"O mercy, mercy, noble lord!

Spare the poor's pittance," was his cry, "Earn'd by the sweat these brows have pour'd, In scorching hour of fierce July ?"

Earnest the right hand stranger pleads,
The left still cheering to the prey,
Th' impetuous earl no warning heeds,
But furious holds the onward way.

"Away, thou hound so basely born,

Or dread the scourge's echoing blow!" Then loudly rung his bugle horn, Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!"

So said, so done: a single bound

Clears the poor labourer's humble pale: Wild follows man, and horse, and hound, Like dark December's stormy gale.

And man, and horse, and hound, and horn, Destructive sweep the field along; While joying o'er the wasted corn,

Fell famine marks the maddening throng.

Again uproused, the timorous prey

Scours moss, and moor, and holt, and hill; Hard run, he feels his strength decay,

And trusts for life his simple skill.

Too dangerous solitude appear'd;

He seeks the shelter of the crowd; Amid the flock's domestic herd

His harmless head he hopes to shroud.

O'er moss, and moor, and holt, and hill, His track the steady bloodhounds trace; O'er moss and moor, unwearied still,

The furious earl pursues the chase.

Full lowly did the herdsman fall;

"O spare, thou noble baron, spare These herds, a widow's little all; These flocks an orphan's fleecy care?"

Earnest the right hand stranger pleads,

The left still cheering to the prey; The earl nor prayer nor pity heeds,

But furious keeps the onward way.

"Unmanner'd dog! to stop my sport Vain were thy cant and beggar whine, Though human spirits, of thy sort,

Were tenants of these carrion kine!"

Again he winds his bugle horn,

"Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!" And through the herd, in ruthless scorn, He cheers his furious hounds to go.

In heaps the throttled victims fall;

Down sinks their mangled herdsman near. The murderous cries the stag appalAgain he starts, new nerved by fear. With blood besmear'd, and white with foam, While big the tears of anguish pour, He seeks, amid the forest's gloom, The humble hermit's hallow'd bower.

But man and horse, and horn and hound,
Fast rattling on his traces go;
The sacred chapel rung around

With, "Hark away! and, holla, ho!"

All mild, amid the route profane,

The holy hermit pour'd his prayer; "Forbear with blood God's house to stain; Revere his altar, and forbear!

"The meanest brute has rights to plead,

Which wrong'd by cruelty or pride, Draw vengeance on the ruthless head:

Be warn'd at length, and turn aside."

Still the fair horseman anxious pleads;

The black, wild whooping, points the prey: Alas! the earl no warning heeds,

But frantic keeps the forward way.

"Holy or not, or right or wrong,

Thy altar, and its rites, I spurn; Not sainted martyr's sacred song,

Not God himself, shall make me turn!"

He spurs his horse, he winds his horn,

"Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!" But off, on wirlwind's pinions borne, The stag, the hut, the hermit, go.

And horse, and man, and horn, and hound,
And clamour of the chase was gone;
For hoofs, and howls, and bugle sound,
A deadly silence reign'd alone.

Wild gazed th' affrighted earl around;
He strove in vain to wake his horn;
In vain to call; for not a sound
Could from his anxious lips be borne.
He listens for his trusty hounds;
No distant baying reach'd his ears:
His courser, rooted to the ground,
The quickening spur unmindful bears.
Still dark and darker frown the shades,
Dark as the darkness of the grave;
And not a sound the still invades,
Save what a distant torrent gave.

High o'er the sinner's humbled head

At length the solemn silence broke; And from a cloud of swarthy red,

The awful voice of thunder spoke.

"Oppressor of creation fair!

Apostate spirits' harden'd tool! Scorner of God! Scourge of the poor! The measure of thy cup is full. "Be chased forever through the wood; Forever roam th' affrighted wild; And let thy fate instruct the proud,

God's meanest creature is his child."

'Twas hush'd: one flash, of sombre glare, With yellow ting'd the forest brown; Up rose the wildgrave's bristling hair, And horror chill'd each nerve and bone.

Cold pour'd the sweat in freezing rill;

A rising wind began to sing; And louder, louder, louder still,

Brought storm and tempest on its wing. Earth heard the call! Her entrails rend; From yawning rifts, with many a yell, Mix'd with sulphureous flames, ascend The misbegotten dogs of hell.

What ghastly huntsman next arose,
Well may I guess, but dare not tell;
His eye like midnight lightning glows,
His steed the swarthy hue of hell.
The wildgrave flies o'er bush and thorn,
With many a shriek of helpless wo;
Behind him hound, and horse, and horn,
And, "Hark away, and holla, ho!"

With wild despair's reverted eye,

Close, close behind, he marks the throng, With bloody fangs, and eager cry,

In frantic fear he scours along.

