And of that Grot where Olives nod, Where, darling of each heart and eye, From all the youth of Sicily,

Saint Rosalie retired to God.

XXIV

410

To stout Saint George of Norwich merry, Saint Thomas, too, of Canterbury, Cuthbert of Durham and Saint Bede, For his sins' pardon hath he prayed. He knows the passes of the North, And seeks far shrines beyond the Forth; Little he eats, and long will wake, And drinks but of the stream or lake. This were a guide o'er moor and dale; Eut when our John hath quaffed his ale, As little as the wind that blows, And warms itself against his nose, Kens he, or cares, which way he goes.'

XXV

'Gramercy!' quoth Lord Marmion,
'Full loath were I that Friar John,
That venerable man, for me
Were placed in fear or jeopardy:
If this same Palmer will me lead

From hence to Holy-Rood,
Like his good saint, I'll pay his meed,
Instead of cockle-shell or bead,

With angels fair and good.
I love such holy ramblers; still
They know to charm a weary hill

With song, romance, or lay:
Some jovial tale, or glee, or jest,
Some lying legend, at the least,
They bring to cheer the way.'-

XXVI

Ah! noble sir,' young Selby said, And finger on his lip he laid,

420

430

This man knows much, perchance e'en

more

440

Than he could learn by holy lore.
Still to himself he 's muttering,
And shrinks as at some unseen thing.
Last night we listened at his cell;
Strange sounds we heard, and, sooth to tell,
He murmured on till morn, howe'er
No living mortal could be near.
Sometimes I thought I heard it plain,
As other voices spoke again.
I cannot tell- I like it not
Friar John hath told us it is wrote,
No conscience clear and void of wrong 450
Can rest awake and pray so long.

Himself still sleeps before his beads Have marked ten aves and two creeds.'

XXVII

'Let pass,' quoth Marmion; by my fay,
This man shall guide me on my way,
Although the great arch-fiend and he
Had sworn themselves of company.
So please you, gentle youth, to call
This Palmer to the castle-hall.'
The summoned Palmer came in place: 460
His sable cowl o'erhung his face;
In his black mantle was he clad,
With Peter's keys, in cloth of red,

On his broad shoulders wrought;
The scallop shell his cap did deck;
The crucifix around his neck

Was from Loretto brought;
His sandals were with travel tore,
Staff, budget, bottle, scrip, he wore;
The faded palm-branch in his hand
Showed pilgrim from the Holy Land.

XXVIII

Whenas the Palmer came in hall,
Nor lord nor knight was there more tall,
Or had a statelier step withal,

Or looked more high and keen;
For no saluting did he wait,

But strode across the hall of state,
And fronted Marmion where he sate,

As he his peer had been.

But his gaunt frame was worn with toil;
His cheek was sunk, alas the while!
And when he struggled at a smile

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479

His eye looked haggard wild: Poor wretch, the mother that him bare, If she had been in presence there, In his wan face and sunburnt bair She had not known her child. Danger, long travel, want, or woe, Soon change the form that best we know For deadly fear can time outgo,

490

And blanch at once the hair; Hard toil can roughen form and face, And want can quench the eye's bright

grace,

Nor does old age a wrinkle trace

More deeply than despair. Happy whom none of these befall, But this poor Palmer knew them all.

XXIX

Lord Marmion then his boon did ask; The Palmer took on him the task,

So he would march with morning tide, 500
To Scottish court to be his guide.
'But I have solemn vows to pay,
And may not linger by the way,

To fair Saint Andrew's bound,
Within the ocean-cave to pray,
Where good Saint Rule his holy lay,
From midnight to the dawn of day,
Sung to the billows' sound;
Thence to Saint Fillan's blessed well,
Whose spring can frenzied dreams dispel,

And the crazed brain restore.

Saint Mary grant that cave or spring
Could back to peace my bosom bring,
Or bid it throb no more!'

XXX

And now the midnight draught of sleep,
Where wine and spices richly steep,
In massive bowl of silver deep,
The page presents on knee.
Lord Marmion drank a fair good rest,
The captain pledged his noble guest,
The cup went through among the rest,
Who drained it merrily;
Alone the Palmer passed it by,
Though Selby pressed him courteously.
This was a sign the feast was o'er;
It hushed the merry wassail roar,

The minstrels ceased to sound.
Soon in the castle nought was heard
But the slow footstep of the guard
Pacing his sober round.

