His unblest feet his native seat, 'Mid Eske's fair woods, regain; Thro' woods more fair no stream more sweet

Rolls to the eastern main.

And lords to meet the pilgrim came,
And vassals bent the knee;
For all 'mid Scotland's chiefs of fame,
Was none more famed than he.

And boldly for his country, still,
In battle he had stood,

Ay, even when on the banks of Till
Her noblest pour'd their blood.
Sweet are the paths, O passing sweet!
By Eske's fair streams that run,
O'er airy steep, through copsewood
deep,

Impervious to the sun.

There the rapt poet's step may rove,
And yield the muse the day;
There Beauty, led by timid Love,
May shun the tell-tale ray;

From that fair dome, where suit is paid,
By blast of bugle free,

To Auchendinny's hazel glade,
And haunted Woodhouselee.

Who knows not Melville's beechy grove,
And Roslin's rocky glen,

Dalkeith, which all the virtues love,
And classic Hawthornden?

Yet never a path, from day to day,
The pilgrim's footsteps range,
Save but the solitary way

To Burndale's ruin'd grange.

A woful place was that, I ween,
As sorrow could desire;

For nodding to the fall was each crumbling wall,

And the roof was scathed with fire.

It fell upon a summer's eve,

While, on Carnethy's head, The last faint gleams of the sun's low beams

Had streak'd the grey with red; And the convent bell did vespers tell,

Newbattle's oaks among,

And mingled with the solemn knell
Our Ladye's evening song:

The heavy knell, the choir's faint swell, Came slowly down the wind,

And on the pilgrim's ear they fell,

As his wonted path he did find.
Deep sunk in thought, I ween, he was,
Nor ever raised his eye,

Until he came to that dreary place,
Which did all in ruins lie.

He gazed on the walls, so scathed with fire,

With many a bitter groanAnd there was aware of a Gray Friar, Resting him on a stone.

"Now, Christ thee save!" said the Gray Brother;

"Some pilgrim thou seemest to be." But in sore amaze did Lord Albert gaze, Nor answer again made he.

Which for ever will cling to me."

Now, woful pilgrim, say not so!
But kneel thee down to me,

And shrive thee so clean of thy deadly sin,

That absolved thou mayst be."

And who art thou, thou Gray Brother, That I should shrive to thee,

When He, to whom are given the keys of earth and heaven,

Has no power to pardon me?"— "O I am sent from a distant clime,

Five thousand miles away, And all to absolve a foul, foul crime, Done here 'twixt night and day." The pilgrim kneel'd him on the sand, And thus began his saye— When on his neck an ice-cold hand Did that Gray Brother laye.

*

GG

WHEN fruitfulClydesdale's apple-bowers

Are mellowing in the noon; When sighs round Pembroke's ruin'd

towers

The sultry breath of June;

When Clyde, despite his sheltering wood,
Must leave his channel dry;
And vainly o'er the limpid flood
The angler guides his fly;

If chance by Bothwell's lovely braes
A wanderer thou hast been,
Or hid thee from the summer's blaze
In Blantyre's bowers of green,
Full where the copsewood opens wild
Thy pilgrim step hath staid,
Where Bothwell's towers, in ruin piled,
O'erlook the verdant glade;

And many a tale of love and fear

Hath mingled with the scene

Of Bothwell's banks that bloom'd so dear,

And Bothwell's bonny Jean.

O, if with rugged minstrel lays
Unsated be thy ear,

And thou of deeds of other days
Another tale wilt hear.-

Then all beneath the spreading beech,
Flung careless on the lea,

The Gothic muse the tale shall teach Of Bothwell's sisters three.

Wight Wallace stood on Deckmont head,

He blew his bugle round,
Till the wild bull in Cadyow wood
Has started at the sound.

St. George's cross, o'er Bothwell hung,
Was waving far and wide,
And from the lofty turret flung

Its crimson blaze on Clyde;

And rising at the bugle blast

That marked the Scottish foe, Old England's yeomen muster'd fast, And bent the Norman bow.

Tall in the midst Sir Aylmer rose, Proud Pembroke's Earl was heWhile "

But more rough and rude are the men of blood,

That hunt my life below!

"Yon spell-bound den, as the aged tell, Was hewn by demon's hands;

But I had lourd * melle with the fiends of hell,

Than with Clavers and his band."

He heard the deep-mouth'd bloodhound bark,

He heard the horses neigh,
He plunged him in the cavern dark,
And downward sped his way.

Now faintly down the winding path

Came the cry of the faulting hound, And the mutter'd oath of baulked wrath Was lost in hollow sound.

He threw him on the flinted floor,
And held his breath for fear;
He rose and bitter cursed his foes,
As the sounds died on his ear.

"O bare thine arm, thou battling Lord, For Scotland's wandering band; Dash from the oppressor's grasp the sword,

And sweep him from the land!

