The sheep, before the pinching heaven,
To shelter'd dale and down are driven,
Where yet some faded herbage pines,
And yet a watery sunbeam shines:
In meek despondency they eye
The wither'd sward and wintry sky,
And far beneath their summer hill,
Stray sadly by Glenkinnon's rill:
The shepherd shifts his mantle's fold,
And wraps him closer from the cold;
His dogs no merry circles wheel,
But shivering follow at his heel;
A cowering glance they often cast,
As deeper moans the gathering blast.
My imps, though hardy, bold, and
wild,

As best befits the mountain child,
Feel the sad influence of the hour,
And wail the daisy's vanished flower;
Their summer gambols tell, and mourn,
And anxious ask,-Will spring return,
And birds and lambs again be gay,
And blossoms clothe the hawthorn
spray?

Yes, prattlers, yes; the daisy's flower Again shall paint your summer bower; Again the hawthorn shall supply The lambs upon the lea shall bound, The garlands you delight to tie ; The wild birds carol to the round, Too short shall seem the summer day. And, while you frolic light as they,

To mute and to material things New life revolving summer brings;

The genial call dead Nature hears,
And in her glory reappears.

But oh my country's wintry state
What second spring shall renovate?
What powerful call shall bid arise
The buried warlike and the wise;
The mind that thought for Britain's
weal,

The hand that grasp'd the victor steel? The vernal sun new life bestows Even on the meanest flower that blows; But vainly, vainly may he shine Where glory weeps o'er NELSON'S shrine;

And vainly pierce the solemn gloom, That shrouds, O PITT, thy hallowed tomb!

Deep grav'd in every British heart, O never let those names depart! Say to your sons,-Lo, here his grave, Who victor died on Gadite wave. To him, as to the burning levin, Short, bright, resistless course was given.

Where'er his country's foes were found,

Was heard the fated thunder's sound, Till burst the bolt on yonder shore, Roll'd, blaz'd, destroy'd,- and was

no more.

Nor mourn ye less his perish'd
worth

Who bade the conqueror go forth,
And launch'd that thunderbolt of war
On Egypt, Hafnia, Trafalgar;
Who, born to guide such high emprize,
For Britain's weal was early wise;
Alas! to whom the Almighty gave,
For Britain's sins, an early grave!
His worth who, in his mightiest hour,
A bauble held the pride of power,
Spurn'd at the sordid lust of pelf,
And serv'd his Albion for herself;
Who, when the frantic crowd amain
Strain'd at subjection's bursting rein,

O'er their wild mood full conquest gain'd,

The pride, he would not crush, restrain'd,

Show'd their fierce zeal a worthier cause,

And brought the freeman's arm to aid the freeman's laws.

Had'st thou but liv'd, though stripp'd of power,

A watchman on the lonely tower, Thy thrilling trump had rous'd the land,

When fraud or danger were at hand;
By thee, as by the beacon-light,
Our pilots had kept course aright;
As some proud column, though alone,
Thy strength had propp'd the tottering

throne:

Now is the stately column broke,
The beacon-light is quench'd in smoke,
The trumpet's silver sound is still,
The warder silent on the hill !

Oh think, how to his latest day, When Death, just hovering, claim'd his prey,

With Palinure's unalter'd mood,
Firm at his dangerous post he stood;
Each call for needful rest repell'd,
With dying hand the rudder held,
Till, in his fall, with fateful sway,
The steerage of the realm gave way!
Then, while on Britain's thousand
plains,

One unpolluted church remains,
Whose peaceful bells ne'er sent around
The bloody tocsin's maddening sound,
But still, upon the hallow'd day,

Convoke the swains to praise and pray; While faith and civil peace are dear, Grace this cold marble with a tear,He, who preserved them, PITT, lies here!

Nor yet suppress the generous sigh, Because his rival slumbers nigh;

Of those who fought, and spoke, and sung;

Here, where the fretted aisles prolong
The distant notes of holy song,
As if some angel spoke agen,
'All peace on earth, good-will to
men;'

If ever from an English heart,
O, here let prejudice depart,
And, partial feeling cast aside
Record, that Fox a Briton died!
When Europe crouch'd to France's
yoke,

And Austria bent, and Prussia broke,
And the firm Russian's purpose brave,
Was barter'd by a timorous slave,
Even then dishonour's peace he
spurn'd,

The sullied olive-branch return'd, Stood for his country's glory fast, And nail'd her colours to the mast! Heaven, to reward his firmness, gave A portion in this honour'd grave,

The names of PITT and Fox alone. Spells of such force no wizard grave E'er fram'd in dark Thessalian cave, Though his could drain the ocean dry, And force the planets from the sky. These spells are spent, and, spent with these,

The wine of life is on the lees; Genius, and taste, and talent gone, For ever tomb'd beneath the stone, Where-taming thought to human pride!—

The mighty chiefs sleep side by side.
Drop upon Fox's grave the tear,
'Twill trickle to his rival's bier;
O'er PITT's the mournful requiem
sound,

And Fox's shall the notes rebound.
The solemn echo seems to cry,

'Here let their discord with them die. Speak not for those a separate doom, Whom Fate made Brothers in the

tomb;

But search the land of living men, Where wilt thou find their like agen?'

