The lighter pine-trees, over-head, Their slender length for rafters spread, Due westward, fronting to the green, Aloft on native pillars borne, Of mountain fir with bark unshorn, The clematis, the favour'd flower XXVII. "My hope, my heaven, my trust must be, A target there, a bugle here, A battle-axe, a hunting spear, And broadswords, bows, and arrows store, Or mantles o'er the bison's horns; XXVIII. - The wondering stranger round him gazed. And next the fallen weapon raised: Few were the arms whose sinewy strength Sufficed to stretch it forth at length. And as the brand he poised and sway'd, "I never knew but one," he said, "Whose stalwart arm might brook to wield A blade like this in battle-field." She sigh'd, then smiled and took the word; "You see the guardian champion's sword: As light it trembles in his hand, As in my grasp a hazel wand; My sire's tall form might grace the part But in the absent giant's hold Are women now, and menials old." XXIX. The mistress of the mansion came, To whom, though more than kindred knew, Meet welcome to her guest she made, Though all unask'd his birth and name.' Which his brave sires, from age to age, 'The Highlanders, who carried hospitality to a punctilious excess, are said to have considered it as churlish, to ask a stranger his name or lineage, before he had taken refreshment. Feuds were so frequent among them, that a contrary rule would in many cases have produced the discovery of some circumstance, which might have excluded the guest from the benefit of the assistance he stood in need of. Outstripp'd his comrades, miss'd the deer, XXX. Fain would the Knight in turn require Turn'd all enquiry light away : "Weird women we! by dale and down 166 They" (meaning the Highlanders) "delight much in musicke, but chiefly in harps and clairschoes of their own fashion. The strings of the clairschoes are made of brass wire, and the strings of the harps of sinews; which strings they strike either with their nayles, growing long, or else with an instrument appointed for that use. They take great pleasure to decke their harps and clairschoes with silver and precious stones; the poore XXXI. Song. "Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er, Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking: Dream of battled fields no more, Days of danger, nights of waking. ones that cannot attayne hereunto, decke them with christall. They sing verses prettily compound, contayning (for the most part) prayses of valiant men. There is not almost any other argument, whereof their rhymes intreat. They speak the ancient French language, altered a little."—"The harp and clairschoes are now only heard of in the Highlands in ancient song. At what period these instruments ceased to be used, is not on record; and tradition is silent on this head. But, as Irish harpers occasionally visited the Highlands and Western Isles till lately, the harp might have been extant so late as the middle of the present century. Thus far we know, that from remote times down to the present, harpers were received as welcome guests, particularly in the Highlands of Scotland; and so late as the latter end of the sixteenth century, as appears by the above quotation, the harp was in common use among the natives of the Western Isles. How it happened that the noisy and inharmonious bagpipe banished the soft and expressive harp, we cannot say; but certain it is, that the bagpipe is now the only instrument that obtains universally in the Highland districts."- CAMPBELL'S Journey through North Britain. Lond. 1808. 4to. I. 175. Mr. Gunn, of Edinburgh, has lately published a curious Essay upon the Harp and Harp Music of the Highlands of Scotland. That the instrument was once in common use there, is most certain. Cleland numbers an acquaintance with it among the few accomplishments which his satire allows to the Highlanders:— In nothing they 're accounted sharp, 1 Vide "Certayne Matters concerning the Realme of Scotland, &c., as they were Anno Domini 1597. Lond. 1603." 4to. LL |