Go, and to tame thy wandering course, Still from the grave their voice is heard; "Or deem'st thou not our later time1 Yields topic meet for classic rhyme? Hast thou no elegiac verse For Brunswick's venerable hearse? And snatch'd the spear, but left the shield! MS.-"Dost thou not deem our later day To join that universal moan, = MS "For honour'd life an honour'd close- On thee relenting Heaven bestows For honour'd life an honour'd close ;* "Or of the Red-Cross hero teach, Dauntless in dungeon as on breach: Alike to him the sea, the shore, The brand, the bridle, or the oar: Alike to him the war that calls Its votaries to the shatter'd walls, Which the grim Turk, besmear'd with blood, Against the Invincible made good; Or that, whose thundering voice could wake When stubborn Russ, and metal'd Swede, play'd; Or that, where Vengeance and Affright "Or, if to touch such chord be thine, Till twice an hundred years roll'd o'er; The general's eye, the pilot's art, 3" Scott seems to have communicated fragments of the poem very freely during the whole of its progress. As early as the 22d February 1807, I find Mrs. Hayman acknowledging, in the name of the Princess of Wales, the receipt of a copy of the Introduction to Canto III., in which occurs the tribute to her royal highness's heroic father, mortally wounded the year before at Jena-a tribute so grateful to her feelings that she herself shortly after sent the poet an elegant silver vase as a memorial of her thankfulness. And about the same time the Marchioness of Abercorn expresses the delight with which both she and her lord had read the generous verses on Pitt and Fox in another of those epistles."-Life of Scott, vol iii. p. 9. 4 Sir Sidney Smith. 5 Sir Ralph Abercromby 6 Joanna Baillie. G Thy friendship thus thy judgment wronging, With praises not to me belonging, In task more meet for mightiest powers, Wouldst thou engage my thriftless hours. But say, my Erskine, hast thou weigh'd That secret power by all obey'd, Which warps not less the passive mind, Its source conceal'd or undefined; Whether an impulse, that has birth Soon as the infant wakes on earth, One with our feelings and our powers, And rather part of us than ours; Or whether fitlier term'd the sway Of habit, form'd in early day? Howe'er derived, its force confest Rules with despotic sway the breast, And drags us on by viewless chain, While taste and reason plead in vain.' Look east, and ask the Belgian why, Beneath Batavia's sultry sky, He seeks not eager to inhale The freshness of the mountain gale, Content to rear his whiten'd wall Beside the dank and dull canal? He'll say, from youth he loved to see The white sail gliding by the tree. Or see yon weatherbeaten hind, Whose sluggish herds before him wind, Whose tatter'd plaid and rugged cheek His northern clime and kindred speak; Through England's laughing meads he goes, And England's wealth around him flows; Ask, if it would content him well, At ease in those gay plains to dwell, Where hedge-rows spread a verdant screen, And spires and forests intervene, And the neat cottage peeps between ? No! not for these will he exchange His dark Lochaber's boundless range: Not for fair Devon's meads forsake Bennevis grey, and Garry's lake. Thus while I ape the measure wild 1 "As man, perhaps, the moment of his breath, The Mind's disease, its RULING PASSION came; "Nature its mother, Habit is its nurse; Wit, Spirit, Faculties, but make it worse: Then rise those crags, that mountain tower, By the green hill and clear blue heaven. Lay velvet tufts of loveliest green; I deem'd such nooks the sweetest shade The sun in all its round survey'd; With some strange tale bewitch'd my mind, Of forayers, who, with headlong force, Down from that strength had spurr'd their horse, Far in the distant Cheviots blue, By Wallace wight and Bruce the bold; Of later fields of feud and fight, When, pouring from their Highland height, Had swept the scarlet ranks away. Reason itself but gives it edge and power; As Heaven's blest beam turns vinegar more sour," &c. 2 MS.-"The lonely hill, the rocky tower, That caught attention's wakening hour." 3 MS.-" Recesses where the woodbine grew." 4 Smailholm Tower, in Berwickshire, the scene of the Author's infancy, is situated about two miles from Dryburgh Abbey. 