winds out of the dark, narrow, and romantic dell, which the text has attempted to describe, and flows onward through a more open valley to meet the Tees, about a quarter of a mile from the castle. Mortham is surrounded by old trees, happily and widely grouped with Mr Morritt's new plantations. Note 12. Stanza xviii. There dig and tomb your precious heap, If time did not permit the buccaneers to lavish away their plunder in their usual debaucheries, they were went to hide it, with many superstitious solemnities, in the desert islands and keys which they frequented, and where much treasure, whose lawless owners perished without reclaiming it, is still supposed to be concealed. The most cruel of mankind are often the most superstitious, and these pirates are said to have had recourse to a horrid ritual in order to secure an unearthly guardian to their treasures. They killed a gro or Spaniard, and buried him with the treasure, Serving that his spirit would haunt the spot, and terrify away all intruders. I cannot produce any other thority on which this custom is ascribed to them than that of maritime tradition, which is, however, amply suficient for the purposes of poetry. Note 13. Stanza xix. The power That unsubdued and lurking lies A Right heavy shall his ransom be, Unless that maid compound with thee! After the battle of Marston-moor, the Earl of Newcastle retired beyond sea in disgust, and many of his followers laid down their arms, and made the best composition they could with the committees of Parliament. Fines were imposed upon them in proportion fines were often bestowed upon such persons as had to their estates and degrees of delinquency, and these deserved well of the Commons. In some circumstances it happened that the oppressed cavaliers were fain to form family alliances with some powerful person among the triumphant party. The whole of Sir Robert Howard's excellent comedy of the Committee turns upon the plot of Mr and Mrs Day to enrich their family, by compelling Arabella, whose estate was under sequestration, to marry their son Abel, as the price by which she was to compound with Parliament for delinquency; that is, for attachment to the royal cause. CANTO III. All who are conversant with the administration of criminal justice must remember many occasions in | which malefactors appear to have conducted themselves | with a species of infatuation, either by making unnecessary confidences respecting their guilt, or by sudden and involuntary allusions to circumstances by which it could not fail to be exposed. A remarkable instance accurred in the celebrated case of Eugene Aram. skeleton being found near Knaresborough, was supposed, by the persons who gathered around the spot, to Le the remains of one Clarke, who had disappeared same years before, under circumstances leading to a aspicion of his having been murdered. One Houseman, who had mingled in the crowd, suddenly said, while looking at the skeleton, and hearing the opinion which was buzzed around, «That is no more Dan Clarke's bone than it is mine!»-a sentiment expressed so positively, and with such peculiarity of manner, as to lead all who heard him to infer that he must neces sarily know where the real body had been interred. «When the Chickasal nation was engaged in a forAccordingly, being apprehended, he confessed having isted Eugene Aram to murder Clarke, and to hide mer war with the Muskohge, one of their young warhis body in Saint Robert's Cave. It happened to the auriors set off against them to revenge the blood of a near her himself, while conversing with a relation. He went through the most unfrequented fan atrocious crime, for the purpose of rendering and thick parts of the woods as such a dangerous enhim professional assistance upon his trial, to hear the terprise required, till he arrived opposite to the great and old beloved town of refuge, Koosah, which stands Prisoner, after the most solemn and reiterated protest-high on the eastern side of a bold river, about 250 yards ations that he was guiltless, suddenly, and, as were, voluntarily, in the course of his communications, make such an admission as was altogether incompati Note 1. Stanza ii. The Indian, prowling for his prey, The patience, abstinence, and ingenuity exerted by the North American Indians, when in pursuit of plun ble with innocence. Note 14. Stanza xxviii. Brackenbury's dismal tower. person accused This tower has been already mentioned: it is situated hear the north-eastern extremity of the wall which in der or vengeance, is the most distinguished feature in their character; and the activity and address which they display in their retreat is equally surprising. Adair, whose absurd hypothesis and turgid style do not affect the general authenticity of his anecdotes, has recorded an instance which seems incredible. broad, that runs by the late dangerous Alebahma-Fort, beggar, in an old play, describes himself as «born in Redesdale, in Northumberland, and come of a vigit- riding surname, called the Robsons, good honest men i and true, save a little shifting for their living, God help them;»-a description which would have applied to most Borderers on both sides. Reidswair, famous for a skirmish to which it gives name, is on the very edge of the Carter-fell, which di