The old man raised his face and smiled;
And lightened 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.
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
Loitered through the lofty hall,
Or crowded round the ample fire:
The stag-hounds, weary with the chase,
Lay stretched upon the 'rushy floor,
And urged 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 sheathed 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 corselet laced,
Pillowed on buckler cold and hard;
They carved at the meal
With gloves of steel,
And they drank the red wine through the helmet
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,
"Barded with frontlet of steel, I °trow,
And with Jedwood-axe at saddle-bow;
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 armed by night?
They watch to hear the bloodhound baying;
They watch to hear the war-horn braying;
To see Saint George's red cross streaming,
To see the midnight beacon gleaming;
They watch against 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 oyell,
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,
Implored 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 slaughtered 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 dropped nor flower nor tear!
Vengeance, deep-brooding o'er the slain,
Had locked the source of softer woe,
And burning pride and high disdain
Forbade the rising tear to flow;
Until, amid his sorrowing clan,
Her son lisped from the nurse's knee,
"And if I live to be a man,
My father's death revenged 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 slaughtered 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 altered eye
Dared she to look for sympathy.
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