The Poetical Works of Thomas Pringle :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Poetical Works of Thomas Pringle

With A Sketch of his Life, by Leitch Ritchie

Pringle, Thomas (1789-1834)

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AFRICAN SKETCHES.

Rude Rymes, the which a rustic Muse did weave
In salvadge soyl, far from Parnasso Mount,
And roughly wrought in an vnlearned loome.
Spenser.

Avia Pieridum peragro, loca nullius ante
Trita solo: juvat integros accedere fontes,
Atque haurire; juvatque novos decerpere flores.
Lucret.

xvi

TO SIR WALTER SCOTT.

FROM DESERTS WILD AND MANY A PATHLESS WOOD
OF SAVAGE CLIMES WHERE I HAVE WANDERED LONG,
WHOSE HILLS AND STREAMS ARE YET UNGRACED BY SONG,
I BRING, ILLUSTRIOUS FRIEND, THIS GARLAND RUDE:
THE OFFERING, THOUGH UNCOUTH, IN KINDLY MOOD
THOU WILT REGARD, IF HAPLY THERE SHOULD BE,
'MONG MEANER THINGS, THE FLOWER SIMPLICITY,
FRESH FROM COY NATURE'S VIRGIN SOLITUDE.
ACCEPT THIS FRAIL MEMORIAL, HONOURED SCOTT,
OF FAVOURED INTERCOURSE IN FORMER DAY—
OF WORDS OF KINDNESS I HAVE NE'ER FORGOT—
OF ACTS OF FRIENDSHIP I CAN NE'ER REPAY.
FOR I HAVE FOUND (AND WHEREFORE SAY IT NOT?)
THE MINSTREL'S HEART AS NOBLE AS HIS LAY.

January, 1828.

THE BECHUANA BOY.

I sat at noontide in my tent,
And looked across the Desert dun,
Beneath the cloudless firmament
Far gleaming in the sun,
When from the bosom of the waste
A swarthy Stripling came in haste,
With foot unshod and naked limb;
And a tame springbok followed him.

With open aspect, frank yet bland,
And with a modest mien he stood,
Caressing with a gentle hand
That beast of gentle brood;
Then, meekly gazing in my face,
Said in the language of his race,
With smiling look yet pensive tone,
“Stranger—I'm in the world alone!”

“Poor boy!” I said, “thy native home
Lies far beyond the Stormberg blue:
Why hast thou left it, boy! to roam
This desolate Karroo?”
His face grew sadder while I spoke;
The smile forsook it; and he broke
Short silence with a sob-like sigh,
And told his hapless history.

“I have no home!” replied the boy:
“The Bergenaars—by night they came,
And raised their wolfish howl of joy,
While o'er our huts the flame
Resistless rushed; and aye their yell
Pealed louder as our warriors fell
In helpless heaps beneath their shot:
—One living man they left us not!

“The slaughter o'er, they gave the slain
To feast the foul-beaked birds of prey;
And, with our herds, across the plain
They hurried us away—
The widowed mothers and their brood.
Oft, in despair, for drink and food
We vainly cried: they heeded not,
But with sharp lash the captive smote.

“Three days we tracked that dreary wild,
Where thirst and anguish pressed us sore;
And many a mother and her child
Lay down to rise no more.
Behind us, on the desert brown,
We saw the vultures swooping down:
And heard, as the grim night was falling,
The wolf to his gorged comrade calling.

“At length was heard a river sounding
'Midst that dry and dismal land,
And, like a troop of wild deer bounding,
We hurried to its strand—
Among the maddened cattle rushing;
The crowd behind still forward pushing,
Till in the flood our limbs were drenched,
And the fierce rage of thirst was quenched.

“Hoarse-roaring, dark, the broad Gareep
In turbid streams was sweeping fast,
Huge sea-cows in its eddies deep
Loud snorting as we passed;
But that relentless robber-clan
Right through those waters wild and wan
Drove on like sheep our wearied band:
—Some never reached the farther strand.

“All shivering from the foaming flood,
We stood upon the stranger's ground,
When, with proud looks and gestures rude,
The White Men gathered round:
And there, like cattle from the fold,
By Christians we were bought and sold,
'Midst laughter loud and looks of scorn—
And roughly from each other torn.

“My Mother's scream, so long and shrill,
My little Sister's wailing cry,
(In dreams I often hear them still!)
Rose wildly to the sky.
A tiger's heart came to me then,
And fiercely on those ruthless men
I sprang.—Alas! dashed on the sand,
Bleeding, they bound me foot and hand.

“Away—away on prancing steeds
The stout man-stealers blithely go,
Through long low valleys fringed with reeds,
O'er mountains capped with snow,
Each with his captive, far and fast;
Until yon rock-bound ridge we passed,
And distant stripes of cultured soil
Bespoke the land of tears and toil.

“And tears and toil have been my lot
Since I the White Man's thrall became,
And sorer griefs I wish forgot—
Harsh blows, and scorn, and shame!
Oh, Englishman! thou ne'er canst know
The injured bondman's bitter woe,
When round his breast, like scorpions, cling
Black thoughts that madden while they sting!

“Yet this hard fate I might have borne,
And taught in time my soul to bend,
Had my sad yearning heart forlorn
But found a single friend:
My race extinct or far removed,
The Boor's rough brood I could have loved;
But each to whom my bosom turned
Even like a hound the black boy spurned.

“While, friendless thus, my master's flocks
I tended on the upland waste,
It chanced this fawn leapt from the rocks,
By wolfish wild-dogs chased:
I rescued it, though wounded sore
And dabbled in its mother's gore:
And nursed it in a cavern wild,
Until it loved me like a child.

“Gently I nursed it; for I thought
(Its hapless fate so like to mine)
By good Utíko it was brought
To bid me not repine,—
Since in this world of wrong and ill
One creature lived that loved me still,
Although its dark and dazzling eye
Beamed not with human sympathy.

“Thus lived I, a lone orphan lad,
My task the proud Boor's flocks to tend;
And this poor fawn was all I had
To love, or call my friend;
When suddenly, with haughty look
And taunting words, that tyrant took
My playmate for his pampered boy,
Who envied me my only joy.

“High swelled my heart!—But when the star
Of midnight gleamed, I softly led
My bounding favourite forth, and far
Into the Desert fled.
And here, from human kind exiled,
Three moons on roots and berries wild
I've fared; and braved the beasts of prey,
To 'scape from spoilers worse than they.

“But yester morn a Bushman brought
The tidings that thy tents were near;
And now with hasty foot I've sought
Thy presence, void of fear;
Because they say, O English Chief,
Thou scornest not the Captive's grief:
Then let me serve thee, as thine own—
For I am in the world alone!”

Such was Marossi's touching tale.
Our breasts they were not made of stone;
His words, his winning looks prevail—
We took him for ‘our own.’
And One, with woman's gentle art,
Unlocked the fountains of his heart;
And love gushed forth—till he became
Her Child in every thing but name.

AFAR IN THE DESERT.

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side:
When the sorrows of life the soul o'ercast,
And, sick of the Present, I cling to the Past;
When the eye is suffused with regretful tears,
From the fond recollections of former years;
And shadows of things that have long since fled
Flit over the brain, like the ghosts of the dead:
Bright visions of glory—that vanished too soon;
Day-dreams—that departed ere manhood's noon;
Attachments—by fate or by falsehood reft;
Companions of early days—lost or left;
And my Native Land—whose magical name
Thrills to the heart like electric flame;
The home of my childhood; the haunts of my prime;
All the passions and scenes of that rapturous time
When the feelings were young and the world was new,
Like the fresh bowers of Eden unfolding to view;
All—all now forsaken—forgotten—foregone!
And I—a lone exile remembered of none—

My high aims abandoned,—my good acts undone,—
A weary of all that is under the sun,—
With that sadness of heart which no stranger may scan,
I fly to the Desert afar from man!

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side:
When the wild turmoil of this wearisome life,
With its scenes of oppression, corruption, and strife—
The proud man's frown, and the base man's fear,—
The scorner's laugh, and the sufferer's tear,—
And malice, and meanness, and falsehood, and folly,
Dispose me to musing and dark melancholy;
When my bosom is full, and my thoughts are high,
And my soul is sick with the bondman's sigh—
Oh! then there is freedom, and joy, and pride,
Afar in the Desert alone to ride!
There is rapture to vault on the champing steed,
And to bound away with the eagle's speed,
With the death-fraught firelock in my hand—
The only law of the Desert Land!

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side:
Away—away from the dwellings of men,
By the wild deer's haunt, by the buffalo's glen;
By valleys remote where the oribi plays,
Where the gnu, the gazelle, and the hartèbeest graze,
And the kùdù and eland unhunted recline
By the skirts of grey forests o'erhung with wild-vine;
Where the elephant browses at peace in his wood,
And the river-horse gambols unscared in the flood,
And the mighty rhinoceros wallows at will
In the fen where the wild-ass is drinking his fill.

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side:
O'er the brown Karroo, where the bleating cry
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively;
And the timorous quagga's shrill whistling neigh
Is heard by the fountain at twilight grey;
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane,
With wild hoof scouring the desolate plain;
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste,
Hieing away to the home of her rest,
Where she and her mate have scooped their nest,
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view
In the pathless depths of the parched Karroo.

Afar in the Desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side:
Away—away—in the Wilderness vast,
Where the White Man's foot hath never passed,
And the quivered Coránna or Bechuán
Hath rarely crossed with his roving clan:
A region of emptiness, howling and drear,
Which Man hath abandoned from famine and fear;
Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone,
With the twilight bat from the yawning stone;
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root,
Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot;
And the bitter-melon, for food and drink,
Is the pilgrim's fare by the salt lake's brink:
A region of drought, where no river glides,
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides;
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling fount,
Nor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount,
Appears, to refresh the aching eye:
But the barren earth and the burning sky,

And the blank horizon, round and round,
Spread—void of living sight or sound.

And here, while the night-winds round me sigh,
And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky,
As I sit apart by the desert stone,
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave alone,
‘A still small voice’ comes through the wild
(Like a Father consoling his fretful Child),
Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear,—
Saying—Man is distant, but God is near!

SONG OF THE WILD BUSHMAN.

Let the proud White Man boast his flocks,
And fields of foodful grain;
My home is 'mid the mountain rocks,
The Desert my domain.
I plant no herbs nor pleasant fruits,
I toil not for my cheer;
The Desert yields me juicy roots,
And herds of bounding deer.

The countless springboks are my flock,
Spread o'er the unbounded plain;
The buffalo bendeth to my yoke,
The wild-horse to my rein;
My yoke is the quivering assagai,
My rein the tough bow-string;
My bridle curb is a slender barb—
Yet it quells the forest-king.

The crested adder honoureth me,
And yields at my command
His poison-bag, like the honey-bee,
When I seize him on the sand.
Yea, even the wasting locust-swarm,
Which mighty nations dread,
To me nor terror brings nor harm—
For I make of them my bread.

Thus I am lord of the Desert Land,
And I will not leave my bounds,
To crouch beneath the Christian's hand,
And kennel with his hounds:
To be a hound, and watch the flocks,
For the cruel White Man's gain—
No! the brown Serpent of the Rocks
His den doth yet retain;
And none who there his sting provokes,
Shall find its poison vain!

THE CORANNA.

Fast by his wild resounding River
The listless Córan lingers ever;
Still drives his heifers forth to feed,
Soothed by the gorrah's humming reed;
A rover still unchecked will range,
As humour calls, or seasons change;
His tent of mats and leathern gear
All packed upon the patient steer.
'Mid all his wanderings hating toil,
He never tills the stubborn soil;

But on the milky dams relies,
And what spontaneous earth supplies.
Or, should long-parching droughts prevail,
And milk, and bulbs, and locusts fail,
He lays him down to sleep away
In languid trance the weary day;
Oft as he feels gaunt hunger's stound,
Still tightening famine's girdle round;
Lulled by the sound of the Gareep,
Beneath the willows murmuring deep:
Till thunder-clouds, surcharged with rain,
Pour verdure o'er the panting plain;
And call the famished Dreamer from his trance,
To feast on milk and game, and wake the moon-light dance.

Stound—a sharp pang, a shooting pain. Spenser.—Burns.

THE KOSA.

The free-born Kosa still doth hold
The fields his fathers held of old;
With club and spear, in jocund ranks,
Still hunts the elk by Chumi's banks:
By Keisi's meads his herds are lowing;
On Debè's slopes his gardens glowing,
Where laughing maids at sunset roam,
To bear the juicy melons home:
And striplings from Kalumna's wood
Bring wild grapes and the pigeon's brood,
With fragrant hoard of honey-bee
Rifled from the hollow tree:

And herdsmen shout from rock to rock;
And through the glen the hamlets smoke:
And children gambol round the kraal,
To greet their sires at evening-fall:
And matrons sweep the cabin floor,
And spread the mat beside the door,
And with dry faggots wake the flame
To dress the wearied huntsman's game.

Bright gleams the fire: its ruddy blaze
On many a dusky visage plays.
On forkèd twigs the game is drest;
The neighbours share the simple feast:
The honey-mead, the millet-ale,
Flow round—and flow the jest and tale;
Wild legends of the ancient day,
Of hunting feat, of warlike fray;
And now come smiles, and now come sighs,
As mirth and grief alternate rise.
Or should a sterner strain awake,
Like sudden flame in summer brake,
Bursts fiercely forth in battle song
The tale of Amakósa's wrong;
Throbs every warrior bosom high,
With lightning flashes every eye,
And, in wild cadence, rings the sound
Of barbèd javelins clashing round.

But lo, like a broad shield on high,
The moon gleams in the midnight sky.
'Tis time to part: the watch-dog's bay
Beside the folds has died away.
'Tis time to rest: the mat is spread,
The hardy hunter's simple bed:
His wife her dreaming infant hushes
On the low cabin's couch of rushes;

Softly he draws its door of hide,
And, stretched by his Gulúwi's side,
Sleeps soundly till the peep of dawn
Wakes on the hills the dappled fawn;
Then forth again he gaily bounds,
With club and spear and questing hounds.

EVENING RAMBLES.

The sultry summer-noon is past;
And mellow Evening comes at last,
With a low and languid breeze
Fanning the mimosa trees,
That cluster o'er the yellow vale,
And oft perfume the panting gale
With fragrance faint: it seems to tell
Of primrose-tufts in Scottish dell,
Peeping forth in tender spring
When the blithe lark begins to sing.