5 The two next couplets are not in the MS. MS." While still with mimic hosts of shells, Again my sport the combat tells Onward the Scottish Lion bore, And onward still the Scottish Lion bore, Still, with vain fondness, could I trace, Anew, each kind familiar face, That brighten'd at our evening fire! From the thatch'd mansion's grey-hair'd Sire, Wise without learning, plain and good, And sprung of Scotland's gentler blood; Whose eye, in age, quick, clear, and keen, Show'd what in youth its glance had been; Whose doom discording neighbours sought, Content with equity unbought ;3 To him the venerable Priest, Our frequent and familiar guest, Whose life and manners well could paint Alike the student and the saint; Alas! whose speech too oft I broke With gambol rude and timeless joke: For I was wayward, bold, and wild, A self-will'd imp, a grandame's child; But half a plague, and half a jest, Was still endured, beloved, caress’d. For me, thus nurtured, dost thou ask The classic poet's well-conn'd task? Nay, Erskine, nay-On the wild hill Let the wild heath-bell flourish still; Cherish the tulip, prune the vine, But freely let the woodbine twine, And leave, untrimm'd the eglantine: Nay, my friend, nay-Since oft thy praise Hath given fresh vigour to my lays; Since oft thy judgment could refine My flatten'd thought, or cumbrous line; Still kind, as is thy wont, attend, And in the minstrel spare the friend. Though wild as cloud, as stream, as gale, Flow forth, flow unrestrain'd, my Tale! Marmion. CANTO THIRD. The Hostel, or Enn. I. THE livelong day Lord Marmion rode: The mountain path the Palmer show'd, 1 See notes on The Eve of St. John. • Robert Scott of Sandy knows, the grandfather of the Poet. 3 Upon revising the Poem, it seems proper to mention that the lines, "Whose doom discording neighbours sought, have been unconsciously borrowed from a passage in Dryden's beautiful epistle to John Driden of Chesterton.-1808. Note to Second Edit. ♦ MS." The student, gentleman, and saint." The reverend gentleman alluded to was Mr. John Martin. By glen and streamlet winded still, In the deep heath, the black-cock rose; II. No summons calls them to the tower, To Scotland's camp the Lord was gone; So late, to unknown friends or foes. On through the hamlet as they paced, Lord Marmion drew his rein: Might well relieve his train. Down from their seats the horsemen sprung, With jingling spurs the court-yard rung; They bind their horses to the stall, For forage, food, and firing call, And various clamour fills the hall: Weighing the labour with the cost, Toils everywhere the bustling host. III., Soon, by the chimney's merry blaze, Bore wealth of winter cheer; minister of Mertoun, in which parish Smailholm Tower is situated. 5 MS.-" They might not choose the easier road, For many a forayer was abroad." 6 See Notes to "The Bride of Lammermoor." Waverley Novels, vols. xiii. and xiv. 7 The village of Gifford lies about four miles from Haddington: close to it is Yester House, the seat of the Marquis of Tweeddale, and a little farther up the stream, which descends from the hills of Lammermoor, are the remains of the old castle of the family. 8 See Appendix, Note 2 N. Of sea-fow! dried, and solands store, And savoury haunch of deer. Were tools for housewives' hand; Nor wanted, in that martial day, The implements of Scottish fray, The buckler, lance, and brand. Beneath its shade, the place of state, On oaken settle Marmion sate, And view'd around the blazing hearth. His followers mix in noisy mirth; Whom with brown ale, in jolly tide, From ancient vessels ranged aside, Full actively their host supplied. IV. Theirs was the glee of martial breast, Boisterous as March, yet fresh as May; How pale his cheek, his eye how bright, Whene'er the firebrand's fickle light Glances beneath his cowl! Full on our Lord he sets his eye; For his best palfrey, would not I Endure that sullen scowl." VII. But Marmion, as to chase the awe saw The ever-varying fire-light show Now call'd upon a squire:- VIII. "So please you," thus the youth rejoin'd, IX. A mellow voice Fitz-Eustace had, X. Song. Where shali the lover rest, Whom the fates sever And rested with his head a space, Reclining on his hand. His thoughts I scan not; but I ween, That, could their import have been seen, The meanest groom in all the hall, That e'er tied courser to a stall, Would scarce have wish'd to be their prey, For Lutterward and Fontenaye. XIII. High minds, of native pride and force, For soon Lord Marmion raised his head, Say, what may this portend?"— Then first the Palmer silence broke, (The livelong day he had not spoke,) "The death of a dear friend."1 XIV. Marmion, whose steady heart and eye Or something in the Palmer's look, A fool's wild speech confounds the wise. XV. Well might he falter!-By his aid Even from his King, a scornful look." a MS." But tired to hear the furious mai¿.” |