 | The Collected Songs of Charles Mackay |  |
THE GLADES OF WINDSOR.
[James I. of Scotland was taken captive by the English in the eleventh year of his age. He was educated at Windsor Castle, and became the most accomplished prince of his time. He excelled particularly in poetry and music; and on his return to Scotland, after a captivity of nineteen years, he introduced into his own land the music which he had learned in Windsor Castle. He is universally recognised as “the father of Scottish melody,” and popular tradition ascribes to him the composition of many national airs. He has narrated, in his poem of “The King's Quir” (The King's Book), the romantic history of his love for the daughter of the Duke of Somerset—the beautiful Lady Jane Beaufort—whom he saw for the first time from a turret of Windsor Castle, as she was walking among her maidens. He afterwards married this lady, who became Queen of Scotland; and during his unhappy reign of fourteen years, and in the tragic incident which ended his life, she conducted herself with a mingled gentleness and heroism which justified the passionate attachment of her husband, and which to this day shed a halo of light upon her name and memory.]
I
Oh, fond is remembrance of time long departed;Come, sit by my side, and the days I'll recall,
When the present was bright to the young and true-hearted,
And the fast-coming future seem'd brighter than all.
Through each fair forest glade
Of green Windsor we stray'd;
Our speech was a token, our silence a sign,
And thy hand's gentle pressure,
My heart's dearest treasure,
First told me of love that responded to mine.
II
In the dark gloomy dawn of my life's early morning,When captive I pined for my home far away,
I forgot all my foemen,—their gibes and their scorning,
As soon as thy love shed a light on my way.
When I gazed from the tower,
And beheld thee below in thy beauty and grace;
With bondage contented,
No more I lamented,
But found a new hope in the heaven of thy face.
III
The hope I then cherish'd has never deceived me,With thee all my days have been days of delight;
The world may have oft, but thou never hast grieved me,
And always thy counsels have led me aright:
Oh! my love and my life,
My heart's partner and wife,
The weight of a crown is a burden of pain;
Sharp agonies line it,
And might I resign it,
'Twere sweet to be with thee in Windsor again.
| The Collected Songs of Charles Mackay | |