509

520

530

With early dawn Lord Marmion rose:
And first the chapel doors unclose;
Then, after morning rites were done
A hasty mass from Friar John-
And knight and squire had broke their
fast

540

On rich substantial repast, Lord Marmion's bugles blew to horse. Then came the stirrup-cup in course: Between the baron and his host, No point of courtesy was lost; High thanks were by Lord Marmion paid, Solemn excuse the captain made, Till, filing from the gate, had passed That noble train, their lord the last. Then loudly rung the trumpet call; Thundered the cannon from the wall, And shook the Scottish shore; Around the castle eddied slow Volumes of smoke as white as snow

spears

Have fenced him for three hundred years,
While fell around his green compeers
Yon lonely thorn, would he could tell
The changes of his parent dell,
Since he, so gray and stubborn now,
Waved in each breeze a sapling bough!
Would he could tell how deep the shade
A thousand mingled branches made;
How broad the shadows of the oak,
How clung the rowan to the rock,
And through the foliage showed his head,
With narrow leaves and berries red;
What pines on every mountain sprung,
O'er every dell what birches hung,
In every breeze what aspens shook,
What alders shaded every brook!

10

20

'Here, in my shade,' methinks he'd say,
'The mighty stag at noontide lay;
The wolf I've seen, a fiercer game,
The neighboring dingle bears his name,
With lurching step around me prowl,
And stop, against the moon to howl;
The mountain-boar, on battle set,
His tusks upon my stem would whet;
While doe, and roe, and red-deer good, 30
Have bounded by through gay greenwood.
Then oft from Newark's riven tower
Sallied a Scottish monarch's power:
A thousand vassals mustered round,
With horse, and hawk, and horn, and
hound;

And I might see the youth intent
Guard every pass with crossbow bent;
And through the brake the rangers stalk,

61

70

Our mirth, dear Marriott, was the same.
Remember'st thou my greyhounds true?
O'er holt or hill there never flew,
From slip or leash there never sprang,
More fleet of foot or sure of fang.
Nor dull, between each merry chase,
Passed by the intermitted space;
For we had fair resource in store,
In Classic and in Gothic lore:
We marked each memorable scene,
And held poetic talk between;
Nor hill, nor brook, we paced along,
But had its legend or its song.
All silent now
for now are still
Thy bowers, untenanted Bowhill !
No longer from thy mountains dun
The yeoman hears the well-known gun,
And while his honest heart glows warm
At thought of his paternal farm,
Round to his mates a brimmer fills,
And drinks, The Chieftain of the Hills!'
No fairy forms, in Yarrow's bowers,
Trip o'er the walks or tend the flowers,
Fair as the elves whom Janet saw
By moonlight dance on Carterhaugh;
No youthful Baron 's left to grace
The Forest-Sheriff's lonely chace,
And ape, in manly step and tone,
The majesty of Oberon:

And she is gone whose lovely face
Is but her least and lowest grace;
Though if to Sylphid Queen 't were given
To show our earth the charms of heaven,

80

89

Close to my side with what delight
They pressed to hear of Wallace wight,
When, pointing to his airy mound,
I called his ramparts holy ground!
Kindled their brows to hear me speak;
And I have smiled, to feel my cheek,
Despite the difference of our years,
Return again the glow of theirs.
Ah, happy boys! such feelings pure,
They will not, cannot long endure;
Condemned to stem the world's rude tide,
You may not linger by the side;
For Fate shall thrust you from the shore
And Passion ply the sail and oar.
Yet cherish the remembrance still
Of the lone mountain and the rill;
For trust, dear boys, the time will come,
When fiercer transport shall be dumb,
And you will think right frequently,
But, well I hope, without a sigh,
On the free hours that we have spent
Together on the brown hill's bent.

When, musing on companions gone,
We doubly feel ourselves alone,
Something, my friend, we yet may gain;
There is a pleasure in this pain:
It soothes the love of lonely rest,

Deep in each gentler heart impressed.
"T is silent amid worldly toils,
And stifled soon by mental broils;
But, in a bosom thus prepared,

Its still small voice is often heard,

130

140

Whispering a mingled sentiment

"Twixt resignation and content. Oft in my mind such thoughts awake By lone Saint Mary's silent lake:

150

Thou know'st it well, - -nor fen nor sedge
Pollute the pure lake's crystal edge;
Abrupt and sheer, the mountains sink
At once upon the level brink,
And just a trace of silver sand
Marks where the water meets the land.
Far in the mirror, bright and blue,
Each hill's huge outline you may view;
Shaggy with heath, but lonely bare,
Nor tree, nor bush, nor brake is there,
Save where of land yon slender line
Bears thwart the lake the scattered pine.
Yet even this nakedness has power,
And aids the feeling of the hour:
Nor thicket, dell, nor copse you spy,
Where living thing concealed might lie;
Nor point retiring hides a dell

160

Where swain or woodman lone might dwell.

There's nothing left to fancy's guess,
You see that all is loneliness:

And silence aids - though the steep hills
Send to the lake a thousand rills;
In summer tide so soft they weep,
The sound but lulls the ear asleep;
Your horse's hoof-tread sounds too rude,
So stilly is the solitude.

