hail to shower;
And flashing armor frequent broke
From eddying whirls of sable smoke,
Where upon tower and turret-head,
The seething pitch and molten lead
Reek'd, like a witch's caldron red.
While yet they gaze, the bridges fall,
The wicket opes, and from the wall
Rides forth the hoary Seneschal.

Armed he rode, all save the head,
His white beard o'er his breast-plate spread;
Unbroke by age, erect his seat,
He rul'd his eager courser's gait;
Forc'd him, with chasten'd fire to prance,
And, high curvetting, slow advance;
In sign of truce, his better hand
Display'd a peeled willow wand;
His squire, attending in the rear,
Bore high a gauntlet on a spear.
When they espied him riding out,
Lord Howard and Lord Dacre stout
Sped to the front of their array,
To hear what this old knight should say.

"Ye English warden lords, of you
Demands the Ladye of Buccleuch
Why, 'gainst the truce of Border tide,
In hostile guise ye dare to ride,
With Kendal bow, and Gilsland brand,
And all yon mercenary band,
Upon the bounds of iair Scotland?
My Ladye reads you swith return;
And, if but one poor straw you burn
Or do our towers so much molest
As scare one swallow from her nest,
St. Mary! but we'll light a brand
Shall warm your hearths in Cumberland."

A wrathful man was Dacre's lord,
But calmer oward took the word:
"May 't please thy Dame, Sir Seneschal,
To seek the castle's outward wall,
Our pursuivant-at-arms shall show
Buth why we came, and when we go."
The message sped, the noble Dame
To the wall's outward circle came;
Each chief around lean'd on his spear
To see the pursuivant appear.
All in Lord Howard's livery dress'd,
The lion argent deck-d his breast;
He led a boy of blooming hue---
O sight to meet a mother's view!
It was the heir of great Buccleuch
Obeisance meet the herald made,
And thus his master's will he said:

"It irks, high Dame, my noble Lords,
'Gainst ladye fair to draw their swords;
But yet they may not tamely see,
All through the Western Wardenry,
Your law-contemning kinsmen ride,
And burn and spoil the Border-side;
And ill beseems yom rank and birth
To make your towers a flemens-firth
We claim from thee William of Deloraine
That he may suffer march-treason pain.
It was but last St. Cuthbert's even
He prick'd to Stapleton on Leven,
Harried the lands of Richard Musgrave,
And slew his brother by dint of glaive.
Then, since a lone and widow'd Dame
These restless riders may not tame,
Either receive within thy towers
Two hundred of my master's powers,
Or straight they sound their warrison,
And storm and spoil thy garrison:
And this fair boy, to London led,
Shall good King Edward's page be bred."

He ceased---and loud the boy did cry,
And stretch'd his little arms on high;
Implor'd for aid each well-known face,
And strove to seek the Dame's embrace .
A moment chang'd that Ladye's cheer,
Gush'd to her eye the unbidden tear;
She gaz'd upon the leaders round,
And dark and sad each warrior frown'd;
Then, deep within her sobbing breast
She lock'd the struggling sigh to rest;
Unalter'd and collected stood,
And thus replied in dauntless mood:

"Say to your Lords of high emprize,
Who war on women and on boys,
That either William of Deloraine
Will cleanse him by oath of march-treasou stain
Or else he will the combat take
'Gainst Musgrave, for his honor's sake.
No knight in Cumberland so good,
But William may count with him kin and blood.
Knighthood he took of Douglas' sword,
When English blood swell'd Ancram's ford;
And but Lord Dacre's steed was wight,
And bare him ably in the flight,
Himself had seen him dubb'd a knight
For the young heir of Branksome's line,
God be his aid, and God be mine;
Through me no friend shall meet his doom;
Here, while I live, no foe finds room.
     Then, if thy Lords their purpose urge
          Take our defiance loud and high;
     Our slogan is their lyke-wake dirge,
          Our moat the grave where they shall lie."

Proud she look'd round, applause to claim---
Then lighten'd Thirlestane's eye of flame
     His bugle Wat of Harden blew;
Pensils and pennons wide were flung,
To heaven the Border slogan rung,
     "St. Mary for the young Buccleuch!"
The English war-cry answer'd wide,
     And forward bent each southern spear;
Each Kendal archer made a stride,
     And drew the bowstring to his ear;
Each minstrel's war-note loud was blown;
But, ere a grey-goose shaft had flown
     A horseman gallop'd from the rear.

"Ah! noble Lords!" he breathless said,
"What treason has your march betray'd ?
What make you here, from aid so far,
Before you walls, around you war?
Your foemen triumph in the thought
That in the toils the lion's caught.
Already on dark Ruberslaw
The Douglas holds his weapon-schaw;
The lances, waving in his train,
Clothe the dun heath like autumn grain;
And on the Liddel's northern strand,
To bar retreat to Cumberland,
Lord Maxwell ranks his merry-men good,
Beneath the eagle and the rood;
     And Jedwood, Eske, and Teviotdale,
          Have to proud Angus come;
     And all the Merse and Lauderdale
          Have risen with haughty Home.
     An exile from Northumberland,
          In Liddesdale I've wander'd long;
     But still my heart was with merry England,
          And cannot brook my country's wrong;
And hard I've spurr'd all night, to show
The mustering of the coming foe."

"And let them come!" fierce Dacre cried;
"For soon yon crest, my father's pride,
That swept the shores of Judah's sea,
And wav'd in gales of Galilee,
From Branksome's highest towers display'd,
Shall mock the rescue's lingering aid!---
Level each harquebuss on row;
Draw, merry archers, draw the bow;
Up, bill-men, to the walls, and cry,
Dacre for England, win or die!"

"Yet hear," quoth Howard, "calmly hear
Nor deem my words the words of fear:
For who, in field or foray slack,
Saw the blanche lion e'er fall back?
But thus to risk our Border flower
In strife against a kingdom's power,
Ten thousand Scots 'gainst thousands three,
Certes, were desperate policy.
Nay, take the terms the Ladye made,
Ere conscious of the advancing aid:
Let Musgrave meet fierce Deloraine
In single fight, and, if he gain,
He gains for us; but if he's cross'd,
'Tis but a single warrior lost:
The rest retreating as they came,
Avoid defeat, and death, and shame."

