For lo, when through the vapours dank,

Morn shone on Ettrick fair,

A corpse amid the alders rank,

The Palmer welter'd there.

The Maid of Neidpath.

1806.

There is a tradition in Tweeddale, that, when Neidpath Castle, near Peebles, was inhabited by the Earls of March, a mutual passion subsisted between a daughter of that noble family, and a son of the Laird of Tushielaw, in Ettrick Forest. As the alliance was thought unsuitable by her parents, the young man went abroad. During his absence, the lady fell into a consumption; and at length, as the only means of saviny her life, her father consented that her lover should be recalled. On the day when he was expected to pass through Peebles, on the road to Tushielaw, the young lady, though much exhausted, caused herself to be carried to the balcony of a house in Peebles, belonging to the family, that she might see him as he rode past. Her anxiety and eagerness gave such force to her organs, that she is said to have distinguished his horse's footsteps at an incredible distance. But Tushielaw, unprepared for the change in her appearance, and not expecting to see her in that place, rode on without recognizing her, or even slackening his pace. The lady was unable to support the shock; and, after a short struggle, died in the arms of her attendants. There is an incident similar to this traditional tale in Count Hamilton's "Fleur d'Epine."

O LOVERS' eyes are sharp to see,
And lovers' ears in hearing;

And love, in life's extremity,

Can lend an hour of cheering. Disease had been in Mary's bower,

And slow decay from mourning, Though now she sits on Neidpath's tower, To watch her love's returning.

All sunk and dim her eyes so bright,
Her form decay'd by pining,

Till through her wasted hand, at night,
You saw the taper shining;

By fits, a sultry hectic hue

Across her cheek were flying;
By fits, so ashy pale she grew,
Her maidens thought her dying.

Yet keenest powers to see and hear, Seem'd in her frame residing; Before the watch-dog prick'd his ear, She heard her lover's riding:

What poet's voice is smother'd here in dust
Till waked to join the chorus of the just,-
Lo! one brief line an answer sad supplies,
Honour'd, beloved, and mourn'd, here SEWARD lies!
Her worth, her warmth of heart, let friendship say,-
Go seek her genius in her living lay.

Prologue

TO MISS BAILLIE'S PLAY OF THE FAMILY LEGEND. 2

1809.

'Tis sweet to hear expiring Summer's sigh,
Through forests tinged with russet, wail and die;
'Tis sweet and sad the latest notes to hear
Of distant music, dying on the ear;
But far more sadly sweet, on foreign strand,
We list the legends of our native land,
Link'd as they come with every tender tie,
Memorials dear of youth and infancy.

Chief, thy wild tales, romantic Caledon, Wake keen remembrance in each hardy son. Whether on India's burning coasts he toil, Or till Acadia's 3 winter-fetter'd soil,

He hears with throbbing heart and moisten'd eyes,

And, as he hears, what dear illusions rise!

It opens on his soul his native dell,

The woods wild waving, and the water's swell; Tradition's theme, the tower that threats the plain,

The mossy cairn that hides the hero slain;

The cot, beneath whose simple porch were told,

By grey-hair'd patriarch, the tales of old,

The infant group, that hush'd their sports the while,
And the dear maid who listen'd with a smile.
The wanderer, while the vision warms his brain,
Is denizen of Scotland once again.

Are such keen feelings to the crowd confined,
And sleep they in the Poet's gifted mind?
Oh no! For She, within whose mighty page
Each tyrant Passion shows his woe and rage,
Has felt the wizard influence they inspire,
And to your own traditions tuned her lyre.
Yourselves shall judge-whoe'er has raised the sail
By Mull's dark coast, has heard this evening's tale.
The plaided boatman, resting on his oar,
Points to the fatal rock amid the roar

Of whitening waves, and tells whate'er to-night
Our humble stage shall offer to your sight;

This prologue was spoken on that occasion by the Author s friend, Mr. Daniel Terry.

3 Acadia, or Nova Scotia.

Proudly preferr'd that first our efforts give
Scenes glowing from her pen to breathe and live;
More proudly yet, should Caledon approve
The filial token of a Daughter's love.

The Poacher.

