Scott's Lady of the Lake

CANTO FIRST
THE CHASE

 
Harp of the North!¹ that moldering long hast hung
On the witch-elm² that shades St. Fillan’s³ spring,
And down the fitful breeze thy numbers flung,
Till envious ivy did around thee cling,
Muffling with verdant ringlet every string, —
O minstrel Harp! still must thine accents sleep?
Mid rustling leaves and fountain’s murmuring,
Still must thy sweeter sounds their silence keep,
Nor bid a warrior smile, nor teach a maid to weep?
 
 
Not thus, in ancient days of Caledon,⁴
Was thy voice mute amid the festal crowd,
When lay of hopeless love, or glory won,
Aroused the fearful, or subdued the proud.
At each according pause, was heard aloud
Thine ardent symphony sublime and high!
Fair dames and crested chiefs attention bow’d;
For still the burden of thy minstrelsy
Was Knighthood’s dauntless deed, and Beauty’s matchless eye.
 
 
Oh, wake once more! how rude soe’er the hand
That ventures o’er thy magic maze to stray;
Oh, wake once more! though scarce my skill command
Some feeble echoing of thine earlier lay:
Though harsh and faint, and soon to die away,
And all unworthy of thy nobler strain,
Yet if one heart throb higher at its sway,
The wizard note has not been touch’d in vain.
 

Then silent be no more! Enchantress, wake again!

I

 
The stag at eve had drunk his fill,
Where danced the moon on Monan’s⁵ rill,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney’s hazel shade;
But, when the sun his beacon red
Had kindled on Benvoirlich’s head,
The deep-mouth’d bloodhound’s heavy bay
Resounded up the rocky way,
And faint, from farther distance borne,
Were heard the clanging hoof and horn.
 

II

 
As Chief, who hears his warder⁷ call,
“To arms! the foemen storm the wall,”
The antler’d monarch of the waste
Sprung from his heathery⁸ couch in haste.
But, ere his fleet career he took,
The dewdrops from his flanks he shook;
Like crested leader proud and high,
Toss’d his beam’d⁹ frontlet to the sky;
A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuff’d the tainted gale,¹⁰
A moment listen’d to the cry,
That thicken’d as the chase drew nigh;
Then, as the headmost foes appear’d,
With one brave bound the copse he clear’d,
And, stretching forward free and far,
Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var.
 

III

 
Yell’d on the view the opening¹² pack;
Rock, glen, and cavern, paid them back;
To many a mingled sound at once
The awaken’d mountain gave response.
A hundred dogs bay’d deep and strong,
Clatter’d a hundred steeds along,
Their peal the merry horns rung out,
A hundred voices join’d the shout;
With hark and whoop and wild halloo,
No rest Benvoirlich’s echoes knew.
Far from the tumult fled the roe,
Close in her covert cower’d the doe,
The falcon, from her cairn on high,
Cast on the rout¹³ a wondering eye,
Till far beyond her piercing ken¹⁴
The hurricane had swept the glen.
Faint, and more faint, its failing din
Return’d from cavern, cliff, and linn,¹⁵
And silence settled, wide and still,
On the lone wood and mighty hill.
 

IV

 
Less loud the sounds of silvan war
Disturb’d the heights of Uam-Var,
And roused the cavern, where, ’tis told,
A giant made his den of old;
For ere that steep ascent was won,
High in his pathway hung the sun,
And many a gallant, stay’d perforce,
Was fain to breathe his faltering horse,
And of the trackers of the deer,
Scarce half the lessening pack was near;
So shrewdly¹⁶ on the mountain side
Had the bold burst their mettle tried.
 

V

 
The noble stag was pausing now
Upon the mountain’s southern brow,
Where broad extended, far beneath,
The varied realms of fair Menteith.¹⁷
With anxious eye he wander’d o’er
Mountain and meadow, moss and moor,
And ponder’d refuge from his toil,
By far Lochard or Aberfoyle.
But nearer was the copsewood gray,
That waved and wept on Loch Achray,
And mingled with the pine trees blue
On the bold cliffs of Benvenue.
Fresh vigor with the hope return’d,
With flying foot the heath he spurn’d,
Held westward with unwearied race,
And left behind the panting chase.
 

