Announced by prophet sooth and old,
Doomed doubtless, for achievement bold,
I'll lightly front each high emprize,
For one kind glance of those bright eyes.
Permit me, first, the task to guide
Your fairy frigate o'er the tide."

The maid, with smile suppressed and sly,
The toil unwonted saw him try;
For seldom, sure, if e'er before,
His noble hand had grasped an oar:
Yet with main strength his strokes he drew,
And o'er the lake the shallop flew:
With heads erect, and whimpering cry,
The hounds behind their passage ply.
Nor frequent does the bright oar break
The darkening mirror of the lake,
Until the rocky isle they reach,
And moor their shallop on the beach.
XXV.

The stranger viewed the shore around;
'Twas all so close with copse-wood bound,
Nor track nor pathway might declare
That human foot frequented there,
Until the mountain maiden showed
A clambering unsuspected road,
That winded through the tangled screen,
And opened on a narrow green,
Where weeping birch and willow round
With their long fibres swept the ground.
Here, for retreat in dangerous hour,
Some chief had framed a rustic bower.7
XXVI.

It was a lodge of ample size,
But strange of structure and device;
Of such materials, as around

The workman's hand had readiest found.

Lopped of their boughs, their hoar trunks bared,
And by the hatchet rudely squared,
To give the walls their destined height,
The sturdy oak and ash unite;
While moss and clay and leaves combined
To fence each crevice from the wind.
The lighter pine-trees, over head,
Their slender length for rafters spread,
And withered heath and rushes dry
Supplied a russet canopy.

Due westward, fronting to the green,
A rural portico was seen,
Aloft on native pillars borne,

Of mountain fir with bark unshorn,
Where Ellen's hand had taught to twine
The ivy and Idæan vine,

The clematis, the favoured flower
Which boasts the name of virgin-bower,
And every hardy plant could bear
Loch-Katrine's keen and searching air.
An instant in this porch she staid,
And gayly to the stranger said,
"On heaven and on thy lady call,
And enter the enchanted hall!"

XXVII.

"My hope, my heaven, my trust must be,
My gentle guide, in following thee."-
He crossed the threshold-and a clang
Of angry steel that instant rang.
To his bold brow his spirit rushed,
But soon for vain alarm he blushed,
When on the floor he saw displayed,
Cause of the din, a naked blade

Dropped from the sheath, that careless flung,
Upon a stag's huge antlers swung;

For all around, the walls to grace,
Hung trophies of the fight or chase:
A target there, a bugle here,
A battle-axe, a hunting spear,

And broad-swords, bows, and arrows, store,
With the tusked trophies of the boar.
Here grins the wolf as when he died,
And there the wild-cat's brindled hide
The frontlet of the elk adorns,

Or mantles o'er the bison's horns:
Pennons and flags defaced and stained,
That blackening streaks of blood retained,
And deer-skins, dappled, dun and white,
With otter's fur and seal's unite,
In rude and uncouth tapestry all,
To garnish forth the sylvan hall.
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 swayed,
"I never knew but one," he said,
"Whose stalwart arm might brook to wield
A blade like this in battle field."
She sighed, 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
Of Ferragus, or Ascapart:

But in the absent giant's hold

Are women now, and menials old."

XXIX.

The mistress of the mansion came,
Mature of age, a graceful dame;
Whose easy step and stately port
Had well become a princely court,
To whom, though more than kindred knew,
Young Ellen gave a mother's due.
Meet welcome to her guest she made,
And every courteous rite was paid,
That hospitality could claim,

Though all unasked his birth and name.9
Such then the reverence to a guest,
That fellest foe might join the feast,
And from his deadliest foeman's door
Unquestioned turn, the banquet o'er.
At length his rank the stranger names,
"The knight of Snowdoun, James Fitz-James;
Lord of a barren heritage,

Which his brave sires, from age to age,
By their good swords had held with toil;
His sire had fallen in such turmoil,
And he, God wot, was forced to stand
Oft for his right with blade in hand.
This morning with lord Moray's train
He chased a stalwart stag in vain,
Outstripped his comrades, missed the deer,
Lost his good steed, and wandered here."
XXX.

