Page images
PDF
EPUB

Out of the field he shall be led,
When he is bludie and wo for blood;
Yet to his men shall he say,

For God's love turn you againe,
And give yon sutherne folk a frey!
Why should I lose the right is mine?
My date is not to die this day.""

Who can doubt, for a moment, that this refers to the battle of Flodden, and to the popular reports concerning the doubtful fate of James IV.? Allusion is immediately afterwards made to the death of George Douglas, heir apparent of Angus, who fought and fell with his sovereign :

"The sternes three that day shall die,
That bears the harte in silver sheen."
The well-known arms of the Douglas family are
the heart and three stars. In another place, the
battle of Pinkie is expressly mentioned by name:-

"At Pinken Cluch there shall be spilt
Much gentle blood that day;

There shall the bear lose the guilt,
And the eagill bear it away."

To the end of all this allegorical and mystical rhapsody, is interpolated, in the later edition by Andro Hart, a new edition of Berlington's verses, before quoted, altered and manufactured, so as to bear reference to the accession of James VI., which had just then taken place. The insertion is made with a peculiar degree of awkwardness, betwixt a question, put by the narrator, concerning the name and abode of the person who showed him these strange matters, and the answer of the prophet to that question:

"Then to the Beirne could I say,

Where dwells thou, or in what countrie?
[Or who shall rule the isle of Britane,
From the north to the south sey?

A French queene shall bear the sonne,

Shall rule all Britaine to the sea;

Which of the Bruce's blood shall come,
As neere as the nint degree:

I frained fast what was his name,

Where that he came, from what country.]
In Erslingtoun I dwell at hame,
Thomas Rymour men cals me.'

There is surely no one, who will not conclude, with Lord Hailes, that the eight lines, enclosed in brackets, are a clumsy interpolation, borrowed from Berlington, with such alterations as might render the supposed prophecy applicable to the union of

the crowns.

While we are on this subject, it may be proper briefly to notice the scope of some of the other predictions in Hart's Collection. As the prophecy of Berlington was intended to raise the spirits of the nation, during the regency of Albany, so those of Sybilla and Eltraine refer to that of the Earl of Arran, afterwards Duke of Chatelherault, during the minority of Mary, a period of similar calamity. This is obvious from the following verses :

"Take a thousand in calculation,
And the longest of the lyon,
Four crescents under one crowne,
With St. Andrew's crose thrice,
Then threescore and thrise three:
Take tent to Merling truely,
Then eball the wars ended be,
And never again rise.

In that yere there shall a king,
A duke, and no crowned king:
Becaus the prince shall be yong,
And tender of yeares."

The date, above hinted at, seems to be 1549, when the Scottish Regent, by means of some succours derived from France, was endeavouring to repair the consequences of the fatal battle of Pinkie. Allusion is made to the supply given to the "Moldwarte [England] by the fained hart," (the Earl of Angus.) The Regent is described by his bearing the antelope; large supplies are promised from France, and complete conquest predicted to Scotland and her allies. Thus was the same hackneyed stratagem repeated, whenever the interest of the rulers appeared to stand in need of it. The Regent was not, indeed, till after this period, created Duke of Chatelherault; but that honour was the object of his hopes and expecta

tions.

The name of our renowned soothsayer is liberally used as an authority, throughout all the prophecies published by Andro Hart. Besides those expressly put in his name, Gildas, another assumed personage, is supposed to derive his knowledge from him; for he concludes thus:

"True Thomas me told in a troublesome time,
In a harvest inorn at Eldoun hills."

The Prophecy of Gildas. In the prophecy of Berlington, already quoted, we are told,

"Marvellous Merlin, that many men of tells,
And Thomas's sayings comes all at once."