But soon, amidst our Lybian vale,
Such soothing recollections fail;
Soon we raise the eye to range
O'er prospects wild, grotesque, and strange;
Sterile mountains, rough and steep,
That bound abrupt the valley deep,
Heaving to the clear blue sky
Their ribs of granite bare and dry,
And ridges, by the torrents worn,
Thinly streaked with scraggy thorn,
Which fringes Nature's savage dress,
Yet scarce relieves her nakedness.

But where the Vale winds deep below,
The landscape hath a warmer glow:
There the spekboom spreads its bowers
Of light green leaves and lilac flowers;
And the aloe rears her crimson crest,
Like stately queen for gala drest;
And the bright-blossomed bean-tree shakes
Its coral tufts above the brakes,
Brilliant as the glancing plumes
Of sugar birds among its blooms,
With the deep-green verdure blending
In the stream of light descending.

And now, along the grassy meads,
Where the skipping reebok feeds,
Let me through the mazes rove
Of the light acacia grove;
Now while yet the honey-bee
Hums around the blossomed tree;
And the turtles softly chide,
Wooingly, on every side;
And the clucking pheasant calls
To his mate at intervals;
And the duiker at my tread
Sudden lifts his startled head,
Then dives affrighted in the brake,
Like wild-duck in the reedy lake.

My wonted seat receives me now—
This cliff with myrtle-tufted brow,
Towering high o'er grove and stream,
As if to greet the parting gleam.
With shattered rocks besprinkled o'er,
Behind ascends the mountain hoar,

Whose crest o'erhangs the Bushman's Cave,
(His fortress once, and now his grave,)
Where the grim satyr-faced baboon
Sits gibbering to the rising moon,
Or chides with hoarse and angry cry
The herdsman as he wanders by.

Spread out below in sun and shade,
The shaggy Glen lies full displayed—
Its sheltered nooks, its sylvan bowers,
Its meadows flushed with purple flowers;
And through it like a dragon spread,
I trace the river's tortuous bed.
Lo there the Chaldee-willow weeps,
Drooping o'er the headlong steeps,
Where the torrent in his wrath
Hath rifted him a rugged path,
Like fissure cleft by earthquake's shock,
Through mead and jungle, mound and rock.
But the swoln water's wasteful sway,
Like tyrant's rage, hath passed away,
And left the ravage of its course
Memorial of its frantic force.
—Now o'er its shrunk and slimy bed
Rank weeds and withered wrack are spread,
With the faint rill just oozing through,
And vanishing again from view;
Save where the guana's glassy pool
Holds to some cliff its mirror cool,
Girt by the palmite's leafy screen,
Or graceful rock-ash, tall and green,
Whose slender sprays above the flood
Suspend the loxia's callow brood
In cradle-nests, with porch below,
Secure from winged or creeping foe—

Weasel or hawk or writhing snake;
Light swinging, as the breezes wake,
Like the ripe fruit we love to see
Upon the rich pomegranate-tree.

But lo, the sun's descending car
Sinks o'er Mount-Dunion's peaks afar;
And now along the dusky vale
The homeward herds and flocks I hail,
Returning from their pastures dry
Amid the stony uplands high.
First, the brown Herder with his flock
Comes winding round my hermit-rock:
His mien and gait and vesture tell,
No shepherd he from Scottish fell;
For crook the guardian gun he bears,
For plaid the sheep-skin mantle wears;
Sauntering languidly along;
Nor flute has he, nor merry song,
Nor book, nor tale, nor rustic lay,
To cheer him through his listless day.
His look is dull, his soul is dark;
He feels not hope's electric spark;
But, born the White Man's servile thrall,
Knows that he cannot lower fall.

Next the stout Neat-herd passes by,
With bolder step and blither eye;
Humming low his tuneless song,
Or whistling to the hornèd throng.
From the destroying foeman fled,
He serves the Colonist for bread:
Yet this poor heathen Bechuan
Bears on his brow the port of man;
A naked, homeless exile he—
But not debased by Slavery.

Now, wizard-like, slow Twilight sails
With soundless wing adown the vales,
Waving with his shadowy rod
The owl and bat to come abroad,
With things that hate the garish sun,
To frolic now when day is done.
Now along the meadows damp
The enamoured fire-fly lights his lamp;
Link-boy he of woodland green
To light fair Avon's Elfin Queen;
Here, I ween, more wont to shine
To light the thievish porcupine,
Plundering my melon-bed,—
Or villain lynx, whose stealthy tread
Rouses not the wakeful hound
As he creeps the folds around.

But lo! the night-bird's boding scream
Breaks abrupt my twilight dream;
And warns me it is time to haste
My homeward walk across the waste,
Lest my rash tread provoke the wrath
Of adder coiled upon the path,
Or tempt the lion from the wood,
That soon will prowl athirst for blood.
—Thus, murmuring my thoughtful strain,
I seek our wattled cot again.

Glen-Lynden, 1822.

THE LION HUNT.

Mount—mount for the hunting—with musket and spear!
Call our friends to the field—for the Lion is near!
Call Arend and Ekhard and Groepe to the spoor;
Call Muller and Coetzer and Lucas Van Vuur.

Side up Eildon-Cleugh, and blow loudly the bugle:
Call Slinger and Allie and Dikkop and Dugal;
And George with the elephant-gun on his shoulder—
In a perilous pinch none is better or bolder.

In the gorge of the glen lie the bones of my steed,
And the hoofs of a heifer of fatherland's breed:
But mount, my brave boys! if our rifles prove true,
We'll soon make the spoiler his ravages rue.

Ho! the Hottentot lads have discovered the track—
To his den in the desert we'll follow him back;
But tighten your girths, and look well to your flints,
For heavy and fresh are the villain's foot-prints.

Through the rough rocky kloof into grey Huntly-Glen,
Past the wild-olive clump where the wolf has his den,
By the black-eagle's rock at the foot of the fell,
We have tracked him at length to the buffalo's well.

Now mark yonder brake where the blood-hounds are howling;
And hark that hoarse sound—like the deep thunder growling;
'Tis his lair—'tis his voice!—from your saddles alight;
He's at bay in the brushwood preparing for fight.

Leave the horses behind—and be still every man:
Let the Mullers and Rennies advance in the van:
Keep fast in your ranks;—by the yell of yon hound,
The savage, I guess, will be out—with a bound.

He comes! the tall jungle before him loud crashing,
His mane bristled fiercely, his fiery eyes flashing;
With a roar of disdain, he leaps forth in his wrath,
To challenge the foe that dare 'leaguer his path.

He couches—ay now we'll see mischief, I dread:
Quick—level your rifles—and aim at his head:
Thrust forward the spears, and unsheath every knife—
St. George! he's upon us!—Now, fire, lads, for life!

He's wounded—but yet he'll draw blood ere he falls—
Ha! under his paw see Bezuidenhout sprawls—
Now Diederik! Christian! right in the brain
Plant each man his bullet—Hurra! he is slain!

Bezuidenhout—up, man!—'tis only a scratch—
(You were always a scamp, and have met with your match!)
What a glorious lion!—what sinews—what claws—
And seven-feet-ten from the rump to the jaws!

His hide, with the paws and the bones of his skull,
With the spoils of the leopard and buffalo bull,
We'll send to Sir Walter.—Now, boys, let us dine,
And talk of our deeds o'er a flask of old wine.

THE LION AND GIRAFFE.

Wouldst thou view the Lion's den?
Search afar from haunts of men—
Where the reed-encircled rill
Oozes from the rocky hill,
By its verdure far descried
'Mid the desert brown and wide.

Close beside the sedgy brim
Couchant lurks the Lion grim;
Watching till the close of day
Brings the death-devoted prey.
Heedless, at the ambushed brink
The tall Giraffe stoops down to drink:
Upon him straight the savage springs
With cruel joy. The desert rings
With clanging sound of desperate strife—
The prey is strong and he strives for life.
Plunging oft with frantic bound,
To shake the tyrant to the ground,
He shrieks—he rushes through the waste,
With glaring eye and headlong haste:
In vain!—the spoiler on his prize
Rides proudly—tearing as he flies.

For life—the victim's utmost speed
Is mustered in this hour of need:
For life—for life—his giant might
He strains, and pours his soul in flight;
And, mad with terror, thirst, and pain,
Spurns with wild hoof the thundering plain.

'Tis vain; the thirsty sands are drinking
His streaming blood—his strength is sinking;
The victor's fangs are in his veins—
His flanks are streaked with sanguine stains—
His panting breast in foam and gore
Is bathed—he reels—his race is o'er:
He falls—and, with convulsive throe,
Resigns his throat to the ravening foe!
—And lo! ere quivering life has fled,
The vultures, wheeling overhead,
Swoop down, to watch, in gaunt array,
Till the gorged tyrant quits his prey.

THE EMIGRANT'S CABIN.

AN EPISTLE IN RHYME.

Where the young river, from its wild ravine,
Winds pleasantly through Eildon's pastures green,—
With fair acacias waving on its banks,
And willows bending o'er in graceful ranks,
And the steep mountain rising close behind,
To shield us from the Snowberg's wintry wind,—
Appears my rustic cabin, thatched with reeds,
Upon a knoll amid the grassy meads;
And, close beside it, looking o'er the lea,
Our summer-seat beneath an umbra-tree.

This morning, musing in that favourite seat,
My hound, old Yarrow, dreaming at my feet,
I pictured you, sage Fairbairn, at my side,
By some good Genie wafted cross the tide;

And, after cordial greetings, thus went on
In Fancy's Dream our colloquy, dear John.

P.
—Enter, my friend, our beehive-cottage door:
No carpet hides the humble earthen floor,
But it is hard as brick, clean-swept, and cool.
You must be wearied? Take that jointed stool;
Or on this couch of leopard-skin recline;
You'll find it soft—the workmanship is mine.

F.
—Why, Pringle, yes—your cabin's snug enough,
Though oddly shaped. But as for household stuff,
I only see some rough-hewn sticks and spars;
A wicker cupboard, filled with flasks and jars;
A pile of books, on rustic frame-work placed;
Hides of ferocious beasts that roam the waste;
Whose kindred prowl, perchance, around this spot—
The only neighbours, I suspect, you've got!
Your furniture, rude from the forest cut,
However, is in keeping with the hut.
This couch feels pleasant: is't with grass you stuff it?
So far I should not care with you to rough it.
But—pardon me for seeming somewhat rude—
In this wild place how manage ye for food?

P.
—You'll find, at least, my friend, we do not starve;
There's always mutton, if nought else, to carve;
And even of luxuries we have our share.
But here comes dinner (the best bill of fare),
Drest by that ‘Nut-Brown Maiden,’ Vytjè Vaal.
[To the Hottentot Girl.]
Meid, roep de Juffrouwen naar't middagmaal:
[To F.]
Which means—‘The ladies in to dinner call.’

Enter Mrs. P. and her Sister, who welcome their Guest to Africa. The party take their seats round the table, and conversation proceeds.]

P.
—First, here's our broad-tailed mutton, small and fine,
The dish on which nine days in ten we dine;
Next, roasted springbok, spiced and larded well;
A haunch of hartèbeest from Hyndhope Fell;
A paauw, which beats your Norfolk turkey hollow;
Korhaan, and Guinea-fowl, and pheasant, follow;
Kid carbonadjes, à-la-Hottentot,
Broiled on a forkèd twig; and, peppered hot
With Chili pods, a dish called Caffer-stew;
Smoked ham of porcupine, and tongue of gnu.
This fine white household bread (of M—t's baking)
Comes from an oven too of my own making,
Scooped from an ant-hill. Did I ask before
If you would taste this brawn of forest-boar?

Our fruits, I must confess, make no great show:
Trees, grafts, and layers must have time to grow.
But there's green roasted maize, and pumpkin pie,
And wild asparagus. Or will you try
A slice of water-melon?—fine for drouth,
Like sugared ices melting in the mouth.
Here too are wild-grapes from our forest-vine,
Not void of flavour, though unfit for wine.
And here comes dried fruit I had quite forgot,
(From fair Glen-Avon, M—t, is it not?)
Figs, almonds, raisins, peaches. Witbooy Swart
Brought this huge sackful from kind Mrs. Hart—
Enough to load a Covent-Garden cart.

But come, let's crown the banquet with some wine.
What will you drink? Champagne? Port? Claret? Stein?
Well—not to tease you with a thirsty jest,
Lo, there our only vintage stands confest,
In that half-aum upon the spigot-rack.
And certes, though it keeps the old Kaap smaak,

The wine is light and racy; so we learn,
In laughing mood, to call it Cape Sauterne.
—Let's pledge this cup ‘to all our friends,’ Fairbairn!

F.
—Well, I admit, my friend, your dinner's good.
Springbok and porcupine are dainty food;
That lordly paauw was roasted to a turn;
And in your country fruits and Cape Sauterne,
The wildish flavour's really—not unpleasant;
And I may say the same of gnu and pheasant.
—But—Mrs. Pringle ... shall I have the pleasure...?
Miss Brown, ... some wine?—(These quaighs are quite a treasure.)
—What! leave us now? I've much to ask of you...
But, since you will go—for an hour adieu.

[Exeunt Ladies.]

But, Pringle—‘à nos moutons revenons’—
Cui bono's still the burthen of my song—
Cut off, with these good ladies, from society,
Of savage life you soon must feel satiety:
The MIND requires fit exercise and food,
Not to be found 'mid Afric's deserts rude.
And what avail the spoils of wood and field,
The fruits or wines your fertile valleys yield,
Without that higher zest to crown the whole—
‘The feast of Reason and the flow of Soul?’
—Food, shelter, fire, suffice for savage men;
But can the comforts of your wattled den,
Your sylvan fare and rustic tasks, suffice
For one who once seemed finer joys to prize?
—When, erst, like Virgil's swains, we used to sing
Of streams and groves, and all that sort of thing,’

The spot we meant for our ‘Poetic Den’
Was always within reach of Books and Men;
By classic Esk, for instance, or Tweed-side,
With gifted friends within an easy ride:
Besides our college chum, the Parish Priest;
And the said den with six good rooms at least.—
Here!—save for Her who shares and soothes your lot,
You might as well squat in a Caffer's cot!

