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IV.

His mantle dark, his bosom bare,
His floating eyes and flowing hair,
Methinks the visioned bard I see
Beneath the mystic Eildon Tree,

Tradition reports that, from under this tree, the Rhymer was wont to utter his prophecies, and also, that it was from this spot he was enticed away by the Queen of Fairyland:—

“True Thomas lay on Huntlie bank,
A ferlie he spied wi' his ee;
And there he saw a lady bright
Come riding down by the Eeldon Tree.
Her shirt was of the grass-green silk,
Her mantle of the velvet fine;
At ilka tett of her horse's mane,
Hung fifty silver bells and nine.”

Piercing the mazy depths of Time,
And weaving thence prophetic rhyme;
Beings around him that had birth
Neither in Heaven, nor yet on earth;
And at his feet the broken law
Of Nature, through whose chinks he saw.