The meeting of these champions proud Seem'd like the bursting thunder-cloud. VI. Stern was the dint the Borderer lent! And his plumes went scattering on the gale; But Cranstoun's lance, of more avail, VII. But when he rein'd his courser round, Lie senseless as the bloody clay, For the kinsman of the maid he loved. VIII. Away in speed Lord Cranstoun rode; The dwarf espied the Mighty Book! He thought not to search or stanch the wound, IX. The iron band, the iron clasp, 1 See Appendix, Note 2 L. * Magical delusion Would not yield to unchristen'd hand, X. He had not read another spell, The clasps, though smeared with Christian gore He hid it underneath his cloak.— XI. Even to the Ladye's secret bower; Was always done maliciously; And the blood well'd freshly from the wound The Lay TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE CHARLES EARL OF DALKEITH, THIS POEM IS INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. The Poem now offered to the Public, is intended to illustrate the customs and manners which anciently prevailed on the Borders of England and Scotland. The inhabitants living in a state partly pastoral and partly warlike, and combining habits of constant depredation with the influence of a rude spirit of chivalry, were often engaged in scenes highly susceptible of poetical ornament. As the description of scenery and manners was more the object of the Author than a combined and regular narrative, the plan of the Ancient Metrical Romance was adopted, which allows greater latitude, in this respect, than would be consistent with the dignity of a regular Poem. The same model offered other facilities, as it permits an occasional alteration of measure, which, in some degree, authorizes the change of rhythm in the text.' The machinery, also, adopted from popular belief, would have seemed puerile in a Poem which did not partake of the rudeness of the old Ballad, or Metrical Romance. For these reasons, the Poem was put into the mouth of an ancient Minstrel, the last of the race, who, as he is supposed to have survived the Revolution, might have caught somewhat of the refinement of modern poetry, without losing the simplicity of his original model. The date of the Tale itself is about the middle of the sixteenth century, when most of the personages actually flourished. The time occupied by the action is Three Nights and Three Days. INTRODUCTION. THE way was long, the wind was cold, 1 "The chief excellence of the Lay consists in the beauty of the descriptions of local scenery, and the accurate picture of customs and manners among the Scottish Borderers at the time it refers to. The various exploits and adventures which occur in those half-civilized times, when the bands of government were so loosely twisted, that every man depended for safety more on his own arm, or the prowess of his chief, than on the civil power, may be said to hold a middle rank between nistory and private anecdote. War is always most picturesque where it is least formed into a science; it has most variety and interest where the prowess and activity of individuals has most play; and the nocturnal expedition of Diomed and Ulysses to Beize the chariot and horses of Rhesus, or a raid of the Scotts or the Kerrs to drive cattle, will make a better figure in verse, than all the battles of the great King of Prussia. The sleuthdog, the beacon-fires, the Jedwood-axes, the moss-troopers, the yell of the slogan, and all the irregular warfare of predatory expeditions, or feuds of hereditary vengeance, are far more captivating to the imagination than a park of artillery and battalions of well-drilled soldiers."-Annual Review, 1804. "It must be observed, that there is this difference between the license of the old romancer, and that assumed by Mr. Scott: the aberrations of the first are usually casual and slight; those of the other, premeditated and systematic. The ald romancer may be compared to a man who trusts his reins to his horse; his palfrey often blunders, and occasionally breaks his pace, sometimes from vivacity, oftener through in His wither'd cheek, and tresses gray, dolence. Mr. Scott sets out with the intention of diversifying 'Make graceful caprioles, and prance A main objection to this plan is to be found in the shock which For "From the novelty of its style and subject, and from the spirit of its execution, Mr. Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel kindled a sort of enthusiasm among all classes of readers; and the concurrent voice of the public assigned to it a very exalted rank, which, on more cool and dispassionate examination, its numerous essential beauties will enable it to maintain. vivid richness of coloring and truth of costyme, many of its descriptive pictures stand almost unrivalled; it carries us back in imagination to the time of action; and we wander with the poet along Tweedside, or among the wild glades of Ettrick Forest."-Monthly Review, May, 1808. 3 "We consider this poem as an attempt to transfer the refinements of modern poetry to the matter and the manner of The last of all the Bards was he, The unpremeditated lay: Old times were changed, old manners gone; He pass'd where Newark's' stately tower the ancient metrical romance. The author, enamored of the ofty visions of chivalry, and partial to the strains in which they were formerly embodied, seems to have employed all the resources of his genius in endeavoring to recall them to the avor and admiration of the public, and in adapting to the taste of modern readers a species of poetry which was once the delight of the courtly, but has long ceased to gladden any other eyes than those of the scholar and the antiquary. This is a romance, therefore, composed by a minstrel of the present day; or such a romance as we may suppose would have been written in modern times, if that style of composition had continued to be cultivated, and partakes consequently of the improvements which every branch of literature has received since the time of its desertion."