Come now, be candid: tell me, my dear friend,
Of your aspiring aims is this the end?
Was it for Nature's wants, fire, shelter, food,
You sought this dreary, soulless solitude?
Broke off your ties with men of cultured mind,
Your native land, your early friends resigned?
As if, believing with insane Rousseau
Refinement the chief cause of human woe,
You meant to realize that raver's plan,
And be a philosophic Bosjesman!—
Be frank; confess the fact you cannot hide—
You sought this den from disappointed pride.

P.
—You've missed the mark, Fairbairn! my breast is clear.
Nor wild Romance nor Pride allured me here:
Duty and Destiny with equal voice
Constrained my steps: I had no other choice.

The hermit ‘lodge in some vast wilderness,’
Which sometimes poets sigh for, I confess,
Were but a sorry lot. In real life
One needs a friend—the best of friends, a wife;
But with a home thus cheered, however rude,
There's nought so very dull in solitude,—
Even though that home should happen to be found,
Like mine, in Africa's remotest bound.

—I have my farm and garden, tools and pen;
My schemes for civilising savage men;
Our Sunday service, till the sabbath-bell
Shall wake its welcome chime in Lynden dell;
Some duty or amusement, grave or light,
To fill the active day from morn to night:
And thus two years so lightsomely have flown
That still we wonder when the week is gone.
—We have at times our troubles, it is true,
Passing vexations, and privations too;
But were it not for woman's tender frame,
These are annoyances I scarce would name;
For though perchance they plague us while they last,
They only serve for jests when they are past.

And then your notion that we're quite exiled
From social life amid these mountains wild,
Accords not with the fact—as you will see
On glancing o'er this district map with me,

—First, you observe, our own Glen-Lynden clan
(To whom I'm linked like a true Scottish man)
Are all around us. Past that dark ravine,—
Where on the left gigantic crags are seen,
And the steep Tarka mountains, stern and bare,
Close round the upland cleughs of lone Glen-Yair,—
Our Lothian Friends with their good Mother dwell,
Beside yon Kranz whose pictured records tell
Of Bushmen's huntings in the days of old,
Ere here Bezuidenhout had fixed his fold.
—Then up the widening vale extend your view,
Beyond the clump that skirts the Lion's Cleugh,
Past our old camp, the willow-trees among,
Where first these mountains heard our sabbath song;

And mark the Settlers' homes, as they appear
With cultured fields and orchard-gardens near,
And cattle-kraals, associate or single,
From fair Craig-Rennie up to Clifton-Pringle.

Then there is Captain Harding at Three-Fountains,
Near Cradock—forty miles across the mountains:
I like his shrewd remarks on things and men,
And canter o'er to dinner now and then.
—There's Landdrost Stockenstrom at Graaff-Reinét,
A man, I'm sure, you would not soon forget,
Who, though in this wild country born and bred,
Is able in affairs, in books well read,
And—What's more meritorious in the case—
A zealous friend to Afric's swarthy race.
We visit there; but, travelling in ox-wagon,
(And not, like you, drawn by a fiery dragon)
We take a month—eight days to go and come—
And spend three weeks or so with Stockenstrom.
—At Somerset, again, Hart, Devenish, Stretch,
And ladies—whose kind acts 'twere long to sketch;
The officers at Káha and Roodewál,
Bird, Sanders, Morgan, Rogers, Petingal;
All hold with us right friendly intercourse—
The nearest thirty miles—five hours with horse.
—Sometimes a pleasant guest, from parts remote,
Cheers for a passing night our rustic cot;
As, lately, the gay-humoured Captain Fox,
With whom I roamed 'mid Koonap's woods and rocks,
From Winterberg to Gola's savage grot,
Talking of Rogers, Campbell, Coleridge, Scott,
Of Fox and Mackintosh, Brougham, Canning, Grey;
And lighter themes and laughter cheered the way—
While the wild-elephants in groups stood still,
And wondered at us on their woody hill.

—Here too, sometimes, in more religious mood,
We welcome Smith or Brownlee, grave and good,
Or fervid Read,—to Natives, kneeling round,
Proclaiming the GREAT WORD of glorious sound:
Or, on some Christian mission bravely bent,
Comes Philip with his apostolic tent;
Ingenious Wright, or steadfast Rutherfoord;
With whose enlightened hopes our hearts accord.

And thus, you see, even in my desert-den,
I still hold intercourse with thinking men;
And find fit subjects to engage me too—
For in this wilderness there's work to do;
Some purpose to accomplish for the band
Who left with me their much loved Father-Land;
Something for the sad Natives of the soil,
By stern oppression doomed to scorn and toil;
Something for Africa to do or say—
If but one mite of Europe's debt to pay—
If but one bitter tear to wipe away.
Yes! here is work, my Friend, if I may ask
Of Heaven to share in such a hallowed task!

But these are topics for more serious talk,
So we'll reserve them for an evening walk.
Fill now a parting glass of generous wine—
The doch-an-dorris cup—for ‘Auld Lang Syne;’
For my good M—t summons us to tea,
In her green drawing-room—beneath the tree;—
And lo! Miss Brown has a whole cairn of stones
To pose us with—plants, shells, and fossil bones.

[Outside the Hut.]
F.
—'Tis almost sun-set. What a splendid sky!
And hark—the homeward cow-boy's echoing cry

Descending from the mountains. This fair clime
And scene recal the patriarchal time,
When Hebrew herdsmen fed their teeming flocks
By Arnon's meads and Kirjath-Arba's rocks;
And bashful maidens, as the twilight fell,
Bore home their brimming pitchers from the well.—
—But who are these upon the river's brink!

P.
—Ha! armèd Caffers with the shepherd Flink
In earnest talk ? Ay, now I mark their mien;
It is Powána from Zwort-Kei, I ween,
The Amatémbu Chief. He comes to pay
A friendly visit, promised many a day;
To view our settlement in Lynden-Glen,
And smoke the Pipe of Peace with Scottish men.
And his gay consort, Moya, too, attends,
To see ‘the World’ and ‘Amanglézi friends,’
Her fond heart fluttering high with anxious schemes
To gain the enchanting beads that haunt her dreams!

F.
—Yet let us not these simple folk despise;
Just such our sires appeared in Cæsar's eyes:
And, in the course of Heaven's evolving plan,
By truth made free, the long-scorned African,
His Maker's Image radiant in his face,
Among earth's noblest sons shall find his place.

P.
—[To Flink, the old Hottentot Shepherd, who comes forward.]
Well, Flink, what says the Chief?

Flink.
Powána wagh’
Tot dat de Baas hem binnenshuis zal vraagh.’

P.
— [To F.]
In boorish Dutch which means, ‘Powána waits
Till Master bid him welcome to our gates.’

[To Flink.]
—We haste to greet him. Let rush mats be spread
On th' cabin-floor. Prepare the Stranger's bed
In the spare hut,—fresh-strewed with fragrant hay.
Let a fat sheep be slaughtered. And, I pray,
Good Flink, for the attendants all provide;
These men dealt well with us at Zwart-Kei side:
Besides, you know, 'tis the Great Guide's command
Kindly to treat the Stranger in our Land.

[Exeunt.]

L'ENVOI.

Fairbairn, adieu! I close my idle strain,
And doff wild Fancy's Wishing Cap again,
Whose witchery, o'er ocean's wide expanse,
Triumphant over adverse Circumstance,
From Tyne's far banks has conjured you away,
To spend with me this summer holiday;
Half-realising, as I weave these rhymes,
Our kind companionship in other times,
When, round by Arthur's Seat and Blackford Hill,
Fair Hawthornden and homely Hyvotmill,
(With a dear Friend, too early from us torn!)
We roamed untired to eve from early morn.

Those vernal days are gone: and stormy gales
Since then on Life's rough Sea have tossed our sails
Far diverse,—led by Fortune's changeful Star,
From quietude and competence afar.
Yet, Comrade dear! while memory shall last,
Let our leal hearts, aye faithful to the Past,
In frequent interchange of written thought,
Which half the ills of absence sets at nought,
Keep bright the links of Friendship's golden chain,
By living o'er departed days again;
Or meet in Fancy's bower, for ever green,
Though ‘half the convex globe intrudes between.’

Glen-Lynden, 1822.

Quaigh (Scotch), a small drinking cup, usually of wood or horn.

Hic nemus: hic ipso tecum consumerer ævo.

See Vignette.

AN EMIGRANT'S SONG.

Oh, Maid of the Tweed, wilt thou travel with me,
To the wilds of South-Africa, far o'er the sea,
Where the blue mountains tow'r in the beautiful clime,
Hung round with huge forests all hoary with time?
I'll build thee a cabin beside the clear fount,
Where it leaps into light from the heart of the mount,
Ere yet its fresh footsteps have found the fair meads
Where among the tall lilies the antelope feeds.

Our home, like a bee-hive, shall stand by the wood
Where the lory and turtle-dove nurse their young brood,
And the golden-plumed paroquet waves his bright wings
From the bough where the green-monkey gambols and swings:
With the high rocks behind us, the valley before,
The hills on each side with our flocks speckled o'er,
And the far-sweeping river oft glancing between,
With the heifers reclined on its margins of green.

There, rich in the wealth which a bountiful soil
Pours forth to repay the glad husbandman's toil;
Content with the Present, at peace with the Past,
No cloud on the Future our joys to o'ercast;
Like our brave Scottish sires in the blithe Olden Day,
The heart will keep young though the temples wax grey;
While love's Olive Plants round our table shall rise—
Engrafted with Hopes that bear fruit in the Skies.

MAKANNA'S GATHERING.

Wake! Amakósa, wake!
And arm yourselves for war.
As coming winds the forest shake,
I hear a sound from far:
It is not thunder in the sky,
Nor lion's roar upon the hill,
But the voice of Him who sits on high,
And bids me speak his will!

He bids me call you forth,
Bold sons of Káhabee,
To sweep the White Men from the earth,
And drive them to the sea:
The sea, which heaved them up at first,
For Amakósa's curse and bane,
Howls for the progeny she nurst,
To swallow them again.

Hark! 'tis Uhlanga's voice
From Debè's mountain caves!
He calls you now to make your choice—
To conquer or be slaves:
To meet proud Amanglézi's guns,
And fight like warriors nobly born:
Or, like Umláo's feeble sons,
Become the freeman's scorn.

Then come, ye Chieftains bold,
With war-plumes waving high;
Come, every warrior young and old,
With club and assagai.
Remember how the spoiler's host
Did through our land like locusts range!
Your herds, your wives, your comrades lost—
Remember—and revenge!

Fling your broad shields away—
Bootless against such foes;
But hand to hand we'll fight to-day,
And with their bayonets close.
Grasp each man short his stabbing spear—
And, when to battle's edge we come,
Rush on their ranks in full career,
And to their hearts strike home!

Wake! Amakósa, wake!
And muster for the war:
The wizard-wolves from Keisi's brake,
The vultures from afar,
Are gathering at Uhlanga's call,
And follow fast our westward way—
For well they know, ere evening-fall,
They shall have glorious prey!

THE INCANTATION.

Half-way up Indóda climbing,
Hangs the wizard-forest old,
From whose shade is heard the chiming
Of a streamlet clear and cold:
With a mournful sound it gushes
From its cavern in the steep;
Then at once its wailing hushes
In a lakelet dark and deep.

Standing by the dark blue water,
Robed in panther's speckled hide,
Who is she? Jalúhsa's daughter,
Bold Makanna's widowed bride.
Stern she stands, her left hand clasping
By the arm her wondering child:
He, her shaggy mantle grasping,
Gazes up with aspect wild.

Thrice in the soft fount of nursing
With sharp steel she pierced a vein,—
Thrice the White Oppressor cursing,
While the blood gushed forth amain,—
Wide upon the dark-blue water,
Sprinkling thrice the crimson tide,—
Spoke Jalúhsa's high-souled daughter,
Bold Makanna's widowed bride.

“Thus into the Demon's River
Blood instead of milk I fling:
Hear, Uhlanga—great Life-Giver!
Hear, Togúgh—Avenging King!
Thus the Mother's feelings tender
In my breast I stifle now:
Thus I summon you to render
Vengeance for the Widow's vow!

“Who shall be the Chief's Avenger?
Who the Champion of the Land?
Boy! the pale Son of the Stranger
Is devoted to thy hand.
He who wields the bolt of thunder
Witnesses thy Mother's vow!
He who rends the rocks asunder
To the task shall train thee now!

“When thy arm grows strong for battle,
Thou shalt sound Makanna's cry,
Till ten thousand shields shall rattle
To war-club and assagai:
Then, when like hail-storm in harvest
On the foe sweeps thy career,
Shall Uhlanga whom thou servest,
Make them stubble to thy spear!”

THE CAFFER COMMANDO.

Hark!—heard ye the signals of triumph afar?
'Tis our Caffer Commando returning from war:
The voice of their laughter comes loud on the wind,
Nor heed they the curses that follow behind.
For who cares for him, the poor Kosa, that wails
Where the smoke rises dim from yon desolate vales—
That wails for his little ones killed in the fray,
And his herds by the Colonist carried away?
Or who cares for him that once pastured this spot,
Where his tribe is extinct and their story forgot?
As many another, ere twenty years pass,
Will only be known by their bones in the grass!
And the sons of the Keisi, the Kei, the Gareep,
With the Gunja and Ghona in silence shall sleep:
For England hath spoken in her tyrannous mood,
And the edict is writing in African blood!

Dark Katta is howling: the eager jackall,
As the lengthening shadows more drearily fall,
Shrieks forth his hymn to the hornèd moon!
And the lord of the desert will follow him soon:
And the tiger-wolf laughs in his bone-strewed brake,
As he calls on his mate and her cubs to awake;
And the panther and leopard come leaping along;
All hymning to Hecate a festival song:
For the tumult is over, the slaughter hath ceased—
And the vulture hath bidden them all to the feast!

A NOON-DAY DREAM.

'Twas noon-tide; and breathless beneath the hot ray
The far-winding vales of the wilderness lay:
By the Koonap's lone brink, with the cool shadow o'er me,
I slept—and a Dream spread its visions before me.

