Where easily his eye might reach
The Harper on the islet beach,
Reclined against a blighted tree,
As wasted, gray, and worn as he.
To minstrel meditation given,

His reverend brow was raised to heaven,
As from the rising sun to claim
A sparkle of inspiring flame.
His hand, reclined upon the wire,
Seemed watching the awakening fire;
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.

Upon a rock with lichens wild,
Beside him

Smiled she tollen sate and smiled.
see the stately drake

Lead forth his fleet upon the lake,
While her vexed spaniel, from the beach,
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 hill;
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 Grame was held the flower.

VII.

The Minstrel waked his harp-three time
Arose the well-known martial chimes,

And thrice their high heroic pride

In melancholy murmurs died.

"Vainly thou bidd'st, oh noble maid!

Clasping his withered hands, he said,

"Vainly thou bidd'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 woe;

And the proud march which victors tread,

Sinks in the wailing for the dead.

Oh well for me, if mine alone

That dirge's deep prophetic tone!

If, as my tuneful fathers said,

This harp, which erst Saint Modan swayed,

Can thus its master's fate foretell,

Then welcome be the minstrel's knell!

VIIL.

"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 Douglases to ruin driven,

Were exiled from their native heaven.

Oh! if yet worse mishap and woe
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 wõe,
Then shivered shall thy fragments lie,
Thy master cast him down and die."

Soothing she answered him, "Assuage,
Mine honoured friend, the fears of age;
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 blithe 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 soothe their woe,
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!
Oh might I live to see thee grace,
In Scotland's court, thy birthright 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 f every minstrel's art,
The Lady of the leeding Heart!"

XL

"Fair dreams are these," the maiden cried, (Light was her accent, yet she sighed,) "Yet is this mossy rock to me

Worth splendid chair and canopy;

Nor would my footstep spring more gay
In courtly dance than blithe 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 lee 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 knight he slew;

I saw, when back the dirk he drew,
Courtiers give 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! woe the day,
That I such hated truth should say―
The Douglas, like a stricken deer,
Disowned by every noble peer,
Even 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, oh loved maid, thy mirth refrain!
Thy hand is on a lion's mane."

66

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 a 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 Maronan's cell;