WRITTEN IN IMITATION OF CRABBE, AND PUBLISHED
IN THE EDINBURGH ANNUAL REGISTER OF 1809.1
WELCOME, grave Stranger, to our green retreats,
Where health with exercise and freedom meets!
Thrice welcome, Sage, whose philosophic plan
By nature's limits metes the rights of man;
Generous as he, who now for freedom bawls,
Now gives full value for true Indian shawls:
O'er court, o'er customhouse, his shoe who flings,
Now bilks excisemen, and now bullies kings.
Like his, I ween, thy comprehensive mind
Holds laws as mouse-traps baited for mankind:
Thine eye, applausive, each sly vermin sees,
That baulks the snare, yet battens on the cheese;
Thine ear has heard, with scorn instead of awe,
Our buckskinn'd justices expound the law,
Wire-draw the acts that fix for wires the pain,
And for the netted partridge noose the swain;
And thy vindictive arm would fain have broke
The last light fetter of the feudal yoke,
To give the denizens of wood and wild,
Nature's free race, to each her free-born child.
Hence hast thou mark'd, with grief, fair London's

race,

Mock'd with the boon of one poor Easter chase,
And long'd to send them forth as free as when
Pour'd o'er Chantilly the Parisian train,
When musket, pistol, blunderbuss, combined,
And scarce the field-pieces were left behind!

A squadron's charge each leveret's heart dismay'd
On every covey fired a bold brigade;

La Douce Humanité approved the sport,
For great the alarm indeed, yet small the hurt;

Shouts patriotic solemnized the day,
And Seine re-echo'd Vive la Liberté!
But mad Citoyen, meek Monsieur again,
With some few added links resumes his chain.
Then, since such scenes to France no more are known,
Come, view with me a hero of thine own!
One, whose free actions vindicate the cause
Of silvan liberty o'er feudal laws.

Seek we yon glades, where the proud oak o'ertops Wide-waving seas of birch and hazel copse,

1 See Life of Scott, vol. iii., p. 329.

2 Such is the law in the New Forest, Hampshire, tending greatly to increase the various settlements of thieves, smugglers, and deer-stealers, who infest it. In the forest courts the presiding judge wears as a badge of office an antique stir

Leaving between deserted isles of land,
Where stunted heath is patch'd with ruddy sand;
And lonely on the waste the yew is seen,
Or straggling hollies spread a brighter green.
Here, little worn, and winding dark and steep,
Our scarce mark'd path descends yon dingle deep:
Follow-but heedful, cautious of a trip,-

In earthly mire philosophy may slip.

Step slow and wary o'er that swampy stream,
Till, guided by the charcoal's smothering steam,
We reach the frail yet barricaded door
Of hovel form'd for poorest of the poor;
No hearth the fire, no vent the smoke receives,
The walls are wattles, and the covering leaves;
For, if such hut, our forest statutes say,
Rise in the progress of one night and day,
(Though placed where still the Conqueror's hests
o'erawe,

And his son's stirrup shines the badge of law,)
The builder claims the unenviable boon,
To tenant dwelling, framed as slight and soon
As wigwam wild, that shrouds the native frore
On the bleak coast of frost-barr'd Labrador.2

Approach, and through the unlatticed window

peep

Nay, shrink not back, the inmate is asleep;
Sunk 'mid yon sordid blankets, till the sun
Stoop to the west, the plunderer's toils are done.
Loaded and primed, and prompt for desperate

hand,

Rifle and fowling-piece beside him stand;
While round the hut are in disorder laid
The tools and booty of his lawless trade;
For force or fraud, resistance or escape,
The crow, the saw, the bludgeon, and the crape.
His pilfer'd powder in yon nook he hoards,
And the filch'd lead the church's roof affords-
(Hence shall the rector's congregation fret,
That while his sermon's dry his walls are wet.)
The fish-spear barb'd, the sweeping net are there,
Doe-hides, and pheasant plumes, and skins of hare,
Cordage for toils, and wiring for the snare.
Barter'd for game from chase or warren won,

Yon cask holds moonlight,3 run when moon was

none;

And late-snatch'd spoils lie stow'd in hutch apart, To wait the associate higgler's evening cart.

Look on his pallet foul, and mark his rest: What scenes perturb'd are acting in his breast! His sable brow is wet and wrung with pain, And his dilated nostril toils in vain; For short and scant the breath each effort draws, And 'twixt each effort Nature claims a pause.

rup, said to have been that of William Rufus. See Mr. William Rose's spirited poem, entitled "The Red King." "To the bleak coast of savage Labrador."-FALCONER. 3 A cant term for smuggled spirits.