"O change accursed! past are those days; False Murray's ruthless spoilers came, And, for the hearth's domestic blaze, Ascends destruction's volumed flame. "What sheeted phantom wanders wild, Where mountain Eske through woodland flows, Her arms enfold a shadowy child- "The wilder'd traveller sees her glide, And hears her feeble voice with awe'Revenge,' she cries, 'on Murray's pride! And woe for injured Bothwellhaugh!' He ceased-and cries of rage and grief Burst mingling from the kindred band, And half arose the kindling Chief, And half unsheathed his Arran brand. But who, o'er bush, o'er stream and rock, Rides headlong, with resistless speed, Whose bloody poniard's frantic stroke Drives to the leap his jaded steed; Whose cheek is pale, whose eyeballs glare, As one some vision'd sight that saw, Whose hands are bloody, loose his hair? 'Tis he! 'tis he! 'tis Bothwellhaugh. From gory selle,* and reeling steed, Sprung the fierce horseman with a bound, And, reeking from the recent deed, He dash'd his carbine on the ground. Sternly he spoke-"'Tis sweet to hear In good greenwood the bugle blown, But sweeter to Revenge's ear, To drink a tyrant's dying groan. "Your slaughter'd quarry proudly trode, At dawning morn, o'er dale and down, But prouder base-born Murray rode Through old Linlithgow's crowded town. "From the wild Border's humbled side, In haughty triumph marched he, While Knox relax'd his bigot pride, And smiled, the traitorous pomp to see. *Selle-Saddle. A word used by Spenser, and other ancient authors. "But can stern Power, with all his vaunt, Or Pomp, with all her courtly glare, The settled heart of Vengeance daunt, Or change the purpose of Despair? "With hackbut bent, my secret stand, Dark as the purposed deed, I chose, And mark'd, where, mingling in his band, Troop'd Scottish pikes and English bows. 66 Dark Morton, girt with many a spear, Murder's foul minion, led the van; And clash'd their broadswords in the rear The wild Macfarlanes' plaided clan. "Glencairn and stout Parkhead were nigh, Obsequious at their Regent's rein, And haggard Lindesay's iron eye, That saw fair Mary weep in vain. "Mid pennon'd spears, a steely grove, Proud Murray's plumage floated high; Scarce could his trampling charger move, So close the minions crowded nigh. "From the raised vizor's shade, his eye, Dark-rolling, glanced the ranks along, And his steel truncheon, waved on high, Seem'd marshalling the iron throng. "But yet his sadden'd brow confess'd A passing shade of doubt and awe; Some fiend was whispering in his breast; 'Beware of injured Bothwellhaugh!' "The death-shot parts-the charger springs- Wild rises tumult's startling roar ! To see in dust proud Murray roll; With pride her bleeding victim saw ; And shriek'd in his death-deafen'd ear, ‘Remember injured Bothwellhaugh !· J "Then speed thee, noble Chatlerault ! Loud bugles join their wild acclaim"Murray is fall'n, and Scotland freed ! Couch, Arran! couch thy spear of flame!" But, see! the minstrel vision fails-- more; * An oak, half-sawn, with the motto through, is an ancient cognizance of the family of Hamilton. The shouts of war die on the gales, The banner'd towers of Evandale. THE GRAY BROTHER. A FRAGMENT. The imperfect state of this ballad, which was written several years ago, is not a circumstance affected for the purpose of giving it that peculiar interest, which is often found to arise from ungratified curiosity. On the contrary, it was the Editor's intention to have completed the tale, if he had found himself able to succeed to his own satisfaction. Yielding to the opinion of persons, whose judgment, if not biassed by the partiality of friendship, is entitled to deference, he has preferred inserting these verses as a fragment, to his intention of entirely suppressing them. The tradition, upon which the tale is founded, regards a house upon the barony of Gilmerton, near Lasswade, in Mid-Lothian. This building, now called Gilmerton Grange, was originally named Burndale, from the following tragic adventure. The barony of Gilmerton belonged, of yore, to a gentleman named Heron, who had one beautiful daughter. This young lady was seduced by the Abbot of Newbattle, a richly endowed abbey, upon the banks of the South Esk, now a seat of the Marquis of Lothian. Heron came to the knowledge of this circumstance, and learned also, that the lovers carried on their guilty intercourse by the connivance of the lady's nurse, who lived at this house of Gilmerton Grange, or Burndale. formed a resolution of bloody vengeance, undeterred by the supposed sanctity of the clerical character, or by the stronger claims of natural affection. Choosing, therefore, a dark and windy night, when the objects of his vengeance were engaged in a stolen interview, he set fire to a stack of dried thorns, and other combustibles, which he had caused to be piled against the house, and reduced to a pile of glowing ashes the dwelling, with all its inmates. He The scene with which the ballad opens, was suggested by the following