While I am upon the subject of these prophecies,
may, I be permitted to call the attention of anti-
quaries to Merdwynn Wyllt, or Merlin the Wild, in
whose name, and by no means in that of Ambrose
Merlin, the friend of Arthur, the Scottish prophecies
are issued? That this personage resided at Drum-
melziar, and roamed, like a second Nebuchadnezzar,
of his nephew, we learn from Fordun.
the woods of Tweeddale, in remorse for the death
Scotichronicon, lib. 3, cap. 31, is an account of an
In the
interview betwixt St. Kentigern and Merlin, then
in this distracted and miserable state.
to have been called Lailoken, from his mode of life.
He is said
On being commanded by the saint to give an ac-
count of himself, he says, that the penance which
he performs was imposed on him by a voice from
heaven, during a bloody contest betwixt Lidel and
Carwanolow, of which battle he had been the cause.
According to his own prediction, he perished at once
by wood, earth, and water; for, being pursued with
stones by the rustics, he fell from a rock into the
river Tweed, and was transfixed by a sharp stake,
fixed there for the purpose of extending a fishing-

net:

"Sude perfossus, lapide percussus, et unda,
Hæc tría Merlinum fertur inire necem.
Sicque ruit, mersusque fuit lignoque prehensus,
Et fecit vatem per terna pericula verum."

But, in a metrical history of Merlin of Caledonia, tions of the Welsh bards, this mode of death is compiled by Geoffrey of Monmouth, from the tradiattributed to a page, whom Merlin's sister, desirous to convict the prophet of falsehood, because he had three various disguises, inquiring each time in what betrayed her intrigues, introduced to him, under Merlin answered, the party should perish by a fall manner the person should die. To the first demand from a rock; to the second, that he should die by a tree; and to the third, that he should be drowned. The youth perished, while hunting, in the mode imputed by Fordun to Merlin himself.

Fordun, contrary to the French authorities, confounds this person with the Merlin of Arthur; but concludes by informing us, that many believed him to be a different person. The grave of Merlin is pointed out at Drummelziar, in Tweeddale, beneath an aged thorn-tree. On the east side of the churchyard, the brook, called Pausayl, falls into the Tweed; and the following prophecy is said to have been current concerning their union :

"When Tweed and Pausayl join at Merlin's grave, Scotland and England shall one monarch have." On the day of the coronation of James VI._the Tweed accordingly overflowed, and joined the Pausayl at the prophet's grave.-PENNYCUICK'S History of Tweeddale, p. 26. These circumstances would seem to infer a communication betwixt the southwest of Scotland and Wales, of a nature peculiarly intimate; for I presume that Merlin would retain sense enough to choose for the scene of his wanderings, a country having a language and manners similar to his own.

Be this as it may, the memory of Merlin Sylvester, or the Wild, was fresh among the Scots during the reign of James V. Waldhave, under whose name a set of prophecies was published, describes himself as lying upon Lomond Law; he hears a voice, which bids him stand to his defence; he looks

*I do not know whether the person here meant be Waldhave, an abbot of Melrose, who died in the odour of sanctity about 1160.

around, and beholds a flock of hares and foxes* pursued over the mountain by a savage figure, to whom he can hardly give the name of man. At the sight of Waldhave, the apparition leaves the objects of his pursuit, and assaults him with a club. Waldhave defends himself with his sword, throws the savage to the earth, and refuses to let him arise till he swear, by the law and lead he lives upon, to do him no harm." This done, he permits him to arise, and marvels at his strange appearance ;

66

"He was formed like a freike [man] all his four quarters;
And then his chin and his face haired so thick,
With haire growing so grime, fearful to see."

He answers briefly to Waldhave's inquiry concerning his name and nature, that he "drees his weird," i. e. does penance in that wood; and, having hinted that questions as to his own state are offensive, he pours forth an obscure rhapsody concerning futurity, and concludes,

"Go musing upon Merlin if thou wilt:

For I mean no more, man, at this time."

This is exactly similar to the meeting betwixt Merlin and Kentigern in Fordun. These prophecies of Merlin seem to have been in request in the minority of James V.; for, among the amusements with which Sir David Lindsay diverted that prince during his infancy, are,

"The prophecies of Rymer, Bede, and Merlin."

