There mayst thou rest, thy labor done,
Their lord shall speed the signal on.
As stoops the hawk
The henchman shot him down the way.
upon his
prey,
What woeful accents load the gale ?
The funeral yell, the female wail!
A gallant hunter's sport is o'er,
A valiant warrior fights no more.
Who, in the battle or the chase,

At Roderick's side shall fill his place!
Within the hall, where torch's ray
Supplies the excluded beams of day,
Lies Duncan on his lowly bier,

And o'er him streams his widow's tear.
His stripling son stands mournful by,
His youngest weeps, but knows not why;
The village maids and matrons round
The dismal coronach resound.

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390

177

400

As if some stranger step he hears.
'Tis not a mourner's muffled tread,
Who comes to sorrow o'er the dead,
But headlong haste or deadly fear
Urge the precipitate career.
All stand aghast:- unheeding all,
The henchman bursts into the hall;
Before the dead man's bier he stood,
Held forth the Cross besmeared with
blood;

'The muster-place is Lanrick mead;
Speed forth the signal! clansmen, speed!'

XVIII

4 10

Angus, the heir of Duncan's line, Sprung forth and seized the fatal sign. In haste the stripling to his side His father's dirk and broadsword tied; But when he saw his mother's eye Watch him in speechless agony, Back to her opened arms he flew, Pressed on her lips a fond adieu, 'Alas!' she sobbed, and yet be gone, And speed thee forth, like Duncan's son !' One look he cast upon the bier, Dashed from his eye the gathering tear, Breathed deep to clear his laboring breast, And tossed aloft his bonnet crest, Then, like the high-bred colt when, freed, First he essays his fire and speed, He vanished, and o'er moor and moss Sped forward with the Fiery Cross. Suspended was the widow's tear While yet his footsteps she could hear; And when she marked the henchman's

eye

Wet with unwonted sympathy,

'Kinsman,' she said, his race is run
That should have sped thine errand on;
The oak has fallen, - the sapling bough
Is all Duncraggan's shelter now.
Yet trust I well, his duty done,

The orphan's God will guard my son.
And you, in many a danger true,

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459

It glanced like lightning up Strath-Ire.
O'er dale and hill the summons flew,
Nor rest nor pause young Angus knew;
The tear that gathered in his eye
He left the mountain-breeze to dry;
Until, where Teith's young waters roll
Betwixt him and a wooded knoll
That graced the sable strath with green,
The chapel of Saint Bride was seen.
Swoln was the stream, remote the bridge,
But Angus paused not on the edge;
Though the dark waves danced dizzily,
Though reeled his sympathetic eye,
He dashed amid the torrent's roar:
His right hand high the crosslet bore,
His left the pole-axe grasped, to guide
And stay his footing in the tide.

He stumbled twice, the foam splashed high,

With hoarser swell the stream raced by;
And had he fallen, forever there,
Farewell Duncraggan's orphan heir!
But still, as if in parting life,
Firmer he grasped the Cross of strife,
Until the opposing bank he gained,
And up the chapel pathway strained.

XX

A blithesome rout that morning-tide
Had sought the chapel of Saint Bride.
Her troth Tombea's Mary gave
To Norman, heir of Armandave,
And, issuing from the Gothic arch,
The bridal now resumed their march.
In rude but glad procession came
Bonneted sire and coif-clad dame;
And plaided youth, with jest and jeer,
Which snooded maiden would not hear;
And children, that, unwitting why,
Lent the gay shout their shrilly cry;
And minstrels, that in measures vied
Before the young and bonny bride,
Whose downcast eye and cheek disclose
The tear and blush of morning rose.
With virgin step and bashful hand
She held the kerchief's snowy band.
The gallant bridegroom by her side

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490

XXII

520

Yet slow he laid his plaid aside,
And lingering eyed his lovely bride,
Until he saw the starting tear
Speak woe he might not stop to cheer;
Then, trusting not a second look,
In haste he sped him up the brook,
Nor backward glanced till on the heath
Where Lubnaig's lake supplies the Teith.-
What in the racer's bosom stirred?
The sickening pang of hope deferred,
And memory with a torturing train
Of all his morning visions vain.
Mingled with love's impatience, came
The manly thirst for martial fame;
The stormy joy of mountaineers
Ere yet they rush upon the spears;
And zeal for Clan and Chieftain burning,
And hope, from well-fought field return-
ing,

530

With war's red honors on his crest,
To clasp his Mary to his breast.
Stung by such thoughts, o'er bank and

brae,

Like fire from flint he glanced away, While high resolve and feeling strong Burst into voluntary song.