Methought, among scenes which I loved when a boy
I was walking again with fresh feelings of joy;
For my soul, like the landscape, seemed softened and changed
To what it was once—when in childhood I ranged
Through Cheviot's valleys, to pluck the bright flowers,
Or chase with young rapture the birds through the bowers.
—On my dreaming ear waters were murmuring still,
But the wild foreign river had shrunk to a rill,
And Káha's dark mountains had melted away;
And the brown thorny desert, where antelopes stray,
Had become a sweet Glen, where the young lambs were racing,
And yellow-haired children the butterflies chasing;
And the meadows were gemmed with the primrose and gowan,
And the ferny braes fringed with the hazel and rowan;
The foxglove looked out from the osiers dank,
And the wild-thyme and violet breathed from the bank.
—And green fairy nooks 'mid the landscape were seen,
Half hid by the grey rocks that high o'er them lean,
Where the light birch, above its loose tresses was waving;
And the willow, below, in the blue stream was laving
Its silvery garlands of soft downy buds;
And the throstle sang blithe to his mate in the woods;
And the brood of the wild-duck plashed over the pool,
New-fledged from their nest among well-cresses cool.

—And trouts from the limpid stream lightly were springing,
And larks in the fleckered sky cheerily singing;
And down in the copsewood the cushat was cooing;
And o'er the brown moorland the huntsman hallooing;
The grey-plaided shepherd piped high on the fell;
And the milk-maiden sang as she sat by the well:
With the lowing of herds from the broom-blossomed lea;
The cuckoo's soft note from the old beechen-tree;
The waving of woods in the health-breathing gale;
The dash of the mill-wheel afar down the dale.
—All these were around me:—and with them there came
Sweet voices that called me aloud by my name,—
And looks of affection from innocent eyes,—
And light-hearted laughter,—and shrill joyous cries:
And I saw the mild features of all that were there,
Unaltered by years, and unclouded by care!

Then it seemed as that Scene slowly melted away,
Like the bright cloud of morn in a midsummer's day;
And I lost the blithe sounds of the Pastoral Glen,
'Mid the rattle of wheels and loud murmurs of men.
—I stood on a mount, and saw, towering around,
A City with ramparts and palaces crowned;
Where poets and sages were passing along,
And statesmen and heroes—a glorious throng!
I heard from on high the loud heralds proclaim
With silver-toned voice each illustrious name;
I marked from afar their mild dignified mien,
And their aspect, benevolent, simple, serene;
And lingered, in heart-greeting silence to gaze
On the faces of some I had loved in their lays.
—But suddenly out-burst a boisterous crowd
Of maskers and rhapsodists, railing aloud,
And scattering brands in their frantic mirth,
As if lewd love of mischief had called them forth:

And the burthen and boast of their scurrilous song
Was to scoff at the Right and applaud the Wrong.
—I looked on the scene till my heart grew sad—
Then turned me away from the uproar mad!

The visionary Pageant again seemed to change,
And a land lay before me of aspect strange—
Where the tumult of voices disturbed me no more,
But I heard the hoarse surf dashing wild on the shore,
As bewildered I stood. Yet I was not alone;
For still amid crowds my dream passed on:
'Mid crowds—but silent, and sad as death;
For it seemed as if each man held his breath,
And cowered with his body, in abject fear,
Like a caitiff beneath the proud conqueror's spear.
—Then I turned, and lifted my wondering eye,
And beheld a grim Spectre enthroned on high,
And his name it was written—Tyranny!
—I gazed, and beheld how his scourge-bearing hand
Was high outstretched o'er the shuddering land;
And his eyes, that like those of the basilisk shone,
Blasted whatever they glared upon.
—Yet crowds of votaries, kneeling around,
Were worshipping him with a whispering sound;
And, ever and anon, his priests on high
Hymned forth his praises to the sky.
—Full many a race lay mingled there:
Swart Afric's tribes with their woolly hair,
The enslaved Madagass, the dejected Malay,
And degenerate Belgian baser than they,
Prone and promiscuous round him lay.
As I drew more near 'mid the suppliant train,
My heart swelled high with grief and pain,
Proud England's children there to view,
Commingled with that crouching crew;

And I marvelled much that no manly hand
Was raised to redeem the desolate land;
For I saw that the Monster's enchanted mould,
Though braced with iron and bound with gold,
Was formed but of vile and crumbling dust,
Unfit to withstand the Avenger's thrust.
—While thus I was musing, a crashing stroke,
As when the red lightning shivers the rock,
Fell! ..... And I started and awoke!

Awaking, I heard but the wild river sounding;
I gazed, but saw only the klip-springer bounding,
And the eagle of Winterberg high o'er the woods,
Sailing supreme 'mid his solitudes.

River Koonap, 1825.

THE BROWN HUNTER'S SONG.

Under the Dídima lies a green dell,
Where fresh from the forest the blue waters swell;
And fast by that brook stands a yellow-wood tree,
Which shelters the spot that is dearest to me.

Down by the streamlet my heifers are grazing;
In the pool of the guanas the herd-boy is gazing;
Under the shade my Amána is singing—
The shade of the tree where her cradle is swinging.

When I come from the upland as daylight is fading,
Though spent with the chase, and the game for my lading,
My nerves are new-strung, and my fond heart is swelling,
As I gaze from the cliff on our wood-circled dwelling.

Down the steep mountain, and through the brown forest,
I haste like a hart when his thirst is the sorest;
I bound o'er the swift brook that skirts the savannah,
And clasp my first-born in the arms of Amána.

THE EXILE'S LAMENT.

A SONG.

[_]

Air—“The Banks o' Cayle.”

By the lone Mankazána's margin grey
A Scottish Maiden sung;
And mournfully poured her melting lay
In Teviot's Border tongue:

O, bonny grows the broom on Blaiklaw knowes,
And the birk in Clifton dale;
And green are the hills o' the milk-white ewes,
By the briary banks o' Cayle.

Here bright are the skies—and these valleys of bloom
May enchant the traveller's eye;
But all seems drest in death-like gloom
To the exile—who comes to die!

O, bonny grows the broom, &c.

Far round and round spreads the howling waste,
Where the wild beast roams at will;
And yawning cleughs, by woods embraced,
Where the savage lurks to kill!

O, bonny grows the broom, &c.

Full oft over Cheviot's uplands green
My dreaming fancy strays;
But I wake to weep 'mid the desolate scene
That scowls on my aching gaze!

O, bonny grows the broom, &c.

Oh, light, light is poverty's lowliest state,
On Scotland's peaceful strand,
Compared with the heart-sick exile's fate,
In this wild and weary land!

O, bonny grows the broom, &c.

THE CAPTIVE OF CAMALÚ.

O Camalú—green Camalú!
'Twas there I fed my father's flock,
Beside the mount where cedars threw
At dawn their shadows from the rock;
There tended I my father's flock
Along the grassy-margined rills,
Or chased the bounding bontèbok
With hound and spear among the hills.

Green Camalú! methinks I view
The lilies in thy meadows growing;
I see thy waters bright and blue
Beneath the pale-leaved willows flowing;
I hear, along the valleys lowing,
The heifers wending to the fold,
And jocund herd-boys loudly blowing
The horn—to mimic hunters bold.

Methinks I see the umkóba-tree
That shades the village-chieftain's cot;
The evening smoke curls lovingly
Above that calm and pleasant spot.
My father?—Ha!—I had forgot—
The old man rests in slumber deep:
My mother?—Ay! she answers not—
Her heart is hushed in dreamless sleep.

My brothers too—green Camalú,
Repose they by thy quiet tide?
Ay! there they sleep—where White Men slew
And left them—lying side by side.
No pity had those men of pride,
They fired the huts above the dying!—
—White bones bestrew that valley wide—
I wish that mine were with them lying!

I envy you by Camalú,
Ye wild harts on the woody hills;
Though tigers there their prey pursue,
And vultures slake in blood their bills.
The heart may strive with Nature's ills,
To Nature's common doom resigned:
Death the frail body only kills—
But Thraldom brutifies the mind.

Oh, wretched fate!—heart-desolate,
A captive in the spoiler's hand,
To serve the tyrant whom I hate—
To crouch beneath his proud command—
Upon my flesh to bear his brand—
His blows, his bitter scorn to bide!—
Would God, I in my native land
Had with my slaughtered brothers died!

Ye mountains blue of Camalú,
Where once I fed my father's flock,
Though desolation dwells with you,
And Amakósa's heart is broke,
Yet, spite of chains these limbs that mock,
My homeless heart to you doth fly,—
As flies the wild-dove to the rock,
To hide its wounded breast—and die!

Yet, ere my spirit wings its flight
Unto Death's silent shadowy clime,
Utíko! Lord of life and light,
Who, high above the clouds of Time,
Calm sittest where yon hosts sublime
Of stars wheel round thy bright abode,
Oh, let my cry unto Thee climb,
Of every race the Father-God!

I ask not Judgments from thy hand—
Destroying hail, or parching drought,
Or locust-swarms to waste the land—
Or pestilence, by famine brought;
I say the prayer Jankanna taught,
Who wept for Amakósa's wrongs—
‘Thy Kingdom come—thy Will be wrought—
For unto Thee all Power belongs.’

Thy Kingdom come! Let Light and Grace
Throughout all lands in triumph go;
Till pride and strife to love give place,
And blood and tears forget to flow;
Till Europe mourn for Afric's woe,
And o'er the deep her arms extend
To lift her where she lieth low—
And prove indeed her Christian Friend!

THE DESOLATE VALLEY.

Far up among the forest-belted mountains,
Where Winterberg, stern giant old and grey,
Looks down the subject dells, whose gleaming fountains
To wizard Kat their virgin tribute pay,
A valley opens to the noontide ray,
With green savannahs shelving to the brim
Of the swift River, sweeping on his way
To where Umtóka hies to meet with him,
Like a blue serpent gliding through the acacias dim.

Round this secluded region circling rise
A billowy waste of mountains, wild and wide;
Upon whose grassy slopes the pilgrim spies
The gnu and quagga, by the greenwood side,
Tossing their shaggy manes in tameless pride;
Or troop of elands near some sedgy fount;
Or kùdù fawns, that from the thicket glide
To seek their dam upon the misty mount;
With harts, gazelles, and roes, more than the eye may count.

And as we journeyed up the pathless glen,
Flanked by romantic hills on either hand,
The boschbok oft would bound away—and then
Beside the willows, backward gazing, stand.
And where old forests darken all the land,
From rocky Katberg to the river's brink,
The buffalo would start upon the strand,
Where, 'mid palmetto flags, he stooped to drink,
And, crashing through the brakes, to the deep jungle shrink.

Then, couched at night in hunter's wattled shieling,
How wildly beautiful it was to hear
The elephant his shrill réveillé pealing,
Like some far signal-trumpet on the ear!
While the broad midnight moon was shining clear,
How fearful to look forth upon the woods,
And see those stately forest-kings appear,
Emerging from their shadowy solitudes—
As if that trump had woke Earth's old gigantic broods!

Such the majestic, melancholy scene
Which 'midst that mountain-wilderness we found;
With scarce a trace to tell where man had been,
Save the old Caffer cabins crumbling round.
Yet this lone glen (Sicána's ancient ground),
To Nature's savage tribes abandoned long,
Had heard, erewhile, the Gospel's joyful sound,
And low of herds mixed with the Sabbath song.
But all is silent now. The Oppressor's hand was strong.

Now the blithe loxia hangs her pensile nest
From the wild-olive, bending o'er the rock,
Beneath whose shadow, in grave mantle drest,
The Christian Pastor taught his swarthy flock.
A roofless ruin, scathed by flame and smoke,
Tells where the decent Mission-chapel stood;
While the baboon with jabbering cry doth mock
The pilgrim, pausing in his pensive mood
To ask—‘Why is it thus? Shall Evil baffle Good?’

Yes—for a season Satan may prevail,
And hold, as if secure, his dark domain;
The prayers of righteous men may seem to fail,
And Heaven's Glad Tidings be proclaimed in vain.

But wait in faith: ere long shall spring again
The seed that seemed to perish in the ground;
And, fertilised by Zion's latter rain,
The long-parched land shall laugh, with harvests crowned,
And through those silent wastes Jehovah's praise resound.

Look round that Vale: behold the unburied bones
Of Ghona's children withering in the blast:
The sobbing wind, that through the forest moans,
Whispers—‘The spirit hath for ever passed!’
Thus, in the Vale of Desolation vast,
In moral death dark Afric's myriads lie;
But the Appointed Day shall dawn at last,
When, breathed on by a Spirit from on High,
The dry bones shall awake, and shout—‘Our God is nigh!’

THE GHONA WIDOW'S LULLABY.

Utíko umkúla gozizulína;
Yebínza inquínquis Nosilimélè.
Umzi wakonána subiziélè,
Umkokéli úa sikokéli tina:
Uénza infáma zenza ga bómi.
Sicána's Hymn.

The storm hath ceased: yet still I hear
The distant thunder sounding,
And from the mountains, far and near,
The headlong torrents bounding.
The jackal shrieks upon the rocks;
The tiger-wolf is howling;
The panther round the folded flocks
With stifled gurr is prowling.

But lay thee down in peace, my child;
God watcheth o'er us midst the wild.

I fear the Bushman is abroad—
He loves the midnight thunder;
The sheeted lightning shows the road,
That leads his feet to plunder:
I'd rather meet the hooded-snake
Than hear his rattling quiver,
When, like an adder, through the brake,
He glides along the river.
But, darling, hush thy heart to sleep—
The Lord our Shepherd watch doth keep.

The Kosa from Luhéri high
Looks down upon our dwelling;
And shakes the vengeful assagai,—
Unto his clansman telling
How he, for us, by grievous wrong,
Hath lost these fertile valleys;
And boasts that now his hand is strong
To pay the debt of malice.
But sleep, my child; a Mightier Arm
Shall shield thee (helpless one!) from harm.

The moon is up; a fleecy cloud
O'er heaven's blue deeps is sailing;
The stream, that lately raved so loud,
Makes now a gentle wailing.
From yonder crags, lit by the moon,
I hear a wild voice crying:
'Tis but the harmless bear-baboon,
Unto his mates replying.
Hush—hush thy dreams, my moaning dove,
And slumber in the arms of love!

The wolf, scared by the watch-dog's bay,
Is to the woods returning;
By his rock-fortress, far away,
The Bushman's fire is burning.
And hark! Sicána's midnight hymn,
Along the valley swelling,
Calls us to stretch the wearied limb,
While kinsmen guard our dwelling:
Though vainly watchmen wake from sleep,
‘Unless the Lord the city keep.’

At dawn, we'll seek, with songs of praise,
Our food on the savannah,
As Israel sought, in ancient days,
The heaven-descended manna;
With gladness from the fertile land
The veld-kost we will gather,
A harvest planted by the hand
Of the Almighty Father—
From thraldom who redeems our race,
To plant them in their ancient place.