Sir DAVID LINDSAY'S Epistle to the King. And we find, in Waldhave, at least one allusion to the very ancient prophecy, addressed to the Countess of Dunbar :

"This is a true token that Thomas of tells,

When a ladde with a ladye shall go over the fields." The original stands thus :

666

"When laddes weddeth lovedies."

[ocr errors]

Another prophecy of Merlin seems to have been current about the time of the Regent Morton's execution. When that nobleman was committed to the charge of his accuser, Captain James Stewart, newly created Earl of Arran, to be conducted to his trial at Edinburgh, Spottiswoode says, that he asked, 'Who was Earl of Arran?' and being answered that Captain James was the man, after a short pause, he said, And is it so? I know then what I may look for!' meaning, as was thought, that the old prophecy of the Falling of the heartf by the mouth of Arran,' should then be fulfilled. Whether this was his mind or not, it is not known; but some spared not, at the time when the Hamiltons were banished, in which business he was held too earnest, to say, that he stood in fear of that prediction, and went that course only to disappoint it. But if so it was, he did find himself now deluded; for he fell by the mouth of another Arran than he imagined."-SPOTTISWOODE, 313. The fatal words alluded to seem to be these in the prophecy of Merlin :

"In the mouthe of Arrane a selcouth shall fall,
Two bloodie hearts shall be taken with a false traine,
And derfly dung down without any dome."

* The strange occupation, in which Waldhave beholds Merlin engaged, derives some illustration from a curious passage in Geof frey of Monmouth's life of Merlin, above quoted. The poem, af ter narrating that the prophet had fled to the forest in a state of distraction, proceeds to mention, that, looking upon the stars one clear evening, he discerned from his astrological knowledge, that his wife, Guendolen, had resolved, upon the next morning, to take another husband. As he had presaged to her that this would happen, and had promised her a nuptial gift (cautioning her, however, to keep the bridegroom out of his sight,) he now resolved to make good his word. Accordingly, he collected all the stags and lesser game in his neighbourhood; and, having seated himself upon a buck, drove the herd before him to the capital of Cumberland, where Guendolen resided. But her lover's curiosity leading him to inspect too nearly this extraordinary cavalcade, Merlin's rage was awakened, and he slew him with the stroke of an antler of the stag. The original runs thus:

"Dixerat: et silvas et saltus circuit omnes,
Cervorumque greges agmen collegit in unum.
Et damas, capreasque simul; cervoque resedit,'
Et, veniente die, compellens agmina præ se,
Festinans vadit quo nubit Guendolena.
Postquam venit co, pacienter ipse coegit
Cervos ante fores, proclamans, Guendolana,
Guendolaæna, veni, te talia munera spectant.'

To return from these desultory remarks, into which I have been led by the celebrated name of Merlin, the style of all these prophecies published by Hart, is very much the same. The measure is alliterative, and somewhat similar to that of Pierce Plowman's Visions; a circumstance which might entitle us to ascribe to some of them an earlier date than the reign of James V., did we not know that Sir Galloran of Galloway, and Gawaine and Gologras, two romances rendered almost unintelligible by the extremity of affected alliteration, are perhaps not prior to that period. Indeed, although we may allow, that, during much earlier times, prophecies, under the names of those celebrated soothsayers, have been current in Scotland, yet those published by Hart have obviously been so often vamped and re-vamped, to serve the political purposes of different periods, that it may be shrewdly suspected, that, as in the case of Sir John Cutler's transmigrated stockings, very little of the original materials now remains. I cannot refrain from indulging my readers with the publisher's title to the last prophecy, as it contains certain curious information concerning the Queen of Sheba, who is identified with the Cumean Sibyl: "Here followeth a prophecie, pronounced by a noble queene and matron, called Sybilla, Regina Austri, that came to Solomon. Through the which she compiled four bookes, at the instance of the said King Sol, and others divers: and the fourth book was directed to a noble king, called Baldwine, King of the broad isle of Britain; in the which she maketh mention of two_noble princes and emperours, the which is called Leones. How these two shall subdue and overcome all earthlie princes to their diademe and crowne, and also be glorified and crowned in the heaven among saints. The first of these two is Constantinus Magnus: that was Leprosus, the son of Saint Helena, that found the croce. The second is the sixt king of the name of Steward of Scotland, the which is our most noble king." With such editors and commentators, what wonder that the text became unintelligible, even beyond the usual oracular obscurity of prediction?