Ill could the haughty Dacre brook
His brother Warden's sage rebuke;
And yet his forward step he stay'd,
And slow and sullenly obey'd.
But ne'er again the Border side
Did these two lords in friendship ride;
And this slight discontent, men say,
Cost blood upon another day.

The pursuivant-at-arms again
Before the castle took his stand;
His trumpet call'd, with parleying strain
The leaders of the Scottish band;
And he defied in Musgrave's right,
Stout Deloraine to single fight;
A gauntlet at their feet he laid,
And thus the terms of fight he said:
"If in the lists good Musgrave's sword
     Vanquish the Knight of Deloraine,
Your youthful chieftain, Branksome's Lord
     Shall hostage for his clan remain:
If Deloraine foil good Musgrave,
The boy his liberty shall have.
     Howe'er it falls the English band,
Unharming Scots, by Scots unharm'd,
In peaceful march, like men unarm'd,
     Shall straight retreat to Cumberland."

Unconscious of the near relief
The proffer pleased each Scottish chief,
     Though much the Ladye sage gainsay'd;
For though their hearts were brave and true,
From Jedwood's recent sack they knew
     How tardy was the Regent's aid:
And you may guess the noble Dame
     Durst not the secret prescience own,
Sprung from the art she might not name,
     By which the coming help was known.
Clos'd was the compact, and agreed
That lists should be enclos'd with speed,
     Beneath the castle, on a lawn:
They fix'd the morrow for the strife,
On foot, with Scottish axe and knife,
     At the fourth hour from peep of dawn;
When Deloraine, from sickness freed,
Or else a champion in his stead,
Should for himself and chieftain stand
Against stout Musgrave, hand to hand.

I know right well, that, in their lay,
Full many minstrels sing and say,
     Such combat should be made on horse,
On foaming steed, in full career,
With brand to aid, when as the spear
     Should shiver in the course:
But he, the jovial Harper, taught
Me, yet a youth, how it was fought,
     In guise which now I say;
He knew each ordinance and clause
Of Black Lord Archibald s battle-laws,
     In the old Douglas' day.
He brook'd not, he, that scoffing tongue
Should tax his minstrelsy with wrong,
     Or call his song untrue:
For this, when they the goblet plied,
And such rude taunt had chaf'd his pride,
     The Bard of Reull he slew.
On Teviot's side, in fight they stood,
And tuneful hands were stain'd with blood;
Where still the thorn's white branches wave,
Memorial o'er his rival's grave.

Why should I tell the rigid doom
That dragg'd my master to his tomb;
     How Ousenam's maidens tore their hair
Wept till their eyes were dead and dim
And wrung their hands for love of him
     Who died at Jedwood Air?
He died!---his scholars, one by one,
To the cold silent grave are gone;
And I, alas! survive alone,
To muse o'er rivalries of yore,
And grieve that I shall hear no more
The strains, with envy heard before;
For, with my minstrel brethren fled,
My jealousy of song is dead.

HE paused: the listening dames again
Applaud the hoary Minstrel's strain.
With many a word of kindly cheer,
In pity half, and half sincere,
Marvell'd the Duchess how so well
His legendary song could tell
Of ancient deeds, so long forgot;
Of feuds, whose memory was not;
Of forests, now laid waste and bare;
Of towers, which harbor now the hare;
Of manners, long since chang'd and gone;
Of chiefs, who under their grey stone
So long had slept, that fickle Fame
Had blotted from her rolls their name,
And twin'd round some new minion's head
The fading wreath for which they bled;
In sooth,'twas strange, this old man's verse
Could call them from their marble hearse.

The Harper smil'd, well-pleas'd; for ne'er
Was flattery lost on poet's ear:
A simple race! they waste their toil
For the vain tribute of a smile;
E'en when in age their flame expires,
Her dulcet breath can fan its fires:
Their drooping fancy wakes at praise,
And strives to trim the short-liv'd blaze.

     Smil'd then, well pleas'd, the aged man
And thus his tale continued ran.


CANTO FIFTH

ALL it not vain; they do not err,
     Who say, that when the Poet dies,
Mute Nature mourns her worshipper,
     And celebrates his obsequies:
Who say, tall cliff and cavern lone
For the departed Bard make moan;
That mountains weep in crystal rill;
That flowers in tears of balm distill;
Through his lov'd groves that breezes sigh,
And oaks, in deeper groan, reply;
And rivers teach their rushing wave
To murmur dirges round his grave

Not that, in sooth, o'er mortal urn
Those things inanimate can mourn;
But that the stream, the wood, the gale
Is vocal with the plaintive wail
Of those, who, else forgotten long,
Liv'd in the poet's faithful song,
And with the poet's parting breath,
Whose memory feels a second death.
The Maid's pale shade, who wails her lot,
That love, true love, should be forgot,
From rose and hawthorn shakes the tear
Upon the gentle Minstrel's bier:

The phantom Knight, his glory fled,
Mourns o'er the field he heap'd with dead;
Mounts the wild blast that sweeps amaun,
And shrieks along the battle-plain.
The Chief, whose antique crownlet long
Still sparkled in the feudal song,
Now, from the mountain's misty throne,
Sees, in the thanedom once his own,
His ashes undistinguish'd lie,
His place, his power, his memory die:
His groans the lonely caverns fill,
His tears of rage impel the rill:
All mourn the Minstrel's harp unstrung,
Their name unknown, their praise unsung.

Scarcely the hot assault was staid,
The terms of truce were scarcely made,
When they could spy, from Branksome's towers,
The advancing march of martial powers.
Thick clouds of dust afar appear'd,
And trampling steeds were faintly heard;
Bright spears, above the columns dun,
Glanced momentary to the sun;
And feudal banners fair display'd
The bands that moved to Branksome's aid.

Vails not to tell each hardy clan,
     From the fair Middle Marches came;
The Bloody Heart blaz'd in the van,
     Announcing Douglas, dreaded name!
Vails not to tell what steeds did spurn,
Where the Seven Spears of Wedderburne
     Their men in battle-order set;
And Swinton laid the lance in rest,
That tamed of yore the sparkling crest
     Of Clarence's Plantagenet.
Nor list I say what hundreds more,
From the rich Merse and Lammermore,
And Tweed's fair borders to the war,
Beneath the crest of Old Dunbar.
     And Hepburn's mingled banners come,
Down the steep mountain glittering far
     And shouting still, "A Home! a Home!"