vides England from Scotland. The Rooken is a place upon Reedwater. Bertram, being described as a native of these dales, where the habits of hostile depredation long survived the union of the crowns, may have been, in some degree, prepared by education for the exercise of a similar trade in the wars of the buccaneers. and return home. Ho waited with watchfulness and ing from such lewde and wicked progenitors. This patience almost three days, when a young man, a wo-regulation continued to stand unrepealed until 1771. A man, and a girl, passed a little wide of him about an hour before sunset. The former he shot down, tomahawked the other two, and scalped each of them in a trice, in full view of the town. By way of bravado, he shaked the scalps before them, sounded the awful deathwhoop, and set off along the trading path, trusting to his heels, while a great many of the enemy ran to their arms, and gave chase. Seven miles from thence he entered the great blue ridge of the Apalahche mountains. About an hour before day he had run over seventy miles of that mountainous tract; then, after sleeping two hours in a sitting posture, leaning his back against a tree, he set off again with fresh speed. As he threw away the venison when he found himself pursued by the enemy, he was obliged to support nature with such herbs, roots, and nuts, as his sharp eyes, with a running glance, directed him to snatch up in his course. Though I often have rode that war-path alone, when delay might have proved dangerous, and with as fine and strong horses as any in America, it took me five days to ride from the aforesaid Koosal to this sprightly warrior's place in the Chickasah country, the distance of 300 computed miles; yet he ran it, and got home safe and well at about eleven o'clock of the third day, which was only one day and a half and two nights.»-ADAIR's History of the American Indians, Lond. 1775, 4to. p. 395. upon Note 2. Stanza ii. In Redesdale his youth had heard Each art her wily dalesmen dared. <<What manner of cattle-stealers they are that inhabit these valleys in the marches of both kingdoms, John Lesley, a Scotchman himself, and Bishop of Ross, will inform you. They sally out of their own borders in the night, in troops, through unfrequented by-ways and many intricate windings, all the day time they refresh themselves and their horses in lurking holes they had pitched upon before, till they arrive in the dark in those places they have a design upon. As soon as they have seized the booty, they in like manner return home in the night, through blind ways, and fetching many a compass. The more skilful any captain is to pass through those wild deserts, crooked turnings, and deep precipices in the thickest mists, his reputation is the greater, and he is looked upon as a man of an excellent head. And they are so very cunning that they seldom have their booty taken from them, unless sometimes when, by the help of blood-hounds following them exactly upon the track, they may chance to fall into the hands of their adversaries; when, being taken, they have so much persuasive eloquence, and so many smooth insinuating words at command, that if they do not move their judges, nay, and even their adversaries (notwithstanding the severity of their natures), to have mercy, yet they incite them to admiration and compassion,» CAMDEN'S Britannia. The inhabitants of the valleys of Tyne and Reed wore, in ancient times, so inordinately addicted to these depredations, that in 1564 the Incorporated Merchant-adventurers of Newcastle made a law that none born in these districts should be admitted apprentice. The inhabitants are stated to be so generally addicted to rapine, that no faith should be reposed in those proceed Note 3. Stanza iv. After one of the recent battles, in which the Irish rebels were defeated, one of the most active leaders was found in a bog, in which he was immersed up to the shoulders, while his head was concealed by an impend ing ledge of turf. Being detected and seized, notwithstanding his precaution, he became solicitous to know how his retreat had been discovered. «I caught, answered the Sutherland Highlander, by whom he was taken, «< the sparkle of your eye.» Those who are accustomed to mark hares upon their form, usually discover them by the same circumstance. Note 4. Stanza viii. And throatwart with its azure bell. The CAMPANULA LATIFOLIA, Grand Throatwort, of Canterbury bells, grows in profusion upon the beauti ful banks of the river Greta, where it divides the manors of Brignal and Scargill, about three miles above Greta-bridge. Note 5. Stanza iz Here stood a wretch, prepared to change His soul's redemption for revenge! It is agreed by all the writers upon magic and witchcraft, that revenge was the most common motive for the pretended compact between Satan and his vassals. The ingenuity of Reginald Scot has very happily stated how such an opinion came to root itself, not only in the mind of the public and of the judges, but even in that of the poor wretches themselves who were accused of sorcery, and were often firm believers in their own power and their own guilt. <«< One sort of such as are said to be witches, are wo men which be commonly old, lame, blear-eyed, pale, foul, and full of wrinkles; poor, sullen, superstitious, or