"Forget not thou thy people's groans From dark Dunnotter's tower, Mix'd with the seafowl's shrilly moans, And ocean's bursting roar ! "O, in fell Clavers' hour of pride, Even in his mightiest day,

As bold he strides through conquest's tide,

O stretch him on the clay !

His widow and his little ones,
O may their tower of trust
Remove its strong foundation stones,
And crush them in the dust !"--

"Sweet prayers to me," a voice replied,
"Thrice welcome, guest of mine!
And glimmering on the cavern side,
A light was seen to shine.
An aged man, in amice brown,
Stood by the wanderer's side,
*Lourd: i.e. liefer-rather.

By powerful charm, a dead man's arm The torch's light supplied.

From each stiff finger, stretch'd upright,
Arose a ghastly flame,

That waved not in the blast of night
Which through the cavern came.

O, deadly blue was that taper's hue,
That flamed the cavern o'er,

But more deadly blue was the ghastly hue
Of his eyes who the taper bore.

He laid on his head a hand like lead,
As heavy, pale, and cold—
"Vengeance be thine, thou guest of mine,
If thy heart be firm and bold.

"But if faint thy heart, and caitiff fear Thy recreant sinews know,

The mountain erne thy heart shall tear,
Thy nerves the hooded crow.'
The wanderer raised him undismay'd:
"My soul, by dangers steel'd,
Is stubborn as my border blade,

Which never knew to yield.

"And if thy power can speed the hour
Of vengeance on my foes,
Theirs be the fate, from bridge and gate,
To feed the hooded crows.

The Brownie look'd him in the face,
And his colour fled with speed-
"I fear me," quoth he," uneath it will be
To match thy word and deed.

"In ancient days when English bands Sore ravaged Scotland fair,

The sword and shield of Scottish land Was valiant Halbert Kerr.

"A warlock loved the warrior well, Sir Michael Scott by name, And he sought for his sake a spell to make,

Should the Southern foemen tame. "Look thou,' he said, 'from Cessford head,

As the July sun sinks low, And when glimmering white on Cheviot's height

Thou shalt spy a wreath of snow,

The haughty Saxon foe.'

"For many a year wrought the wizard here,

In Cheviot's bosom low,

Till the spell was complete, and in July's heat

Appear'd December's snow;
But Cessford's Halbert never came
The wondrous cause to know.
"For years before in Bowden aisle

The warrior's bones had lain,
And after short while, by female guile,
Sir Michael Scott was slain.

"But me and my brethren in this cell

His mighty charms retain,And he that can quell the powerful spell Shall o'er broad Scotland reign.” He led him through an iron door

And up a winding stair, And in wild amaze did the wanderer gaze

On the sight which open'd there. Through the gloomy night flash'd ruddy light,

A thousand torches glow; The cave rose high, like the vaulted sky, O'er stalls in double row.

In every stall of that endless hall

Stood a steed in barbing bright;

At the foot of each steed, all arm'd save the head,

Lay stretch'd a stalwart knight.

In each mail'd hand was a naked brand; As they lay on the black bull's hide, Each visage stern did upwards turn,

With eyeballs fix'd and wide.

A launcegay strong, full twelve ells long, By every warrior hung;

At each pommel there, for battle yare,
A Jedwood axe was slung.

The casque hung near each cavalier;
The plumes waved mournfully
At every tread which the wanderer made
Through the hall of gramarye.

The ruddy beam of the torches' gleam
That glared the warriors on,

Reflected light from armour bright,
In noontide splendour shone.
And onward seen in lustre sheen,
Still lengthening on the sight,
Through the boundless hall stood steeds
in stall,

And by each lay a sable knight.

Still as the dead lay each horseman dread, And moved nor limb nor tongue; Each steed stood stiff as an earthfast cliff,

Nor hoof nor bridle rung.

No sounds through all the spacious hall The deadly still divide,

Save where echoes aloof from the vaulted roof

To the wanderer's step replied.

At length before his wondering eyes, On an iron column borne, Of antique shape, and giant size, Appear'd a sword and horn. "Now choose thee here," quoth his leader,

"Thy venturous fortune try; Thy woe and weal, thy boot and bale, In yon brand and bugle lie.'

To the fatal brand he mounted his hand, But his soul did quiver and quail; The life-blood did start to his shuddering heart,

And left him wan and pale.

The brand he forsook, and the horn he took

To 'say a gentle sound; But so wild a blast from the bugle brast,

That the Cheviot rock'd around.

From Forth to Tees, from seas to seas,
The awful bugle rung;

On Carlisle wall, and Berwick withal,
To arms the warders sprung.

With clank and clang the cavern rang,

The steeds did stamp and neigh; And loud was the yell as each warrior fell Sterte up with hoop and cry.

"Woe, woe," they cried, "thou caitiff coward,

That ever thou wert born!