Then, let us calmly rest, my child;
Jehovah's arm is round us,
The God, the Father reconciled,
In heathen gloom who found us;
Who to this heart, by sorrow broke,
His wondrous WORD revealing,
Led me, a lost sheep, to the flock,
And to the Fount of Healing.
Oh may the Saviour-Shepherd lead
My darling where his lambs do feed!

THE ROCK OF RECONCILEMENT.

A rugged mountain, round whose summit proud
The eagle sailed, or heaved the thunder cloud,
Poured from its cloven breast a gurgling brook,
Which down the grassy glades its journey took;
Oft bending round to lave, with rambling tide,
The groves of evergreens on either side.
Fast by this stream, where yet its course was young,
And, stooping from the heights, the forest flung
A grateful shadow o'er the narrow dell,
Appeared the Missionary's hermit cell.
Woven of wattled boughs, and thatched with leaves,
The sweet wild jasmine clustering to its eaves,
It stood, with its small casement gleaming through
Between two ancient cedars. Round it grew
Clumps of acacias and young orange bowers,
Pomegranate hedges, gay with scarlet flowers,
And pale-stemmed fig-trees with their fruit yet green,
And apple blossoms waving light between.
All musical it seemed with humming bees;
And bright-plumed sugar-birds among the trees
Fluttered like living blossoms.

In the shade
Of a grey rock, that midst the leafy glade
Stood like a giant sentinel, we found
The habitant of this fair spot of ground—
A plain tall Scottish man, of thoughtful mien;
Grave, but not gloomy. By his side was seen
An ancient Chief of Amakósa's race,
With javelin armed for conflict or the chase;

And, seated at their feet upon the sod,
A Youth was reading from the Word of God,
Of Him who came for sinful men to die,
Of every race and tongue beneath the sky.

Unnoticed, towards them we softly stept.
Our Friend was wrapt in prayer; the Warrior wept,
Leaning upon his hand; the Youth read on.
And then we hailed the group: the Chieftain's Son,
Training to be his country's Christian guide—
And Brownlee and old Tshâtshu side by side.

THE FORESTER OF THE NEUTRAL GROUND.

A SOUTH-AFRICAN BORDER-BALLAD.

We met in the midst of the Neutral Ground,
'Mong the hills where the buffalo's haunts are found;
And we joined in the chase of the noble game,
Nor asked each other of nation or name.

The buffalo bull wheeled suddenly round,
When first from my rifle he felt a wound;
And, before I could gain the Umtóka's bank,
His horns were tearing my courser's flank.

That instant a ball whizzed past my ear,
Which smote the beast in his fierce career;
And the turf was drenched with his purple gore,
As he fell at my feet with a bellowing roar.

The Stranger came galloping up to my side,
And greeted me with a bold huntsman's pride:
Full blithely we feasted beneath a tree;—
Then out spoke the Forester, Arend Plessie.

“Stranger! we now are true comrades sworn;
Come pledge me thy hand while we quaff the horn;
Thou'rt an Englishman good, and thy heart is free,
And 'tis therefore I'll tell my story to thee.

“A Heemraad of Camdebóo was my Sire;
He had flocks and herds to his heart's desire,
And bondmen and maidens to run at his call,
And seven stout sons to be heirs of all.

“When we had grown up to man's estate,
Our Father bade each of us choose a mate,
Of Fatherland blood, from the black taint free,
As became a Dutch burgher's proud degree.

“My Brothers they rode to the Bovenland,
And each came with a fair bride back in his hand;
But I brought the handsomest bride of them all—
Brown Dinah, the bondmaid who sat in our hall.

“My Father's displeasure was stern and still;
My Brothers' flamed forth like a fire on the hill;
And they said that my spirit was mean and base,
To lower myself to the servile race.

“I bade them rejoice in their herds and flocks,
And their pale-faced spouses with flaxen locks;
While I claimed for my share, as the youngest son,
Brown Dinah alone with my horse and gun.

“My Father looked black as a thunder-cloud,
My Brothers reviled me and railed aloud,
And their young wives laughed with disdainful pride,
While Dinah in terror clung close to my side.

“Her ebon eyelashes were moistened with tears,
As she shrunk abashed from their venomous jeers;
But I bade her look up like a Burgher's wife—
Next day to be mine, if God granted life.

“At dawn brother Roelof came galloping home
From the pastures—his courser all covered with foam;
‘Tis the Bushmen!’ he shouted; ‘haste, friends, to the spoor!
Bold Arend! come help with your long-barrelled roer.’

“Far o'er Bruintjes hoogtè we followed—in vain:
At length surly Roelof cried, ‘Slacken your rein;
We have quite lost the track.’—Hans replied with a smile.
—Then my dark-boding spirit suspected their guile.

“I flew to our Father's. Brown Dinah was sold!
And they laughed at my rage as they counted the gold.
But I leaped on my horse, with my gun in my hand,
And sought my lost love in the far Bovenland.

“I found her; I bore her from Gauritz' fair glen,
Through lone Zitzikamma, by forest and fen.
To these mountains at last like wild pigeons we flew,
Far, far from the cold hearts of proud Camdebóo.

“I've reared our rude shieling by Gola's green wood,
Where the chase of the deer yields me pastime and food:
With my Dinah and children I dwell here alone,
Without other comrades—and wishing for none.

“I fear not the Bushman from Winterberg's fell,
Nor dread I the Caffer from Kat-River's dell;
By justice and kindness I've conquered them both,
And the Sons of the Desert have pledged me their troth.

“I fear not the leopard that lurks in the wood,
The lion I dread not, though raging for blood;
My hand it is steady—my aim it is sure—
And the boldest must bend to my long-barrelled roer.

“The elephant's buff-coat my bullet can pierce;
And the giant rhinoceros, headlong and fierce,
Gnu, eland, and buffalo furnish my board,
When I feast my allies like an African lord.

“And thus from my kindred and colour exiled,
I live like old Ismael, Lord of the Wild—
And follow the chase with my hounds and my gun;
Nor ever repent the bold course I have run.

“But sometimes there sinks on my spirit a dread
Of what may befal when the turf's on my head;
I fear for poor Dinah—for brown Rodomond
And dimple-faced Karel, the sons of the bond.

“Then tell me, dear Stranger, from England the free,
What good tidings bring'st thou for Arend Plessie?
Shall the Edict of Mercy be sent forth at last,
To break the harsh fetters of Colour and Caste?”

THE SLAVE DEALER.

From ocean's wave a Wanderer came,
With visage tanned and dun:
His Mother, when he told his name,
Scarce knew her long-lost son;
So altered was his face and frame
By the ill course he had run.

There was hot fever in his blood,
And dark thoughts in his brain;
And oh! to turn his heart to good
That Mother strove in vain,
For fierce and fearful was his mood,
Racked by remorse and pain.

And if, at times, a gleam more mild
Would o'er his features stray,
When knelt the Widow near her Child,
And he tried with her to pray,
It lasted not—for visions wild
Still scared good thoughts away.

“There's blood upon my hands!” he said,
“Which water cannot wash;
It was not shed where warriors bled—
It dropped from the gory lash,
As I whirled it o'er and o'er my head,
And with each stroke left a gash.

“With every stroke I left a gash,
While Negro blood sprang high;
And now all ocean cannot wash
My soul from murder's dye;
Nor e'en thy prayer, dear Mother, quash
That Woman's wild death-cry!

“Her cry is ever in my ear,
And it will not let me pray;
Her look I see—her voice I hear—
As when in death she lay,
And said, ‘With me thou must appear
On God's great Judgment-day!’”

“Now, Christ from frenzy keep my son!”
The woeful Widow cried;
“Such murder foul thou ne'er hast done—
Some fiend thy soul belied!”—
“—Nay, Mother! the Avenging One
Was witness when she died!

“The writhing wretch with furious heel
I crushed—no mortal nigh;
But that same hour her dread appeal
Was registered on high;
And now with God I have to deal,
And dare not meet His eye!”

THE TORNADO.

Dost thou love to list the rushing
Of the Tempest in its might?
Dost thou joy to see the gushing
Of the Torrent at its height?
Hasten forth while lurid gloaming
Waneth into wilder night,
O'er the troubled ocean, foaming
With a strange phosphoric light.

Lo, the sea-fowl, loudly screaming,
Seeks the shelter of the land;
And a signal-light is gleaming
Where yon Vessel nears the strand:
Just at sun-set she was lying
All-becalmed upon the main;
Now with sails in tatters flying,
She to seaward beats—in vain!

Hark! the long-unopened fountains
Of the clouds have burst at last:
And the echoes of the mountains
Lift their wailing voices fast:
Now a thousand rills are pouring
Their far-sounding waterfalls;
And the wrathful stream is roaring
High above its rocky walls.

Now the forest-trees are shaking,
Like bulrushes in the gale;
And the folded flocks are quaking
'Neath the pelting of the hail.

From the jungle-cumbered river
Comes a growl along the ground;
And the cattle start and shiver,
For they know full well the sound.

'Tis the lion, gaunt with hunger,
Glaring down the darkening glen;
But a fiercer Power and stronger
Drives him back into his den:
For the fiend Tornado rideth
Forth with Fear, his maniac bride,
Who by shipwrecked shores abideth,
With the she-wolf by her side.

Heard ye not the Demon flapping
His exulting wings aloud?
And his Mate her mad hands clapping
From yon scowling thunder-cloud?
By the fire-flaucht's gleamy flashing
The doomed Vessel ye may spy,
With the billows o'er her dashing—
Hark (Oh God!) that fearful cry!

Twice two hundred human voices
In that shriek came on the blast!
Ha! the Tempest-Fiend rejoices—
For all earthly aid is past!
White as smoke the surf is showering
O'er the cliffs that seaward frown,
While the greedy gulf, devouring,
Like a dragon sucks them down!

Zitzikamma, 1825.

PARAPHRASE OF THE TWENTY-THIRD PSALM.

The Lord himself my steps doth guide;
I feel no want, I fear no foe:
Along the verdant valley's side,
Where cool the quiet waters flow,
Like as his flock a shepherd feedeth,
My soul in love Jehovah leadeth.

And when amid the stumbling mountains
Through frowardness I blindly stray,
Or wander near forbidden fountains
Where the Destroyer lurks for prey,
My wayward feet again he guideth
To paths where holy Peace resideth.

Though that dread Pass before me lies,
(First opened up by Sin and Wrath)
Where Death's black shadow shrouds the skies,
And sheds its horrors o'er the path,
Yet even there I'll fear no ill,
For my Redeemer guards me still.

Even He who walked by Abraham's side
My steps doth tend through weal and woe;
With rod and staff to guard and guide,
And comfort me where'er I go;
And He his ransomed flock that keepeth,
Our Shepherd, slumbereth not nor sleepeth.

For me a banquet he doth spread
Of high desires and hallowed joys;
With blessings he anoints my head,
And fills a cup that never cloys;
And nothing more my soul doth lack,
Save gratitude to render back.

Oh! still may Goodness, Mercy, Truth,
Attend my steps from stage to stage,
As they have followed me from youth
Through life's long weary pilgrimage;
Till He who Israel led of old,
Shall guide me to his heavenly fold.

SONNETS.

I. THE HOTTENTOT.

Mild, melancholy, and sedate, he stands,
Tending another's flock upon the fields,
His fathers' once, where now the White Man builds
His home, and issues forth his proud commands.
His dark eye flashes not; his listless hands
Lean on the shepherd's staff; no more he wields
The Libyan bow—but to th' oppressor yields
Submissively his freedom and his lands.
Has he no courage? Once he had—but, lo!
Harsh Servitude hath worn him to the bone.
No enterprise? Alas! the brand, the blow,
Have humbled him to dust—even hope is gone!
“He's a base-hearted hound—not worth his food”—
His Master cries—“he has no gratitude!”

II. THE CAFFER.

Lo! where he crouches by the cleugh's dark side,
Eyeing the farmer's lowing herds afar;
Impatient watching till the Evening Star
Lead forth the Twilight dim, that he may glide
Like panther to the prey. With freeborn pride
He scorns the herdsman, nor regards the scar
Of recent wound—but burnishes for war
His assagai and targe of buffalo-hide.
He is a Robber?—True; it is a strife
Between the black-skinned bandit and the white.
A Savage?—Yes; though loth to aim at life,
Evil for evil fierce he doth requite.
A Heathen?—Teach him, then, thy better creed,
Christian! if thou deserv'st that name indeed.

III. THE BUSHMAN.

The Bushman sleeps within his black-browed den,
In the lone wilderness. Around him lie
His wife and little ones unfearingly—
For they are far away from ‘Christian Men.’
No herds, loud lowing, call him down the glen:
He fears no foe but famine; and may try
To wear away the hot noon slumberingly;
Then rise to search for roots—and dance again.
But he shall dance no more! His secret lair,
Surrounded, echoes to the thundering gun,
And the wild shriek of anguish and despair!
He dies—yet, ere life's ebbing sands are run,
Leaves to his sons a curse, should they be friends
With the proud ‘Christian-Men’—for they are fiends!

IV. SLAVERY.

Oh Slavery! thou art a bitter draught!
And twice accursèd is thy poisoned bowl,
Which taints with leprosy the White Man's soul,
Not less than his by whom its dregs are quaffed.
The Slave sinks down, o'ercome by cruel craft,
Like beast of burthen on the earth to roll.
The Master, though in luxury's lap he loll,
Feels the foul venom, like a rankling shaft,
Strike through his reins. As if a demon laughed,
He, laughing, treads his victim in the dust—
The victim of his avarice, rage, or lust,
But the poor Captive's moan the whirlwinds waft
To Heaven—not unavenged: the Oppressor quakes
With secret dread, and shares the hell he makes!

1823.

V. FRANSCHEHOEK.

To this far nook the Christian exiles fled,
Each fettering tie of earthly texture breaking;
Wealth, country, kindred, cheerfully forsaking,
For that good cause in which their fathers bled.
By Faith supported and by Freedom led,
A fruitful field amidst the desert making,
They dwelt secure when kings and priests were quaking,
And taught the waste to yield them wine and bread.
And is their worth forgot? their spirit gone?
Now, in the breach of wickedness forth-breaking,
At the lone watchman's warning call awaking,
To lift the faithful standard is there none?
Yes—still 'mong the dry bones there is a shaking,
And a faint glimmering still where former lustre shone.