Still, still shall last the dreadful chase,
Till time itself shall have an end:
By day they scour earth's cavern'd space,
At midnight's witching hour ascend.

This is the horn, and hound, and horse,

That oft the lated peasant hears; Appall'd he signs the frequent cross, When the wild din invades his ears.

The wakeful priest oft drops a tear

For human pride, for human wo, When at his midnight mass, he hears Th' infernal cry of "Holla, ho!"

THE BATTLE OF SEMPACH.

THESE Verses are a literal translation of an ancient Swiss ballad upon the battle of Sempach, fought 9th July, 1386, being the victory by which the Swiss cantons established their independence. The author is Albert Tehudi, denominated the Souter, from his profession of a shoemaker. He was a citizen of Lucerne, esteemed highly among his countrymen, both for his powers as a Meistersinger, or minstrel, and his courage as a soldier; so that he might share the praise conferred by Collins on Eschylus, that

-Not alone he nursed the poet's flame, But reach'd from Virtue's hand the patriot steel. The circumstance of their being written by a poet returning from a well-fought field he describes, and in which his country's fortune was secured, may confer on Tehudi's verses an interest which they are not entitled to claim from their poetical merit. But ballad poetry, the more literally it is translated, the more it loses its simplicity, without acquiring either grace or strength; and therefore some of the faults of the verses must be imputed to the translator's feeling it a duty to

keep as closely as possible to his original. The various puns, rude attempts at pleasantry, and disproportioned episodes, must be set down to Tehudi's account, or to the taste of his age.

The military antiquary will derive some amusement from the minute particulars which the martial poet has recorded. The mode in which the Austrian men-at-arms received the charge of the Swiss was by forming a phalanx, which they defended with their long lances. The gallant Winkelried, who sacrificed his own life by rushing among the spears, clasping in his arms as many as he could grasp, and thus opening a gap in these iron battalions, is celebrated in Swiss history. When fairly mingled together, the unwieldy length of their weapons, and cumbrous weight of their defensive armour, rendered the Austrian men-at-arms a very unequal match for the light-armed mountaineers. The victories obtained by the Swiss over the German chivalry, hitherto deemed as formidable on foot as on horseback, led to important changes in the art of war. The poet describes the Austrian knights and squires as cutting the peaks from their boots ere they could act upon foot, in allusion to an inconvenient piece of foppery, often mentioned in the middle ages. Leopold III., Archduke of Austria, called "The handsome man-atarms," was slain in the battle of Sempach, with the flower of his chivalry.

'Twas when among our linden trees
The bees had housed in swarms,
(And gray-hair'd peasants say that these
Betoken foreign arms,)

Then look'd we down to Willisow,
The land was all in flame;
We knew the Archduke Leopold
With all his army came.

The Austrian nobles made their vow,
So hot their hearts and bold,
"On Switzer carles we'll trample now,
And slay both young and old."

With clarion loud, and banner proud,
From Zurich on the lake,
In martial pomp and fair array,

Their onward march they make.

"Now list ye, lowland nobles all

Ye seek the mountain strand, Nor wot ye what shall be your lot In such a dangerous land.

"I rede ye, shrive you of your sins Before you further go;

A skirmish in Helvetian hills

May send your souls to wo."

"But where now shall we find a priest, Our shrift that he may hear?" "The Switzer priest* has ta'en the field, He deals a penance drear.

* All the Swiss clergy who were able to bear arms fought in this patriotic war.

In the original, Haasenstein, or Hare-stone. This seems to allude to the preposterous fashion, during the middle ages, of wearing boots with the points or peaks turned upwards, and so long that, in some cases, they were fastened to the knees of the wearer with small chains. When they alighted to fight upon foot, it would seem that the Austrian gentlemen found it necessary to cut off these peaks, that they might move with the necessary activity.

A pun on the archduke's name, Leopold.

"I have a virtuous wife at home,

A wife and infant son;

I leave them to my country's care-
This field shall soon be won.

"These nobles lay their spears right thick, And keep full firm array,

Yet shall my charge their order break,
And make my brethren way."

He rush'd against the Austrian band,
In desperate career,

And with his body, breast, and hand,
Bore down each hostile spear.

Four lances splinter'd on his crest, Six shiver'd in his side;

Still on the serried files he press'd-
He broke their ranks, and died.

This patriot's self-devoted deed
First tamed the lion's mood,
And the four forest cantons freed
From thraldom by his blood.

Right where his charge had made a lane,
His valiant comrades burst,
With sword, and axe, and partizan,

And hack, and stab, and thrust.

The daunted lion 'gan to whine,

And granted ground amain; The mountain bull,* he bent his brows, And gored his sides again.

Then lost was banner, spear, and shield,
At Sempach, in the flight;

The cloister vaults at Koningsfield
Hold many an Austrian knight.

