His gorgeous collar hung adown,

Wrought with the badge of Scotland's crown,

The thistle brave, of old renown;

His trusty blade, Toledo right,
Descended from a baldric bright;
White were his buskins, on the heel
His spurs inlaid of gold and steel;

His bonnet, all of crimson fair,

Was buttoned with a ruby rare :

And Marmion deemed he ne'er had seen

A prince of such a noble mien.

IX..

The Monarch's form was middle size;

For feat of strength, or exercise,

Shaped in proportion fair;

And hazle was his eagle eye,

And auburn of the darkest dye,

His short curled beard and hair. Light was his footstep in the dance,

And firm his stirrup in the lists;

And, oh! he had that merry glance,

That seldom lady's heart resists.
Lightly from fair to fair he flew,
And loved to plead, lament, and sue;—
Suit lightly won, and short-lived pain!
For monarchs seldom sigh in vain.

I said he joyed in banquet-bower;

But, mid his mirth, 'twas often strange,
How suddenly his cheer would change,

His look o'ercast and lower,

If, in a sudden turn, he felt

The pressure of his iron belt,

That bound his breast in penance-pain,

In memory of his father slain.

Even so 'twas strange how, evermore,

Soon as the passing pang was o'er,

Forward he rushed, with double glee,

Into the stream of revelry:

Thus, dim-seen object of affright

Startles the courser in his flight,

And half he halts, half springs aside;
But feels the quickening spur applied,

And, straining on the tightened rein,

Scours doubly swift o'er hill and plain.

X.

O'er James's heart, the courtiers say,

Sir Hugh the Heron's wife held sway :

To Scotland's court she came,

To be a hostage for her lord,

Who Cessford's gallant heart had gored,

And with the King to make accord,

Had sent his lovely dame.

Nor to that lady free alone

Did the gay King allegiance own ;

For the fair Queen of France

Sent him a Turquois ring, and glove,

And charged him, as her knight and love,

For her to break a lance;

And strike three strokes with Scottish brand,

And march three miles on Southron land,

And bid the banners of his band

In English breezes dance.

And thus, for France's Queen, he drest

His manly limbs in mailed vest;

And thus admitted English fair,

His inmost counsels still to share;

And thus, for both, he madly planned

The ruin of himself and land!

And yet, the sooth to tell,

Nor England's fair, nor France's Queen,

Were worth one pearl-drop, bright and sheen.

From Margaret's eyes that fell,

His own Queen Margaret, who, in Lithgow's bower, All lonely sat, and wept the weary hour.

XI.

The Queen sits lone in Lithgow pile,

And weeps the weary day,

The war against her native soil,

Her Monarch's risk in battle broil;

And in gay Holy-Rood, the while,

Dame Heron rises with a smile

Upon the harp to play.

Fair was her rounded arm, as o'er

The strings her fingers flew ;

And as she touched and tuned them all,

Ever her bosom's rise and fall

Was plainer given to view;

For all, for heat, was laid aside,
Her wimple, and her hood untied.

And first she pitched her voice to sing,

Then glanced her dark eye on the King,

And then around the silent ring;

And laughed, and blushed, and oft did say

Her pretty oath, by Yea, and Nay,

She could not, would not, durst not play!

At length, upon the harp, with glee,

Mingled with arch simplicity,

A soft, yet lively, air she rung,

While thus the wily lady sung.

R