Now squire and knight, from Branksome sent,
On many a courteous message went;
To every chief and lord they paid
Meet thanks for prompt and powerful aid:
And told them,---how a truce was made.
     And how a day of fight was ta'en
     'Twixt Musgrave and stout Deloraine;
          And how the Ladye pray'd them dear,
     That all would stay the fight to see,
     And deign, in love and courtesy,
          To taste of Branksome cheer.
Nor, while they bade to feast each Scot,
Were England's noble Lords forgot
Himself, the hoary Seneschal
Rode forth, in seemly terms to call
Those gallant foes to Branksome Hall.
Accepted Howard, than whom knight
Was never dubb'd more bold in fight;
Nor, when from war and armor free,
More fam'd for stately courtesy:
But angry Dacre rather chose
In his pavilion to repose

Now, noble Dame, perchance you ask
     How these two hostile armies met?
Deeming it were no easy task
     To keep the truce which here was set
Where martial spirits, all on fire,
Breathed only blood and mortal ire.
By mutual inroads, mutual blows,
By habit, and by nation, foes
     They met on Teviot's strand;
They met and sate them mingled down,
Without a threat, without a frown,
     As brothers meet in foreign land:
The hands the spear that lately grasp'd,
Still in the mailed gauntlet clasp'd,
     Were interchang'd in greeting dear;
Visors were raised, and faces shown,
And many a friend, to friend made known,
     Partook of social cheer.
Some drove the jolly bowl about;
     With dice and draughts some chas'd the day;
And some, with many a merry shout,
In riot revelry, and rout,
     Pursued the foot-ball play.

Yet, be it known, had bugles blown,
     Or sign of war been seen,
Those bands so fair together rang'd,
Those hands, so frankly interchang'd,
     Had dyed with gore the green:
The merry shout by Teviot-side
Had sunk in war-cries wild and wide,
     And in the groan of death;
And whingers, now in friendship bare
The social meal to part and share,
     Had found a bloody sheath.
'Twixt truce and war, such sudden change
Was not infrequent, nor held strange,
     In the old Border-day:
But yet on Branksome's towers and town
In peaceful merriment, sunk down
     The sun's declining ray.

The blithsome signs of bassel gay
Decay'd not with the dying day:
Soon through the lattic'd windows tall
Of lofty Branksome's lordly hall,
Divided square by shafts of stone,
Huge flakes of ruddy lustre shone
Nor less the gilded rafters rang
With merry harp and beakers' clang:
     And frequent, on the darkening plain,
          Loud hollo, whoop, or whistle ran,
     As bands, their stragglers to regain
          Give the shrill watchword of their clan;
And revellers, o'er their bowls, proclaim
Douglas or Dacre's conquering name.

Less frequent heard, and fainter still
     At length the various clamors died:
And you might hear, from Branksome hill
     No sound but Teviot's rushing tide;
Save when the changing sentinel
The challenge of his watch could tell;
And save where, through the dark profound,
The clanging axe and hammer's sound
     Rung from the nether lawn;
For many a busy hand toil'd there,
Strong pales to shape, and beams to square,
The lists' dread barriers to prepare
     Against the morrow's dawn.

Margaret from hall did soon retreat,
     Despite the Dame's reproving eye;
Nor mark'd she as she left her seat,
     Full many a stifled sigh;
For many a noble warrior strove
To win the Flower of Teviot's love,
     And many a bold ally.
With throbbing head and anxious heart,
All in her lonely bower apart,
     In broken sleep she lay:
Betimes from silken couch she rose
While yet the banner'd hosts repose,
     She view'd the dawning day:
Of all the hundreds sunk to rest
First woke the loveliest and the best.

She gaz'd upon the inner court,
     Which in the tower's tall shadow lay;
Where coursers' clang, and stamp, and snort
     Had rung the livelong yesterday;
Now still as death; till stalking slow---
     The jingling spurs announc'd his tread---
A stately warrior pass'd below;
     But when he rais'd his plumed head---
          Bless'd Mary! can it be?
Secure, as if in Ousenam bowers,
He walks through Branksome's hostile towers
     With fearless step and free.
She dar'd not sign, she dar'd not speak---
Oh! if one page's slumbers break,
     His blood the price must pay!
Not all the pearls Queen Mary wears
Not Margaret's yet more precious tears,
     Shall buy his life a day.

Yet was his hazard small; for well
You may bethink you of the spell
     Of that sly urchin page;
This to his lord he did impart,
And made him seem, by glamour art,
     A knight from Hermitage.
Unchalleng'd thus, the warder's post,
The court, unchalleng'd, thus he cross'd,
     For all the vassalage:
But O! what magic's quaint disguise
Could blind fair Margaret s azure eyes!
     She started from her seat;
While with surprise and fear she strove,  
And both could scarcely master love,
     Lord Henry's at her feet.

Oft have I mus'd what purpose bad
That foul malicious urchin had
     To bring this meeting round;
For happy love's a heavenly sight,
And by a vile malignant sprite
     In such no joy is found;
And oft I've deem'd perchance he thought
Their erring passion might have wrought
     Sorrow, and sin, and shame;
And death to Cranstoun's gallant Knight
And to the gentle ladye bright
     Disgrace and loss of fame.
But earthly spirit could not tell
The heart of them that lov'd so well.
True love's the gift which God has given
To man alone beneath the heaven:
     It is not fantasy's hot fire,
          Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly;
     It liveth not in fierce desire,
          With dead desire it doth not die;
It is the secret sympathy,
The silver link, the silken tie,
Which heart to heart, and mind to mind
In body and in soul can bind.
Now leave we Margaret and her Knight,
To tell you of the approaching fight.

Their warning blasts the bugles blew,
     The pipe's shrill port arous'd each clan;
In haste, the deadly strife to view,
     The trooping warriors eager ran:
Thick round the lists their lances stood
Like blasted pines in Ettric wood;
To Branksome many a look they threw,
The combatants' approach to view,
And bandied many a word of boast
About the knight each favor'd most.

Meantime, full anxious was the Dame;
For now arose disputed claim
Of who should fight for Deloraine,
'Twixt Harden and 'twixt Thirlestaine
They 'gan to reckon kin and rent,
And frowning brow on brow was bent;
     But yet not long the strife---for, lo!
Himself, the Knight of Deloraine,
Strong, as it seem'd, and free from pain
     In armor sheath'd from top to toe,
Appear'd and crav'd the combat due.
The Dame her charm successful knew,
And the fierce chiefs their claims withdrew.