Rest, ardent Spirits! till the cries
Of dying Nature bid you rise;
Not even your Britain's groans can
pierce

The leaden silence of your hearse;
Then, O, how impotent and vain
This grateful tributary strain!

clime,

Ye heard the Border Minstrel's rhyme: His Gothic harp has o'er you rung; The Bard you deign'd to praise, your deathless names has sung.

Stay yet, illusion, stay a while, My wilder'd fancy still beguile ! From this high theme how can I part, Ere half unloaded is my heart! For all the tears e'er sorrow drew And all the raptures fancy knew, And all the keener rush of blood, That throbs through bard in bard-like mood,

Were here a tribute mean and low, Though all their mingled streams could flow

Woe, wonder, and sensation high,
In one spring-tide of ecstasy!
It will not be, it may not last,
The vision of enchantment's past :
Like frostwork in the morning ray,
The fancied fabric melts away;
Each Gothic arch, memorial-stone,
And long, dim, lofty aisle, are gone;
And, lingering last, deception dear,
The choir's high sounds die on my

ear.

Now slow return the lonely down, The silent pastures bleak and brown, The farm begirt with copsewood wild, The gambols of each frolic child, Mixing their shrill cries with the

tone

Of Tweed's dark waters rushing on.

Prompt on unequal tasks to run, Thus Nature disciplines her son : Meeter, she says, for me to stray, And waste the solitary day,

In plucking from yon fen the reed, And watch it floating down the Tweed;

Or idly list the shrilling lay,

With which the milkmaid cheers her

way,

(Alas, that lawless was their love!)
He sought proud Tarquin in his den,
And freed full sixty knights; or when,
A sinful man, and unconfess'd,
He took the Sangreal's holy quest,
And, slumbering, saw the vision high,
He might not view with waking eye.

The mightiest chiefs of British song Scorn'd not such legends to prolong : They gleam through Spenser's elfin dream,

And mix in Milton's heavenly theme;
And Dryden, in immortal strain,
Had raised the Table Round again,
But that a ribald King and Court
Bade him toil on, to make them sport;
Demanded for their niggard pay,
Fit for their souls, a looser lay,
Licentious satire, song, and play;

design,

Profan'd the God-given strength, and

marr'd the lofty line.

Warm'd by such names, well may
we then,

Though dwindled sons of little men,
Essay to break a feeble lance

In the fair fields of old romance;
Or seek the moated castle's cell,
Where long through talisman and spell,
While tyrants rul'd, and damsels wept,
Thy Genius, Chivalry, hath slept :
There sound the harpings of the North,
Till he awake and sally forth,
On venturous quest to prick again,
In all his arms, with all his train,
Shield, lance, and brand, and plume,
and scarf,

Fay, giant, dragon, squire, and dwarf,
And wizard with his wand of might,
And errant maid on palfrey white.
Around the Genius weave their spells,
Pure Love, who scarce his passion tells;
Mystery, half veil'd and half reveal'd;
And Honour, with his spotless shield;
Attention, with fix'd eye; and Fear,
That loves the tale she shrinks to hear;
And gentle Courtesy; and Faith,
Unchanged by sufferings, time, or
death;

And Valour, lion-mettled lord,
Leaning upon his own good sword.

Well has thy fair achievement shown, A worthy meed may thus be won; Ytene's oaks-beneath whose shade Their theme the merry minstrels made, Of Ascapart, and Bevis bold, And that Red King, who, while of old, Through Boldrewood the chase he led, By his loved huntsman's arrow bledYtene's oaks have heard again Renew'd such legendary strain; For thou hast sung, how He of Gaul, That Amadis so famed in hall,

The Necromancer's felon might;
And well in modern verse hast wove
Partenopex's mystic love :
Hear, then, attentive to my lay,
A knightly tale of Albion's elder day.

Canto First.

The Castle.

I.

DAY set on Norham's castled steep, And Tweed's fair river, broad and deep,

And Cheviot's mountains lone : The battled towers, the donjon keep, The loophole grates, where captives

weep,

The flanking walls that round it sweep,
In yellow lustre shone.
The warriors on the turrets high,
Moving athwart the evening sky,

Seem'd forms of giant height: Their armour, as it caught the rays, Flash'd back again the western blaze, In lines of dazzling light.

II.

St. George's banner, broad and gay, Now faded, as the fading ray

Less bright, and less, was flung; The evening gale had scarce the power To wave it on the Donjon Tower,

So heavily it hung.

The scouts had parted on their search,

The Castle gates were barr'd; Above the gloomy portal arch, Timing his footsteps to a march,

The Warder kept his guard; Low humming, as he paced along, Some ancient Border gathering song.

III.

A distant trampling sound he hears; He looks abroad, and soon appears