of the provocation, seemed to his kinsmen to jus- The Regent's death happened 23d January 1569. It is applauded or stigmatized, by contemporary historians, according to their religious or party prejudices. The triumph of Blackwood is unbounded. He not only extols the pious feat of Bothwellhaugh, "who," he observes, "satisfied, with a single ounce of lead, him, whose sacrilegious avarice had stripped the metropolitan church of St Andrews of its covering;" but he ascribes it to immediate divine inspiration, and the escape of Hamilton to little less than the miraculous interference of the Deity.-JEBB, vol. ii. p. 263. With equal injustice, it was, by others, made the ground of a general national reflection; for, when Mather urged Berney to assassinate Burleigh, and quoted the examples of Poltrot and Bothwellhaugh, the other conspirator answered, "that neyther Poltrot nor Hambleton did attempt their enterpryse, without some reason or consideration to lead them to it; as the one, by hyre, and promise of preferment or rewarde; the other, upon desperate mind of revenge, for a lyttle wrong done unto him, as the report goethe, according to the vyle trayterous dysposysyon of the hoole natyon of the Scottes."-MURDIN'S State Papers, vol. i. p. 197. CADYOW CASTLE. ADDRESSED TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LADY ANNE HAMILTON.1 BY WALTER SCOTT. WHEN princely Hamilton's abode The song went round, the goblet flow'd, Then, thrilling to the harp's gay sound, As mirth and music cheer'd the hall. 1 [Eldest daughter of Archibald, 9th Duke of Hamilton.ED.] But Cadyow's towers, in ruins laid, Yet still, of Cadyow's faded fame, For thou, from scenes of courtly pride, From pleasure's lighter scenes, canst turn, To draw oblivion's pall aside, And mark the long-forgotten urn. Then, noble maid! at thy command, Where, with the rock's wood cover'd side, Rise turrets in fantastic pride, And feudal banners flaunt between : Where the rude torrent's brawling course Was shagg'd with thorn and tangling sloe, The ashler buttress braves its force, And ramparts frown in battled row. 'Tis night-the shade of keep and spire And on the wave the warder's fire Fades slow their light; the east is grey; The drawbridge falls-they hurry out- Urge the shy steed, and slack the rein. First of his troop, the Chief rode on;1 The steed of princely Hamilton Was fleeter than the mountain wind. From the thick copse the roebucks bound, For the hoarse bugle's warrior sound Has roused their mountain haunts again. 1 The head of the family of Hamilton, at this period, was James, Earl of Arran, Duke of Chatelherault, in France, and first peer of the Scottish realm. In 1569, he was appointed by Queen Mary her lieutenant-general in Scotland, under the singular title of her adopted father. |