When for the lists they sought the plain,
The stately Ladye's silken rein
     Did noble Howard hold;
Unarmed by her side he walk'd,
And much, in courteous phrase, they talk'd
     Of feats of arms of old.
Costly his garb; his Flemish ruff
Fell o'er his doublet, shap'd of buff,
     With satin slash'd and lin'd;
Tawny his boot, and gold his spur,
His cloak was all of Poland fur,
     His hose with silver twin'd;
His Bilboa blade, by Marchmen felt,
Hung in a broad and studded belt;
Hence, in rude phrase, the Borderers still
Call'd noble Howard, Belted Will.

Behind Lord Howard and the Dame,
Fair Margaret on her palfrey came,
     Whose foot-cloth swept the ground:
White was her wimple, and her veil,
And her loose locks a chaplet pale
     Of whitest roses bound;
The lordly Angus, by her side,
In courtesy to cheer her tried;
Without his aid, her hand in vain
Had strove to guide her broider'd rein.
He deem'd she shudder'd at the sight
Of warriors met for mortal fight;
But cause of terror, all unguess'd,
Was fluttering in her gentle breast,
When, in their chairs of crimson plac'd,
The Dame and she the barriers grac'd.

Prize of the field, the young Buccleuch,
An English knight led forth to view;
Scarce rued the boy his present plight,
So much he long'd to see the fight.
Within the lists, in knightly pride,
High Home and haughty Dacre ride;
Their leading staffs of steel they wield
As marshals of the mortal field;
While to each knight their care assign'd
Like vantage of the sun and wind.
Then heralds hoarse did loud proclaim,
In King and Queen and Warden's name
     That none, while lasts the strife,
Should dare, by look, or sign, or word,
Aid to a champion to afford,
     On peril of his life;
And not a breath the silence broke,
Till thus the alternate Heralds spoke:

ENGLISH HERALD
"Here standeth Richard of Musgrave,
     Good knight and true, and freely born,
Amends from Deloraine to crave,
     For foul despiteous scathe and scorn.
He sayeth that William of Deloraine
     Is traitor false by Border laws;
This with his sword he will maintain,
     So help him God, and his good cause!"

SCOTTISH HERALD
"Here standeth William of Deloraine,
Good knight and true, of noble strain,
Who sayeth that foul treason's stain,
     Since he bore arms, ne'er soil'd his coat;
          And that, so help him God above!
     He will on Musgrave's body prove,
          He lies most foully in his throat."

LORD DACRE
"Forward, brave champions, to the fight!
Sound trumpets!"

LORD HOME
                         "God defend the right!"
Then, Teviot! how thine echoes rang,
When bugle-sound and trumpet-clang
     Let loose the martial foes,
And in mid list, with shield pois'd high,
And measur'd step and wary eye,
     The combatants did close.

Ill would it suit your gentle ear,
Ye lovely listeners, to hear
How to the axe the helms did sound,
And blood pour'd down from many a wound;
For desperate was the strife and long,
And either warrior fierce and strong.
But, were each dame a listening knight,
I well could tell how warriors fight!
For I have seen war's lightning flashing,
Seen the claymore with bayonet clashing,
Seen through red blood the war-horse dashing,
And scorn'd, amid the reeling strife,
To yield a step for death or life.

'Tis done, 'tis done! that fatal blow
     Has stretch d him on the bloody plain;
He strives to rise---brave Musgrave, no!
     Thence never shalt thou rise again!
He chokes in blood! some friendly hand
Undo the visor's barred band,
Unfix the gorget's iron clasp,
And give him room for life to gasp!
O, bootless aid! haste, holy Friar,
Haste, ere the sinner shall expire!
Of all his guilt let him be shriven,
And smooth his path from earth to heaven!

In haste the holy Friar sped
His naked foot was dyed with red
     As through the lists he ran;
Unmindful of the shouts on high,
That hail'd the conqueror's victory,
     He rais'd the dying man;
Loose wav'd his silver beard and hair,
As o'er him he kneel'd down in prayer;
And still the crucifix on high
He holds before his darkening eye;
And still he bends an anxious ear
His faltering penitence to hear;
     Still props him from the bloody sod,
Still, even when soul and body part,
Pours ghostly comfort on his heart,
     And bids him trust in God.
Unheard he prays; the death pang's o'er!
Richard of Musgrave breathes no more.

As if exhausted in the fight,
Or musing o'er the piteous sight,
     The silent victor stands;
His beaver did he not unclasp,
Mark'd not the shouts, felt not the grasp
     Of gratulating hands.
When lo! strange cries of wild surprise,
Mingled with seeming terror, rise
     Among the Scottish bands;
And all amid the throng'd array,
In panic haste gave open way
To a half-naked ghastly man
Who downward from the castle ran:
He cross'd the barriers at a bound,
And wild and haggard look d around,
     As dizzy, and in pain;
And all, upon the armed ground
     Knew William of Deloraine!
Each ladye sprung from seat with speed;
Vaulted each marshal from his steed;
     "And who art thou," they cried,
"Who hast this battle fought and won?"
His plumed helm was soon undone---
     "Cranstoun of Teviot-side !
For this fair prize I've fought and won."
And to the Ladye led her son.

Full oft the rescued boy she kiss'd,
And often press'd him to her breast;
For, under all her dauntless show,
Her heart had throbb'd at every blow;
Yet not Lord Cranstoun deign'd she greet,
Though low he kneeled at her feet.
Me lists not tell what words were made,
What Douglas, Home, and Howard said---
     For Howard was a generous foe---
And how the clan united pray'd
     The Ladye would the feud forego,
And deign to bless the nuptial hour
Of Cranstoun's Lord and Teviot's Flower.

She look'd to river, look'd to hill,
     Thought on the Spirit's prophecy,
Then broke her silence stern and still---
     "Not you, but Fate, has vanquish'd me;
Their influence kindly stars may shower
On Teviot's tide and Branksome's tower,
     For pride is quell'd, and love is free."
She took fair Margaret by the hand,
Who, breathless, trembling, scarce might stand;
     That hand to Cranstoun's lord gave she:
"As I am true to thee and thine,
Do thou be true to me and mine!
     This clasp of love our bond shall be;
For this is your betrothing day,
And all these noble lords shall stay
To grace it with their company."