VI. GENADENDAL.

In distant Europe oft I've longed to see
This quiet Vale of Grace; to list the sound
Of lulling brooks and moaning turtles round
The apostle Schmidt's old consecrated tree;
To hear the hymns of solemn melody
Rising from the sequestered burial ground;
To see the heathen taught, the lost sheep found,
The blind restored, the long-oppressed set free.
All this I've witnessed now—and pleasantly
Its memory shall in my heart remain;
But yet more close familiar ties there be
That bind me to this spot with grateful chain—
For it hath been a Sabbath Home to me,
Through lingering months of solitude and pain.

November, 1824.

VII. ENON.

By Heaven directed, by the World reviled,
Amidst the Wilderness they sought a home,
Where beasts of prey and men of murder roam,
And untamed Nature holds her revels wild.
There, on their pious toils their Master smiled,
And prospered them, beyond the thoughts of men,
Till in the satyr's haunt and dragon's den
A garden bloomed, and savage hordes grew mild.
—So, in the guilty heart when Heavenly Grace
Enters, it ceaseth not till it uproot
All Evil Passions from each hidden cell;
Planting again an Eden in their place,
Which yields to men and angels pleasant fruit;
And God himself delighteth there to dwell.

April, 1821.

VIII. THE GOOD MISSIONARY.

He left his Christian friends and native strand,
By pity for benighted men constrained:
His heart was fraught with charity unfeigned;
His life was strict, his manners meek and bland.
Long dwelt he lonely in a heathen land,
In want and weariness—yet ne'er complained;
But laboured that the lost sheep might be gained,
Nor seeking recompense from human hand.
The credit of the arduous works he wrought
Was reaped by other men who came behind:
The world gave him no honour—none he sought,
But cherished Christ's example in his mind.
To one great aim his heart and hopes were given—
To serve his God and gather souls to Heaven.

Cafferland, 1825.

IX. TO THE REV. DR. PHILIP.

Thy heavenly Master's voice with reverent awe
Thou heard'st, as thus to thy stirred heart it spoke:
‘Go forth and gather yon poor scattered Flock
Within the free pale of the Gospel Law.
The trembling lamb pluck from the tiger's paw,
Nor fear his cruel fangs; for by the stroke
Of thy frail staff his cheek-bone shall be broke,
And many saved from the Devourer's jaw.’
Such the high task: and manfully and well
Thou for that peeled and scattered Flock hast striven;
And henceforth they in quietude shall dwell,
(Their ruthless spoilers fettered, or forth-driven,)
With nought to scare them, save the baffled yell
Of hungry wolves from whom the prey was riven.

1828.

X. A COMMON CHARACTER.

Not altogether wicked—but so weak,
That greater villains made of him their tool;
Not void of talent—yet so much a fool
As honour by dishonest means to seek:
Proud to the humble, to the haughty meek;
In flattery servile, insolent in rule:
Keen for his own—for others' interest cool;
Hate in his heart, and smiles upon his cheek.
This man, with abject meanness joined to pride,
Was yet a pleasant fellow in his day;
For all unseemly traits he well could hide,
Whene'er he mingled with the great and gay.
—But he is buried now—and, when he died,
No one seemed sorry that he was away!

Cape Town, 1825.

XI. THE NAMELESS STREAM.

I found a Nameless Stream among the hills,
And traced its course through many a changeful scene;
Now gliding free through grassy uplands green,
And stately forests, fed by limpid rills;
Now dashing through dark grottos, where distils
The poison dew; then issuing all serene
'Mong flowery meads, where snow-white lilies screen
The wild-swan's whiter breast. At length it fills
Its deepening channels; flowing calmly on
To join the Ocean on his billowy beach.
—But that bright bourne its current ne'er shall reach:
It meets the thirsty Desert—and is gone
To waste oblivion! Let its story teach
The fate of one—who sinks, like it, unknown.

Glen-Lynden, 1825.

XII. MY COUNTRY.

My Country! when I think of all I've lost,
In leaving thee to seek a foreign home,
I find more cause the farther that I roam
To mourn the hour I left thy favoured coast;
For each high privilege which is the boast
And birth-right of thy sons, by patriots gained,
Dishonoured dies where Right and Truth are chained,
And caitiffs rule—by sordid lusts engrossed.
I may, perhaps, (each generous purpose crossed,)
Forget the higher aims for which I've strained,
Calmly resign the hopes I prized the most,
And learn cold cautions I have long disdained;
But my heart must be calmer—colder yet—
Ere thee, my Native Land! I can forget.

1825.

XIII. THE CAPE OF STORMS.

O Cape of Storms! although thy front be dark,
And bleak thy naked cliffs and cheerless vales,
And perilous thy fierce and faithless gales
To stanchest mariner and stoutest bark;
And though along thy coasts with grief I mark
The servile and the slave, and him who wails
An exile's lot—and blush to hear thy tales
Of sin and sorrow and oppression stark:—
Yet, spite of physical and moral ill,
And after all I've seen and suffered here,
There are strong links that bind me to thee still,
And render even thy rocks and deserts dear;
Here dwell kind hearts which time nor place can chill—
Loved Kindred and congenial Friends sincere.

1825.

XIV. TO OPPRESSION.

Oppression! I have seen thee, face to face,
And met thy cruel eye and cloudy brow:
But thy soul-withering glance I fear not now;
For dread to prouder feelings doth give place
Of deep abhorrence. Scorning the disgrace
Of slavish knees that near thy footstool bow,
I also kneel—but with far other Vow
Do hail thee and thy herd of hirelings base.
I swear, while life-blood warms my throbbing veins,
Still to oppose and thwart with heart and hand
Thy brutalising sway—till Afric's chains
Are burst, and Freedom rules the rescued land,—
Trampling Oppression and his iron rod.
—Such is the Vow I take—So help me God!

1825.

[_]

THE EMIGRANTS. [I propose, if I can find time, to complete my original design with regard to the fragment entitled “Glen-Lynden,” namely, to make it the first part of a Poem to be entitled The Emigrants, and which will comprise two, or perhaps three, parts of similar length. This, with my juvenile and miscellaneous Poetry, might make a moderate-sized Volume. My African Poetry to make another Volume by itself.]

INTRODUCTORY STANZAS.

Sweet Teviot, fare thee well! Less gentle themes
Far distant call me from thy pastoral dale,
To climes where Amakosa's woods and streams
Invite, in the fair South, my venturous sail.
There roaming sad the solitary vale,
From native haunts and early friends exiled,
I tune no more the string for Scottish tale;
For to my aching heart, in accents wild,
Appeals the bitter cry of Afric's race reviled.

From Keissi's meads, from Chumi's hoary woods,
Bleak Tarka's dens, and Stormberg's rugged fells,
To where Gareep pours down his sounding floods
Through regions where the hunted Bushman dwells,
That bitter cry wide o'er the desert swells,
And, like a spirit's voice, demands the song
That of these savage haunts the story tells—
A tale of foul oppression, fraud, and wrong,
By Afric's sons endured from Christian Europe long.

Adieu, ye lays to youthful fancy dear!
Let darker scenes a sterner verse inspire,
While I attune to strains that tyrants fear
The deeper murmurs of the British lyre,—
And from a holier altar ask the fire
To point the indignant line with heavenly light,
(Though soon again in darkness to expire,)
That it oppression's cruel pride may blight,
By flashing Truth's full blaze on deeds long hid in night!

100

THE EMIGRANTS.

Sweet Teviot! by adventurous Leyden sung,
And famed by mighty Scott in deathless lays,
I may not hope, with far less gifted tongue,
Aught higher to advance thy classic praise;
Yet, as a son his pious tribute pays
To the loved mother he has left behind,
I fain some grateful monument would raise,
Which in far foreign lands may call to mind
The scenes that Scottish hearts to their dear country bind.

And, though the last and lowliest of the train
By haunted Teviot smit with love of song,
(Sweet witchery that charms full many a pain!)
I join with venturous voice the minstrel throng:
For Nature is the nurse to whom belong
Alike the thrush that cheers the broomy dale,
And the proud swan that, on bold pinions strong,
Through the far tracts of ether dares to sail,
And pours 'mid scenes sublime his soul-subduing wail.

101

No perilous theme I meditate: To me
To soar 'mid clouds and storms hath not been given;
Or through the gates of Dread and Mystery
To gaze—like those dark spirits who have striven
To rend the veil that severs Earth from Heaven:
For I have loved with simple hearts to dwell,
That ne'er to Doubt's forbidden springs were driven,
But lived sequestered in life's lowly dell,
And drank the untroubled stream from Inspiration's well.

Such were thy virtuous sons, fair Teviotdale,
While old simplicity was yet in prime;
But now among thy glens the faithful fail,
Forgetful of our sires in olden time:
That grey-haired race is gone—of look sublime,
Calm in demeanour, courteous, and sincere;
Yet stern, when duty called them, as their clime
When it flings off the autumnal foliage sere,
And shakes the shuddering woods with solemn voice severe.

And such were they whose tale I now rehearse—
But not to fashion's minions, who in vain
Would ask amusement from the artless verse
Of one who sings to soothe long hours of pain:
A nameless exile o'er the southern main,
I pour 'mid savage wilds my pensive song;
And if some gentle spirits love the strain,
Enough for me, though midst the louder throng
Few may be found to prize, or listen to it long.

A rustic home in Lynden's pastoral dell
With modest pride a verdant hillock crowned;
Where the bold stream, like dragon from the fell,
Came glittering forth, and, gently gliding round

102

The broom-clad skirts of that fair spot of ground
Danced down the vale, in wanton mazes bending;
Till finding where it reached the meadow's bound,
Romantic Teviot on his bright course wending,
It joined the sounding streams—with his blue waters blending.

Behind, a lofty wood along the steep
Fenced from the chill north-east this quiet glen;
And green hills, gaily sprinkled o'er with sheep,
Spread to the south; while by the bughting-pen
Rose the blithe sound of flocks and hounds and men,
At summer dawn and gloaming; or the voice
Of children nutting in the hazelly den,
Sweet mingling with the wind's and water's noise,
Attuned the softened heart with nature to rejoice.

Upon the upland height a mouldering Tower,
By time and outrage marked with many a scar,
Told of past days of feudal pomp and power
When its proud chieftains ruled the dales afar.
But that was long gone by: and waste and war,
And civil strife more ruthless still than they,
Had quenched the lustre of Glen-Lynden's star—
Which glimmered now, with dim declining ray,
O'er this secluded spot,—sole remnant of their sway.

A grave mild husbandman was Lynden's lord,
Who, smiling o'er these wrecks of grandeur gone,
Had for the plough-share changed the warrior's sword
Which, like his sires, he erst had girded on.
And on his toils relenting Fortune shone,
And blessed his fruitful fields and fleecy store;
And she he loved in youth, and loved alone,
Was his: ah, what could wealth have added more,
Save pride and peevish cares which haunt the rich man's door?

103

Vain wealth or rank could ne'er have won such love
As that devoted bosom's—lofty, warm,—
Which, while it blooms below, puts forth above
Celestial shoots secure from earthly harm.
And now his pleasant home and pastoral farm
Are all the world to him: he feels no sting
Of restless passions; but, with grateful arm,
Clasps the twin cherubs round his neck that cling,
Breathing their innocent thoughts like violets in Spring.

Another prattler, too, lisps on his knee,
The orphan daughter of a hapless pair,
Who, voyaging upon the Indian sea,
Met the fierce typhon-blast—and perished there:
But she was left the rustic home to share
Of those who her young mother's friends had been;
And old affection thus enhanced the care
With which those faithful guardians loved to screen
This sweet forsaken flower, in their wild arbours green.

With their twin children dark-eyed Helen grew—
(Arthur and Anna were the kindred twain)—
And she, the engrafted germ, appeared to view
So like a younger sister, that 'twere pain
To think that group should ever part again:
They grew, like three fair roses on one stalk,
In budding beauty yet without a stain:
So the fond parents said in kindly talk,
Nor dreamt how frowning fate their blooming hopes would balk.

But dark calamity comes aye too soon—
And why anticipate its evil day?
Ah, rather let us now in lovely June
O'erlook these happy children at their play:

104

Lo, where they gambol through the garden gay,
Or round the hoary hawthorn dance and sing,
Or, 'neath yon moss-grown cliff, grotesque and grey,
Sit plaiting flowery wreathes in social ring,
And telling wondrous tales of the green Elfin King.

And Elfin lore and ancient Border song
The mother, smiling o'er the eager train,
Would often chant in winter evenings long—
And oft they pressed the pleasing task again:
But still she warned them that such tales were vain,
And but the dotage of a darker time;
And urged them better knowledge to attain
While yet their pliant minds were in their prime,
And open for the seed of scripture truth sublime.

Then would she tell—and in far other tone—
Of evil times gone by and evil men—
“When they who worshipped God must meet alone
At midnight, in the cleugh or quaking-fen,
In peril and alarm,—for round them then
Were ranging those who hunted for their blood:
Ay! long shall we remember!—In this glen,
From yon grim cavern where the screech-owls brood
Our ancestor was dragged, like outlaw from the wood!

“He died a victim; and his ancient lands,
Held by Glen-Lynden's lords since Bruce's day,
Have passed for ever to the spoiler's hands!”—
—“Hush thee!” the father then would gently say;
“'Twas Heaven's good pleasure we that debt should pay—
Perchance for guilt of those fierce feudal lords,
Who, void of pity, when they shared the prey,
Full often in the balance flung their swords,
And wasted orphans' lands with their marauding hordes.”

105

Such was their talk around the evening hearth:
And mildly thus, as the young playmates grew,
They taught them to join trembling with their mirth;
For life is but a pilgrim's passage through
A waste, where springs of joy are faint and few:
Yet, lest this thought their hearts too much o'ercast,
They oft would turn to lightsome themes anew:
For youth's hilarity we must not blast,
But lead it kindly on to wisdom's paths at last.

Fain would I linger 'mong those fairy bowers,
Aloof from manhood's feverish hopes and fears,
Where Innocence among the vernal flowers
Leads young Delight, aye laughing through his tears;
But lo! the cruel spectre Time appears,
Half hid amidst the foliage bright with bloom,
Weaving his ceaseless web of hours and years,
Still onward dyed with deeper hues of gloom—
And Death behind stands darkly—pointing to the tomb!

