XIV.

<< Disastrous news!» dark Wycliffe said;
Assumed despondence bent his head,
While troubled joy was in his eye,
The well-feign'd sorrow to belie.-

« Disastrous news!-when needed most,
Told ye not that your chiefs were lost?
Complete the woeful tale, and say,
Who fell upon that fatal day;
What leaders of repute and name
Bought by their death a deathless fame.
If such my direst foemau's doom,
My tears shall dew his honour'd tomb.-
No answer?-Friend, of all our host,
Thou know'st whom I should hate the most;
Whom thou too once wert wont to hate,
Yet leavest me doubtful of his fate.»-
With look unmoved,-« Of friend or foe,
Aught,» answer'd Bertram, « wouldst thou know,
Demand in simple terms and plain,
A soldier's answer shalt thou gain;
For question dark, or riddle high,
I have nor judgment nor reply.»-

XV.

,))-

The wrath his art and fear suppress'd
Now blazed at once in Wycliffe's breast;
And brave from man so meanly born
Roused his hereditary scorn.
-«<Wretch! hast thou paid thy bloody debt?
PHILIP OF MORTHAM, lives he yet?
False to thy patron or thine oath,
Trait'rous or perjured, one or both,
Slave! hast thou kept thy promise plight,
To slay thy leader in the fight?»-----
Then from his seat the soldier
sprung,
And Wycliffe's hand he strongly wrung;
His grasp, as hard as glove of mail,

Forced the red blood-drop from the nail-
« A health!» he cried; and, ere he quaff'd,
Flung from him Wycliffe's hand, and laugh'd:
Now, Oswald Wycliffe, speaks thy heart!
Now play'st thou well thy genuine part!
Worthy, but for thy craven fear,
Like me to roam a buccaneer.
What reck'st thou of the cause divine,
If Mortham's wealth and lands be thine?
What carest thou for beleaguer'd York,
If this good hand have done its work?
Or what though Fairfax and his best
Are reddening Marston's swarthy breast,
If Philip Mortham with them lie,
Lending his life-blood to the dye?—
Sit then! and as 'mid comrades free
Carousing after victory,

When tales are told of blood and fear,
That boys and women shrink to hear,
From point to point I frankly tell
The deed of death as it befel.

XVI.

« When purposed vengeance I forego,
Term me a wretch, nor deem me foe;
And when an insult I forgive,
Then brand me as a slave, and live!-

Philip of Mortham is with those Whom Bertram Risingham calls foes; Or whom more sure revenge attends, If number'd with ungrateful friends. As was his wont, ere battle glow'd, Along the marshall'd ranks he rode, And wore his vizor up the while.

I saw his melancholy smile,
When, full opposed in front, he knew
Where ROKEBY's kindred banner flew,
'And thus,' he said, will friends divide!»-'
I heard, and thought how, side by side,
We two had turn'd the battle's tide,
In many a well-debated field,

Where Bertram's breast was Philip's shield.

I thought on Darien's deserts pale,
Where death bestrides the evening gale,
How o'er my friend my cloak I threw,
And fenceless faced the deadly dew;

I thought on Quariana's cliff,

Where, rescued from our foundering skiff,
Through the white breakers' wrath I bore
Exhausted Mortham to the shore;
And when his side an arrow found,

I suck'd the Indian's venom'd wound.
These thoughts like torrents rush'd along,
To sweep away my purpose strong.

XVII.

& Hearts are not flint, and flints are rent;
Hearts are not steel, and steel is bent.
When Mortham bade me, as of yore,
Be near him in the battle's roar,
I scarcely saw the spears laid low,
I scarcely heard the trumpets blow;
Lost was the war in inward strife,
Debating Mortham's death or life.
'T was then I thought, how, lured to come
As partner of his wealth and home,
Years of piratic wandering o'er,
With him I sought our native shore..
But Mortham's lord grew far estranged
From the bold hearts with whom he ranged;
Doubts, horrors, superstitious fears,
Sadden'd and dimm'd descending years;
The wily priests their victim sought,
And damn'd each free-born deed and thought.
Then must I seek another home,
My license shook his sober dome;
If gold he gave, in one wild day
I revell'd thrice the sum away.
An idle outcast then I stray'd,
Unfit for tillage or for trade,
Deem'd, like the steel of rusted lance,
Useless and dangerous at once.
The women fear'd my hardy look,

At my approach the peaceful shook;
The merchant saw my glance of flame,
And lock'd his hoards when Bertram came,
Each child of coward peace kept far
From the neglected son of war.

