To chafe thy mood and cloud thy brow:
Enough, I am by promise tied

To match me with this man of pride.
Twice have I sought Clan-Alpine's glen
In peace; but when I come again,
I come with banner, brand, and bow,
As leader seeks his mortal foe.
For love-lorn swain in lady's bower
Ne'er panted for the appointed hour
As I, until before me stand

This rebel chieftain and his band."

6. "Have, then, thy wish!" He whistled shrill, And he was answered from the hill:

Wild as the scream of the curlew,
From crag to crag the signal flew.
Instant, through copse and heath, arose
Bonnets and spears and bended bows;
On right, on left, above, below,
Sprung up at once the lurking foe;
From shingles gray their lances start;
The bracken bush sends forth the dart;
The rushes and the willow-wand
Are bristling into axe and brand;
And every tuft of broom gives life
To plaided warrior armed for strife.
That whistle garrisoned the glen
At once with full five hundred men,
As if the yawning hill to heaven
A subterranean host had given.

7. Watching their leader's beck and will, All silent there they stood, and still,

Like the loose crags whose threatening mass
Lay tottering o'er the hollow pass,

As if an infant's touch could urge

Their headlong passage down the verge;
With step and weapon forward flung,
Upon the mountain-side they hung.
The mountaineer cast glance of pride
Along Benledi's living side,

Then fixed his eye and sable brow

Full on Fitz-James: "How sayest thou now?
These are Clan-Alpine's warriors true;

And, Saxon, I am Roderick Dhu !"

8. Fitz-James was brave. Though to his heart
The life-blood thrilled with sudden start,
He manned himself with dauntless air,
Returned the chief his haughty stare;
His back against a rock he bore,
And firmly placed his foot before:
"Come one, come all! This rock shall fly
From its firm base as soon as I."
Sir Roderick marked, and in his eyes
Respect was mingled with surprise,
And the stern joy which warriors feel
In foemen worthy of their steel.

9. Short space he stood, then waved his hand:
Down sunk the disappearing band;

Each warrior vanished where he stood,
In broom or bracken, heath or wood ;
Sunk brand and spear and bended bow
In osiers pale and copses low:

It seemed as if their mother Earth
Had swallowed up her warlike birth.
The wind's last breath had tossed in air
Pennon and plaid and plumage fair;
The next but swept a lone hill-side,
Where heath and fern were waving wide:
The sun's last glance was glinted back
From spear and glaive, from targe and jack;
The next all unreflected shone

On bracken green and cold gray stone.

10. Fitz-James looked round, yet scarce believed
The witness that his sight received:
Such apparition well might seem
Delusion of a dreadful dream.
Sir Roderick in suspense he eyed,
And to his look the chief replied :
“Fear naught—nay, that I need not say;
But-doubt not aught from mine array.
Thou art my guest: I pledged my word
As far as Coilantogle ford;

Nor would I call a clansman's brand
For aid against one valiant hand,
Though on our strife lay every vale
Rent by the Saxon from the Gael.
So move we on: I only meant
To show the reed on which you leant,
Deeming this path you might pursue
Without a pass from Roderick Dhu.”

11. They moved.

I said Fitz-James was brave As ever knight that belted glaive,

Yet dare not say that now his blood
Kept on its wont and tempered flood,
As, following Roderick's stride, he drew
That seeming lonesome pathway through,
Which yet, by fearful proof, was rife
With lances that to take his life
Waited but signal from a guide
So late dishonored and defied.

12. Ever by stealth his eye sought round
The vanished guardians of the ground,
And still from copse and heather deep
Fancy saw spear and broadsword peep,
And in the plover's shrilly strain
The signal-whistle heard again.
Nor breathed he free till far behind
The pass was left; for then they wind
Along a wide and level green,
Where neither tree nor tuft was seen;
Nor rush nor bush of broom was near,
To hide a bonnet or a spear.

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

DEFINITIONS.—2. Gael, a Scotch Highlander. Sooth, truth. 3. Lūre, attraction. 5. A vow', to declare. Chāfe, to fret. 6. €ûr'lew, a wading bird. Brack'en, fern. Sub ter ra'ne an, underground. 7. Beek, signal. Săx'on, a name given by the Highlanders to those not of Gaelic descent. 9. Ō'şiers, willows. Ğlint ́ed, reflected; glanced. Glaive, a broadsword. Tärge, a small shield or buckler. Jǎek, a species of armor. 11. Rife, abounding.

NOTES. Fitz James and Roderick Dhu. The poem of The Lady of the Lake, from which this extract is taken, relates the supposed adventures of James V. of Scotland. Roderick Dhu ("Black Roderick") was the chief of Clan-Alpine, a tribe of Highlanders in arms against the king. 7. Ben lěd'i is a mountain of Scotland, in the county of Perth.

82.-EXECUTION OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS.

JOHN LINGARD was born at Winchester, England, February 5, 1771. He was a clergyman of the Roman Catholic Church. His chief work was a History of England from the Invasion by the Romans. He also published The Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church in 1809. His History has now taken its place among the most valuable of our standard works. His style is simple and chaste, and exhibits thorough and patient research into the facts of English history. He died July 13, 1851.

1. THE queen seated herself on a stool which was prepared for her. On her right stood the two earls; on the left, the sheriff and Beal, the clerk of the Council; in front, the executioner from the Tower, in a suit of black velvet, with his assistant, also clad in black. The warrant was read, and Mary, in an audible voice, addressed the assembly.

2. She would have them recollect that she was a sovereign princess,—not subject to the Parliament of England, but brought there to suffer by injustice and violence. She, however, thanked her God that He had given her this opportunity of publicly professing her religion, and of declaring, as she had often before declared, that she had never imagined, nor compassed, nor consented to, the death of the English queen, nor even sought the least harm to her person. After her death, many things which were then buried in darkness would come to light. But she pardoned from her heart all her enemies, nor should her tongue utter that which might turn to their prejudice.

3. Here she was interrupted by Dr. Fletcher, Dean of Peterborough, who, having caught her eye, began to preach, and under that cover, perhaps through motives of zeal, contrived to insult the feelings of the unfortunate sufferer. Mary repeatedly desired him not to trouble himself and her. He persisted; she turned aside. He made the circuit of the scaffold, and again addressed her in front.