There's Derby and Cavendish, dread of their foes; There's Erin's high Ormond, and Scotland's Montrose!
Would you match the base Skippon, and Massey, and Brown,
With the Barons of England, that fight for the Crown?
Now joy to the crest of the brave Cavalier!
Be his banner unconquer'd, resistless his spear,
Till in peace and in triumph his toils he may
drown,
In a pledge to fair England, her Church, and her
Crown.1
"Alas!" Matilda said, "that strain,
Good harper, now is heard in vain!
The time has been, at such a sound,
When Rokeby's vassals gather'd round,
An hundred manly hearts would bound;
But now, the stirring verse we hear,
Like trump in dying soldier's ear! 2
1 [In the MS. the last quatrain of this song is,
If they boast that fair Reading by treachery fell,
Of Stratton and Lansdoune the Cornish can tell,
And the North tell of Braham and Adderton Down,
Where God bless'd the brave gallants who fought for the Crown."]
2 [MS." But now it sinks upon the ear,
Like dirge beside a hero's bier."]
Listless and sad the notes we own,
The power to answer them is flown.
Yet not without his meet applause
Be he that sings the rightful cause,
Even when the crisis of its fate
To human eye seems desperate.
While Rokeby's Heir such power retains,
Let this slight guerdon pay thy pains:-
And, lend thy harp; I fain would try,
If my poor skill can ought supply,
Ere yet I leave my fathers' hall,
To mourn the cause in which we fall."
The harper, with a downcast look,
And trembling hand, her bounty took.-
As yet, the conscious pride of art
Had steel'd him in his treacherous part;
A powerful spring, of force unguess'd,
That hath each gentler mood suppress'd,
And reign'd in many a human breast;
From his that plans the red campaign,
To his that wastes the woodland reign.
The failing wing, the blood-shot eye,-1
The sportsman marks with apathy,
Each feeling of his victim's ill
Drown'd in his own successful skill.
1 [MS.-"Marking, with sportive cruelty,
The failing wing, the blood-shot eye."]
15
The veteran, too, who now no more
Aspires to head the battle's roar,1
Loves still the triumph of his art,
And traces on the pencill'd chart
Some stern invader's destined way,
Through blood and ruin, to his prey;
Patriots to death, and towns to flame,
He dooms, to raise another's name,
And shares the guilt, though not the fame.
What pays him for his span of time
Spent in premeditating crime?
What against pity arms his heart?
It is the conscious pride of art 2
But principles in Edmund's mind
Were baseless, vague, and undefined.
His soul, like bark with rudder lost,
On Passion's changeful tide was tost;
Nor Vice nor Virtue had the power
Beyond the impression of the hour;
And, O! when Passion rules, how rare
The hours that fall to Virtue's share!
1 [MS." The veteran chief whose broken age, No more can lead the battle's rage."]
2 ["Surely no poet has ever paid a finer tribute to the power of his art, than in the foregoing description of its effects on the mind of this unhappy boy! and none has ever more justly appreciated the worthlessness of the sublimest genius, unrestrained by reason, and abandoned by virtue."— Critica! Review.]
Yet now she roused her-for the pride,
That lack of sterner guilt supplied,
Could scarce support him when arose
The lay that mourn'd Matilda's woes.
The sound of Rokeby's woods I hear,
They mingle with the song:
Dark Greta's voice is in mine ear,
I must not hear them long.
From every loved and native haunt
The native Heir must stray,
And, like a ghost whom sunbeams daunt,
Must part before the day.
Soon from the halls my fathers rear'd,
Their scutcheons,may descend,
A line so long beloved and fear'd
May soon obscurely end.
No longer here Matilda's tone
Shall bid those echoes swell;
Yet shall they hear her proudly own
The cause in which we fell.
The Lady paused, and then again
Resumed the lay in loftier strain.1
1 [This couplet is not in the MS.]
Let our halls and towers decay,
Be our name and line forgot,
Lands and manors pass away,-
We but share our Monarch's lot.
If no more our annals show
Battles won and banners taken, 'Still in death, defeat, and wo, Ours be loyalty unshaken!
Constant still in danger's hour,
Princes own'd our fathers' aid; Lands and honours, wealth and power,1 Well their loyalty repaid. Perish wealth, and power, and pride! Mortal boons by mortals given: But let Constancy abide,
Constancy's the gift of Heaven.
While thus Matilda's lay was heard,
A thousand thoughts in Edmund stirr❜d.
In peasant life he might have known
As fair a face, as sweet a tone;
But village notes could ne'er supply
That rich and varied melody;
And ne'er in cottage-maid was seen
The easy dignity of mien,
1 [MS. "Knightly titles, wealth and power."]
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