When the half sigh her swelling breast

Against the silken ribband prest;

When her blue eyes their secret told,

Though shaded by her locks of gold

Where would you find the peerless fair,

With Margaret of Branksome might compare!

XXIX.

And now, fair dames, methinks I see

You listen to my minstrelsy;

Your waving locks ye backward throw,

And sidelong bend your necks of snow :

Ye ween to hear a melting tale,

Of two true lovers in a dale;

And how the Knight, with tender fire,
To paint his faithful passion strove ;

Swore, he might at her feet expire,

But never, never cease to love;

And how she blushed, and how she sighed,
And, half consenting, half denied,

And said that she would die a maid ;

Yet, might the bloody feud be stayed,
Henry of Cranstoun, and only he,

Margaret of Branksome's choice should be.

XXX.

Alas! fair dames, your hopes are vain!
My harp has lost the enchanting strain ;
Its lightness would my age reprove :
My hairs are gray, my limbs are old,
My heart is dead, my veins are cold :—
I may not, must not, sing of love.

XXXI.

Beneath an oak, mossed o'er by eld,
The Baron's Dwarf his courser held,

And held his crested helm and spear: That Dwarf was scarcely an earthly man, If the tales were true, that of him ran

Through all the Border, far and near.

'Twas said, when the Baron a-hunting rode
Through Reedsdale's glens, but rarely trod,
He heard a voice cry, "Lost! lost! lost!"
And, like tennis-ball by racquet toss'd,
A leap, of thirty feet and three,
Made from the gorse this elfin shape,
Distorted like some dwarfish ape,

And lighted at Lord Cranstoun's knee. Lord Cranstoun was some whit dismay'd; 'Tis said that five good miles he rade,

To rid him of his company;

But where he rode one mile, the Dwarf ran four, And the Dwarf was first at the castle door.

XXXII.

Use lessens marvel, it is said:

This elvish Dwarf with the Baron staid;

Little he ate, and less he spoke,

Nor mingled with the menial flock:

And oft apart his arms he toss'd,

And often mutter'd, "Lost! lost! lost!"
He was waspish, arch, and litherlie,

But well Lord Cranstoun served he:
And he of his service was full fain;
For once he had been ta'en or slain,
An' it had not been his ministry.
All between Home and Hermitage,
Talk'd of Lord Cranstoun's Goblin-Page.

XXXIII.

For the Baron went on pilgrimage,
And took with him this elvish Page,
To Mary's Chapel of the Lowes :
For there, beside Our Ladye's lake,
An offering he had sworn to make,

And he would pay his vows.

But the Ladye of Branksome gathered a band

Of the best that would ride at her command;

The trysting place was Newark Lee. Wat of Harden came thither amain, And thither came John of Thirlestaine,

And thither came William of Deloraine ; spears and three.

They were three hundred

Through Douglas-burn, up Yarrow stream,
Their horses prance, their lances gleam.
They came to St Mary's lake ere day;
But the chapel was void, and the Baron away.
They burn'd the chapel for very rage,

And cursed Lord Cranstoun's Goblin-Page.

XXXIV.

And now, in Branksome's good green wood,

As under the aged oak he stood,

The Baron's courser pricks his ears,

As if a distant noise he hears ;

The Dwarf waves his long lean arm on high,

And signs to the lovers to part and fly ;

No time was then to vow or sigh.