THE

OF

BY THE AUTHOR.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE poem now offered to the public is intended to illustrate the customs and manners which anciently prevailed on the Borders of England and Scotland. The inhabitants, living in a state partly pastoral and partly warlike, and combining habits of constant depredation with the influence of a rude spirit of chivalry, were often engaged in scenes highly susceptible of poetical ornament. As the description of scenery and manners was more the object of the author than a combined and regular narrative, the plan of the ancient metrical romance was adopted, which allows greater latitude, in this respect, than would be consistent with the dignity of a regular poem. The same model offered other facilities, as it permits an occasional alteration of measure, which, in some degree, authorises the change of rhythm in the text. The machinery also, adopted from popular belief, would have seemed puerile in a poem which did not partake of the rudeness of the old ballad or metrical romance.

For these reasons, the poem was put into the mouth of an ancient minstrel, the last of the race, who, as he is supposed to have survived the Revolution, might have caught somewhat of the refinement of modern poetry, without losing the simplicity of his original The date of the Tale itself is about the middle of the sixteenth century, when most of the personages actually flourished. The time occupied by the action is three nights and three days.

model.

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, well-a-day! 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.

gone,

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
And of Earl Walter, 3 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 sate,
Where she with all her ladies state,
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 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 recal 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.

Anne, Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, representative of the ancient lords of Buccleuch, and widow of the unfortunate James, Duke of Monmouth, who was beheaded in 1685.

Francis Scott, Earl of Buccleuch, father to the duchess.

3 Walter, Earl of Buccleuch, grandfather to the duchess, and a celebrated warrior.

V.

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 saddle-bow: (3)
A hundred more fed free in stall :-
Such was the custom of Branksome-hall.

VI.

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 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. (4)

VII.

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! (5) 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 yellThen the Chief of Branksome fell.

VIII.

Can piety the discord heal,

Or staunch 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; (6)
Implored, in vain, the grace divine

For chiefs their own red falchions slew : While Cessford owns the rule of Car, (7) 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!

IX.

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;

The war-cry, or gathering word of a Border clan.

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 revenged shall be !»
Then fast the mother's tears did seek
To dew the infant's kindling cheek.
X.

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
Dared she to look for sympathy.
Her lover, 'gainst her father's clan,
With Car 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, (8)
Would see her on her dying bed.

XI.

Of noble race the Ladye came;
Her father was a clerk of fame,

Of Bethune's line of Picardie: (9)
He learn'd the art that none may name,
In Padua, far beyond the sea. (10)
Men said he changed his mortal frame
By feat of magic mystery;

For when, in studious mood, he paced St Andrew's cloister'd hall,

His form no darkening shadow traced Upon the sunny wall! (11)

XII.

And of his skill, as bards avow,
He taught that Ladye fair,
Till to her bidding she could bow

The viewless forms of air. (12)
And now she sits in secret bower,
In old Lord David's western tower,
And listens to a heavy sound,

That moans the mossy turrets 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?

XIII.

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!

Scar, a precipitous bank of earth.

And, with jocund din, among them all,
Her son pursued his infant play.
A fancied moss-trooper, (13) 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,

A stark moss-trooping Scott was he,
As e'er couch'd Border lance by knee:
Through Solway sands, through Tarrass moss,
Blindfold he knew the paths to cross;

By wily turns, by desperate bounds,
Had baffled Percy's best blood-hounds; (16)
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.

XXII.

Sir William of Deloraine, good at need,
Mount thee on the wightest steed;
Spare not to spur, nor stint to ride,
Until you 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.

XXIII.

«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 thou hadst ne'er been born.»>

Foray, a predatory inroad.

Alluding to the armorial bearings of the Scotts and Cars.