It was the Archduke Leopold,

So lordly would he ride,

But he came against the Switzer churls, And they slew him in his pride.

The heifer said unto the bull,

"And shall I not complain? There came a foreign nobleman To milk me on the plain.

"One thrust of thine outrageous horn
Has gall'd the knight so sore,
That to the churchyard he is borne,
To range our glens no more."-

An Austrian noble left the stour,
And fast the flight 'gan take;
And he arrived in luckless hour
At Sempach, on the lake.

He and his squire a fisher call'd,
(His name was Hans Von Rot,)
"For love, or meed, or charity,
Receive us in thy boat."

Their anxious call the fisher heard,
And glad the meed to win,

A pun on the Urus, or wild bull, which gives name to the canton of Uri.

From high Dunedin's towers we come,

A band of brothers true;

Our casques the leopard's spoils surround; With Scotland's hardy thistle crown'd, We boast the red and blue.*

Though tamely crouch to Gallia's frown

Dull Holland's tardy train;

Their ravish'd toys though Romans mourn, Though gallant Switzers vainly spurn, And foaming gnaw the chain;

O! had they mark'd th' avenging callt Their brethren's murder gave, Disunion ne'er their ranks had mown, Nor patriot valour, desperate grown, Sought freedom in the grave!

Shall we, too, bend the stubborn head, In freedom's temple born,

Dress our pale cheeks in timid smile, To hail a master in our isle,

Or brook a victor's scorn?

No! though destruction o'er the land Come pouring as a flood,

The sun that sees our falling day Shall mark our sabres' deadly sway, And set that night in blood.

For gold let Gallia's legions fight,
Or plunder's bloody gain;

Unbribed, unbought, our swords we draw,
To guard our king, to fence our law,
Nor shall their edge be vain.

If ever breath of British gale
Shall fan the tri-colour,

Or footstep of invader rude,

With rapine foul, and red with blood, Pollute our happy shore

Then farewell home! and farewell friends!
Adieu each tender tie!

Resolved, we mingle in the tide,
Where charging squadrons furious ride,
To conquer or to die.

To horse to horse! the sabres gleam;
High sounds our bugle call;
Combined by honour's sacred tie,
Our word is, Laws and Liberty!
March forward, one and all!

MAC-GREGOR'S GATHERING.

WRITTEN FOR ALBYN'S ANTHOLOGY. Air-Thain' a Grigalach.*

THESE Verses are adapted to a very wild, yet lively gathering-tune, used by the Mac-Gregors. The severe treatment of this clan, their outlawry, and the proscription of their very name, are alluded to in the ballad.

THE moon's on the lake, and the mist's on the brae,

And the clan has a name that is nameless by day! Then gather, gather, gather, Gregalach! Gather, gather, gather, &c.

Our signal for fight, that from monarchs we drew, Must be heard but by night in our vengeful haloo! Then haloo, Gregalach! haloo, Gregalach! Haloo, haloo, haloo, Gregalach, &c.

Glen Orchy's proud mountains, Coalchuirn and her towers,

Glenstrae and Glenlyon no longer are ours:

We're landless, landless, landless, Gregalach!
Landless, landless, landless, &c.

But doom'd and devoted by vassal and lord
Mac-Gregor has still both his heart and his sword!
Then courage, courage, courage, Gregalach!
Courage, courage, courage, &c.

If they rob us of name, and pursue us with beagles, Give their roofs to the flame, and their flesh to the eagles!

Then vengeance, vengeance, vengeance, Gregalach!

Vengeance, vengeance, vengeance, &c.

While there's leaves in the forest, and foam on the river,

Mac-Gregor, despite them, shall flourish for ever! Come then, Gregalach! come then, Gregalach! Come then, come then, come then, &c.

Through the depths of Loch Katrine the steed shall career,

O'er the peak of Ben Lomond the galley shall steer,

And the rocks of Craig Royston like icicles melt, Ere our wrongs be forgot, or our vengeance unfelt! Then gather, gather, gather, Gregalach! Gather, gather, gather, &c.

The royal colours.

The allusion is to the massacre of the Swiss guards, on the fatal 10th of August, 1792. It is painful, but not useless, to remark, that the passive temper with which the Swiss regarded the death of their bravest countrymen, mercilessly slaughtered in discharge of their duty, encou raged and authorized the progressive injustice by which the Alps, once the seat of the most virtuous and free people upon the continent, have, at length, been converted into the citadel of a foreign and military despot. A state degraded is half enslaved.

MACKRIMMON'S LAMENT.

Air-Cha till mi tuille.†

MACKRIMMON, hereditary piper to the laird of Macleod, is said to have composed this lament when the clan was about to depart upon a distant

"The Mac-Gregor is come." +"We return no more."