If there still remain, therefore, among these predictions, any verses having a claim to real antiquity, it seems now impossible to discover them from those which are comparatively modern. Nevertheless, as there are to be found, in these compositions, some uncommonly wild and masculine expressions, the Editor has been induced to throw a few passages together, into the sort of ballad to which this disquisition is prefixed. It would, indeed, have been no difficult matter for him, by a judicious selection, to have excited, in favour of Thomas of Ercildoune, a share of the admiration bestowed by sundry wise persons upon Mass Robert Fleming. For example:

"But then the lilye shal be loused when they least think;
Then clear king's blood shal quake for fear of death;
For churls shal chop off heads of their chief beirns,
And carfe of the crowns that Christ hath appointed.

Ocius ergo venit subridens Guendolana,
Gestarique virum cervo miratur, et illum
Sic parere viro, tantum quoque posse ferarum
Uniri numerum quas præ se solus agebat,
Sicut pastor oves, quas ducere suevit ad herbas.
Stabat ab excelsa sponsus spectando fenestra,
In solio mirans equitem, risunque movebat.
Ast ubi vidit eum vates, animoque quis esset
Calluit, extemplo divalsit cornua cervo
Quo gestabatur, vibrataque jecit in illum,
Et caput illius penitus contrivit, eumque
Reddidit exanimem, vitamque fugavit in auras;
Ocius inde suum, talorum verbere, cervum
Diffugiens egit, silvasque redire paravit."

For a perusal of this curious poem, accurately copied from a MS, in the Cotton Library, nearly coeval with the author, I was indebted to my learned friend, the late Mr. Ritson. There is an excellent paraphrase of it in the curious and entertaining Speetmens of Early English Romances, published by Mr. Ellis. The heart was the cognizance of Morton.

[The Rev. R. Fleming, pastor of a Scotch congregation in London, published in 1701,Discourses on the Rise and Fall of Papacy, in which he expressed his belief, founded on a text in the Apocalypse, that the French Monarchy would undergo some remarkable humiliation about 1794.-ED.]

Thereafter, on every side, sorrow shal arise;
The barges of clear barons down shal be sunken
Seculars shal sit in spiritual seats,

Occupying offices anointed as they were."

Taking the lily for the emblem of France, can there be a more plain prophecy of the murder of her monarch, the destruction of her nobility, and the desolation of her hierarchy ?

But, without looking farther into the signs of the times, the Editor, though the least of all the prophets, cannot help thinking, that every true Briton will approve of his application of the last prophecy quoted in the ballad.

Hart's collection of prophecies was frequently reprinted during the last century, probably to favour the pretensions of the unfortunate family of Stuart. For the prophetic renown of Gildas and Bede, see Fordun, lib. 3.

Before leaving the subject of Thomas's predictions, it may be noticed, that sundry rhymes, passing for his prophetic effusions, are still current among the vulgar. Thus, he is said to have prophesied of the very ancient family of Haig of Bemerside,

"Betide, betide, whate'er betide,

Haig shall be Haig of Bemerside."

The grandfather of the present proprietor of Bemerside had twelve daughters, before his lady brought him a male heir. The common people trembled for the credit of their favourite soothsayer. The late Mr. Haig was at length born, and their belief in the prophecy confirmed beyond a shadow of doubt.

Another memorable prophecy bore, that the Old Kirk at Kelso, constructed out of the ruins of the Abbey, should fall when at the fullest." At a very crowded sermon, about thirty years ago, a piece of lime fell from the roof of the church. The alarm, for the fulfilment of the words of the seer, became universal; and happy were they, who were nearest the door of the predestined edifice. The church was in consequence deserted, and has never since had an opportunity of tumbling upon a full congregation. I hope, for the sake of a beautiful specimen of SaxoGothic architecture, that the accomplishment of this prophecy is far distant.