VI

 
’Twere long to tell what steeds gave o’er,
As swept the hunt through Cambus-more;¹⁸
What reins were tighten’d in despair,
When rose Benledi’s ridge in air;
Who flagg’d upon Bochastle’s heath,
Who shunn’d to stem the flooded Teith, —
For twice that day, from shore to shore,
The gallant stag swam stoutly o’er.
Few were the stragglers, following far,
That reach’d the lake of Vennachar;
And when the Brigg¹⁹ of Turk was won,
The headmost horseman rode alone.
 

VII

 
Alone, but with unbated zeal,
That horseman plied the scourge and steel;²⁰
For jaded now, and spent with toil,
Emboss’d with foam, and dark with soil,
While every gasp with sobs he drew,
The laboring stag strain’d full in view.
Two dogs of black St. Hubert’s breed,
Unmatch’d for courage, breath, and speed,
Fast on his flying traces came,
And all but won that desperate game;
For, scarce a spear’s length from his haunch,
Vindictive toil’d the bloodhounds stanch,
Nor nearer might the dogs attain,
Nor farther might the quarry strain.
Thus up the margin of the lake,
Between the precipice and brake,²¹
O’er stock²² and rock their race they take.
 

VIII

 
The Hunter mark’d that mountain²³ high,
The lone lake’s western boundary,
And deem’d the stag must turn to bay,²⁴
Where that huge rampart barr’d the way;
Already glorying in the prize,
Measured his antlers with his eyes;
For the death wound and death halloo,
Muster’d his breath, his whinyard drew; —
But thundering as he came prepared,
With ready arm and weapon bared,
The wily quarry shunn’d the shock,
And turn’d him from the opposing rock;
Then, dashing down a darksome glen,
Soon lost to hound and Hunter’s ken,
In the deep Trosachs’²⁵ wildest nook
His solitary refuge took.
There, while close couch’d, the thicket shed
Cold dews and wild flowers on his head,
He heard the baffled dogs in vain
Rave through the hollow pass amain,
Chiding the rocks that yell’d²⁶ again.
 

IX

 
Close on the hounds the Hunter came,
To cheer them on the vanish’d game;
But, stumbling on²⁷ the rugged dell,
The gallant horse exhausted fell.
The impatient rider strove in vain
To rouse him with the spur and rein,
For the good steed, his labors o’er,
Stretch’d his stiff limbs, to rise no more;
Then, touch’d with pity and remorse,
He sorrow’d o’er the expiring horse.
“I little thought, when first thy rein
I slack’d upon the banks of Seine,²⁸
That Highland eagle e’er should feed
On thy fleet limbs, my matchless steed!
Woe worth²⁹ the chase, woe worth the day,
That costs thy life, my gallant gray!”
 

X

 
Then through the dell his horn resounds,
From vain pursuit to call the hounds.
Back limp’d, with slow and crippled pace,
The sulky leaders of the chase;
Close to their master’s side they press’d,
With drooping tail and humbled crest;
But still the dingle’s hollow throat
Prolong’d the swelling bugle note.
The owlets started from their dream,
The eagles answer’d with their scream,
Round and around the sounds were cast
Till echo seem’d an answering blast;
And on the Hunter hied his way,³⁰
To join some comrades of the day;
Yet often paused, so strange the road,
And wondrous were the scenes it show’d.
 

XI

 
The western waves of ebbing day
Roll’d o’er the glen their level way;³¹
Each purple peak, each flinty spire,
Was bathed in floods of living fire.
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below,
Where twined the path in shadow hid,
Round many a rocky pyramid,
Shooting abruptly from the dell
Its thunder-splinter’d pinnacle;
Round many an insulated³² mass,
The native bulwarks of the pass,
Huge as the tower³³ which builders vain
Presumptuous piled on Shinar’s plain.
The rocky summits, split and rent,
Form’d turret, dome, or battlement,
Or seem’d fantastically set
With cupola or minaret,
Wild crests as pagod³⁴ ever deck’d,
Or mosque of Eastern architect.
Nor were these earth-born castles bare,
Nor lack’d they many a banner fair;
For, from their shiver’d brows display’d,
Far o’er the unfathomable glade,
All twinkling with the dewdrop sheen,³⁵
The brier-rose fell in streamers green,
And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes,
Waved in the west wind’s summer sighs.
 