540

XXIII

SONG

The heath this night must be my bed,
The bracken curtain for my head,
My lullaby the warder's tread,

Far, far, from love and thee, Mary;
To-morrow eve, more stilly laid,
My couch may be my bloody plaid,
My vesper song thy wail, sweet maid!
It will not waken me, Mary!

I may not, dare not, fancy now
The grief that clouds thy lovely brow,
I dare not think upon thy vow,
And all it promised me, Mary.
No fond regret must Norman know;
When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe,
His heart must be like bended bow,
His foot like arrow free, Mary.

A time will come with feeling fraught,
For, if I fall in battle fought,
Thy hapless lover's dying thought

Shall be a thought on thee, Mary.
And if returned from conquered foes,
How blithely will the evening close,
How sweet the linnet sing repose,
To my young bride and me, Mary!

XXIV

550

566

Not faster o'er thy heathery braes, Balquidder, speeds the midnight blaze, 570 Rushing in conflagration strong Thy deep ravines and dells along, Wrapping thy cliffs in purple glow, And reddening the dark lakes below; Nor faster speeds it, nor so far, As o'er thy heaths the voice of war. The signal roused to martial coil The sullen margin of Loch Voil, Waked still Loch Doine, and to the source Alarmed, Balvaig, thy swampy course; 580 Thence southward turned its rapid road Adown Strath-Gartney's valley broad, Till rose in arms each man might claim A portion in Clan-Alpine's name, From the gray sire, whose trembling hand Could hardly buckle on his brand, To the raw boy, whose shaft and bow Were yet scarce terror to the crow. Each valley, each sequestered glen, Mustered its little horde of men, That met as torrents from the height In high and dales their streams unite,

590

It was a wild and strange retreat,
As e'er was trod by outlaw's feet.
The dell, upon the mountain's crest,
Yawned like a gash on warrior's breast;
Its trench had stayed full many a rock,
Hurled by primeval earthquake shock
From Benvenue's gray summit wild,
And here, in random ruin piled,
They frowned incumbent o'er the spot,
And formed the rugged sylvan grot.
The oak and birch with mingled shade
At noontide there a twilight made,
Unless when short and sudden shone
Some straggling beam on cliff or stone,
With such a glimpse as prophet's eye
Gains on thy depth, Futurity.
No murmur waked the solemn still,
Save tinkling of a fountain rill;

But when the wind chafed with the lake,

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640

A sullen sound would upward break,
With dashing hollow voice, that spoke

The incessant war of wave and rock.
Suspended cliffs with hideous sway
Seemed nodding o'er the cavern gray.
From such a den the wolf had sprung,
In such the wild-cat leaves her young; 650
Yet Douglas and his daughter fair
Sought for a space their safety there.
Gray Superstition's whisper dread
Debarred the spot to vulgar tread;
For there, she said, did fays resort,
And satyrs hold their sylvan court,
By moonlight tread their mystic maze,
And blast the rash beholder's gaze.

XXVII

Now eve, with western shadows long,
Floated on Katrine bright and strong,
When Roderick with a chosen few
Repassed the heights of Benvenue.
Above the Goblin Cave they go,
Through the wild pass of Beal-nam-bo;
The prompt retainers speed before,
To launch the shallop from the shore,
For 'cross Loch Katrine lies his way
To view the passes of Achray,
And place his clansmen in array.
Yet lags the Chief in musing mind,
Unwonted sight, his men behind.
A single page, to bear his sword,
Alone attended on his lord;

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670

The rest their way through thickets break,
And soon await him by the lake.
It was a fair and gallant sight,
To view them from the neighboring height,
By the low-levelled sunbeam's light!
For strength and stature, from the clan
Each warrior was a chosen man,
As even afar might well be seen,
By their proud step and martial mien.
Their feathers dance, their tartans float,
Their targets gleam, as by the boat
A wild and warlike group they stand,
That well became such mountain-strand.

XXVIII

Their Chief with step reluctant still Was lingering on the craggy hill, Hard by where turned apart the road To Douglas's obscure abode.

It was but with that dawning morn That Roderick Dhu had proudly sworn To drown his love in war's wild roar, Nor think of Ellen Douglas more;

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690

But he who stems a stream with sand,
And fetters flame with flaxen band,
Has yet a harder task to prove,
By firm resolve to conquer love!
Eve finds the Chief, like restless ghost,
Still hovering near his treasure lost;
For though his haughty heart deny
A parting meeting to his
eye,
Still fondly strains his anxious ear
The accents of her voice to hear,
And inly did he curse the breeze
That waked to sound the rustling trees.
But hark! what mingles in the strain?
It is the harp of Allan-bane,

That wakes its measure slow and high,
Attuned to sacred minstrelsy.
What melting voice attends the strings?
'T is Ellen, or an angel, sings.

XXIX

HYMN TO THE VIRGIN

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710