Another prediction, ascribed to the Rhymer, seems to have been founded on that sort of insight into futurity, possessed by most men of a sound and combining judgment. It runs thus:

"At Eldon Tree if you shall be,

A brigg ower Tweed you there may see."

The spot in question commands an extensive prospect of the course of the river; and it was easy to foresee, that when the country should become in the least degree improved, a bridge would be somewhere thrown over the stream. In fact you now see no less than three bridges from that elevated situation.

Corspatrick, (Comes Patrick,) Earl of March, but more commonly taking his title from his castle of Dunbar, acted a noted part during the wars of Edward I. in Scotland. As Thomas of Ercildoune is said to have delivered to him his famous prophecy of King Alexander's death, the Editor has chosen to introduce him into the following ballad. All the prophetic verses are selected from Hart's publica

tion.*

THOMAS THE RHYMER.

PART SECOND.

WHEN seven years were come and gane,
The sun blinked fair on pool and stream;

And Thomas lay on Huntlie bank,
Like one awakened from a dream.

He heard the trampling of a steed,
He saw the flash of armour flee,

[An exact reprint of Hart's volume, from the copy in the Library at Abbotsford, is about to appear under the care of the learned antiquary, Mr. David Laing, of Edinburgh.-ED. 1933.] * King Alexander killed by a fall from his horse,near Kinghorn. 1 The uncertainty which long prevailed in Scotland, concerning the fate of James IV., is well known. Ꮓ

And he beheld a gallant knight

Come riding down by the Eildon-tree.
He was a stalwart knight, and strong;
Of giant make he 'pear'd to be:
He stirr'd his horse, as he were wode,
Wi' gilded spurs, of faushion free.

Says "Well met, well met, true Thomas!
Some uncouth ferlies show to me.'
Says "Christ thee save, Corspatrick brave!
Thrice welcume, good Dunbar to me!
"Light down, light down, Corspatrick brave
And I will show thee curses three,
Shall gar fair Scotland greet and grane,
And change the green to the black livery.
"A storm shall roar this very hour,
From Ross's Hills to Solway sea."-
"Ye lied, ye lied, ye warlock hoar!

For the sun shines sweet on fauld and lea."He put his hand on the Earlie's head;

He show'd him a rock beside the sea,
Where a king lay stiff beneath his steed,t
And steel-dight nobles wiped their ee.
"The neist curse lights on Branxton hills:
By Flodden's high and heathery side,
Shall wave a banner red as blude,

And chieftains throng wi' meikle pride. "A Scottish King shall come full keen, The ruddy lion beareth he;

A feather'd arrow sharp, I ween,

Shall make him wink and warre to see.

"When he is bloody, and all to bledde,
Thus to his men he still shall say-
'For God's sake, turn ye back again,
And give yon southern folk a fray!
Why should I lose the right is mine?
My doom is not to die this day.'
"Yet turn ye to the eastern hand,
And wo and wonder ye sall see;
How forty thousand spearmen stand,
Where yon rank river meets the sea.
"There shall the lion lose the gylte,
And the libbards bear it clean away;
At Pinkyn Cleuch there shall be spilt
Much gentil bluid that day."-

"Enough, enough, of curse and ban;
Some blessings show thou now to me,
Or, by the faith o' my bodie," Corspatrick said,
Ye shall rue the day ye e'er saw me!"-
"The first of blessings I shall thee show,
Is by a burn, that's call'd of bread;$
Where Saxon men shall tine the bow,

And find their arrows lack the head. "Beside that brigg, out ower that burn, Where the water bickereth bright and sheen, Shall many a falling courser spurn, And knights shall die in battle keen. "Beside a headless cross of stone,

The libbards there shall lose the gree; The raven shall come, the erne shall go, And drink the Saxon bluid sae free. The cross of stone they shall not know, So thick the corses there shall be."

"But tell me now," said brave Dunbar, "True Thomas, tell now unto me,

What man shall rule the isle Britain,

"

Even from the north to the southern sea?"

