CONCLUSION.

Go forth, my Song, upon thy venturous way;
Go boldly forth; nor yet thy master blame,
Who chose no patron for his humble lay,

And graced thy numbers with no friendly name, Whose partial zeal might smooth thy path to fame. There was—and O! how many sorrows crowd Into these two brief words!—there was a claim

By generous friendship given-had fate allowed, It well had bid thee rank the proudest of the proud!

All angel now-yet little less than all,

While still a pilgrim in our world below! What 'vails it us that patience to recall,

Which hid its own, to sooth all other wo; What 'vails to tell, how Virtue's purest glow Shone yet more lovely in a form so fair ;— And, least of all, what 'vails the world should know, That one poor garland, twined to deck thy hair, Is hung upon thy hearse, to droop and wither there!

17*

NOTES.

NOTES

TO

CANTO FIRST.

Note I.

Thy rugged halls, Artornish ! rung.-St. I. p. 11. The ruins of the castle of Artornish are situated upon a premontory, on the Morven, or mainland side of the Sound of Mull, a name given to the deep arm of the sea, which divides that island from the continent. The situation is wild and romantic in the highest degree, having on the one hand a high and precipitous chain of rocks overhanging the sea, and on the other the narrow entrance to the beautiful salt-water lake, called Loch-Alline, which is in many places finely fringed with copse-wood. The ruins of Artornish are not now very considerable, and consist chiefly of the remains of an old keep, or tower, with fragments of outward defences. But, in former days, it was a place of great consequence, being one of the principal strong-holds which the Lords of the Isles, during the period of their stormy independence, possessed upon the mainland of Argyleshire. Here they assembled what popular tradition calls their parliaments, meaning, I suppose, their cour pleniere, or assembly of feudal and patriarchal vassals and dependants. From this castle of Artornish, upon the 19th day of October, 1461, John de Vle, designing himself Earl of Ross, and Lord of the Isles, granted, in the style of an independent sovereign, a commission to his trusty and well-beloved cousins, Ro