curious passage, extracted from the Life of Alexander Peden, one of the wandering and persecuted teachers of the sect of Cameronians, during the reign of Charles II, and his successor, James. This person was supposed by his followers, and, perhaps, really believed himself, to be possessed of supernatural gifts; for the wild scenes which they frequented, and the constant dangers which were incurred through their proscription, deepened upon their minds the gloom of superstition, so general in that age. "About the same time he [Peden] came to Andrew Normand's house, in the parish of Alloway, in the shire of Ayr, being to preach at night in his barn. After he came in, he halted a little, leaning upon a chair-back, with his face covered when he lifted up his head, he said, They are in this house that I have not one word of salvation unto;' he halted a little again, saying, 'This is strange, that the devil will not go out, that we may begin our work !' Then there was a woman went out, ill-looked upon almost all her life, and to her dying hour, for a witch, with many presumptions of the same. It escaped me, in the former passages, what John Muirhead (whom I have often mentioned) told me, that when he came from Ireland to Galloway, he was at family-worship, and giving some notes upon the Scripture read, when a very ill-looking man came, and sat down within the door, at the back of the hallan, [partition of the cottage:] immediately he halted and said, 'There is some unhappy body just now come into this house. I charge him to go out, and not stop my mouth!' This person went out, and he insisted [went on,] yet he saw him neither come in nor go out."-The Life and Prophecies of Mr. Alexander Peden, late Minister of the Gospel at New Glenluce, in Galloway, part ii. § 26. A friendly correspondent remarks, "that the incapacity of proceeding in the performance of a religious duty, when a contaminated person is present, is of much higher antiquity than the era of the Reverend Mr. Alexander Peden." Vide Hygini Fabulas, cap. 26. "Medea Corintho exul, Athenas, ad Ægeum Pandionis filium devenit in hospitium, eique nupsit. "Postea sacerdos Diana Medeam exagitare cœpit, regique negabat sacra caste facere posse, eo quod in ea civitate esset mulier venefica et scelerata; tunc exulatur." THE Pope he was saying the high, high mass, All on Saint Peter's day, With the power to him given, by the saints in heaven, To wash men's sins away. The Pope he was saying the blessed mass, And from each man's soul his sins did As he kiss'd the holy ground. The holy accents rung. At the holiest word he quiver'd for fear, The breath of one of evil deed "A being, whom no blessed word "Up, up, unhappy! haste, arise ! I charge thee not to stop my voice, In gown of sackcloth gray; For forty days and nights so drear, I ween he had not spoke, Seem'd none more bent to pray; His weary course he drew, 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 Impervious to the sun. There the rapt poet's step may rove, From that fair dome, where suit is paid, 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, 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, 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, Until he came to that dreary place, 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. "O come ye from east, or come ye from west, Or bring reliques from over the sea; Or come ye from the shrine of St. James the divine, Or St. John of Beverley?" "I come not from the shrine of St. James the divine, Nor bring reliques from over the sea; I bring but a curse from our father, the Pope, Which for ever will cling to me. 66 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. THE RESOLVE. IN IMITATION OF AN OLD ENGLISH POEM. [1809.] Published anonymously in the Edinburgh Annual Register of 1808. My wayward fate I needs must plain, Yet all was but a dream; For, as her love was quickly got, Not maid more bright than maid was My fancy shall beguile, By flattering word, or feigned tear, In cheek, or chin, or brow, The flaunting torch soon blazes out, The diamond's ray abides; Such gem I fondly deem'd was mine, No waking dream shall tinge my With dyes so bright and vain, No more I'll pay so dear for wit, Nor shall wild passion trouble it,— And thus I'll hush my heart to rest,- Thou shalt no more be wildly blest, They seek no loves-no more will I— NORA'S VOW. AIR-" Cha teid mis a chaoidh." * WRITTEN FOR ALBYN'S ANTHOLOGY. [1816.] + In the original Gaelic, the lady makes protestations that she will not go with the Red Earl's son, until the swan should build in the cliff, and the eagle in the lakeuntil one mountain should change places with another, and so forth. It is but fair to add, that there is no authority for supposing that she altered her mind-except the vehemence of her protestation. HEAR What Highland Nora said, "I will never go with him." I. For all the gold, for all the gear, I would not wed the Earlie's son.". [See also Mr. Thomson's Scottish Collection, 1822.] |