papists, or such as know no religion; in whose drow sie minds the devil hath gotten a fine seat; so as what mischief, mischance, calamity, or slaughter is brought to pass, they are easily perswaded the same is done by themselves, imprinting in their minds an earnest and constant imagination thereof. These go from house to house, and from door to door, for a pot of milk, yest, drink, pottage, or some such relief, without the which they could hardly live; neither obtaining for their service or pains, nor yet by their art, nor yet at the devil's hands (with whom they are said to make a perfect and visible bargain), either beauty, money, promotion, wealth, pleasure, honour, knowledge, learning, or any other benefit whatsoever. elt falleth out many time, that neither their necessities nor their expectation is answered or served in those places where they beg or borrow, but rather their lewdness is by their neighbours reproved. And farther, in tract of time the witch waxeth odious and tedious to her neighbours, and they again are despised and despited of her; so as sometimes she curseth one, and ⚫ sometimes another, and that from the master of the house, his wife, children, cattle, etc., to the little pig that lieth in the stie. Thus, in process of time, they have all displeased her, and she hath wished evil luck unto them all; perhaps with curses and imprecations made in form. Doubtless (at length) some of her neighbours die or fall sick, or some of their children are visited with diseases that vex them strangely, as apoplexies, epilepsies, convulsions, hot fevers, worms, etc. which, by ignorant parents, are supposed to be the vengeance of witches.---. Note 7. Stanza xiv. — Brignal's woods, and Scargill's, wave E'en now o'er many a sister cave. The banks of the Greta, below Rutherford-bridge, abound in seams of a grayish slate, which are wrought in some places to a very great depth under ground, thus forming artificial caverns, which, when the seam has been exhausted, are gradually hidden by the underwood which grows in profusion upon the romantic banks of the river. In times of public confusion, they might be well adapted to the purposes of banditti. Note 8. Stanza xx. When Spain waged warfare with our land. There was a short war with Spain in 1625-6, which will be found to agree pretty well with the chronology of the poem. But probably Bertram held an opinion very common among the maritime heroes of the age, that there was no peace beyond the Line.» The Spanish guarda costas were constantly employed in ag and French, and by their own severities gave room for the system of buccaneering, at first adopted in self-defence and retaliation, and afterwards persevered in from habit and a thirst of plunder. The witch, on the other side, expecting her neigh-gressions upon the trade and settlements of the English bours mischances, and seeing things sometimes come to pass according to her wishes, curses, and incantations (for Bodin himself confesses, that not above two in a hundred of their witchings or wishings take effect), being called before a justice, by due examination of the circumstances, is driven to see her imprecations and desires, and her neighbours' harms and losses to concur, and, as it were, to take effect; and so confessed that she (as a goddess) had brought such things to pass. Wherein not only she, but the accuser, and also the justice, are foully deceived and abused, as being, through her confession, and other circumstances, perswaded (to the injury of God's glory) that she hath done, or can do, that which is proper only to God himself.-SCOT's Discovery of Witchcraft, Lond. 1655, fol. pp. 4, 5. Note 6. Stanza xi. Of my marauding on the clowns Of Calverley and Bradford downs. The Note 9. Stanza xxiii. ―― our comrades' strife. The laws of the buccaneers, and their successors the pirates, however severe and equitable, were, like other laws, often set aside by the stronger party. Their quarrels about the division of the spoil fill their history, and they as frequently arose out of mere frolic, or the ty rannical humour of their chiefs. An anecdote of Teach (called Blackbeard) shows that their habitual indifference for human life extended to their companions as well as their enemies and captives. « One night drinking in his cabin with Hands, the pilot, and another man, Blackbeard, without any provocation, privately draws out a small pair of pistols, and cocks them under the table, which being perceived by the man, he withdrew upon deck, leaving Hands, the pilot, and the captain together. When the pistols hands, discharged them at his company; Hands the master was shot through the knee, and lamed for life; the other pistol did no execution.»