Page images
PDF
EPUB

ROKEBY.

1812.

WALTER SCOTT.

O, BRIGNALL BANKS ARE WILD AND FAIR.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

FROM CANTO III.

(xvI.)

BRIGNALL banks are wild and fair,

And Greta woods are green,

And you may gather garlands there,

Would grace a summer queen.
And as I rode by Dalton-hall,

Beneath the turrets high,

A Maiden on the castle wall

Was singing merrily,

CHORUS.

"O, Brignall banks are fresh and fair,
And Greta woods are green;

I'd rather rove with Edmund there,
Than reign our English queen."-

"If, Maiden, thou would'st wend with me,
To leave both tower and town,

Thou first must guess what life lead we,

That dwell by dale and down?

And if thou canst that riddle read,

As read full well you may,

Then to the green-wood shalt thou speed,
As blithe as Queen of May."-

CHORUS.

Yet sung she, "Brignall banks are fair
And Greta woods are green;
I'd rather rove with Edmund there,
Than reign our English queen.

(XVII.)

I read you, by your bugle-horn,
And by your palfrey good,

I read you for a Ranger sworn,

To keep the king's green-wood.""A Ranger, lady, winds his horn, And 'tis at peep of light;

His blast is heard at merry morn,
And mine at dead of night."—

CHORUS.

Yet sung she, "Brignall banks are fair,
And Greta woods are gay;

I would I were with Edmund there,
To reign his Queen of May !

With burnished brand and musketoon,
So gallantly you come,

I read you for a bold Dragoon,
That lists the tuck of drum."-

"I list no more the tuck of drum,

No more the trumpet hear;

But when the beetle sounds his hum, My comrades take the spear.”—

CHORUS.

"And, O! though Brignall banks be fair,
And Greta woods be gay,

Yet mickle must the maiden dare,
Would reign my Queen of May!

(XVIII.)

Maiden! a nameless life I lead,

A nameless death I'll die;

The fiend, whose lantern lights the mead,38 Were better mate than I!

And when I'm with my comrades met,

Beneath the green-wood bough,

What once we were we all forget,
Nor think what we are now.

$9

CHORUS.

Yet Brignall banks are fresh and fair,
And Greta woods are green,

And you may gather garlands there
Would grace a summer queen."

THE LORD OF THE ISLES.

1814.

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

LAKE CORISKIN.

FROM CANTO III.

(XIII.)

A WHILE their route they silent made,
As men who stalk for mountain-deer,

Till the good Bruce to Ronald said,
"St Mary! what a scene is here!
I've traversed many a mountain-strand,
Abroad, and in my native land,
And it has been my lot to tread

Where safety more than pleasure led;
Thus, many a waste I've wander❜d o'er,
Clombe many a crag, cross'd many a moor,
But, by my halidome,

A scene so rude, so wild as this,
Yet so sublime in barrenness,

Ne'er did my wandering footsteps press
Where'er I happ'd to roam."

(XIV.)

No marvel thus the Monarch spake;

For rarely human eye has known A scene so stern as that dread lake,

With its dark ledge of barren stone.

Seems that primeval earthquake's sway
Hath rent a strange and shatter'd way
Through the rude bosom of the hill,
And that each naked precipice,
Sable ravine, and dark abyss,

Tells of the outrage still.

The wildest glen, but this, can show
Some touch of Nature's genial glow;
On high Benmore green mosses grow,
And heath-bells bud in deep Glencoe,
And copse on Cruchan-Ben ;

But here,-above, around, below,
On mountain or in glen,

Nor tree, nor shrub, nor plant, nor flower,
Nor aught of vegetative power,

The weary eye may ken.

For all is rocks at random thrown,

Black waves, bare crags, and banks of stone,
As if were here denied

The summer sun, the spring's sweet dew,
That clothe with many a varied hue

The bleakest mountain-side.

(xv.)

And wilder, forward as they wound,
Were the proud cliffs and lake profound.
Huge terraces of granite black 40
Afforded rude and cumber'd track;
For from the mountain hoar,

Hurl'd headlong in some night of fear,
When yell'd the wolf and fled the deer,
Loose crags had toppled o'er;

And some, chance-poised and balanced, lay,
So that a stripling arm might sway

« PreviousContinue »