A French Queen shall bear the son,
Shall rule all Britain to the sea;

§ One of Thomas's rhymes, preserved by tradition, runs thus :-"The burn of breid

Shall run fow reid."

Bannock burn is the brook here meant. The Scots give the name of bannock to a thick round cake of unleavened bread.

He of the Bruce's blood shall come,
As near as in the ninth degree.
"The waters worship shall his race;
Likewise the waves of the farthest sea;
For they shall ride over ocean wide,
With hempen bridles, and horse of tree."

THOMAS THE RHYMER.

PART THIRD.-MODERN.

BY W. SCOTT.

THOMAS THE RHYMER was renowned among his contemporaries, as the author of the celebrated romance of Sir Tristrem. Of this once admired poem only one copy is now known to exist, which is in the Advocates' Library. The Editor, in 1804, published a small edition of this curious work; which, if it does not revive the reputation of the bard of Ercildoune, is at least the earliest specimen of Scottish poetry hitherto published. Some account of this romance has already been given to the world in Mr. ELLIS's Specimens of Ancient Poetry, vol. i. p. 165, iii. p. 410; a work to which our predecessors and our posterity are alike obliged; the former, for the preservation of the best selected examples of their poetical taste; and the latter, for a history of the English language, which will only cease to be interesting with the existence of our mother-tongue, and all that genius and learning have recorded in it. It is sufficient here to mention, that so great was the reputation of the romance of Sir Tristrem, that few were thought capable of reciting it after the manner of the author-a circumstance alluded to by Robert de Brunne, the annalist:

"I see in song, in sedgeyng tale,

Of Erceldoun, and of Kendale,

Now thame says as they thame wroght,
And in thare saying it seems nocht.

That thou may here in Sir Tristrem,
Over gestes it has the steme,

Over all that is or was;

If men it said as made Thomas," &c.

It appears from a very curious MS. of the thireenth century, penes Mr. Douce of London, containing a French metrical romance of Sir Tristrem, that the work of our Thomas the Rhymer was known, and referred to, by the minstrels of Normandy and Bretagne. Having arrived at a part of the romance where reciters were wont to differ in the mode of telling the story, the French bard expressly cites the authority of the poet of Ercildoune :

"Plusurs de nos granter ne volent,
Co que del naim dire se solent,
Ki femme Kaherdin dut aimer,
Li naim redut Tristram narrer,
E entusche par grant engin,
Quant il afole Kaherdin;
Pur cest plai e pur cest mal,
Enveiad Tristram Guvernal,
En Engletterre pur Ysolt:
THOMAS ico granter ne volt,
Et si volt par raisun mostrer,
Qu' ico ne put pas esteer," &c.

The tale of Sir Tristrem, as narrated in the Edinburgh MS., is totally different from the voluminous romance in prose, originally compiled on the same subject by Rusticien de Puise, and analyzed by M. de Tressan; but agrees in every essential particular with the metrical performance just quoted, which is a work of much higher antiquity.

The following attempt to commemorate the Rhymer's poetical fame, and the traditional account of his marvellous return to Fairy Land, being en

Ruberslaw and Dunyon, are two hills near Jedburgh. An ancient tower near Ercildoune, belonging to a family of the name of Home. One of Thomas's prophecies is said to have run thus :

"Vengeance! vengeance! when and where?

On the house of Coldingknow, now and ever mair!"

tirely modern, would have been placed with greaser propriety among the class of Modern Ballads, had it not been for its immediate connexion with the first and second parts of the same story.

THOMAS THE RHYMER.

PART THIRD.

WHEN seven years more were come and gone,
Was war through Scotland spread,
And Ruberslaw show'd high Dunyon*
His beacon blazing red.

Then all by bonny Coldingknow,t
Pitch'd palliouns took their room,
And crested helms, and spears a-rowe,
Glanced gaily through the broom.

The Leader, rolling to the Tweed,
Resounds the ensenzie ;+
They roused the deer from Caddenhead,
To distant Torwoodlee.§

The feast was spread in Ercildoune,

In Learmont's high and ancient hall:
And there were knights of great renown,
And ladies, laced in pall.