-JOHNSON'S History of Pirates, Lond. 1724, 8vo, vol. I, p. 88. The troops of the king, when they first took the field, were as well disciplined as could be expected from circumstances. But as the circumstances of Charles became less favourable, and his funds for regularly pay-were ready, he blew out the candles, and, crossing his ing his forces decreased, habits of military license prevailed among them in greater excess. Lacy the player, who served his master during the Civil War, brought out, after the Restoration, a piece called the Old Troop, in which he seems to have commemorated some real incidents which occurred in his military career. names of the officers of the troop sufficiently express their habits. We have Flea-flint, Plunder-Master-General, Captain Ferret-farm, and Quarter-Master Burndrop. The officers of the troop are in league with these worthies, and connive at their plundering the country for a suitable share in the plunder. All this was undoubtedly drawn from the life, which Lacy had an opportunity to study. The moral of the whole is comprehended in a rebuke given to the lieutenant, whose disorders in the country are said to prejudice the king's cause more than his courage in the field could recompense. The piece is by no means void of farcical humour. Another anecdote of this worthy may be also mentioned. « The hero of whom we are writing was thoroughly accomplished this way, and some of his frolics of wickedness were so extravagant, as if he aimed at making his men believe he was a devil incarnate; for one day being at sea, and a little flushed with drink, Come,' says he, let us make a hell of our own, and try how long we can bear it. Accordingly he, with two or three others, went down into the hold, and, closing up all the hatches, filled several pots full of brimstone and other combustible matter, and set it on fire, and so continued till they were almost suffocated, when some of the men cried out for air. At length he. opened the hatches, not a little pleased that he held out the longest.»-Ibid. p. 90. Note 10. Stanza xxv. my rangers go Even now to track a milk-white doe. When day is gone, and night is come, I think on them that 's far awa The lee-lang night, and weep. Note 12. Stanza xxx. The Baron of Ravensworth. The ruins of Ravensworth Castle stand in the North of Richmond, and adjoining to the waste called the Forest of Arkingarth. It belonged originally to the powerful family of Fitzhugh, from whom it passed to the Lords Dacre of the South. Note 13. Stanza xxx. Rere-cross on Stanmore. << Immediately after supper, the huntsman should go to his master's chamber, and if he serve a king, then let him go to the master of the game's chamber, to know in what quarter he determineth to hunt the day following, that he may know his own quarter; that done, he may go to bed, to the end that he may rise the earlier in the morning, according to the time and sea-Riding of Yorkshire, about three miles from the town son, and according to the place where he must hunt then, when he is up and ready, let him drinke a good draught, and fetch his hound, to make him breake his fast a little; and let him not forget to fill his bottel with good wine; that done, let him take a little vinegar into the palme of his hand, and put it in the nostrils of his hound, for to make him snuffe, to the end his scent may be the perfecter; then let him go to the wood. --When the huntsman perceiveth that it is time to begin to beat, let him put his hound before him, and beat the outsides of springs or thickets; and if he find an hart or deer that likes him, let him mark well whether it be fresh or not, which he may know as well by the manner of his hound's drawing, as also by the eye.-- When «At length a peace was concluded betwixt the two he hath well considered what manner of hart it may kings vnder these conditions, that Malcome should enbe, and hath marked every thing to judge by, then let joy that part of Northumberland which lieth betwixt him draw till he come to the couert where he is gone Tweed, Cumberland, and Stainmore, and doo homage to; and let him harbour him if he can, still marking to the Kinge of England for the same. In the midst all his tokens, as well by the slot as by the entries, of Stainmore there shall be a crosse set up, with the foyles, or such like. That done, let him plash or brush Kinge of England's image on the one side, and the Kinge down small twigges, some aloft and some below, as the of Scotland's on the other, to signifie that one is march art requireth, and therewithall, whilest his hound is to England, and the other to Scotland. This crosse hote, let him beat the outsides, and make his ring was called the Roi-crosse, that is, the crosse of the walkes twice or thrice about the wood.»-The Noblekinge.»-HOLLINSHED, Lond. 1808, 4to. p. 280. Art of Venerie, or Hunting, Lond. 1611, 4to. pp. 76, 77. Note 11. Stanza xxviii. He turn'd his charger as he spake, etc. This is a fragment of an old cross with its pediment, surrounded by an entrenchment, upon the very summit of the waste ridge of Stanmore, near a small house of entertainment called the Spittal. It is called Rere-cross, or Ree-cross, of which Hollinshed gives us the following i explanation : Hollinshed's sole authority seems to have been Boethius. But it is not improbable that his account may be the true one, although the circumstance does not oecur in Wintoun's Chronicle. The situation of the cross, Note 14. Stanza xxxii. The last verse of this song is taken from the frag-and the pains taken to defend it, seem to indicate that ment of an old Scottish ballad, of which I only recol- it was intended for a land-mark of importance. lected two verses, when the first edition of Rokeby was published. Mr Thomas Sheridan kindly pointed out to me an entire copy of this beautiful