Fain would the knight in turn require
The name and state of Ellen's sire;
Well showed the elder lady's mien,
That courts and cities she had seen;
Ellen, though more her looks displayed
The simple grace of sylvan maid,
In speech and gesture, form and face,
Showed she was come of gentle race;
Twere strange in ruder rank to find
Such looks, such manners, and such mind.

Each hint the knight of Snowdoun gave,
Dame Margaret heard with silence grave;
Or Ellen, innocently gay,
Turned all inquiry light away:
"Wierd women we! by dale and down
We dwell, afar from tower and town.
We stem the flood, we ride the blast,
On wandering knights our spells we cast;
While viewless minstrels touch the string,
Tis thus our charmed rhymes we sing."
She sung, and still a harp unseen
Filled up the symphony between. 10
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. In our isle's enchanted hall,

Hands unseen thy couch are strewing,
Fairy strains of music fall,

Every sense in slumber dewing.
Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er,
Dream of fighting fields no more;
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking,
Morn of toil, nor night of waking.

"No rude sound shall reach thine ear, Armour's clang, or war-steed champing, Trump nor pibroch summon here

Mustering clan, or squadron tramping.
Yet the lark's shrill fife may come,
At the day-break from the fallow,
And the bittern sound his drum,

Booming from the sedgy shallow.
Ruder sounds shall none be near,
Guards nor warders challenge here,
Here's no war-steed's neigh and champing,
Shouting clans or squadrons stamping."
XXXII.

She paused-then, blushing, led the lay
To grace the stranger of the day.
Her mellow notes awhile prolong
The cadence of the flowing song,
Till to her lips in measured frame
The minstrel verse spontaneous came.

At length, with Ellen in a grove
He seemed to walk, and speak of love;
She listened with a blush and sigh,
His suit was warm, his hopes were high.
He sought her yielded hand to clasp,
And a cold gauntlet met his grasp;
The phantom's sex was changed and gone,
Upon its head a helmet shone;
Slowly enlarged to giant size,

With darkened cheek and threatening eyes,
The grisly visage, stern and hoar,
To Ellen still a likeness bore.-
He woke, and, panting with affright,
Recalled the vision of the night.

The hearth's decaying brands were red,
And deep and dusky lustre shed,
Half showing, half concealing all
The uncouth trophies of the hall.

'Mid those the stranger fixed his eye
Where that huge falchion hung on high,

And thoughts on thoughts, a countless throng, Rushed, chasing countless thoughts along, Until, the giddy whirl to cure,

He rose, and sought the moonshine pure.

XXXV.

The wild rose, eglantine, and broom,
Wasted around their rich perfume;
The birch trees wept in fragrant balm,
The aspen slept beneath the calm;
The silver light, with quivering glance,
Played on the water's still expanse,-
Wild were the heart whose passion's sway
Could rage beneath the sober ray!
He felt its calm, that warrior guest,
While thus he communed with his breast:-
"Why is it, at each turn I trace
Some memory of that exiled race?
Can I not mountain maiden spy,
But she must bear the Douglas eye?
Can I not view a highland brand,
But it must match the Douglas hand?
Can I not frame a fevered dream,
But still the Douglas is the theme?
I'll dream no more-by manly mind
Not e'en in sleep is will resigned.
My midnight orisons said o'er,
I'll turn to rest, and dream no more."
His midnight orison he told,
A prayer with every bead of gold,
Consigned to heaven his cares and woes,
And sunk in undisturbed repose;
Until the heath cock shrilly crew,
And morning dawned on Ben-venue.

CANTO II.

THE ISLAND, 1.

Allan-bane!

II.

SONG.

'Not faster yonder rowers' might

Flings from their oars the spray,
Not faster yonder rippling bright,
That tracks the shallop's course in light,
Melts in the lake away,

Than men from memory erase
The benefits of former days;

Then, stranger, go! good speed the while,
Nor think again of the lonely isle.