Ay! Time's harsh hand for youth nor age will stay—
And I must hasten with my lagging strain.
Years steal on years: the locks are wearing grey
On either parent's brow: the youthful train
Have long outgrown their childish pastimes vain:
On Arthur's manly features we may trace
High thought and feeling, checked by anxious pain;
And, in each timid maiden's milder face,
Some shade of pensive care with woman's opening grace.

So young—so innocent—can grief's dark cloud
Thus early o'er their hearts its shadow fling?
Affliction's angel, though he crush the proud,
Might pass the humble with relenting wing!

106

Yet death has not been here; nor hath the sting
Of baleful passion touched one gentle breast:
Whence then can venomed care and sorrow spring,
In this calm seat of love and pious rest?
And the dear parent twain—why look they so distressed?

Ah! evil days have fallen upon the land:
A storm that brooded long has burst at last;
And friends, like forest trees that closely stand,
With roots and branches interwoven fast,
May aid awhile each other in the blast;
But as when giant pines at length give way
The groves below must share the ruin vast,
So men, who seemed aloof from Fortune's sway,
Fall crushed beneath the shock of loftier than they.

Even so it fared. And dark round Lynden grew
Misfortune's troubles; and foreboding fears,
That rose like distant shadows, nearer drew,
O'ercasting the calm evening of his years:
Yet still amidst the gloom fair Hope appears,
A rainbow in the cloud. And, for a space,
Till the horizon closes round, or clears,
Returns our tale the enchanted paths to trace
Where Youth's fond visions rise with fair but fleeting grace.

Far up the dale, where Lynden's ruined towers
O'erlooked the valley from the old oak wood,
A lake, blue-gleaming from deep forest bowers,
Spread its fair mirror to the landscape rude:
Oft by the margin of that quiet flood,
And through the groves and hoary ruins round,
Young Arthur loved to roam in lonely mood;
Or, here, amid tradition's haunted ground,
Long silent hours to lie in mystic musings drowned.

107

Bold feats of war, fierce feuds of elder times,
And wilder Elfin legends,—half forgot,
And half preserved in uncouth ballad rhymes,—
Had peopled with romantic tales the spot:
And, here, save bleat of sheep, or simple note
Of shepherd's pipe far on the upland lone,
Or linnet in the bush and lark afloat
Blithe carolling, or stock-dove's plaintive moan,
No sound of living thing through the long day was known.

No sound—save, aye, one small brook's tinkling dash
Down the grey mossy cliffs; and, midst the lake,
The quick trout springing oft with gamesome plash;
And wild ducks rustling in the sedgy brake;
And sighing winds that scarce the willows shake;
And hum of bees among the blossomed thyme;
And pittering song of grasshoppers—that make
Throughout the glowing meads their mirthful chime;
All rich and soothing sounds of summer's fragrant prime.

Here, by the fairy brooklet's sylvan side,
Young Arthur, deep-entranced in poets' dream,
His bosom's bashful ecstacy to hide
Would fling him by the hazel-margined stream,
Giving free fancy rein,—till twilight's gleam
Died in the rosy west; the summer-day
All, all too brief for the enthusiast theme,
Though voice nor verse gave utterance to the lay
That from the up-gushing fount of rapture welled away.

Not sounding verse, but sweet and silent tears,
Poured forth unbidden far from mortal eye,
Formed the pure offering of the blissful years
When first he woed the enchantress, Poesy

108

And found for glowing thought expression high
In moaning forest and deep-murmuring flood,
In every gorgeous cloud that streaked the sky,
In every beauteous hue that tinged the wood,
In each expressive change of Nature's fitful mood.

Thus passed his lonely hours the dreaming boy,
Erewhile, romantic reveries to frame;
Or read adventurous tales with thrilling joy,
Till his young breast throbbed high with thirst of fame;
But with fair manhood's dawn Love's tender flame
'Gan mingle with his minstrel musings high;
And trembling wishes,—which he feared to name,
Yet oft betrayed in many a half-drawn sigh,—
Told that the hidden shaft deep in his heart did lie.

And there were eyes that from long silken lashes
With stolen glance could spy his secret pain,—
Soft hazel eyes, whose dewy light out-flashes
Like joyous day-spring after summer rain:
And she, sweet Helen, loved the youth again
With maiden's first affection, fond and true.
—Ah! youthful love is like the tranquil main,
Heaving 'neath smiling skies its bosom blue—
Beautiful as a spirit—calm but fearful too!

And forth they wander, that fair girl and boy,
To roam in gladness through the summer bowers;
Of love they talk not, but love's tender joy
Breathes from their hearts like fragrance from the flowers:
Elysium opens round them; and the hours
Glide on unheeded, till grey Twilight's shade
Wraps in its wizard shroud the ivied towers,
And fills with mystic shapes the forest glade—
And wakes “thick-coming fancies” in strange guise arrayed.

109

And oft they linger those lone haunts among,
Though darker fall the shadows of the wood,
And the witch-owl invokes with fitful song
The phantom train of Superstition's brood.
A gentle Star lights up their solitude,
And lends fair hues to all created things;
And dreams alone of beings pure and good
Hover around their hearts with angel wings—
Hearts, like sweet fountains sealed, where silent rapture springs.

I may not here their growing passion paint,
Or their day-dreams of cloudless bliss disclose:
I may not tell how hope deferred grew faint,
When griefs and troubles in far vista rose:
As the woods tremble ere the tempest blows,
How quaked their hearts (misled by treacherous fears)
When that fell nightmare of the soul's repose,
Green Jealousy his snaky crest uprears,
Whose breath of mildew blights the cherished faith of years.

'Tis Autumn's pensive noon: no zephyr's breath
The withered foliage in the woods is shaking;
Their feeble song the mournful birds bequeath
To the sere coverts they are fast forsaking.
And now their last farewell that pair are taking;
For Arthur, bound to Indian climes, must leave
These early haunts. Each silent heart is breaking—
Yet both attempt to hide how much they grieve—
And each, deceived in turn, the other doth deceive!

How can they part?—The lake, the woods, the hills,
Speak to their pensive hearts of early days;

110

Remembrance wooes them from the haunted rills,
And hallows every spot their eye surveys;
Some sweet memorial of their infant plays,
Some tender token of their bashful loves,
Each rock, and tree, and sheltered nook displays:
How can they part?—Nature the crime reproves,
And their commingling souls to milder purpose moves!

For what were life—ah, what were weary life,
Without each other, in this world of care?
A voyage through wild seas of storm and strife,
Without an aim for which to struggle there.
But, blessed in wedded hopes, how sweet to share
The gladness or the grief that life may bring!
Then join, relenting Love! this gentle pair;
Let worldly hearts to gold and grandeur cling;
Around the lowly cot thy turtles sweetest sing.

Yes! they shall part no more! Those downcast eyes,
And blushes mantling o'er the changeful cheek—
The plighted kiss—the tears—the trembling sighs—
The head upon his arm declining meek—
Tell, far more tenderly than words can speak,
How that devoted heart is all his own!
Oh, Love is eloquent!—but language weak
To paint the feelings to chaste bosoms known,
When Transport's heavenly wings are sweetly round them thrown!

And now the lake, the hills, the yellow woods,
Are bathed in beauty by the parting ray:
Through earth and air a hallowed rapture broods,
And starting tears confess its mystic sway:
As home they wend, amidst the year's decay,

111

Some magic spell the hues of Eden throws
O'er every scene that, on their outward way,
Told but of pleasures past and coming woes;
Such the enchanted radiance heartfelt bliss bestows.

Oh Nature! by impassioned hearts alone
Thy genuine charms are felt. The vulgar mind
Sees but the shadow of a Power Unknown:
Thy loftier beauties beam not to the blind
And sensual throng, to grovelling hopes resigned:
But they whom high and holy thoughts inspire,
Adore thee, in celestial glory shrined
In that diviner fane where Love's pure fire
Burns bright, and Genius tunes his rapt immortal lyre!

Change we once more the strain. The sire has told
The heart-struck group of dark disaster nigh:
Their old paternal home must now be sold,
And that last relic of their ancestry
Resigned to strangers. Long and strenuously
He strove to stem the flood's o'erwhelming mass;
But still some fresh unseen calamity
Burst like a foaming billow—till, alas!
No hope remains that this their sorest grief may pass.

“Yet be not thus dismayed. Our altered lot
He that ordains will brace us to endure.
This changeful world affords no sheltered spot,
Where man may count his frail possessions sure:
Our better birthright, noble, precious, pure,
May well console for earthly treasures marred,—
Treasures, alas! how vain and insecure,
Where none from rust and robbery can guard:
The wise man looks to heaven alone for his reward.”

112

The Christian father thus. But whither now
Shall the bewildered band their course direct?
What home shall shield that matron's honoured brow,
And those dear pensive maids from wrong protect?
Or cheer them 'mid the world's unkind neglect?
That world to the unfortunate so cold,
While lavish of its smiles and fair respect
Unto the proud, the prosperous, the bold;
Still shunning want and woe; still courting pomp and gold.

Shall they adopt the poor retainer's trade,
And sue for pity from the great and proud?
No! never shall ungenerous souls upbraid
Their conduct in adversity—which bowed
But not debased them. Or, amidst the crowd,
In noisome towns shall they themselves immure,
Their wants, their woes, their weary days to shroud
In some mean melancholy nook obscure?
No! worthier tasks await, and brighter scenes allure.

A land of climate fair and fertile soil,
Teeming with milk and wine and waving corn,
Invites from far the venturous Briton's toil:
And thousands, long by fruitless cares foreworn,
Are now across the wide Atlantic borne,
To seek new homes on Afric's southern strand:
Better to launch with them than sink forlorn
To vile dependence in our native land;
Better to fall in God's than man's unfeeling hand!

With hearts resigned they tranquilly prepare
To share the fortunes of that exile train.
And soon with many a follower, forth they fare—
High hope and courage in their hearts again:
And now, afloat upon the dark-blue main,

113

They gaze upon the fast-receding shore
With tearful eyes—while thus the ballad strain,
Half heard amidst the ocean's weltering roar,
Bids farewell to the scenes they ne'er shall visit more:—

“Our native Land—our native Vale—
A long and last adieu!
Farewell to bonny Lynden-dale,
And Cheviot-mountains blue!

“Farewell, ye hills of glorious deeds,
And streams renowned in song;
Farewell, ye blithesome braes and meads
Our hearts have loved so long.

“Farewell, ye broomy elfin knowes,
Where thyme and harebells grow;
Farewell, ye hoary haunted howes,
O'erhung with birk and sloe.

“The battle-mound, the Border-tower,
That Scotia's annals tell;
The martyr's grave, the lover's bower—
To each—to all—farewell!

“Home of our hearts! our fathers' home!
Land of the brave and free!
The keel is flashing through the foam
That bears us far from thee:

“We seek a wild and distant shore
Beyond the Atlantic main;
We leave thee to return no more,
Nor view thy cliffs again:

114

“But may dishonour blight our fame,
And quench our household fires,
When we, or ours, forget thy name,
Green Island of our Sires!

“Our native Land—our native Vale—
A long, a last adieu!
Farewell to bonny Lynden-dale,
And Scotland's mountains blue.”

115

EPHEMERIDES.

I. PART I. JUVENILE POEMS.

116

VOUCHSAFE IN WORTH THIS SMALL GUIFT TO RECEAUE, WHICH IN YOUR HANDS AS LOWLYE PLEDGE I LEAUE OF PURPOSED THEME, IN SCOTIA'S PASTORAL GUISE; IF SO THE MUSE SHALL E'ER THE DREAMES FULFILL WITH WHICH SHE ERST HATH CHARMD MY TRANCED EYES: NOT THAT MY LINES MAY FOR SUCH THEMES SUFFICE; FOR THEREUNTO DOTH NEED A GOLDEN QUILL, AND SILUER LEAUES, THEM RIGHTLY TO DEUISE; BUT TO MAKE HUMBLE PRESENT OF GOOD WILL; WHICH, WHEN AS TIMELY MEANES IT PURCHASE MAY, IN AMPLER WISE ITSELFE WILL FORTH DISPLAY.

[_]

(Altered from Spenser.)

Edinburgh, January 5th, 1819.

117

THE AUTUMNAL EXCURSION.

(A POETICAL EPISTLE TO A FRIEND.)

Hic inter flumina nota
Et fontes sacros------

Dear Story, while the southern breeze
Floats, fragrant, from the upland leas,
Whispering of Autumn's mellow spoils,
And jovial sports and grateful toils,—
Awakening in the softened breast
Regrets and wishes long supprest,—
O, come with me once more to hail
The scented heath, the sheafy vale,
The hills and streams of Teviotdale.
—'Tis but a parting pilgrimage,
To save, from Time's destroying rage,
And changeful Fortune's withering blast,
The pictured relics of the Past.

Then come, dear Comrade!—welcome still
In every change of good or ill;
Whom young affection's wishes claim,
And friendship ever finds the same;
Awake, with all thy flow of mind,
With fancy bright and feelings kind,
And tune with me the rambling lay,
To cheer us on our mountain way.

118

Say, shall we wander where the swain,
Bent o'er his staff, surveys the plain,
With ruddy cheek and locks of grey,
Like patriarch of the olden day?—
Around him ply the reaper band,
With lightsome heart and eager hand:
And mirth and music cheer the toil;
While sheaves that stud the russet soil,
And sickles gleaming in the sun,
Tell, jocund Autumn is begun.

I love the blithesome harvest morn,
Where Ceres pours her plenteous horn:
The hind's hoarse cry from loaded car,
The voice of laughter from afar,
The placid master's sober joy,
The frolic of the thoughtless boy;
Cold is the heart when scenes like these
Have lost their genial power to please.
But yet, my friend, there is an hour
(Oft has thy bosom owned its power)
When the full heart, in pensive tone,
Sighs for a scene more wild and lone.
Oh then, more sweet on Scotland's shore
The beetling cliff, the breaker's roar,
The moorland waste, where all is still
Save wheeling plover's whistle shrill,—
More sweet the seat by ancient stone
Or tree with lichens overgrown,—
Than richest bower that Autumn yields
'Midst merry England's cultured fields.

Then, let our pilgrim footsteps seek
Old Cheviot's pathless mossy peak;

119

For there the Mountain Spirit still
Lingers around the lonely hill,
To guard his wizard grottoes hoar
Where Cimbrian sages dwelt of yore;
Or, shrouded in his robes of mist,
Ascends the mountain's shaggy breast,
To seize his fearful seat—upon
The elf-enchanted Hanging Stone,

The Hanging-Stone is a crag on the northern brow of Cheviot, impending over a rocky chasm called Hell's Hole, with which some ancient, but indistinct, popular traditions are associated.