song, which seems to express the fortunes of some follower of the Stuart family: It was a' for our rightful king That we left fair Scotland's strand, It was a' for our rightful king That we e'er saw Irish land. Now all is done that man can do, And all is done in vain! My love! my native land, adieu! For I must cross the main. He turn'd him round and right about, All on the Irish shore, He gave his bridle-reins a shake, Adieu for evermore. The soldier frae the war returns, And ne'er to meet again, hast thou lodged our deer? The duty of the ranger, or pricker, was first to lodge, or harbour the deer; i. e. to discover his retreat, as described at length in Note 10., and then to make his report to his prince, or master: Before the king I come report to make, Then hush and peace for noble Tristrame's sake--- My hound did sticke, and seem'd to vent some beast. I held him short, and drawing after him, I might behold the hart was feeding trym; My bound by sent did me thereof assure --- The toes were great, the joynt bones round and short, The Art of Venerie, ut supra, p. 96. CANTO IV. Note 1. Stanza i. When Denmark's Raven soar'd on high, Bade Reged's Britons dread the yoke. About the year of God 866, the Danes, under their celebrated leaders Inguar (more properly Agnar) and Bubba, sons, it is said, of the still more celebrated Regnar Lodbrog, invaded Northumberland, bringing with them the magical standard, so often mentioned in poetry, called REAFEN, or Raunfan, from its bearing the igure of a raven : Wrought by the sisters of the Danish king, • Shake, standard, shake this ruin on our foes," The Danes renewed and extended their incursions, and began to colonize, establishing a kind of capital at York, from which they spread their conquests and incursions in every direction. Stanmore, which divides the mountains of Westmoreland and Cumberland, was probably the boundary of the Danish kingdom in that direction. The district to the west, known in ancient British history by the name of Reged, had never been conquered by the Saxons, and continued to maintain a precarious independence, until it was ceded to Malcolm, king of Scots, by William the Conqueror, probably on account of its similarity in language and manners to the neighbouring British kingdom of Strath-Clyde. Upon the extent and duration of the Danish sovereignty in Northumberland, the curious may consult the various authorities quoted in the Gesta et Vestigia Danorum extra Daniam, vol. II, p. 40. The most powerful of their Northumbrian leaders seems to have been lar, called, from the extent of his conquests, Widfami, that is, The Strider. Note 2. Stanza i. Where Tees in tumult leaves his source, Thundering o'er Caldron and High-Force. The Tees rises about the skirts of Crossfell, and falls over the cataracts named in the text before it leaves the mountains which divide the North Riding from Cumberland. High-Force is seventy-five feet in height. Note 3. Stanza i. Beneath the shade the Northmen came, The heathen Danes have left several traces of their religion in the upper part of Teesdale. Balder-Garth, which derives its name from the unfortunate son of Odin, is a tract of waste land on the very ridge of Stanmore; and a brook, which falls into the Tees near Bar nard Castle, is named after the same deity. A field upon the banks of the Tees is also termed Woden-Croft, from the supreme deity of the Edda. Thorsgill, of which a description is attempted in Stanza II., is a beautiful little brook and dell, running up behind the ruins of Eglistone Abbey. Thor was the Hercules of the Scandinavian mythology, a dreaded giant-queller, and in that capacity the champion of the gods and the defender of Asgard, the northern Olympus, against the frequent attacks of the inhabitants of Jotunheim.There is an old poem in the Edda of Sæmund, called the Song of Thrym, which turns upon the loss and recovery of the Mace, or Hammer, which was Thor's principal weapon, and on which much of his power seems to have depended. It may be read to great advantage in a version equally spirited and literal, among the Miscellaneous Translations and Poems of the Hon. William Herbert. Note 4. Stanza vi. Who has not heard how brave O'Neale The O'Neale here meant, for more than one succeed- Lord Mountjoy succeeded in finally subjugating O'Neale; but it was not till the succession of James, to whom he made personal submission, and was received with civility at court. Yet, according to Morrison, « no respect to him could containe many weomen in those parts, who had lost husbands and children in the Irish warres, from dinging durt and stones at the earle as he passed, and from reuilling him with bitter words; yea, when the carle had been at court, and there obtaining his majesties direction for his pardon and performance of all conditions promised him by the Lord Mountjoy, was about September to returne, hee durst not passe by those parts without direction to the sheriffes, to conuay him with troopes of horse from place to place, till he was safely imbarked and put to sea for Ireland.» - Itinerary, p. 296. Note 5. Stanza vi. But chief arose his victor pride, When that brave marshal fought and died. The chief victory which Tyrone obtained over the English was in a battle fought near Blackwater, while |