All as they left the listed plain
Much of the story she did gain
How Cranstoun fought with Deloraine
And of his page, and of the Book
Which from the wounded knight he took;
And how he sought her castle high,
That morn, by help of gramarye;
How, in Sir William's armor dight,
Stolen by his page, while slept the knight,
He took on him the single fight.
But half his tale he left unsaid
And linger'd till he join'd the maid.
Car'd not the Ladye to betray
Her mystic arts in view of day;
But well she thought, ere midnight came
Of that strange page the pride to tame
From his foul hands the Book to save,
And send it back to Michael s grave.
Needs not to tell each tender word
'Twixt Margaret and twixt Cranstoun s lord;
Nor how she told of former woes,
And how her bosom fell and rose,
While he and Musgrave bandied blows
Needs not these lovers' joys to tell:
One day, fair maids, you'll know them well.

William of Deloraine some chance
Had waken'd from his deathlike trance;
     And taught that, in the listed plain
Another, in his arms and shield
Against fierce Musgrave axe did wield
     Under the name of Deloraine.
Hence to the field unarm'd he ran,
And hence his presence scar'd the clan,
Who held him for some fleeting wraith
And not a man of blood and breath.
     Not much this new ally he lov'd,
     Yet, when he saw what hap had prov'd
          He greeted him right heartilie:
He would not waken old debate,
For he was void of rancorous hate,
          Though rude, and scant of courtesy;
In raids he spilt but seldom blood,
Unless when men-at-arms withstood,
Or, as was meet, for deadly feud
He ne'er bore grudge for stalwart blow,
Ta'en in fair fight from gallant foe:
     And so 'twas seen of him, e'en now,
          When on dead Musgrave he look d down;
     Grief darken'd on his rugged brow,
          Though half disguised with a frown;
And thus, while sorrow bent his head,
His foeman's epitaph he made.

"Now, Richard Musgrave, liest thou here!
     I ween, my deadly enemy
For, if I slew thy brother dear,
     Thou slew'st a sister's son to me;
And when I lay in dungeon dark
     Of Naworth Castle, long months three,
Till ransom'd for a thousand mark,
     Dark Musgrave, it was 'long of thee .
And, Musgrave, could our fight be tried,
And thou wert now alive as I,
No mortal man should us divide,
Till one, or both of us, did die:
Yet, rest thee God! for well I know
I ne'er shall find a nobler foe.
In all the northern counties here,
Whose word is Snaffle, spur, and spear,
Thou wert the best to follow gear!
'Twas pleasure, as we look'd behind,
To see how thou the chase could'st wind,
Cheer the dark blood-hound on his way
And with the bugle rouse the fray!
I'd give the lands of Deloraine
Dark Musgrave were alive again."

So mourn'd he, till Lord Dacre's band
Were bowning back to Cumberland.
They rais'd brave Musgrave from the field,
And laid him on his bloody shield;
On levell'd lances, four and four,
By turns, the noble burden bore.
Before, at times, upon the gale,
Was heard the Minstrel s plaintive wail;
Behind, four priests, in sable stole,
Sung requiem for the warrior's soul:
Around, the horsemen slowly rode;
With trailing pikes the spearmen trode;
And thus the gallant knight they bore
Through Liddesdale to Leven's shore;
Thence to Holme Coltrame's lofty nave,
And laid him in his father's grave.

THE harp's wild notes, though hush'd the song,
The mimic march of death prolong;
Now seems it far, and now a-near,
Now meets, and now eludes the ear;
Now seems some mountainside to sweep,
Now faintly dies in valley deep;
Seems now as if the Minstrel's wail,
Now the sad requiem, loads the gale;
Last, o'er the warrior's closing grave,
Rung the full choir in choral stave.

     After due pause, they bade him tell,
Why he, who touch'd the harp so well,
Should thus, with ill-rewarded toil,
Wander a poor and thankless soil,
When the more generous Southern land
Would well requite his skillful hand.
     The aged Harper howsoe'er
His only friend, his harp, was dear,
Lik'd not to hear it rank'd so high
Above his flowing poesy:
Less lik'd he still that scornful jeer
Mispris'd the land he lov'd so dear;
High was the sound, as thus again
The Bard resum'd his minstrel strain.


CANTO SIXTH

BREATHES there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burn'd,
As home his footsteps he hath turn'd,
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no Minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonor'd, and unsung.

O Caledonia! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!
Land of brown heath and shaggy wood,
Land of the mountain and the flood,
Land of my sires! what mortal hand
Can e'er untie the filial band,
That knits me to thy rugged strand!
Still as I view each well-known scene,
Think what is now, and what hath been,
Seems as, to me, of all bereft,
Sole friends thy woods and streams were left;
And thus I love them better still,
Even in extremity of ill.
By Yarrow's stream still let me stray,
Though none should guide my feeble way;
Still feel the breeze down Ettrick break,
Although it chill my wither'd cheek:
Still lay my head by Teviot Stone,
Though there, forgotten and alone,
The Bard may draw his parting groan.

Not scorn'd like me, to Branksome Hall
The Minstrels came at festive call;
Trooping they came, from near and far
The jovial priests of mirth and war;
Alike for feast and fight prepar'd,
Battle and banquet both they shar'd.
Of late, before each martial clan,
They blew their death-note in the van,
But now, for every merry mate,
Rose the portcullis' iron grate;
They sound the pipe, they strike the string,
They dance, they revel, and they sing,
Till the rude turrets shake and ring.

Me lists not at this tide declare
     The splendor of the spousal rite,
How muster'd in the chapel fair
     Both maid and matron, squire and knight;
Me lists not tell of owches rare,
Of mantles green, and braided hair,
And kirtles furr'd with miniver;
What plumage wav'd the altar round,
How spurs and ringing chainlets sound;
And hard it were for bard to speak
The changeful hue of Margaret's cheek---
That lovely hue which comes and flies
As awe and shame alternate rise!