Nor lacked they, while they sat at dine,
The music nor the tale,

Nor goblets of the blood-red wine,
Nor mantling quaighs of ale.
True Thomas rose, with harp in hand,
When as the feast was done:

(In minstrel strife, in Fairy Land,
The elfin harp he won.)

Hush'd were the throng, both limb and tongue, And harpers for envy pale;

And armed lords lean'd on their swords,

And hearken'd to the tale.

In numbers high, the witching tale
The prophet pour'd along;
No after bard might e'er avail¶
Those numbers to prolong.

Yet fragments of the lofty strain
Float down the tide of years,
As, buoyant on the stormy main
A parted wreck appears.**

He sung King Arthur's Table Round;
The Warrior of the Lake;

How courteous Gawaine met the wound,++
And bled for ladies' sake.

But chief, in gentle Tristrem's praise,

The notes melodious swell;

Was none excell'd in Arthur's days,

The knight of Lionelle.#

For Marke, his cowardly uncle's right,
A venom'd wound he bore;
When fierce Morholde he slew in fight,
Upon the Irish shore.

No art the poison might withstand;
No medicine could be found,
Till lovely Isolde's lily hand

Had probed the rankling wound.
With gentle hand and soothing tongue
She bore the leech's part;

And, while she o'er his sick-bed hung,
He paid her with his heart.

Torwoodlee and Caddenhead are places in Selkirkshire; the property of Mr. Pringle of Torwoodlee.

both

Quaighs-Wooden cups composed of staves hooped together.
See introduction to this ballad.

**[This stanza was quoted by the Edinburgh Reviewer, of 1804. as a noble contrast to the ordinary humility of the genuine ballad diction.-ED.]

+ See, in the Fabliaux of Monsieur le Grand, elegantly transThe spot is rendered classical by its having given name to the lated by the lare Gregory Way, Esq., the tale of the Knight and beautiful melody called the Broom o' the Cordenknows. the Sword. [Vol. ii. p. 3.]

1 Ensenzie-War-cry, or gathering word.

[See Sir Tristrem, in another part of this volume.]

O fatal was the gift, I ween!

For, doom'd in evil tide,

The maid must be rude Cornwall's queen, His cowardly uncle's bride.

Their loves, their woes, the gifted bard,

In fairy tissue wove;

Where lords, and knights, and ladies bright,
In gay confusion strove.

The Garde Joyeuse, amid the tale,
High rear'd its glittering head;
And Avalon's enchanted vale
In all its wonders spread.

Brangwain was there, and Segramore,
And fiend-born Merlin's gramarye;
Of that famed wizard's mighty lore,
O who could sing but he?

Through many a maze the winning song
In changeful passion led,

Till bent at length the listening throng
O'er Tristrem's dying bed.

His ancient wounds their scars expand,
With agony his heart is wrung:

O where is Isolde's lilye hand,

And where her soothing tongue?

She comes! she comes !-like flash of flame
Can lovers' footsteps fly;

She comes! she comes!-she only came
To see her Tristrem die.

She saw him die; her latest sigh

Join'd in a kiss his parting breath;

The gentlest pair, that Britain bare,

United are in death.

There paus'd the harp: its lingering sound
Died slowly on the ear;

The silent guests still bent around,
For still they seem'd to hear.

Then wo broke forth in murmurs weak:
Nor ladies heaved alone the sigh:

But, half ashamed, the rugged cheek
Did many a gauntlet dry.

On Leader's stream, and Learmont's tower,
The mists of evening close;
In camp, in castle, or in bower,
Each warrior sought repose.
Lord Douglas, in his lofty tent,
Dream'd o'er the woful tale:

When footsteps light across the bent,
The warrior's ears assail.

He starts, he wakes;-" What, Richard, ho!
Arise, my page, arise!

What venturous wight, at dead of night,
Dare step where Douglas lies!"—

Then forth they rush'd: by Leader's tide,
A selcouth sight they see-
A hart and hind pace side by side,

As white as snow on Fairnalie.t
Beneath the moon, with gesture proud,
They stately move and slow;
Nor scare they at the gathering crowd,
Who marvel as they go.

