The Lay of the Last Minstrel: A Poem

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Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, 1807 - Love poetry, Scottish - 340 pages

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Page 11 - Seemed to have known a better day ; The harp, his sole remaining joy, Was carried by an orphan boy ; The last of all the bards was he, Who sung of Border chivalry.
Page 43 - IF thou would'st view fair Melrose aright, Go visit it by the pale moon-light ; For the gay beams of lightsome day Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray.
Page 215 - That day of wrath, .that dreadful day, When heaven and earth shall pass away, What power shall be the sinner's stay ? How shall he meet that dreadful day ? When, shrivelling like a parched scroll, The flaming heavens together roll ; When louder yet, and yet more dread, Swells the high trump that wakes the dead ! Oh ! on that day, that wrathful day, When man to judgment wakes from clay, Be THOU the trembling sinner's stay, Though heaven and earth shall pass away ! HUSH'D is the harp — the Minstrel...
Page 16 - In varying cadence, soft or strong, He swept the sounding chords along : The present scene, the future lot, His toils, his wants, were all forgot: Cold diffidence, and age's frost, In the full tide of song were lost ; Each blank, in faithless memory void, The poet's glowing thought supplied : And, while his harp responsive rung, 'Twas thus the latest minstrel sung.
Page 59 - Tis said, as through the aisles they passed, They heard strange noises on the blast ; And through the cloister-galleries small, Which at mid-height thread the chancel wall, Loud sobs, and laughter louder ran, And voices unlike the voice of man ; As if the fiends kept holiday, Because these spells were brought to day. I cannot tell how the truth may be ; I say the tale as 'twas said to me.
Page 52 - In these far climes it was my lot To meet the wondrous Michael Scott ; A wizard, of such dreaded fame, That when, in Salamanca's cave, Him listed his magic wand to wave, The bells would ring in Notre Dame...
Page 15 - Where she with all her ladies sate, Perchance he wished his boon denied: For, when to tune his harp he tried, His trembling hand had lost the ease Which marks security to please...
Page 174 - From wandering on a foreign strand ? If such there breathe, go, mark him well; For him no minstrel raptures swell ; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim, — Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.
Page 14 - A braver ne'er to battle rode; And how full many a tale he knew Of the old warriors of Buccleuch: And, would the noble Duchess deign To listen to an old man's strain, Though stiff his hand, his voice though weak, He thought even yet, the sooth to speak, That, if she loved the harp to hear, He could make music to her ear.
Page 152 - True love's the gift which God has given To man alone beneath the heaven : It is not fantasy's hot fire, Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly; It liveth not in fierce desire, With dead desire it doth not die ; It is the secret sympathy, The silver link, the silken tie, Which heart to heart, and mind to mind, In body and in soul can bind.

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