XII

 
Boon³⁶ nature scatter’d, free and wild,
Each plant or flower, the mountain’s child.
Here eglantine embalm’d the air,
Hawthorn and hazel mingled there;
The primrose pale and violet flower,
Found in each cleft a narrow bower;
Foxglove and nightshade, side by side,
Emblems of punishment and pride,
Group’d their dark hues with every stain
The weather-beaten crags retain.
With boughs that quaked at every breath,
Gray birch and aspen³⁷ wept beneath;
Aloft, the ash and warrior oak
Cast anchor in the rifted rock;
And, higher yet, the pine tree hung
His shatter’d trunk, and frequent flung,
Where seem’d the cliffs to meet on high,
His boughs athwart the narrow’d sky.
Highest of all, where white peaks glanced,
Where glist’ning streamers waved and danced,
The wanderer’s eye could barely view
The summer heaven’s delicious blue;
So wondrous wild, the whole might seem
The scenery of a fairy dream.
 

XIII

 
Onward, amid the copse ’gan peep
A narrow inlet, still and deep,
Affording scarce such breadth of brim
As served the wild duck’s brood to swim.
Lost for a space, through thickets veering,
But broader when again appearing,
Tall rocks and tufted knolls their face
Could on the dark-blue mirror trace;
And farther as the Hunter stray’d,
Still broader sweep its channel made.
The shaggy mounds no longer stood,
Emerging from the tangled wood,
But, wave-encircled, seem’d to float,
Like castle girdled with its moat;
Yet broader floods extending still
Divide them from their parent hill,
Till each, retiring, claims to be
An islet in an inland sea.
 

XIV

 
And now, to issue from the glen,
No pathway meets the wanderer’s ken,
Unless he climb, with footing nice,³⁸
A far projecting precipice.
The broom’s³⁹ tough roots his ladder made,
The hazel saplings lent their aid;
And thus an airy point he won,
Where, gleaming with the setting sun,
One burnish’d sheet of living gold,
Loch Katrine lay beneath him roll’d,
In all her length far winding lay,
With promontory, creek, and bay,
And islands that, empurpled bright,⁴⁰
Floated amid the livelier light,
And mountains, that like giants stand,
To sentinel enchanted land.
High on the south, huge Benvenue
Down on the lake in masses threw
Crags, knolls, and mounds, confusedly hurl’d,
The fragments of an earlier world;
A wildering forest feather’d o’er
His ruin’d sides and summit hoar,
While on the north, through middle air,
Ben-an⁴¹ heaved high his forehead bare.
 

XV

 
From the steep promontory gazed
The stranger, raptured and amazed,
And, “What a scene were here,” he cried,
“For princely pomp, or churchman’s pride!
On this bold brow, a lordly tower;
In that soft vale, a lady’s bower;
On yonder meadow, far away,
The turrets of a cloister gray;
How blithely might the bugle horn
Chide, on the lake, the lingering morn!
How sweet, at eve, the lover’s lute
Chime, when the groves were still and mute!
And, when the midnight moon should lave
Her forehead in the silver wave,
How solemn on the ear would come
The holy matins’⁴² distant hum,
While the deep peal’s commanding tone
Should wake, in yonder islet lone,
A sainted hermit from his cell,
To drop a bead⁴³ with every knell —
And bugle, lute, and bell, and all,
Should each bewilder’d stranger call
To friendly feast, and lighted hall.
 

XVI

 
“Blithe were it then to wander here!
But now, – beshrew yon nimble deer, —
Like that same hermit’s, thin and spare,
The copse must give my evening fare;
Some mossy bank my couch must be,
Some rustling oak my canopy.
Yet pass we that; the war and chase
Give little choice of resting place; —
A summer night, in greenwood spent,
Were but to-morrow’s merriment:
But hosts may in these wilds abound,
Such as are better miss’d than found;
To meet with Highland plunderers here
Were worse than loss of steed or deer. —
I am alone; – my bugle strain
May call some straggler of the train;
Or, fall⁴⁴ the worst that may betide,
Ere now this falchion has been tried.”
 