Nought living meets the eye or ear,
But well I ween the dead are near;
For though, in feudal strife, a foe
Hath laid Our Lady's chapel low,
Yet still, beneath the hallowed soil,
The peasant rests him from his toil,
And dying bids his bones be laid
Where erst his simple fathers prayed.

170

180

If age had tamed the passions' strife,
And fate had cut my ties to life,
Here have I thought 't were sweet to
dwell,

And rear again the chaplain's cell,
Like that same peaceful hermitage,
Where Milton longed to spend his age.
'T were sweet to mark the setting day
On Bourhope's lonely top decay,
And, as it faint and feeble died
On the broad lake and mountain's side,
To say, Thus pleasures fade away;
Youth, talents, beauty, thus decay,
And leave us dark, forlorn, and gray;'

190

On which no sunbeam ever shines
So superstition's creed divines -
Thence view the lake with sullen roar
Heave her broad billows to the shore;
And mark the wild-swans mount the gale,
Spread wide through mist their snowy
sail,

210

And ever stoop again, to lave
Their bosoms on the surging wave;
Then, when against the driving hail
No longer might my plaid avail,
Back to my lonely home retire,
And light my lamp and trim my fire;
There ponder o'er some mystic lay,
Till the wild tale had all its sway,
And, in the bittern's distant shriek,
I heard unearthly voices speak,
And thought the Wizard Priest was come
To claim again his ancient home!
And bade my busy fancy range,
To frame him fitting shape and strange,
Till from the task my brow I cleared,
And smiled to think that I had feared.

220.

Through the rude barriers of the lake,
Away its hurrying waters break,
Faster and whiter dash and curl,
Till down yon dark abyss they hurl.
Rises the fog-smoke white as snow,
Thunders the viewless stream below,
Diving, as if condemned to lave
Some demon's subterranean cave,
Who, prisoned by enchanter's spell,
Shakes the dark rock with groan and
yell.

And well that Palmer's form and mien
Had suited with the stormy scene,
Just on the edge, straining his ken
To view the bottom of the den,
Where, deep deep down, and far within,
Toils with the rocks the roaring linn;
Then, issuing forth one foamy wave,
And wheeling round the Giant's Grave,
White as the snowy charger's tail,
Drives down the pass of Moffatdale.

Marriott, thy harp, on Isis strung,
To many a Border theme has rung:
Then list to me, and thou shalt know
Of this mysterious Man of Woe.

CANTO SECOND

THE CONVENT

I

250

260

THE breeze which swept away the smoke
Round Norham Castle rolled,
When all the loud artillery spoke
With lightning-flash and thunder-stroke,
As Marmion left the hold,

It curled not Tweed alone, that breeze,
For, far upon Northumbrian seas,

It freshly blew and strong,

Where, from high Whitby's cloistered pile,
Bound to Saint Cuthbert's Holy Isle,
It bore a bark along.

Upon the gale she stooped her side,
And bounded o'er the swelling tide,

As she were dancing home;

The merry seamen laughed to see
Their gallant ship so lustily.

Furrow the green sea-foam.

Much joyed they in their honored freight;
For on the deck, in chair of state,
The Abbess of Saint Hilda placed,
With five fair nuns, the galley graced.

20

II

'T was sweet to see these holy maids,
Like birds escaped to greenwood shades,
Their first flight from the cage,
How timid, and how curious too,
For all to them was strange and new,
And all the common sights they view
Their wonderment engage.

One eyed the shrouds and swelling sail,
With many a benedicite;

One at the rippling surge grew pale,
And would for terror pray,
Then shrieked because the sea-dog nigh
His round black head and sparkling eye
Reared o'er the foaming spray;
And one would still adjust her veil,
Disordered by the summer gale,
Perchance lest some more worldly eye
Her dedicated charms might spy,
Perchance because such action graced
Her fair-turned arm and slender waist.
Light was each simple bosom there,
Save two, who ill might pleasure share, -
The Abbess and the Novice Clare,

III

The Abbess was of noble blood,
But early took the veil and hood,
Ere upon life she cast a look,
Or knew the world that she forsook.
Fair too she was, and kind had been
As she was fair, but ne'er had seen
For her a timid lover sigh,
Nor knew the influence of her eye.
Love to her ear was but a name,
Combined with vanity and shame;
Her hopes, her fears, her joys, were all
Bounded within the cloister wall;
The deadliest sin her mind could reach
Was of monastic rule the breach,
And her ambition's highest aim
To emulate Saint Hilda's fame.

For this she gave her ample dower

To raise the convent's eastern tower;
For this, with carving rare and quaint,
She decked the chapel of the saint,
the relic-shrine of cost,
With ivory and gems embossed.
The poor her convent's bounty blest,
The pilgrim in its halls found rest.

And gave

IV

Black was her garb, her rigid rule Reformed on Benedictine school;

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40