[1771-1832

LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL,
From the Introduction.

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 e'en 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 obtained;
The aged minstrel audience gained;
But, when he reached the room of state,
Where she, with all her ladies, sate,
Perchance he wished 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 praised 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 played it to King Charles the Good,
When he kept court in Holyrood;

And much he wished, yet feared to try
The long-forgotten melody.

Amid the strings his fingers strayed,
And an uncertain warbling made;
And oft he shook his hoary head-
But when he caught the measure wild,
The old man raised his face and smiled;
And lighted 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.

Nine-and-twenty knights of fame

Hung their shields in Branksome Hall;
Nine-and-twenty squires of name

Brought them their steeds from bower to stall! .

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 barred. . . .

Thirty steeds, both fleet and wight,
Stood saddled in stable day and night.
Why do these steeds stand ready dight?
Why watch these warriors, armed, 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 against Southern force or guile,

Lest Scroop, or Howard, or Percy's powers,
Threaten Branksome's lordly towers,

From Warkworth, or Naworth, or merry Carlisle..
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.

...

While Cessford owns the rule of Car,
While Ettrick boasts the line of Scott,
The slaughtered chiefs, the mortal jar,
The havoc of the feudal war,

Shall never, never be forgot.

Canto II. I.

If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moon-light;
For the gay beams of lightsome day,
Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray.

When the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruined central tower ;-
When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem framed 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 ruined pile;
And home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!

II. 7, 8.

The pillared arches were over their head,

And beneath their feet were the bones of the dead. Spreading herbs and flowerets bright,

Glistened with the dew of night;

Nor herb, nor floweret, glistened there,

But was carved in the cloister arches as fair. . .

II.

The moon on the east oriel shone,

Through slender shafts of shapely stone,

By foliaged tracery combined;

Thou wouldst have thought some fairy's hand
'Twixt poplars straight the ozier wand,

In many a freakish knot, had twined;
Then framed a spell, when the work was done,
And changed the willow-wreaths to stone.

Canto VI.

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, From wandering on a foreign strand !

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 has been,

Seems as to me of all bereft,

Sole friends thy woods and streams were left;

And thus I love them better still,

E'en in extremity of ill.

IV. 16.

The Harper smiled, well pleased; for ne'er

Was flattery lost on poet's ear.

A simple race! they waste their toil

For the vain tribute of a smile.

From-THE LADY OF THE LAKE.
II. 22.

Some feelings are to mortals given,

With less of earth in them than heaven.