"High place to thee in royal court,
High place in battle line,

Good hawk and hound for sylvan sport,
Where beauty sees the brave resort,

The honoured meed be thine!
True be thy sword, thy friend sincere,
Thy lady constant, kind, and dear,
And lost in love's and friendship's smile,
Be memory of the lonely isle.

III.

SONG CONTINUED.

"But if beneath yon southern sky
A plaided stranger roam,
Whose drooping crest and stifled sigh,
And sunken cheek and heavy eye,

Pine for his highland home;
Then, warrior, then be thine to show
The care that sooths a wanderer's wo;
Remember then thy hap ere while,
A stranger in the lonely isle.
"Or, if on life's uncertain main
Mishap shall mar thy sail,

If faithful, wise, and brave in vain,
Wo, want, and exile thou sustain
Beneath the fickle gale;

Waste not a sigh on fortune cnanged,
On thankless courts, or friends estranged,
But come where kindred worth shall smile,
To greet thee in the lonely isle."

So still he sate, as those who wait
Till judgment speak the doom of fate;
So still, as if no breeze might dare
To lift one lock of hoary hair;
So still, as life itself were fled,
In the last sound his harp had sped.

V.
Upon a rock with lichens wild,
Beside him Ellen sate and smiled.
Smiled she to see the stately drake
Lead forth his fleet upon the lake,
While her vexed spaniel, from the beaca,
Bayed at the prize beyond his reach!
Yet tell me, then, the maid who knows,
Why deepened on her cheek the rose?—
Forgive, forgive, fidelity!

Perchance the maiden smiled to see
Yon parting lingerer wave adieu,
And stop and turn to wave anew;
And, lovely ladies, ere your ire
Condemn the heroine of my lyre,
Show me the fair would scorn to spy,
And prize such conquest of her eye!
VI.

While yet he loitered on the spot,
It seemed as Ellen marked him not;
But when he turned him to the glade,
One courteous parting sign she made:
And after, oft the knight would say,
That not when prize of festal day
Was dealt him by the brightest fair,
Who e'er wore jewel in her hair,
So highly did his bosom swell,
As at that simple, mute farewell.
Now with a trusty mountain guide,
And his dark stag-hounds by his side,
He parts-the maid, unconscious still,
Watched him wind slowly round the hiri
But when his stately form was hid,
The guardian in her bosom chid-
"Thy Malcolm! vain and selfish maid!"
'Twas thus upbraiding conscience said,
"Not so had Malcolm idly hung

On the smooth phrase of southern tongue;
Not so had Malcolm strained his eye
Another step than thine to spy.-.
Wake, Allan-bane," aloud she cried,
To the old minstrel by her side,
"Arouse thee from thy moody dream!
I'll give thy harp heroic theme,
And warm thee with a noble name;
Pour forth the glory of the Græme."
Scarce from her lip the word had rushed,
When deep the conscious maiden blushed,

For of his clan, in hall and bower,

Young Malcolm Græme was held the flower

VII.

The minstrel waked his harp-three times
Arose the well-known martial chimes,
And thrice their high heroic pride
In melancholy murmurs died.

"Vainly thou bid'st, O noble maid,"
Clasping his withered hands, he said,
"Vainly thou bid'st me wake the strain,
Though all unwont to bid in vain.
Alas! than mine a mightier hand

Has tuned my harp, my strings has spanned!

I touch the chords of joy, but low

And mournful answer notes of wo;

And the proud march, which victors tread
Sinks in the wailing for the dead.

"But ah' dear lady, thus it sighed
The eve thy sainted mother died;

And such the sounds which, while I strove
To wake a lay of war or love,

Came marring all the festal mirth,
Appalling me who gave them birth,
And, disobedient to my call,

Wailed loud through Bothwell's bannered hall,
Ere Douglasses, to ruin driven,

Were exiled from their native heaven.-4
Oh! if yet worse mishap and wo
My master's house must undergo,
Or aught but weal to Ellen fair,
Brood in these accents of despair,
No future bard, sad harp! shall fling
Triumph or rapture from thy string;
One short, one final strain shall flow,
Fraught with unutterable wo,