XVII

 
But scarce again his horn he wound,
When lo! forth starting at the sound,
From underneath an aged oak,
That slanted from the islet rock,
A damsel guider of its way,
A little skiff shot to the bay,
That round the promontory steep
Led its deep line in graceful sweep,
Eddying, in almost viewless wave,
The weeping willow twig to lave,
And kiss, with whispering sound and slow,
The beach of pebbles bright as snow.
The boat had touch’d this silver strand,
Just as the Hunter left his stand,
And stood conceal’d amid the brake,
To view this Lady of the Lake.
The maiden paused, as if again
She thought to catch the distant strain.
With head upraised, and look intent,
And eye and ear attentive bent,
And locks flung back, and lips apart,
Like monument of Grecian art,
In listening mood, she seem’d to stand,
The guardian Naiad⁴⁵ of the strand.
 

XVIII

 
And ne’er did Grecian chisel trace
A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace,⁴⁶
Of finer form, or lovelier face!
What though the sun, with ardent frown,
Had slightly tinged her cheek with brown, —
The sportive toil, which, short and light,
Had dyed her glowing hue so bright,
Served too in hastier swell to show
Short glimpses of a breast of snow:
What though no rule of courtly grace
To measured mood had train’d her pace, —
A foot more light, a step more true,
Ne’er from the heath flower dash’d the dew,
E’en the slight harebell raised its head,
Elastic from her airy tread:
What though upon her speech there hung
The accents of the mountain tongue, —
Those silver sounds, so soft, so dear,
The list’ner held his breath to hear!
 

XIX

 
A chieftain’s daughter seem’d the maid;
Her satin snood,⁴⁷ her silken plaid,⁴⁸
Her golden brooch such birth betray’d.
And seldom was a snood amid
Such wild luxuriant ringlets hid,
Whose glossy black to shame might bring
The plumage of the raven’s wing;
And seldom o’er a breast so fair
Mantled a plaid with modest care,
And never brooch the folds combined
Above a heart more good and kind.
Her kindness and her worth to spy,
You need but gaze on Ellen’s eye;
Not Katrine, in her mirror blue,
Gives back the shaggy banks more true,
Than every freeborn glance confess’d
The guileless movements of her breast;
Whether joy danced in her dark eye,
Or woe or pity claim’d a sigh,
Or filial love was glowing there,
Or meek devotion pour’d a prayer,
Or tale of injury call’d forth
The indignant spirit of the North.
One only passion unreveal’d,
With maiden pride the maid conceal’d,
Yet not less purely felt the flame; —
Oh! need I tell that passion’s name?
 

XX

 
Impatient of the silent horn,
Now on the gale her voice was borne: —
“Father!” she cried; the rocks around
Loved to prolong the gentle sound.
A while she paused, no answer came, —
“Malcolm, was thine the blast?” the name
Less resolutely utter’d fell,
The echoes could not catch the swell.
“A stranger I,” the Huntsman said,
Advancing from the hazel shade.
The maid, alarm’d, with hasty oar,
Push’d her light shallop⁴⁹ from the shore,
And when a space was gain’d between,
Closer she drew her bosom’s screen;
(So forth the startled swan would swing,
So turn to prune⁵⁰ his ruffled wing.)
Then safe, though flutter’d and amazed,
She paused, and on the stranger gazed.
Not his the form, nor his the eye,
That youthful maidens wont to fly.
 

XXI

 
On his bold visage middle age
Had slightly press’d its signet sage,⁵¹
Yet had not quench’d the open truth
And fiery vehemence of youth;
Forward and frolic glee was there,
The will to do, the soul to dare,
The sparkling glance, soon blown to fire,
Of hasty love, or headlong ire.
His limbs were cast in manly mold,
For hardy sports or contest bold;
And though in peaceful garb array’d,
And weaponless, except his blade,
His stately mien as well implied
A high-born heart, a martial pride,
As if a baron’s crest he wore,
And sheathed in armor trode the shore.
Slighting the petty need⁵² he show’d,
He told of his benighted road;
His ready speech flow’d fair and free,
In phrase of gentlest courtesy;
Yet seem’d that tone, and gesture bland,
Less used to sue than to command.
 

