To chase the fiend and win the prize In that same dungeon ever tries An aged necromantic priest; It is an hundred years at least
Since 'twixt them first the strife begun, And neither yet has lost nor won. And oft the conjurer's words will make The stubborn demon groan and quake ; And oft the bands of iron break, Or bursts one lock that still amain, Fast as 't is opened, shuts again. That magic strife within the tomb May last until the day of doom, Unless the adept shall learn to tell The very word that clenched the spell
When Franch'mont locked the treasure cell. An hundred years are passed and gone,
And scarce three letters has he won.
Such general superstition may Excuse for old Pitscottie say, Whose gossip history has given
My song the messenger from heaven
That warned, in Lithgow, Scotland's king, Nor less the infernal summoning;
May pass the Monk of Durham's tale,
Whose demon fought in Gothic mail; May pardon plead for Fordun grave, Who told of Gifford's Goblin-Cave. But why such instances to you, Who in an instant can renew
Your treasured hoards of various lore, And furnish twenty thousand more? Hoards, not like theirs whose volumes rest Like treasures in the Franch'mont chest,
While gripple owners still refuse To others what they cannot use ; Give them the priest's whole century, They shall not spell you letters three, - Their pleasure in the books the same The magpie takes in pilfered gem. Thy volumes, open as thy heart, Delight, amusement, science, art, To every ear and eye impart ;
Yet who, of all who thus employ them, Can like the owner's self enjoy them? But, hark! I hear the distant drum ! The day of Flodden Field is come, Adieu, dear Heber! life and health, And store of literary wealth.
WHILE great events were on the gale, And each hour brought a varying tale, And the demeanor, changed and cold, Of Douglas fretted Marmion bold, And, like the impatient steed of war, He snuffed the battle from afar,
And hopes were none that back again Herald should come from Terouenne, Where England's king in leaguer lay, Before decisive battle-day,
While these things were, the mournful Clare Did in the dame's devotions share;
For the good countess ceaseless prayed To Heaven and saints her sons to aid, And with short interval did pass
From prayer to book, from book to mass, And all in high baronial pride, A life both dull and dignified: Yet, as Lord Marmion nothing pressed Upon her intervals of rest, Dejected Clara well could bear
'The formal state, the lengthened prayer, Though dearest to her wounded heart The hours that she might spend apart.
I said Tantallon's dizzy steep
Hung o'er the margin of the deep.
Many a rude tower and rampart there Repelled the insult of the air,
Which, when the tempest vexed the sky,
Half breeze, half spray, came whistling by. Above the rest a turret square Did o'er its Gothic entrance bear, Of sculpture rude, a stony shield; The Bloody Heart was in the field, And in the chief three mullets stood, The cognizance of Douglas blood. The turret held a narrow stair,
Which, mounted, gave you access where
A parapet's embattled row
Did seaward round the castle go. Sometimes in dizzy steps descending, Sometimes in narrow circuit bending, Sometimes in platform broad extending, Its varying circle did combine Bulwark, and bartizan, and line, And bastion, tower, and vantage-coign. Above the booming ocean leant The far-projecting battlement; The billows burst in ceaseless flow Upon the precipice below.
Where'er Tantallon faced the land, Gate-works and walls were strongly manned. No need upon the sea-girt side :
The steepy rock and frantic tide Approach of human step denied,
And thus these lines and ramparts rude Were left in deepest solitude.
And, for they were so lonely, Clare Would to these battlements repair, And muse upon her sorrows there, And list the sea-bird's cry,
Or slow, like noontide ghost, would glide Along the dark-gray bulwarks' side, And ever on the heaving tide
Look down with weary eye.
Oft did the cliff and swelling main Recall the thoughts of Whitby's fane, -- A home she ne'er might see again;
For she had laid adown,
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