XVIII.

«But civil discord gave the call, And made my trade the trade of all.

By Mortham urged, I came again
His vassals to the fight to train.
What guerdon waited on my care?
I could not cant of creed or prayer;
Sour fanatics each trust obtain'd,
And I, dishonour'd and disdain'd,
Gain'd but the high and happy lot,
In these poor arms to front the shot!-
All this thou know'st, thy gestures tell;
Yet hear it o'er, and mark it well.
Tis honour bids me now relate
Each circumstance of Mertham's fate.

XIX.

Thoughts, from the tongue that slowly part,
Glance quick as lightning through the heart.
As my spur press'd my courser's side,
Philip of Mortham's cause was tried,
And, ere the charging squadrons mix'd,
His plea was cast, his doom was fix'd.

I watch'd him through the doubtful fray,
That changed as March's moody day,
Till, like a stream that bursts its bank,
Fierce Rupert thunder'd on our flank.

T was then, 'midst tumult, smoke, and strife,
Where each man fought for death or life,
T was then I fired my petronel,
And Mortham, steed and rider, fell.
One dying look he upward cast,

Of wrath and anguish-'t was his last.
Think not that there I stopp'd to view
What of the battle should ensue;
But ere I clear'd that bloody press,
Our northern horse ran masterless;
Monckton and Mitton told the news,

How troops of roundheads choked the Ouse,

Not then by Wycliffe might be shown,
How his pride startled at the tone
la which his 'complice, fierce and free,
Asserted guilt's equality.

In smoothest terms his speech he wove,"
Of endless friendship, faith, and love;
Promised and vow'd in courteous sort,
But Bertram broke professions short.
a Wycliffe, be sure not here I stay!
No, scarcely till the rising day;
Warn'd by the legends of
my youth,
I trust not an associate's truth.
Do not my native dales prolong
Of Percy Rede the tragic song,
Train'd forward to his bloody fall,

By Girsonfield, that treacherous Hall? (8)
Oft, by the Pringle's haunted side,
The shepherd sees his spectre glide.

And near the spot that gave me name,
The moated mound of Risingham,
Where Reed upon her margin sees
Sweet Woodburn's cottages and trees,
Some ancient sculptor's art has shown
An outlaw's image on the stone; (9)
Unmatch'd in strength, a giant he,
With quiver'd back, and kirtled knee.
Ask how he died, that hunter bold,
The tameless monarch of the wold,
And age and infancy can tell,
By brother's treachery he fell.
Thus warn'd by legends of my youth,
I trust to no associate's truth.

XXI.

« When last we reason'd of this deed,
Nought, I bethink me, was agreed,
Or by what rule, or when, or where,
The wealth of Mortham we should share;
Then list, while I the portion name,
Our differing laws give each to claim.
Thou, vassal sworn to England's throne,
Her rules of heritage must own;
They deal thee, as to nearest heir,
Thy kinsman's lands and livings fair,
And these I yield:-do thou revere
The statutes of the buccaneer. (10)
Friend to the sea, and foeman sworn
To all that on her waves are borne,
When falls a mate in battle broil,
His comrade heirs his portion'd spoil;
When dies in fight a daring foe,

He claims his wealth who struck the blow;
And either rule to me assigns

Those spoils of Indian seas and mines,
Hoarded in Mortham's caverns dark;
Ingot of gold and diamond spark,
Chalice and plate from churches borne,
And gems from shrieking beauty torn,
Each string of pearl, each silver bar,
And all the wealth of western war:

go
to search, where, dark and deep,
Those transatlantic treasures sleep.
Thou must along-for, lacking thee,
The heir will scarce find entrance free;
And then farewell. Ihaste to try
Each varied pleasure wealth can buy;
When cloy'd each wish, these wars afford
Fresh work for Bertram's restless sword.»

XXII.