XXII

 
A while the maid the stranger eyed,
And, reassured, at length replied,
That Highland halls were open still
To wilder’d⁵³ wanderers of the hill.
“Nor think you unexpected come
To yon lone isle, our desert home;
Before the heath had lost the dew,
This morn, a couch⁵⁴ was pull’d for you;
On yonder mountain’s purple head
Have ptarmigan⁵⁵ and heath cock bled,
And our broad nets have swept the mere,⁵⁶
To furnish forth your evening cheer.” —
“Now, by the rood,⁵⁷ my lovely maid,
Your courtesy has err’d,” he said;
“No right have I to claim, misplaced,
The welcome of expected guest.
A wanderer, here by fortune tost,
My way, my friends, my courser lost,
I ne’er before, believe me, fair,
Have ever drawn your mountain air,
Till on this lake’s romantic strand
I found a fay in fairyland!”
 

XXIII

 
“I well believe,” the maid replied,
As her light skiff approach’d the side, —
“I well believe, that ne’er before
Your foot has trod Loch Katrine’s shore;
But yet, as far as yesternight,
Old Allan-Bane foretold your plight, —
A gray-hair’d sire, whose eye intent
Was on the vision’d future⁵⁸ bent.
He saw your steed, a dappled gray,
Lie dead beneath the birchen way;
Painted exact your form and mien,
Your hunting suit of Lincoln green,⁵⁹
That tassel’d horn so gayly gilt,
That falchion’s crooked blade and hilt,
That cap with heron plumage trim,
And yon two hounds so dark and grim.
He bade that all should ready be
To grace a guest of fair degree;⁶⁰
But light I held his prophecy,
And deem’d it was my father’s horn
Whose echoes o’er the lake were borne.”
 

XXIV

 
The stranger smiled: – “Since to your home
A destined errant⁶¹ knight I come,
Announced by prophet sooth⁶² and old,
Doom’d, doubtless, for achievement bold,
I’ll lightly front each high emprise⁶³
For one kind glance of those bright eyes.
Permit me, first, the task to guide
Your fairy frigate o’er the tide.”
The maid, with smile suppress’d and sly,
The toil unwonted saw him try;
For seldom sure, if e’er before,
His noble hand had grasp’d an oar:
Yet with main strength his strokes he drew,
And o’er the lake the shallop flew;
With heads erect, and whimpering cry,
The hounds behind their passage ply.
Nor frequent does the bright oar break
The dark’ning mirror of the lake,
Until the rocky isle they reach,
And moor their shallop on the beach.
 

XXV

 
The stranger view’d the shore around;
’Twas all so close with copsewood bound,
Nor track nor pathway might declare
That human foot frequented there,
Until the mountain maiden show’d
A clambering unsuspected road
That winded through the tangled screen,
And open’d on a narrow green,
Where weeping birch and willow round
With their long fibers swept the ground.
Here, for retreat in dangerous hour,
Some chief had framed a rustic bower.
 

XXVI

 
It was a lodge of ample size,
But strange of structure and device;
Of such materials, as around
The workman’s hand had readiest found;
Lopp’d off their boughs, their hoar trunks bared,
And by the hatchet rudely squared.
To give the walls their destined height,
The sturdy oak and ash unite;
While moss and clay and leaves combined
To fence each crevice from the wind.
The lighter pine trees, overhead,
Their slender length for rafters spread,
And wither’d heath and rushes dry
Supplied a russet canopy.
Due westward, fronting to the green,
A rural portico was seen,
Aloft on native pillars borne,
Of mountain fir, with bark unshorn,
Where Ellen’s hand had taught to twine
The ivy and Idæan vine,⁶⁴
The clematis, the favor’d flower
Which boasts the name of virgin bower,
And every hardy plant could⁶⁵ bear
Loch Katrine’s keen and searching air.
An instant in this porch she staid,
And gayly to the stranger said,
“On Heaven and on thy Lady call,
And enter the enchanted hall!”
 