Some bards have sung the Ladye high
Chapel or altar came not nigh;
Nor durst the rites of spousal grace,
So much she fear'd each holy place.
False slanders these: I trust right well
She wrought not by forbidden spell;
For mighty words and signs have power
O'er sprites in planetary hour:
Yet scarce I praise their venturous part,
Who tamper with such dangerous art.
     But this for faithful truth I say,
          The Ladye by the altar stood;
     Of sable velvet her array,
     And on her head a crimson hood
With pearls embroider'd and entwin'd,
Guarded with gold, with ermine lin'd;
A merlin sat upon her wrist
Held by a leash of silken twist.

The spousal rites were ended soon:
'Twas now the merry hour of noon
And in the lofty arched hall
Was spread the gorgeous festival.
Steward and squire, with heedful haste,
Marshall'd the rank of every guest;
Pages, with ready blade, were there,
The mighty meal to carve and share:
O'er capon, heron-shew, and crane,
And princely peacock s gilded train
And o'er the boar-head, garnish'd brave,
And cygnet from St. Mary's wave;
O'er ptarmigan and venison
The priest had spoke his benison.
Then rose the riot and the din,
Above, beneath, without, within!
For, from the lofty balcony,
Rung trumpet, shalm, and psaltery:
Their clanging bowls old warriors quaff'd
Loudly they spoke, and loudly laugh'd;
Whisper'd young knights, in tone more mild,
To ladies fair, and ladies smil'd.
The hooded hawks, high perch'd on beam
The clamor join'd with whistling scream
And flapp'd their wings, and shook their bells
In concert with the stag-hounds' yells
Round go the flasks of ruddy wine,
From Bordeaux, Orleans, or the Rhine;
Their tasks the busy sewers ply,
And all is mirth and revelry.

The Goblin Page, omitting still
No opportunity of ill,
Strove now, while blood ran hot and high,
To rouse debate and jealousy;
Till Conrad, Lord of Wolfenstein:
By nature fierce, and warm with wine,
And now in humor highly cross'd
About some steeds his band had lost,
High words to words succeeding still,
Smote with his gauntlet stout Hunthill---
A hot and hardy Rutherford,
Whom men called Dickon Draw-the-sword.
He took it on the page's say
Hunthill had driven these steeds away.
Then Howard, Home, and Douglas rose
The kindling discord to compose:
Stern Rutherford right little said,
But bit his glove, and shook his head.
A fortnight thence, in Inglewood,
Stout Conrad, cold, and drench'd in blood,
His bosom gor'd with many a wound,
Was by a woodman's lyme-dog found;
Unknown the manner of his death,
Gone was his brand, both sword and sheath;
But ever from that time, 'twas said,
That Dickon wore a Cologne blade.

The dwarf, who fear'd his master's eye
Might his foul treachery espie,
Now sought the castle buttery,
Where many a yeoman, bold and free,
Revell'd as merrily and well
As those that sat in lordly selle.
Watt Tinlinn, there, did frankly raise
The pledge to Arthur Fire-the-Braes
And he, as by his breeding bound,
To Howard's merry-men sent it round.
To quit them, on the English side,
Red Roland Forster loudly cried,
"A deep carouse to yon fair bride!"
At every pledge, from vat and pail,
Foam'd forth in floods the nut-brown ale
While shout the riders every one;
Such day of mirth ne'er cheer'd their clan,
Since old Buccleuch the name did gain
When in the cleuch the buck was ta'en.

The wily page, with vengeful thought
     Remember d him of Tinlinn's yew,
And swore it should be dearly bought
     That ever he the arrow drew.
First, he the yeoman did molest
With bitter gibe and taunting jest;
Told how he fled at Solway strife,
And how Hob Armstrong cheer'd his wife;
Then, shunning still his powerful arm,
At unawares he wrought him harm;
From trencher stole his choicest cheer,
Dash'd from his lips his can of beer;
Then, to his knee sly creeping on,
With bodkin pierced him to the bone:
The venom'd wound, and festering joint,
Long after rued that bodkin's point.
The startled yeoman swore and spurn'd,
And board and flagons overturn'd.
Riot and clamor wild began
Back to the hall the Urchin ran;
Took in a darkling nook his post,
And grinn'd, and mutter'd, "Lost! lost! lost!"

By this, the Dame, lest farther fray
Should mar the concord of the day.
Had bid the Minstrels tune their lay.
And first stept forth old Albert Graeme,
The Minstrel of that ancient name:
Was none who struck the harp so well
Within the Land Debateable;
Well friended, too his hardy kin,
Whoever lost, were sure to win;
They sought the beeves that made their broth,
In Scotland and in England both.
In homely guise, as nature bade
His simple song the Borderer said.

ALBERT GRAEME
It was an English ladye bright,
     (The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,)
And she would marry a Scottish knight,
     For Love will still be lord of all.

Blithely they saw the rising sun
     When he shone fair on Carlisle wall;
But they were sad ere day was done,
     Though Love was still the lord of all.

Her sire gave brooch and jewel fine,
     Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall
Her brother gave but a flask of wine,
     For ire that Love was lord of all.

For she had lands, both meadow and lea,
     Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall;
And he swore her death ere he would see
     A Scottish knight the lord of all!

That wine she had not tasted well,
     (The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,)
When dead in her true love's arms she fell,
     For Love was still the lord of all!

He pierc'd her brother to the heart,
     Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall:
So perish all would true love part
     That Love may still be lord of all!

And then he took the cross divine
     (Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,)
And died for her sake in Palestine
     So Love was still the lord of all!

Now all ye lovers that faithful prove,
     (The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,)
Pray for their souls who died for love,
     For Love shall still be lord of all!

As ended Albert's simple lay,
     Arose a bard of loftier port;
For sonnet, rhyme, and roundelay,
     Renown'd in haughty Henry's court:
There rung thy harp, unrivall'd long,
Fitztraver of the silver song!
     The gentle Surrey lov'ed his lyre---
          Who has not heard of Surrey's fame?
     His was the hero's soul of fire,
          And his the bard's immortal name,
And his was love, exalted high
By all the glow of chivalry.

They sought, together, climes afar,
     And oft, within some olive grove,
When even came with twinkling star,
     They sung of Surrey's absent love
His step the Italian peasant stay'd,
     And deem'd that spirits from on high,
Round where some hermit saint was laid,
     Were breathing heavenly melody;
So sweet did harp and voice combine
To praise the name of Geraldine.