An undecided answer hung
On Oswald's hesitating tongue.
Despite his craft, he heard with awe
This ruffian stabber fix the law;
While his own troubled passions veer
Through hatred, joy, regret, and fear.
Joy'd at the soul that Bertram flies,
He grudged the murder's mighty prize,
Hated his pride's presumptuous tone,
And fear'd to wend with him alone.
At length, that middle course to steer,
To cowardice and craft so dear,
«His charge," he said, « would ill allow
His absence from the fortress now;

What, Oswald Wycliffe, shields thee here?
I've sprung from walls more high than these,
I've swam through deeper streams than Tees.
Might I not stab thee, ere one yell
Could rouse the distant sentinel?
Start not-it is not my design,

But, if it were, weak fence were thine:
And, trust me, that, in time of need,
This hand hath done more desperate deed.-
Go, haste and rouse thy slumbering son;
Time calls, and I must needs be gone.»—

XXIV.

Nought of his sire's ungenerous part
Polluted Wilfrid's gentle heart;
A heart, too soft from early life
To hold with fortune needful strife.
His sire, while yet a hardier race.
Of numerous sons were Wycliffe's grace,
On Wilfrid set contemptuous brand,
For feeble heart and forceless hand; ⚫
But a fond mother's care and joy
Were center'd in her sickly boy.
No touch of childhood's frolic mood
Show'd the elastic spring of blood;
Hour after hour he loved to pore
On Shakspeare's rich and varied lore,
But turn'd from martial scenes and light,
From Falstaff's feast and Percy's fight,
To ponder Jacques's moral strain,
And muse with Hamlet, wise in vain;
And weep himself to soft repose
O'er gentle Desdemona's woes.

XXV.

In youth, he sought not pleasures found
By youth in horse, and hawk, and hound,
But loved the quiet joys that wake
By lonely stream and silent lake;
In Deepdale's solitude to lie,

Where all is cliff, and copse, and sky;
To climb Catcastle's dizzy peak,
Or lone Pendragon's mound to seek.
Such was his wont; and there his dream
Soar'd on some wild fantastic theme,
Of faithful love, or ceaseless spring,
Till contemplation's wearied wing
The enthusiast could no more sustain,
And sad he sunk to earth again.

XXVI.

He loved as many a lay can tell, Preserved in Stanmore's lonely dell; For his was minstrel's skill, he caught The art unteachable, untaught;

He loved his soul did nature frame
For love, and fancy nursed the flame;
Vainly he loved-for seldom swain,
Of such soft mould is loved again;
Silent he loved-in every gaze
Was passion, friendship in his phrase.
So mused his life away-till died
His brethren all, their father's pride.
Wilfrid is now the only heir
Of all his stratagems and care,
And destined, darkling, to pursue
Ambition's maze by Oswald's clue.

XXVII.

Wilfrid must love and woo the bright
Matilda, heir of Rokeby's knight.
To love her was an easy hest,
The secret empress of his breast;
To woo her was a harder task
To one that durst not hope or ask;
Yet all Matilda could she gave
In pity to her gentle slave;
Friendship, esteem, and fair regard,
And praise, the poet's best reward!
She read the tales his taste approved,
And sung the lays he framed or loved;
Yet, loth to nurse the fatal flame
Of hopeless love in friendship's name,"
In kind caprice she oft withdrew
The favouring glance to friendship due,
Then grieved to see her victim's pain,
And gave the dangerous smiles again.

XXVIII.

So did the suit of Wilfrid stand,

When war's loud summons waked the land.
Three banners, floating o'er the Tees,

The woe-foreboding peasant sees.
In concert oft they braved of old
The bordering Scot's incursion bold;
Frowning defiance in their pride,
Their vassals now and lords divide.
From his fair hall on Greta banks,
The Knight of Rokeby led his ranks,
To aid the valiant northern earls,
Who drew the sword for royal Charles;
Mortham, by marriage near allied,-
His sister had been Rokeby's bride,
Though long before the civil fray,
In peaceful grave the lady lay,-
Philip of Mortham raised his band,
And march'd at Fairfax's command;
While Wycliffe, bound by many a train
Of kindred art with wily Vane,
Less prompt to brave the bloody field,
Made Barnard's battlements his shield,
Secured them with his Lunedale powers,
And for the Commons held the towers.

XXIX.

The lovely heir of Rokeby's knight
Waits in his halls the event of fight;
For England's war revered the claim
Of every unprotected name,
And spared, amidst its fiercest rage,
Childhood, and womanhood, and age.

