THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL. CANTO SIXTH. I. 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 burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned, High though his titles, proud his name, Despite those titles, power, and pelf, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung. II. 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 That knits me to thy rugged strand! 12 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, Still feel the breeze down Ettricke break, The Bard may draw his parting groan, III. Not scorned like me! to Branksome Hall The Minstrels came, at festive call ; Battle and banquet both they shared. They blew their death-note in the vans M |