Fitztraver! O what tongue may say
     The pangs thy faithful bosom knew,
When Surrey, of the deathless lay
     Ungrateful Tudor's sentence slew?
Regardless of the tyrant's frown,
His harp call'd wrath and vengeance down.
He left, for Naworth's iron towers,
Windsor's green glades, and courtly bowers
And faithful to his patron's name,
With Howard still Fitztraver came
Lord William's foremost favorite he,
And chief of all his minstrelsy.

FlTZTRAVER
'Twas All-soul's eve, and Surrey's heart beat high;
     He heard the midnight bell with anxious start,
Which told the mystic hour, approaching nigh,
     When wise Cornelius promis'd, by his art,
To show to him the ladye of his heart
     Albeit betwixt them roar'd the ocean grim
Yet so the sage had hight to play his part
     That he should see her form in life and limb
And mark, if still she lov'd, 
     And still she thought of him.

Dark was the vaulted room of gramarye,
     To which the wizard led the gallant Knight,
Save that before a mirror, huge and high,
     A hallow'd taper shed a glimmering light
On mystic implements of magic might;
     On cross, and character, and talisman,
And almagest, and altar, nothing bright:
     For fitful was the lustre, pale and wan
As watchlight by the bed 
     Of some departing man.

But soon, within that mirror huge and high,
     Was seen a self-emitted light to gleam;
And forms upon its breast the Earl 'gan spy
     Cloudy and indistinct, as feverish dream;
Till, slow arranging, and defin'd, they seem
     To form a lordly and a lofty room,
Part lighted by a lamp with silver beam,
     Plac'd by a couch of Agra's silken loom,
And part by moonshine pale, 
     And part was hid in gloom.

Fair all the pageant: but how passing fair
     The slender form which lay on couch of Ind!
O'er her white bosom stray'd her hazel hair;
     Pale her dear cheek, as if for love she pin'd;
All in her night-robe loose she lay reclin'd,
     And pensive read from tablet eburnine
Some strain that seem'd her inmost soul to find:
     That favor'd strain was Surrey's raptur'd line,
That fair and lovely form, 
     The Lady Geraldine.

Slow roll'd the clouds upon the lovely form,
     And swept the .goodly vision all away---
So royal envy roll'd the murky storm
     O'er my beloved Master's glorious day.
Thou jealous, ruthless tyrant! Heaven repay
     On thee, and on thy children's latest line,
The wild caprice of thy despotic sway,
     The gory bridal bed, the plunder'd shrine,
The murderŐd Surrey's blood, 
     The tears of Geraldine!

Both Scots, and Southern chiefs, prolong
Applauses of Fitztraver's song;
These hated Henry's name as death,
And those still held the ancient faith.
Then from his seat, with lofty air,
Rose Harold, bard of brave St. Clair;
St. Clair, who, feasting high at Home,
Had with that lord to battle come.
Harold was born where restless seas
Howl round the storm-swept Orcades;
Where erst St. Clairs held princely sway
O'er isle and islet, strait and bay;---
Still nods their palace to its fall,
Thy pride and sorrow, fair Kirkwall!
Thence oft he mark'd fierce Pentland rave,
As if grim Odin rode her wave:
And watch'd the while, with visage pale,
And throbbing heart, the struggling sail;
For all of wonderful and wild
Had rapture for the lonely child.

And much of wild and wonderful
In these rude isles might fancy cull;
For thither came. in times afar,
Stern Lochlin's sons of roving war.
The Norsemen, train'd to spoil and blood,
Skill'd to prepare the raven's food;
Kings of the main their leaders brave,
Their barks the dragons of the wave.
And there in many a stormy vale,
The Scald had told his wondrous tale;
And many a Runic column high
Had witness'd grim idolatry.
And thus had Harold in his youth
Learn'd many a Saga's rhyme uncouth---
Of that Sea-Snake, tremendous curl'd,
Whose monstrous circle girds the world;
Of those dread Maids, whose hideous yell
Maddens the battle's bloody swell;
Of Chief, who, guided through the gloom
By the pale death-lights of the tomb,
Ransack'd the graves of warriors old,
Their falchions wrench'd from corpses' hold,
Wak'd the deaf tomb with war's alarms,
And bade the dead arise to arms!
With war and wonder all on flame,
To Roslin's bowers young Harold came,
Where, by sweet glen and greenwood tree,
He learn'd a milder minstrelsy;
Yet something of the Northern spell
Mix'd with the softer numbers well.


HAROLD

O listen, listen, ladies gay!
     No haughty feat of arms I tell;
Soft is the note, and sad the lay,
     That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.

---"Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew!
     And gentle ladye, deign to stay!
Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
     Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.

"The blackening wave is edg'd with white:
     To inch and rock the sea-mews fly;
The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite,
     Whose screams forebode that wreck is nigh.

"Last night the gifted Seer did view
     A wet shroud swathed round ladye gay;
Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch:
     Why cross the gloomy firth today?"

" 'Tis not because Lord Lindesay's heir
     To-night at Roslin leads the ball,
But that my ladye-mother there
     Sits lonely in her castle-hall.

" 'Tis not because the ring they ride,
     And Lindesay at the ring rides well,
But that my sire the wine will chide,
     If 'tis not fill'd by Rosabelle."

O'er Roslin all that dreary night
     A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam;
'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light,
     And redder than the bright moonbeam.

It glar'd on Roslin's castled rock,
     It ruddied all the copse wood glen;
'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak
     And seen from cavern'd Hawthorn-den.

Seem'd all on fire that chapel proud,
     Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud,
     Sheath'd in his iron panoply.

Seem'd all on fire within, around,
     Deep sacristy and altar s pale;
Shone every plllar foliage bound,
     And glimmer'd all the dead men's mail.

Blaz'd battlement and pinnet high,
     Blaz'd every rose-carved buttress fair---
So still they blaze when fate is nigh
     The lordly line of high St. Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold
     Lie buried within that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold---
     But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle!

And each St. Clair was buried there,
     With candle, with book, and with knell;
But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung
     The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.

So sweet was Harold's piteous lay,
     Scarce mark'd the guests the darken'd hall,
Though, long before the sinking day,
     Awondrous shade involv'd them all:
It was not eddying mist or fog,
Drain'd by the sun from fen or bog;
     Of no eclipse had sages told;
And yet, as it came on apace,
Each one could scarce his neighbour's face,
     Could scarce his own stretch'd hand behold.
A secret horror check'd the feast,
And chill'd the soul of every guest;
Even the high Dame stood half aghast---
She knew some evil on the blast;
The elvish page fell to the ground,
And, shuddering, mutter'd, "Found! found! found!"