But Wilfrid, son to Rokeby's foe,
Must the dear privilege forego,
By Greta's side, in evening gray,
To steal upon Matilda's way,
Striving, with fond hypocrisy,
For careless step and vacant eye;
Calming each anxious look and glance,
To give the meeting all to chance,
Or framing as a fair excuse,

The book, the pencil, or the muse;.
Something to give, to sing, to say,
Some modern tale, some ancient lay.
Then, while the long'd-for minutes last,-
Ah! minutes quickly overpast!—
Recording each expression free,
Of kind or careless courtesy,
Each friendly look, each softer tone,
As food for fancy when alone.
All this is o'er-but still, unseen,
Wilfrid may lurk in Eastwood green,
To watch Matilda's wonted round,
While springs his heart at every sound.
She comes!-'t is but a passing sight,
Yet serves to cheat his weary night;
She comes not-He will wait the hour,
When her lamp lightens in the tower;
Tis something yet, if, as she past,
Her shade is o'er the lattice cast.

What is my life, my hope?» he said:
Alas! a transitory shade.»>—

XXX.

Thus wore his life, though reason strove
For mastery in vain with love,
Forcing upon his thoughts the sum
Of present woe and ills to come,
While still he turn'd impatient ear
From Truth's intrusive voice severe.
Gentle, indifferent, and subdued,
In all but this, unmoved he view'd
Each outward change of ill and good:
But Wilfrid, docile, soft, and mild,
Was Fancy's spoil'd and wayward child;
In her bright car she bade him ride,
With one fair form to grace his side,
Or, in some wild and lone retreat,
Flung her high spells around his seat,
Bathed in her dews his languid head,
Her fairy mantle o'er him spread,
For him her opiates gave to flow,
Which he who tastes can ne'er forego,
And placed him in her circle, free
From
every stern reality,

Till, to the visionary, seem

Her day-dreams truth, and truth a dream.

XXXI.

Woe to the youth, whom Fancy gains,
Winning from Reason's hand the reins,
Pity and woe! for such a mind
Is soft, contemplative, and kind;

And woe to those who train such youth,
And
spare to press the rights of truth,
The mind to strengthen and anneal,
While on the stithy glows the steel!
O teach him, while your lessons last,
To judge the present by the past;

Remind him of each wish pursued,
How rich it glow'd with promised good;
Remind him of each wish enjoy'd,
How soon his hopes possession cloy'd!
Tell him, we play unequal game,
Whene'er we shoot by Fancy's aim;
And, ere he strip him for her race,
Show the conditions of the chase.
Two sisters by the goal are set,
Cold Disappointment and Regret;
One disenchants the winner's eyes,
"And strips of all its worth the prize,
While one augments its gaudy show,
More to enhance the loser's woe.
The victor sees his fairy gold
Transform'd, when won, to drossy mold;
But still the vanquish'd mourns his loss,
And rues, as gold, that glittering dross.

XXXII.

More wouldst thou know-yon tower survey,
Yon couch unpress'd since parting day,
Yon untrimm'd lamp, whose yellow gleam.
Is mingling with the cold moon-beam,
And yon thin form!-the hectic red
On his pale cheek unequal spread;
The head reclined, the loosen'd hair,
The limbs relax'd, the mournful air.-
See, he looks up ;-a woeful smile
Lightens his woe-worn cheek awhile,—
"T is fancy wakes some idle thought,
To gild the ruin she has wrought;
For, like the bat of Indian brakes,
Her pinions fan the wound she makes,
And soothing thus the dreamer's pain,
She drinks his life-blood from the vein.
Now to the lattice turn his eyes,
Vain hope! to see the sun arise.
The moon with clouds is still o'ercast,
Still howls by fits the stormy blast;
Another hour must wear away,
Ere the east kindle into day,
And hark! to waste that weary hour,
He tries the minstrel's magic power.

XXXIII.
SONG..

TO THE MOON.

Hail to thy cold and clouded beam,
Pale pilgrim of the troubled sky!
Hail, though the mists that o'er thee stream
Lend to thy brow their sullen dye!
How should thy pure and peaceful eye
Untroubled view our scenes below,

Or how a tearless beam supply

To light a world of war and woe!