XXVII

 
“My hope, my heaven, my trust must be,
My gentle guide, in following thee.”
He cross’d the threshold – and a clang
Of angry steel that instant rang.
To his bold brow his spirit rush’d,
But soon for vain alarm he blush’d,
When on the floor he saw display’d,
Cause of the din, a naked blade
Dropp’d from the sheath, that careless flung,
Upon a stag’s huge antlers swung;
For all around, the walls to grace,
Hung trophies of the fight or chase:
A target⁶⁶ there, a bugle here,
A battle-ax, a hunting spear,
And broadswords, bows, and arrows store,
With the tusk’d trophies of the boar.
Here grins the wolf as when he died,
And there the wild cat’s brindled hide
The frontlet of the elk adorns,
Or mantles o’er the bison’s horns;
Pennons and flags defaced and stain’d,
That blackening streaks of blood retain’d,
And deerskins, dappled, dun, and white,
With otter’s fur and seal’s unite,
In rude and uncouth tapestry⁶⁷ all,
To garnish forth the silvan hall.
 

XXVIII

 
The wondering stranger round him gazed,
And next the fallen weapon raised: —
Few were the arms whose sinewy strength
Sufficed to stretch it forth at length:
And as the brand he poised and sway’d,
“I never knew but one,” he said,
“Whose stalwart arm might brook⁶⁸ to wield
A blade like this in battlefield.”
She sighed, then smiled and took the word:
“You see the guardian champion’s sword;
As light it trembles in his hand,
As in my grasp a hazel wand;
My sire’s tall form might grace the part
Of Ferragus, or Ascabart;⁶⁹
But in the absent giant’s hold
Are women now, and menials old.”
 

XXIX

 
The mistress of the mansion came,
Mature of age, a graceful dame;
Whose easy step and stately port
Had well become a princely court;
To whom, though more than kindred knew,⁷⁰
Young Ellen gave a mother’s due.
Meet welcome to her guest she made,
And every courteous rite was paid
That hospitality could claim,
Though all unask’d his birth and name.
Such then the reverence to a guest,
That fellest⁷¹ foe might join the feast,
And from his deadliest foeman’s door
Unquestion’d turn, the banquet o’er.
At length his rank the stranger names,
“The Knight of Snowdoun,⁷² James Fitz-James;⁷³
Lord of a barren heritage,⁷⁴
Which his brave sires, from age to age,
By their good swords had held with toil;
His sire had fall’n in such turmoil,
And he, God wot,⁷⁵ was forced to stand
Oft for his right with blade in hand.
This morning with Lord Moray’s⁷⁶ train
He chased a stalwart stag in vain,
Outstripp’d his comrades, miss’d the deer,
Lost his good steed, and wander’d here.”
 

XXX

 
Fain would the Knight in turn require
The name and state of Ellen’s sire.
Well show’d the elder lady’s mien
That courts and cities she had seen;
Ellen, though more her looks display’d
The simple grace of silvan maid,
In speech and gesture, form and face,
Show’d she was come of gentle race.
’Twere strange in ruder rank to find
Such looks, such manners, and such mind.
Each hint the Knight of Snowdoun gave,
Dame Margaret heard with silence grave;
Or Ellen, innocently gay,
Turn’d all inquiry light away: —
“Weird women we! by dale and down⁷⁷
We dwell, afar from tower and town.
We stem the flood, we ride the blast,
On wandering knights our spells we cast;
While viewless minstrels touch the string,
’Tis thus our charmed rhymes we sing.”
She sung, and still a harp unseen
Fill’d up the symphony between.
 

