(So forth the startled swan would swing,
So turn to prune 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,
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 mould,
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 trod the shore.
Slighting the petty need 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'd 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 couch was pull'd for you;
On yonder mountain's purple head
Have ptarmigan and heath-cock bled,
And our broad nets have swept the mere
To furnish forth your evening cheer."-
"Now, by the rood, 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,

"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 future 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,
That tassell'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,
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 smil'd: "Since to your home
A destined errant-knight I come,
Announced by prophet sooth and old,
Doom'd, doubtless, for achievement bold,
I'll lightly front each high emprise,
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 fibres swept the ground.
Here, for retreat in dangerous hour,
Some chief had framed a rustic bower.7

XXVI.

It was a lodge of ample size,
But strange of structure and device,
Of such materials, as around

The workman's hands 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 over-head,
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,

The clematis, the favor'd flower
Which boasts the name of virgin-bower,
And every hardy plant could 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!"

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 kind-eò
knew,

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.9
Such then the reverence to a guest,
That fellest 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, James Fitz-
James;

Lord of a barren heritage,

Which his brave sires, from age to age,
By their good swords had held with toil;
His sire had fallen in such turmoil,
And he, God wot, was forced to stand
Oft for his right with blade in hand.
This morning, with Lord Moray's 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 sylvan 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 down
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,
Sleepthe sleep that knows not breaking;
Dream of battled fields no more,
Days of danger, nights of waking.

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 worst 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 es-
tranged.

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.
O, were his senses false or true?
Dream'd he of death, or broken vow,
Or is it all a vision now?

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 lustre 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.

AT morn the black-cock trims his jetty wing,

'Tis morning prompts the linnet's blithest lay,

All Nature's children feel the matin spring Of life reviving, with reviving day; And while yon little bark glides down the bay,

Wafting the stranger on his way again, Morn's genial influence roused a minstrel

gray,

And sweetly o'er the lake was heard

thy strain,

Mix'd with the sounding harp, O white hair'd Allan-Bane! 10

II.

SONG.

"Not faster yonder rowers' might
Flings from their oars the spray,
Not faster yonder rippling bright,
That tracks the shallop's course in light,
Melts in the lake away,

Than men from memory erase
The benefits of former days;

Then, stranger, go! good speed the while,

Nor think again of the lonely isle.

"High place to thee in royal court,
High place in battle line,
Good hawk and hound for sylvan sport,
Where beauty sees the brave resort,

The honor'd meed be thine!
True be thy sword, thy friend sincere,
Thy lady constant, kind, and dear,
And lost in love and friendship's smile
Be memory of the lonely isle.

III.

SONG CONTINUED.

"But if beneath yon southern sky
A plaided stranger roam,
Whose drooping crest and stifled sigh,
And sunken cheek and heavy eye,

Pine for his Highland home;
Then, warrior, then be thine to show
The care that soothes a wanderer's woe;
Remember then thy hap erewhile,
A stranger in the lonely isle.

"Or if on life's uncertain main

Mishap shall mar thy sail;

If faithful, wise, and brave in vain,
Woe, want, and exile thou sustain
Beneath the fickle gale;

Waste not a sigh on fortune changed,
On thankless courts, or friends estranged,
But come where kindred worth shall
smile,

To greet thee in the lonely isle."

IV.

As died the sounds upon the tide,
The shallop reach'd the mainland side,
And ere his onward way he took,
The stranger cast a lingering look,

Where easily his eye might reach The Harper on the islet beach, Reclined against a blighted tree, As wasted, gray, and worn as he. To minstrel meditation given,

His reverend brow was raised to heaven,
As from the rising sun to claim
A sparkle of inspiring flame.
His hand, reclined upon the wire,
Seem'd watching the awakening fire;
So still he sate, as those who wait
Till judgment speak the doom of fate;
So still, as if no breeze might dare
To lift one lock of hoary hair;
So still, as life itself were fled,
In the last sound his harp had sped.

V.

Upon a rock with lichens wild,
Beside him Ellen sate and smiled.
Smiled she to see the stately drake
Lead forth his fleet upon the lake,
While her vex'd spaniel from the beach
Bay'd at the prize beyond his reach?
Yet tell me, then, the maid who knows,
Why deepen'd on her cheek the rose? -
Forgive, forgive, Fidelity!

Perchance the maiden smiled to see
Yon parting lingerer wave adieu,
And stop and turn to wave anew;
And, lovely ladies, ere your ire
Condemn the heroine of my lyre,
Show me the fair would scorn to spy,
And prize such conquest of her eye!

VI.

While yet he loiter'd on the spot,
It seem'd as Ellen mark'd him not;
But when he turn'd him to the glade,
One courteous parting sign she made;
And after oft the Knight would say,
That not when prize of festal day
Was dealt him by the brightest fair
Who e'er wore jewel in her hair,
So highly did his bosom swell,
As at that simple mute farewell.
Now with a trusty mountain-guide,
And his dark stag-hounds by his side,
He parts
- the maid, unconscious still,
Watch'd him wind slowly round the hill;
But when his stately form was hid,
The guardian in her bosom chid —