Fair queen! I will not blame thee now,
As once by Greta's fairy side,
Each little cloud that dimm'd thy brow
Did then an angel's beauty hide;
And of the shades I then could chide,
Still are the thoughts to memory dear,
For, while a softer strain I tried,
They hid my blush, and calm'd fear.
my

Then did I swear thy ray serene
Was form'd to light some lonely dell,
By two fond lovers only seen,

Reflected from the crystal well;
Or sleeping on their mossy cell,

Or quivering on the lattice bright, Or glancing on their couch, to tell

How swiftly wanes the summer night!

XXXIV.

He starts-a step at this lone hour!
A voice!-his father seeks the tower,
With haggard look and troubled sense,
Fresh from his dreadful conference.
« Wilfrid !—what, not to sleep addrest?
Thou hast no cares to chase thy rest.
Mortham has fallen on Marston-moor;
Bertram brings warrant to secure
His treasures, bought by spoil and blood,
For the state's use and public good.
The menials will thy voice obey;
Let his commission have its way,
In every point, in every word.»---
Then, in a whisper,-« Take thy sword!
Bertram is--what I must not tell.
I hear his hasty step-farewell!»>

FAR in the chambers of the west,
The gale had sigh'd itself to rest;
The moon was cloudless now and clear,
But pale, and soon to disappear.
The thin gray clouds wax'd dimly light
On Brusleton and Houghton height;
And the rich dale, that eastward lay,
Waited the wakening touch of day,
To give its woods and cultured plain,
And towers and spires, to light again.
But, westward, Stanmore's shapeless swell,
And Lunedale wild, and Kelton-fell,
And rock-begirdled Gilmanscar,
And Arkingarth, lay dark afar;
While, as a livelier twilight falls,
Emerge proud Barnard's banner'd walls.
High crown'd he sits, in dawning pale,
The sovereign of the lovely vale.

II.

What prospects, from his watch-tower high,
Gleam gradual on the warder's eye!—
Far sweeping to the east, he sees

Down his deep woods the course of Tees, (1)
And tracks his wanderings by the steam
Of summer vapours from the stream;
And ere he pace his destined hour
By Brackenbury's dungeon-tower,
These silver mists shall melt away,
And dew the woods with glittering spray.
Then in broad lustre shall be shown

That mighty trench of living stone,

And each huge trunk that, from the side, Reclines him o'er the darksome tide, Where Tees, full many a fathom low, Wears with his rage no common foe; For pebbly bank, nor sand-bed here, Nor clay-mound, checks his fierce career, Condemn'd to mine a channell'd way, O'er solid sheets of marble gray.

III.

Nor Tees alone, in dawning bright,
Shall rush upon the ravish'd sight;
But many a tributary stream,

Each from its own dark dell, shall gleam:
Staindrop, who, from her sylvan bowers,
Salutes proud Raby's battled towers;
The rural brook of Eglistone,
And Balder, named from Odin's son;
And Greta, to whose banks ere long
We lead the lovers of the song;
And silver Lune, from Stanmore wild,
And fairy Thorsgill's murmuring child;
And last and least, but loveliest still,
Romantic Deepdale's slender rill.
Who in that dim-wood glen hath stray'd,
Yet long'd for Roslin's magic glade?

Who, wandering there, hath sought to change
Even for that vale so stern and strange,
Where Cartland's crags, fantastic rent,
Through her green copse like spires are sent!
Yet, Albyn, yet the praise be thine,

Thy scenes and story to combine!
Thou bid'st him, who by Roslin strays,
List to the deeds of other days;
'Mid Cartland's crags thou show'st the cave,
The refuge of thy champion brave;
Giving each rock its storied tale,
Pouring a lay for every dale,
Knitting, as with a moral band,
Thy native legends with thy land,
To lend each scene the interest high
Which genius beams from Beauty's eye.

IV.

Bertram awaited not the sight

Which sunrise shows from Barnard's height,
But from the towers, preventing day,
With Wilfrid took his early way.
While misty dawn, and moon-beam pale,
Still mingled in the silent dale.
By Barnard's bridge of stately stone,
The southern bank of Tees they won;
Their winding path then eastward cast,
And Eglistone's gray ruins (2) past;
Each on his own deep visions bent,
Silent and sad they onward went.
Well may you think that Bertram's mood
To Wilfrid savage seem'd and rude;
Well may you think, bold Risingham
Held Wilfrid trivial, poor, and tame;
And small the intercourse, I ween,
Such uncongenial souls between.

V.

Stern Bertram shunn'd the nearer way, Through Rokeby's park and chase that lay,