Then shivered shall thy fragments lie,
Thy master cast him down and die.”

age;

IX.
Soothing she answered him, "Assuage,
Mine honoured friend, the fears of
All melodies to thee are known,
That harp has rung, or pipe has blown,
In lowland vale or highland glen,
From Tweed to Spey-what marvel, then,
At times, unbidden notes should rise,
Confusedly bound in memory's ties,
Entangling, as they rush along,
The war-march with the funeral song?-
Small ground is now for boding fear;
Obscure, but safe, we rest us here.
My sire, in native virtue great,
Resigning lordship, lands, and state,
Not then to fortune more resigned,
Than yonder oak might give the wind;
The graceful foliage storms may reave,
The noble stem they cannot grieve.
For me"-she stooped, and, looking round,
Plucked a blue hare-bell from the ground,
"For me, whose memory scarce conveys
An image of more splendid days,
This little flower, that loves the lea,
May well my simple emblem be:

It drinks heaven's dew as blith as rose
That in the king's own garden grows;
And when I place it in my hair,
Allan, a bard is bound to swear
He ne'er saw coronet so fair."
Then playfully the chaplet wild

She wreathed in her dark locks, and smiled.
X.

Her smile, her speech, with winning sway,
Wiled the old harper's mood away.
With such a look as hermits throw
When angels stoop to sooth their wo,
He gazed, till fond regret and pride
Thrilled to a tear, then thus replied:
"Loveliest and best! thou little know'st
The rank, the honours thou hast lost!
O might I live to see thee grace,
in Scotland's court, thy birth-right place,

To see my favourite's step advance,
The lightest in the courtly dance,
The cause of every gallant's sigh,
And leading star of every eye,
And theme of every minstrel's art,
The lady of the bleeding heart!"*"

XI.

"Fair dreams are these," the maiden eried,
(Light was her accent, yet she sighed,)
This mossy rock, my friend, to me
Is worth gay chair and canopy;
Nor would my footstep spring more gay
In courtly dance than blith strathspey.
Nor half so pleased mine ear incline
To royal minstrel's lay as thine;
And then for suitors proud and high,
To bend before my conquering eye,
Thou, flattering bard, thyself wilt say,
That grim sir Roderick owns its sway.
The Saxon scourge, Clan-Alpine's pride,
The terror of Loch-Lomond's side,
Would, at my suit, thou know'st delay
A Lennox foray-for a day."

XII.

The ancient bard his glee repressed:
"Ill hast thou chosen theme for jest!
For who, through all this western wild,
Named black sir Roderick e'er, and smiled?
In Holy-Rood a kuight he slew;5

I saw, when back the dirk he drew,
Courtiers gave place before the stride
Of the undaunted homicide:

And since, though outlawed, hath his hand
Full sternly kept his mountain land.
Who else dared give?-ah! wo the day,
That I such hated truth should say-
The Douglas, like a stricken deer,
Disowned by every noble peer,6
E'en the rude refuge we have here!
Alas, this wild marauding chief
Alone might hazard our relief,
And, now thy maiden charms expand,
Looks for his guerdon in thy hand;
Full soon may dispensation sought,

To back his suit, from Rome be brought.
Then, though an exile on the hill,
Thy father, as the Douglas, still

Be held in reverence and fear;

But though to Roderick thou'rt so dear,
That thou might'st guide with silken thread,
Slave of thy will, this chieftain dread,
Yet, O loved maid, thy mirth refrain!
Thy hand is on a lion's mane.'

XIII.
"Minstrel," the maid replied, and high
Her father's soul glanced from her eye,
"My debts to Roderick's house I know:
All that a mother could bestow,
To lady Margaret's care I owe,
Since first an orphan in the wild
She sorrowed o'er her sister's child:
To her brave chieftain son, from ire
Of Scotland's king who shrouds my sire,
A deeper, holier debt is owed;
And, could I pay it with my blood,
Allan! sir Roderick should command
My blood, my life-but not my hand.
Rather will Ellen Douglas dwell

A votaress in Maronnan's cell;7

The well-known cognizance of the Douglas family