To Learmont's tower a message sped,
As fast as page might run ;
And Thomas started from his bed,
And soon his clothes did on.

First he woxe pale, and then woxe red;
Never a word he spake but three;-
"My sand is run; my thread is spun ;
This sign regardeth me.'

The elfin harp his neck around,
In minstrel guise, he hung:

And on the wind, in doleful sound,
Its dying accents rung.

Selcouth-Wondrous.

↑ An ancient seat upon the Tweed, in Selkirkshire. In a popular edition of the first part of Thomas the Rhymer, the Fairy Queen thus addresses him :

"Gin ye wad meet wi' me again, Gang to the bonny banks of Fairnalie." [Fairmilie is now one of the seats of Mr. Pringle of Clifton, M.P. for Selkirkshire. 1833.]

Then forth he went; yet turn'd him oft
To view his ancient hall:

On the gray tower, in lustre soft,
The autumn moonbeams fall;
And Leader's waves, like silver sheen,
Danced shimmering in the ray;
In deepening mass, at distance seen,
Broad Soltra's mountains lay.
"Farewell, my father's ancient tower!
A long farewell," said he :

"The scene of pleasure, pomp, or power,
Thou never more shalt be.

"To Learmont's name no foot of earth
Shall here again belong,

And on thy hospitable hearth,
The hare shall leave her young.
"Adieu! adieu!" again he cried,

All as he turn'd him roun'-
"Farewell to Leader's silver tide!
Farewell to Ercildoune !"

The hart and hind approach'd the place,
As lingering yet he stood;

And there, before Lord Douglas' face,
With them he cross'd the flood.

Lord Douglas leap'd on his berry-brown steed,
And spurr'd him the Leader o'er;

But though he rode with lightning speed,
He never saw them more.

Some said to hill, and some to glen,
Their wond'rous course had been;
But ne'er in haunts of living men
Again was Thomas seen.

GLENFINLAS; OR, LORD RONALD'S CORONACH.‡

BY WALTER SCOTT.

THE simple tradition, upon which the following stanzas are founded, runs thus: While two Highland hunters were passing the night in a solitary bothy, (a hut, built for the purpose of hunting,) and making merry over their venison and whisky, one of them expressed a wish that they had pretty lasses to complete their party. The words were scarcely uttered, when two beautiful young women, habited in green, entered the hut, dancing and singing. One of the hunters was seduced by the siren who attached herself particularly to him, to leave the hut: the other remained, and, suspicious of the fair seducers, continued to play upon a trump, or Jew's harp, some strain, consecrated to the Virgin Mary. Day at length came, and the temptress vanished. Searching in the forest, he found the bones of his unfortunate friend, who had been torn to pieces and devoured by the fiend into whose toils he had fallen. The place was from thence called the Glen of the Green Women.

Glenfinlas is a tract of forest-ground, lying in the Highlands of Perthshire, not far from Callender, in Menteith. It was formerly a royal forest, and now belongs to the Earl of Moray. This country, as well as the adjacent district of Balquidder, was, in times of yore, chiefly inhabited by the Macgregors. To the west of the Forest of Glenfinlas lies Loch Katrine, and its romantic avenue, called the Troshachs. Benledi, Benmore, and Benvoirlich, are mountains in the same district, and at no great distance from Glenfinlas. The river Teith passes Callender and the Castle of Doune, and joins the Forth near Stirling. The Pass of Lenny is immediately above Callender, and is the principal access to the Highlands, from that town. Glenartney is a forest, near Benvoirlich. The whole forms a sublime tract of Alpine scenery.

This ballad first appeared in the Tales of Won

der.§

1 Coronach is the lamentation for a deceased warrior, sung by the aged of the clan..

$ [The scenery of this, the author's first serious attempt in poetry, reappears in the Lady of the Lake, in Waverley, and in Rob Roy.-ED.]

« PreviousContinue »