-JEFFREY, April, 1805. Turning to the northward, Scott showed us the crags and tower of Smailholme, and behind it the shattered fragment of Erceldoune, and repeated some pretty stanzas as cribed to the last of the real wandering minstrels of this district, by name Burn: Sing Erceldoune, and Cowdenknowes, Where Homes had ance commanding, 'But Minstrel Burn cannot assuage His grief while life endureth, To see the changes of this age For mony a place stands in hard case, Life, vol. vi. p. 78. 2 "This is a massive square tower, now unroofed and ruinous, surrounded by an outward wall, defended by round flanking turrets. It is most beautifully situated, about three miles from Selkirk, upon the banks of the Yarrow, a fierce and precipitous stream, which unites with the Ettricke about a mile beneath the castle Looks out from Yarrow's birchen bower: The embattled portal arch he pass'd, When kindness had his wants supplied, And the old man was gratified, Began to rise his minstrel pride: And he began to talk anon, The royal arms, "Newark Castle was built by James II. with the unicorn, are engraved on a stone in the western side of the tower. There was a much more ancient castle in its immediate vicinity, called Auldwark, founded, it is said, by Alexander III. Both were designed for the royal residence when the king was disposed to take his pleasure in the extensive forest of Ettricke. Various grants occur in the records of the Privy Seal, bestowing the keeping of the Castle of Newark upon different barons. There is a popular tradition that it was once seized, and held out by the outlaw Murray, a noted character in song, who only surrendered Newark upon condition of being made hereditary sheriff of the forest. A long ballad, containing an account of this transaction, is preserved in the Border Minstrelsy (vol. i. p. 369). Upon the marriage of James IV. with Margaret, sister of Henry VIII., the Castle of Newark, with the whole forest of Ettricke, was assigned to her as a part of her jointure lands. But of this sho could make little advantage; for, after the death of her hus band, she is found complaining heavily, that Buccleuch had seized upon these lands. Indeed, the office of keeper was latterly held by the family of Buccleuch, and with so firm a grasp, that when the Forest of Ettricke was disparked, they obtained a grant of the Castle of Newark in property. It was within the courtyard of this castle that General Lesly did military execution upon the prisoners whom he had taken at the battle of Philiphaugh. The castle continued to be an occasional seat of the Buccleuch family for more than a century; and here, it is said, the Duchess of Monmouth and Buccleuch was brought up. For this reason, probably, Mr. Scott has chosen to make it the scene in which the Lay of the Last Min strel is recited in her presence, and for her amusement.' SCHETKY's Illustrations of the Lay of the Last Minstrel. It may be added that Bowhill was the favorite residence of Lord and Lady Dalkeith (afterwards Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch), at the time when the poem was composed; the ruins of Newark are all but included in the park attached to that modern seat of the family; and Sir Walter Scott, no doubt, was influenced in his choice of the locality, by the predilection of the charming lady who suggested the subject of his Lay for the scenery of the Yarrow-a beautiful walk on whose banks, leading from the house to the old castle, is called, in memory of her, the Duchess's Walk.-Ep. 3 Anne, Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, representa The Lay of the Last Minstrel: A POEM, IN SIX CANTOS. Dum relego, scripsisse pudet; quia plurima cerno, ADVERTISEMENT TO EDITION 1833. THE INTRODUCTION TO THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL, written in April, 1830, was revised by the Author in the autumn of 1831, when he also made some corrections in the text of the Poem, and several additions to the notes. The work is now printed from his interleaved copy. It is much to be regretted that the original MS. of this Poem has not been preserved. We are thus denied the advantage of comparing throughout the Author's various readings, which, in the case of Marmion, the Lady of the Lake, the Lord of the Isles, &c., are often highly curious and instructive.-ED. INTRODUCTION TO EDITION 1830. A POEM of nearly thirty years' standing' may be supposed hardly to need an Introduction, since, without one, it has been able to keep itself afloat through the best part of a generation. Nevertheless, as, in the edition of the Waverley Novels now in course of publication [1830], I have imposed on myself the task of saying something concerning the purpose and history of each, in their turn, I am desirous that the Poems for which I first received some marks of the public favor, should also be accompanied with such scraps of their literary his 1 Published in 4to (£1 5s.), January, 1805. tory as may be supposed to carry interest along with them. Even if I should be mistaken in think ing that the secret history of what was once so popular, may still attract public attention and cu riosity, it seems to me not without its use to record the manner and circumstances under which the present, and other Poems on the same plan, attained for a season an extensive reputation. I must resume the story of my literary labors at the period at which I broke off in the Essay on the Imitation of Popular Poetry [see post], when I had enjoyed the first gleam of public favor, by the success of the first edition of the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. The second edition of that work, published in 1803, proved, in the language of the trade, rather a heavy concern. The demand in Scotland had been supplied by the first edition, and the curiosity of the English was not much awakened by poems in the rude garb of antiquity, accompanied with notes referring to the obscure feuds of barbarous clans, of whose very names civilized history was ignorant. It was, on the whole, one of those books which are more praised than they are read." At this time I stood personally in a different position from that which I occupied when I first dipt my desperate pen in ink for other purposes than those of my profession. In 1796, when I first pub 2"The 'Lay' is the best of all possible comments on the Border Minstrelsy."-British Critic, August, 1805 |