Then sudden,through the darken'd air,
     A flash of lightning came;
So broad, so bright, so red the glare,
     The castle seem d on flame.
Glanc d every rafter of the hall,
Glanc'd every shield upon the wall;

Each trophied beam, each sculptur'd stone,
Were instant seen, and instant gone; 
Full through the guests' bedazzled band
Resistless flash'd the levin-brand, 
And fill'd the hall with smoldering smoke, 
As on the elvish page it broke. 
     It broke, with thunder long and loud,
     Dismay'd the brave, appall'd the proud,---
          From sea to sea the larum rung;
     On Berwick wall, and at Carlisle withal,
          To arms the startled warders sprung.
When ended was the dreadful roar,
The elvish dwarf was seen no more!

Some heard a voice in Branksome Hall,
Some saw a sight, not seen by all
That dreadful voice was heard by some,
Cry, with loud summons, "GYLBIN, COME!"
     And on the spot where burst the brand
          Just where the page had flung him down,
     Some saw an arm, and some a hand,
          And some the waving of a gown.
The guests in silence pray'd and shook,
And terror dimm'd each lofty look.
But none of all the astonish'd train
Was so dismay'd as Deloraine
His blood did freeze, his brain did burn,
'Twas fear'd his mind would ne'er return;
     For he was speechless, ghastly, wan,
     Like him of whom the story ran
     Who spoke the spectre-hound in Man.
At length, by fits, he darkly told.
With broken hint, and shuddering cold,
     That he had seen, right certainly.
A shape with amice wrapp'd around,
With a wrought Spanish baldric bound,
     Like pilgrim from beyond thesea;
And knew---but how it matter'd not---
It was the wizard, Michael Scott.

The anxious crowd, with horror pale,
All trembling heard the wondrous tale;
     No sound was made, no word was spoke,
     Till noble Angus silence broke;
          And he a solemn sacred plight
     Did to St. Bride of Douglas make,
     That he a pilgrimage would take
     To Melrose Abbey, for the sake
          Of Michael's restless sprite.
Then each, to ease his troubled breast,
To some bless'd saint his prayers address'd:
Some to St. Modan made their vows,
Some to St. Mary of the Lowes,
Some to the Holy Rood of Lisle,
Some to our Ladye of the Isle;
Each did his patron witness make,
That he such pilgrimage would take,
And monks should sing, and bells should toll,
All for the weal of Michael's soul.
While vows were ta'en, and prayers were pray'd,
'Tis said the noble dame, dismay'd,
Renounc'd, for aye, dark magic's aid.

Nought of the bridal will I tell,
Which after in short space befell;
Nor how brave sons and daughters fair
Bless'd Teviot's Flower, and Cranstoun's heir:
After such dreadful scene, 'twere vain
To wake the note of mirth again.
     More meet it were to mark the day
          Of penitence, and prayer divine,
     When pilgrim-chiefs, in sad array,
          Sought Melrose' holy shrine.

With naked foot, and sackcloth vest,
And arms enfolded on his breast,
     Did every pilgrim go;
The standers-by might hear uneath,
Footstep, or voice, or high-drawn breath,
     Through all the lengthen'd row:
No lordly look, nor martial stride;
Gone was their glory, sunk their pride,
     Forgotten their renown
Silent and slow, like ghosts they glide
To the high altar's hallow'd side,
     And there they knelt them down:
Above the suppliant chieftains wave
The banners of departed brave;
Beneath the letter d stones were laid
The ashes of their fathers dead;
From many a garnish'd niche around,
Stern saints and tortur'd martyrs frown'd.

And slow up the dim aisle afar,
With sable cowl and scapular,
And snow-white stoles, in order due,
The holy Fathers, two and two,
     In long procession came;
Taper and host, and book they bare,
And holy banner, flourish'd fair
     With the Redeemer's name.
Above the prostrate pilgrim band
The mitred Abbot stretch'd his hand
     And bless'd them as they kneel'd
With holy cross he sign'd them all,
And pray'd they might be sage in hall,
     And fortunate in field.
Then mass was sung, and prayers were said,
And solemn requiem for the dead;
And bells toll'd out their mighty peal,
For the departed spirit's weal;
And ever in the office close
The hymn of intercession rose;
And far the echoing aisles prolong
The awful burthen of the song,---
     DIES IRAE, DIES ILLA,
     SOLVET SAECLUM IN FAVILLA,---
While the pealing organ rung.
     Were it meet with sacred strain
     To close my lay, so light and vain,
Thus the holy Fathers sung:

HYMN FOR THE DEAD
That day of wrath, that dreadful day,
When heaven and earth shall pass away,
What power shall be the sinner's stay?
How shall he meet that dreadful day?

When, shrivelling like a parched scroll,
The flaming heavens together roll;
When louder yet, and yet more dread,
Swells the high trump that wakes the dead:

Oh! on that day, that wrathful day,
When man to judgment wakes from clay,
Be THOU the trembling sinner's stay,
Though heaven and earth shall pass away!

HUSH'D is tho harp: the Minstrel gone.
And did he wander forth alone?
Alone, in indigence and age,
To linger out his pilgrimage?
No; close beneath proud Newark's tower,
Arose the Minstrel's lowly bower;
A simple hut; but there was seen
The little garden hedged with green,
The cheerful hearth, and lattice clean.
There shelter'd wanderers, by the blaze,
Oft heard the tale of other days
For much he lov'd to ope his door,
And give the aid he begg'd before.
So pass'd the winter's day; but still,
When summer smil'd on sweet Bowhill,
And July's eve, with balmy breath, 
Wav'd the blue-bells on Newark heath; 
When throstles sung in Harehead-shaw,
And corn was green on Carterhaugh,
And fiourish'd broad Blackandro's oak,
The aged Harper's soul awoke!
 
Then would he sing achievements high,
And circumstance of chivalry,
Till the rapt traveller would stay,
Forgetful of the closing day;
And noble youths, the strain to hear,
Forsook the hunting of the deer;
And Yarrow, as he roll'd along,
Bore burden to the Minstrel's song.