-What woful accents load the gale? At Roderick's side shall fill his place!- And o'er him streams his widow's tear. The dismal coronach resound.2 XVI. Coronach. He is gone on the mountain, He is lost to the forest, Like a summer-dried fountain, When our need was the sorest. The font, reappearing, From the rain-drops shall borrow, But to us comes no cheering, To Duncan no morrow! 1 MS.-'Tis woman's scream, 'tis childhood's wail. 2 The Coronach of the Highlanders, like the Ulalatus of the Romans and the Ululoo of the Irish, was a wild expression of lamentation, poured forth by the mourners over the body of a departed friend. When the words T The hand of the reaper Takes the ears that are hoary, But the voice of the weeper Wails manhood and glory. The autumn winds rushing Waft the leaves that are searest, When blighting was nearest. of it were articulate, they expressed the praises of the deceased, and the loss the clan would sustain by his death. The following is a lamentation of this kind, literally translated from the Gaelic, to some of the ideas of which the text stands indebted. The tune is so popular, that it has since become the war-march, or Gathering of the clan. Coronach on Sir Lauchlaa, Chief of Alarlean. "Which of all the Senachies Can trace thy line from the root up to Paradise, But Macvuirih, the son of Fergus? No sooner had thine ancient stately tree Taken firm root in Albion, Than one of thy forefathers fell at Harlaw. "I was then we lost a chief of deathless name. ""Tis no base weed-no planted tree, Nor a seedling of last Autumn; Nor a sapling planted at Beltain;1 Wide, wide around were spread its lofty branches But the topmost bough is lowly laid! Thou hast forsaken us before Sawine.? "Thy dwelling is the winter house;— Loud, sad, sad, and mighty is thy death-song! Oh! courteous champion of Montrose! Oh! stately warrior of the Celtic Isles! Thou shalt buckle thy harness on no more!" The coronach has for some years past been superseded at funerals by the use of the bagpipe; and that also is, like many other Highland peculiarities, falling into disuse, unless in remote districts. 1 Bell's fire, or Whitsunday. 2 Hallowe'en. Fleet foot on the correi,1 Sage counsel in cumber, How sound is thy slumber! Like the foam on the river, 3 XVII. See Stumah, who, the bier beside, 1 Or corri. The hollow side of the hill, where game usually lies. 2 Mr. Scott is such a master of versification, that the most complicated metre does not, for an instant, arrest the progress of his imagination; its difficulties usually operate as a salutary excitement to his attention, and not unfrequently suggest to him new and unexpected graces of expression. If a careless rhyme, or an ill-constructed phrase occasionally escape him amidst the irregular torrent of his stanza, the blemish is often imperceptible by the hurried eye of the reader; but when the short lines are yoked in pairs, any dissonance in the jingle, or interruption of the construction, cannot fail to give offence. We learn from Horace, that in the course of a long work, a poet may legitimately indulge in a momentary slumber; but we do not wish to hear him snore.-Quarterly Review. 3 Faithful. The name of a dog. All stand aghast :-unheeding all, Held forth the Cross besmear'd with blood; "The muster place is Lanrick mead; Speed forth the signal! clansmen, speed!" XVIII. Angus, the heir of Duncan's line,1 Dash'd from his eye the gathering tear, Then, like the high-bred colt, when, freed, First he essays his fire and speed, 1 MS.-Angus, the first of Duncan's line, |