XXXI

SONG

 
“Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking:
Dream of battled fields no more,
Days of danger, nights of waking.
In our isle’s enchanted hall,
Hands unseen thy couch are strewing,
Fairy strains of music fall,
Every sense in slumber dewing.⁷⁸
Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,
Dream of fighting fields no more:
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking,
Morn of toil, nor night of waking.
“No rude sound shall reach thine ear,
Armor’s clang, or war steed champing,
Trump nor pibroch⁷⁹ summon here
Mustering clan, or squadron tramping.
Yet the lark’s shrill fife may come
At the daybreak from the fallow,⁸⁰
And the bittern⁸¹ sound his drum,
Booming from the sedgy shallow.
Ruder sounds shall none be near,
Guards nor warders challenge here,
Here’s no war steed’s neigh and champing,
Shouting clans, or squadrons stamping.”
 

XXXII

 
She paused – then, blushing, led the lay
To grace the stranger of the day.
Her mellow notes awhile prolong
The cadence of the flowing song,
Till to her lips in measured frame
The minstrel verse spontaneous came.
 

SONG CONTINUED

 
“Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done;
While our slumbrous spells assail ye,
Dream not, with the rising sun,
Bugles here shall sound reveille.⁸²
Sleep! the deer is in his den;
Sleep! thy hounds are by thee lying;
Sleep! nor dream in yonder glen,
How thy gallant steed lay dying.
Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done,
Think not of the rising sun,
For at dawning to assail ye,
Here no bugles sound reveille.”
 

XXXIII

 
The hall was clear’d – the stranger’s bed
Was there of mountain heather spread,
Where oft a hundred guests had lain,
And dream’d their forest sports again.
But vainly did the heath flower shed
Its moorland fragrance round his head;
Not Ellen’s spell had lull’d to rest
The fever of his troubled breast.
In broken dreams the image rose
Of varied perils, pains, and woes:
His steed now flounders in the brake,
Now sinks his barge upon the lake;
Now leader of a broken host,
His standard falls, his honor’s lost.
Then, – from my couch may heavenly might
Chase that worse phantom of the night! —
Again return’d the scenes of youth,
Of confident undoubting truth;
Again his soul he interchanged
With friends whose hearts were long estranged.
They come, in dim procession led,
The cold, the faithless, and the dead;
As warm each hand, each brow as gay,
As if they parted yesterday.
And doubt distracts him at the view —
Oh, were his senses false or true?
Dream’d he of death, or broken vow,
Or is it all a vision now?
 

XXXIV

 
At length, with Ellen in a grove
He seem’d to walk, and speak of love;
She listen’d with a blush and sigh,
His suit was warm, his hopes were high.
He sought her yielded hand to clasp,
And a cold gauntlet⁸³ met his grasp:
The phantom’s sex was changed and gone,
Upon its head a helmet shone;
Slowly enlarged to giant size,
With darken’d cheek and threatening eyes,
The grisly visage, stern and hoar,
To Ellen still a likeness bore. —
He woke, and, panting with affright,
Recall’d the vision of the night.
The hearth’s decaying brands were red,
And deep and dusky luster shed,
Half showing, half concealing, all
The uncouth trophies of the hall.
’Mid those the stranger fix’d his eye
Where that huge falchion hung on high,
And thoughts on thoughts, a countless throng,
Rush’d, chasing countless thoughts along,
Until, the giddy whirl to cure,
He rose, and sought the moonshine pure.
 

XXXV

 
The wild rose, eglantine, and broom
Wasted around their rich perfume:
The birch trees wept in fragrant balm,
The aspens slept beneath the calm;
The silver light, with quivering glance,
Play’d on the water’s still expanse, —
Wild were the heart whose passion’s sway
Could rage beneath the sober ray!
He felt its calm, that warrior guest,
While thus he communed with his breast: —
“Why is it at each turn I trace
Some memory of that exiled race?
Can I not mountain maiden spy,
But she must bear the Douglas eye?
Can I not view a Highland brand,
But it must match the Douglas hand?
Can I not frame a fever’d dream,
But still the Douglas is the theme?
I’ll dream no more – by manly mind
Not even in sleep is will resign’d.
My midnight orisons said o’er,
I’ll turn to rest, and dream no more.”
His midnight orisons he told,⁸⁴
A prayer with every bead of gold,
Consign’d to Heaven his cares and woes,
And sunk in undisturb’d repose;
Until the heath cock shrilly crew,
And morning dawn’d on Benvenue.