And count the kindred streams that stray
Through the broad regions of his sway:—
Fair sister streams, that wend afar
By rushy mead or rocky scaur,
Now hidden by the clustering brake,
Now lost amid the mountain lake,
Now clasping, with protective sweep,
Some mouldering castle's moated steep;
Till issuing from the uplands brown,
Fair rolls each flood by tower and town;
The hills recede, and on the sight
Swell the bold rivers broad and bright.

The eye—the fancy almost fails
To trace them through their thousand vales,
Winding these Border hills among,
(The boast of chivalry and song,)
From Bowmont's banks of softest green

Beaumont or Bowmont Water is a sequestered pastoral stream in the south-eastern extremity of Roxburghshire, which, after crossing the English border, joins the river Till near Flodden Field.

The friend to whom the “Autumnal Excursion” is addressed, (that poem being originally designed as a mere rhyming epistle, without any view to publication,) is a native of the Vale of Beaumont. The author and he were born in adjoining parishes, amid the secluded glens of Cheviot, and were inscparable associates in early youth; and, though our pursuits in maturer life have been widely different, it is not the less pleasing to look back over a twenty years' friendship, which no selfish jealousy has ever disturbed, or coldness interrupted, or even long separation impaired. My old companion and valued friend will, I trust, excuse this slight expression of affectionate remembrance, and forgive me for adding that the R--- S--- of my little poem, though not the Poet Laureate of England, (as the Quarterly Review once supposed,) is a person who fears God, and loves mankind not less sincerely—namely, the Rev. Robert Story, minister of Roseneath.

To the rude verge of dark Lochskene.

Lochskene is a wild mountain lake at the head of Moffat Water, on the borders of Dumfriesshire.

—'Tis a heart-stirring sight to view,
Far to the westward stretching blue,
That frontier ridge, which erst defied
The invader's march, or quelled his pride;
The bloody field, for many an age,
Of rival nations' wasteful rage;
In later times a refuge given
To outlaws in the cause of Heaven.

The persccuted covenanters, when outlawed and hunted down in the evil times of Charles II. and James II., often found a temporary refuge among the secluded moorland recesses of the Border mountains.

120

Far inland, where the mountain crest
O'erlooks the waters of the west,
And 'mid the moorland wilderness,
Dark moss-cleughs form a drear recess,
Curtained with ceaseless mists, which feed
The sources of the Clyde and Tweed;
There, injured Scotland's patriot band
For Faith and Freedom made their stand;
When traitor Kings, who basely sold
Their country's fame for Gallic gold,—
Too abject o'er the free to reign,—
Warned by a Father's fate in vain,—
In bigot frenzy trampled down
The race to whom they owed their crown.—
There, worthy of his masters, came
The despots' champion, Bloody Graham,

The celebrated James Graham, of Claverhouse, afterwards created Viscount Dundee, was a man of eminent talent and audacious enterprise; and these qualities have procured him, even in our own times, zealous eulogists, or at least very partial apologists.

To stain for aye a warrior's sword,
And lead a fierce though fawning horde,
The human bloodhounds of the earth
To hunt the peasant from his hearth!
—Tyrants! could not misfortune teach
That man had rights beyond your reach!
Thought ye the torture and the stake
Could that intrepid spirit break,
Which even in woman's breast withstood
The terrors of the fire and flood!—

Ay!—though the sceptic's tongue deride
Those martyrs who for conscience died;
Though modish history blight their fame,
And sneering courtiers hoot the name
Of men who dared alone be free
Amidst a nation's slavery;
Yet long for them the poet's lyre
Shall breathe its notes of heavenly fire;

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Their names shall nerve the patriot's hand
Uprear'd to save a sinking land;
And piety shall learn to burn
With holier transport o'er their urn!—

But now, all sterner thoughts forgot,
Peace broods upon the peasant's cot;
And if tradition still prolongs
The memory of his father's wrongs,
'Tis blent with grateful thoughts that borrow
A blessing from departed sorrow.

How lovely seems the simple vale
Where lives our sires' heroic tale!
Where each wild pass and wandering flood
Was hallowed by the patriot's blood;
And the cold cavern once his tent,
Is now his deathless monument,—
Rehearsing, to the kindling thought,
What faith inspired and valour wrought!
—Oh, ne'er shall he whose ardent prime
Was fostered in the freeman's clime,
Though doomed to seek a distant strand,
Forget his glorious native land—
Forget these storied hills and streams,
Scenes of his youth's enthusiast dreams!
Sequestered haunts—so still—so fair—
That Holy Faith might worship there,
And Error weep away her stains,
And dark Remorse forget his pains;
And Homeless hearts, by fortune tost
Or early hopeless passion crost,
Regain the peace they long had lost!

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Then, let us roam that lovely land,
By Teviot's lone, historic strand
By sylvan Yair, by Ettrick's glens,
By haunted Yarrow's ‘dowie dens;’
Till, with far-circling steps we hail
Thy native Bowmont's broomy dale,
And reach my boyhood's birchen bowers
'Mong Cayle's fair cottages and towers.

The Cayla, or Cale-Water, is one of the many subsidiary branches of the river Teviot. Arising in the midst of the Cheviot mountains, it waters a pleasant pastoral valley, remote from all resorts of commerce or provincial bustle. Its name is conjectured by Chalmers, the author of Caledonia, to have been derived from the woody coverts which in ancient times covered its banks. Celli, in the British language, signifying a grove; and Coille, in the Gaelic, a wood.

Sweet Cayle! like voice of years gone by,
I hear thy mountain melody;
It comes with long-forgotten dreams
Once cherished by thy pastoral streams;
And sings of school-boy rambles free,
And heart-felt young hilarity!
I see the mouldering turrets hoar
Dim gleaming on thy woodland shore,
Where oft, afar from vulgar eye,
I loved at summer tide to lie;
Abandoned to the witching sway
Of some old bard's heroic lay;
Or poring o'er the immortal story
Of Roman and of Grecian glory.
But aye one minstrel charmed me more
Than all I learned of classic lore,
Or war and beauty gaily blent
In pomp of knightly tournament,—
Even he, in rustic verse, who told
Of Scotland's champion—Wallace bold—

The old Scottish minstrel, commonly called Blind Harry.

Of Scotland's ancient “luve and lee,”
And Southrons' cruel treachery!
—And oft I conned that Harper's page
With old hereditary rage,
Till I have wept, in bitter mood,
That now no more, in English blood,

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My country's falchion might atone
The warrior's fall and widow's moan!
—Or 'neath the oak's broad-bending shade,
With half-shut eye-lids musing laid,
(Weaving in fancy's tissue strange
The shapeless visions of revenge!)
I conjured back the past again—
The marshalled bands; the battle plain;
The Border slogan's pealing shout;
The shock, the tumult, and the rout;
Victorious Scotland's bugle blast;
And charging knights that hurry past;
Till down the dim-withdrawing vale
I seemed to see their glancing mail,
And hear the fleet barb's furious tramp
Re-echoed from yon ancient camp.

But chief, when summer Twilight mild
Drew her dim curtain o'er the wild,
I loved beside that ruin grey
To watch the dying gleam of day.
And though, perchance, with secret dread,
I heard the bat flit round my head,
While winds that waved the long lank grass
With sound unearthly seemed to pass,
Yet with a pleasing horror fell
Upon my heart the thrilling spell;
For all that met the ear or eye
Breathed such serene tranquillity,
I deemed nought evil might intrude
Within the saintly solitude.
—Still vivid memory can recall
The figure of each shattered wall;
The aged trees, all hoar with moss,
Low-bending o'er the circling fosse;

124

The rushing of the mountain flood;
The ring-doves cooing in the wood;
The rooks that o'er the turrets sail;
The lonely curlew's distant wail;
The flocks that high on Hounam rest;
The glories of the glowing west.

And, tinged with that departing sun,
To Fancy's eye arises dun
Lone Blaiklaw, on whose trenchèd brow,
Yet unprofaned by ruthless plough,
The shaggy gorse and brown heath wave
O'er many a nameless warrior's grave.
—Yon ridge, of yore, which wide and far
Gleam'd like the wakeful Eye of War,
And oft, with warning flame and smoke,
Ten thousand spears to battle woke,
Now down each subject glen descries
Blue wreaths from quiet hamlets rise,
To where, soft-fading on the eye,
Tweed's cultured banks in beauty lie,
Wide waving with a flood of grain,
From Eildon to the eastern main.
—Oft from yon height I loved to mark,
Soon as the morning roused the lark,
And woodlands raised their raptured hymn,
That land of glory spreading dim;
While slowly up the awakening dale
The mists withdrew their fleecy veil,
And tower, and wood, and winding stream,
Were brightening in the orient beam.
—Yet where the westward shadows fell,
My eye with fonder gaze would dwell;
Though wild the view, and brown and bare,—
Nor castled halls, nor hamlets fair,
Nor range of sheltering woods, were there—

125

Nor river's sweeping pride between,
To give expression to the scene.
There stood a simple home,—where swells
The meadow sward to moory fells,—
A rustic dwelling, thatched and warm,
Such as might suit the upland farm.
A honeysuckle clasped the sash,
Half shaded by the giant ash:
And there the wall-spread apple-tree
Gave its white blossoms to the bee,
Beside the hop-bower's twisted shade
Where age reclined and childhood played.
Below, the silvery willows shook
Their tresses o'er a rambling brook,
That gambolled 'mong its banks of broom,
Till lost in Lerdan's haunted gloom,
Methinks I hear that streamlet's din
Where straggling alders screen the linn,
Gurgling into its fairy pool,
With pebbled bottom clear and cool.
Full oft, in boyhood, from its marge
I loved to launch my mimic barge,
And laughed to see it deftly sail;
While faithful Chevy wagged his tail,
And, moved with sympathetic glee,
Would bounce and bark impatiently,
Until I bade him plunge and swim
To bring it dripping to the brim.

From Teviot's richer dales remote
The traveller's glance would scarcely note
That simple scene,—or there espy
Aught to detain his wandering eye:
But partial memory pictures still
Each bush and stone that specked the hill;

126

The braes with broom and copsewood green;
The rocky knolls that rose between;
The fern that fringed each fairy nook;
The mottled mead; the mazy brook,
That, underneath its ozier shade,
Still to the wild its music made.

Beside that brook, among the hay,
I see an elfin band at play;
Blithe swinging on the green-wood bough;
Or guiding mimic wain and plough:
Intent a summer booth to build;
Or tilling each his tiny field:
Or, proudly ranged in martial rank,
In rival bands upon the bank,
With rushy helm and sword of sedge,
A bloodless Border War to wage.

Anon, with lapse of circling years,
In other guisc that group appears,
As childhood's gamesome mood gives place
To manly thought and maiden grace.
Beneath yon rock with lichens hoar,
Of fabled Elves the haunt of yore,
They sit beside the Fairy's Spring.
I hear the low winds whispering
The mournful ballad's simple strain;
Or breathing flute awakes again
The echoes of each sylvan grot,
With many a sweetly-melting note.

Or, from the chambers of the north,
Comes Winter with his tempests forth;
Athwart the shivering glebe to fling
The blinding snow-drift from his wing;

127

Shrouding, with many a fleecy fold,
The bosky dell and battle wold;
While, banished from his half-ploughed field
The hind essays the flail to wield;
And o'er the hills, the perilous road
Alone by shepherd's foot is trod,
Who gathers on the furzy heath,
His flocks dug from the smothering wreath:—
Then, was it joy indeed to meet
With long-loved friends in that retreat;
And that bleak upland dell's recess
Could charm in winter's wildest dress:
Whether the mountain speat has drowned,
With mingling floods, the meadow ground,
And through their hundred sluices break
The headlong torrents to the Lake;
Or the choked streamlet's deafened flow
Is hushed in crystal caves below,
And down the cliffs the trickling rills
Congeal in columned icicles.

But when day's hasty steps retire,
Still sweeter by the blazing fire,
In that low parlour's narrow bound,
To draw the social circle round;
Where no unwelcome step intrudes,
To check the heart's unstudied moods.
—Round flows the rural jest; the tale
Of Cloister in fair Clifton dale;
Of Weeping Spirit of the Glen;

These lines refer to some of the popular superstitions and romantic legends of the Author's native district, the most interesting of which have been commemorated in Sir Walter Scott's Minstrelsy of the Border.—See Scott's Poetical Works (edition of 1833), vol. III. p. 236, and vol. I. p. 193.

Or Dragon of dark Wormeden;
Of Ladies doomed by Rome's command
To sift the Church-yard mound of sand,
By penance drear to wash away
Foul murder's dire anathema.

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—Or graver history's pregnant page,
Or traveller's venturous toils engage;
Or poet's lay the bosom warms,
With virtue's praise and nature's charms,
And faithful loves and feats of arms.

And 'midst that friendly circle now
I mark a Youth with open brow,
And thoughtful blue eyes beaming mild,
And temples wreathed with clusters wild
Of light brown hair. The pensive grace
Upon his features, seems the trace
Of thought more tender and refined
Than dawns upon the vulgar mind:
But oft across his blooming cheek
Flushes a quick and hectic streak,
Like that which, in an Indian sky,
Though cloudless, tells of danger nigh!
Deepening—until the gazer start,
As if he saw Fate's shadowy dart,
Foredoomed to strike from life and fame
The latest of a gentle name!

How fearful to affection's view
That blush more bright than beauty's hue—
Where, sad as cypress wreath, the rose
Amid Consumption's ruin glows,
Bedecking with deceitful bloom
The untimely passage to the tomb!

Rememberest thou, my Friend, the hour
When some strange sympathetic power
Once led from far our wandering feet
At that Monastic Mound to meet?

129

—Where slopes the green sward to the west,
We sat upon the tomb where rest
My kindred's bones,—conversing late
Of Man's mysterious mortal state.
'Twas summer eve, serene and still;
The broad moon rose behind the hill,
Blending her soft and soothing ray
With the last gleam of closing day:
Amid the circling woods alone
Was heard the stockdove's plaintive moan,
And streamlet's murmur gliding by;
All else was calm in earth and sky.
The scene was such as fancy paints
For visit of departed saints—
And sure if that sublime controul
Which thrills the deep chords of the soul—
If tears of joy 'midst grief—could prove
The ministry of sainted love—
Our hearts in that blest hour might dare
To own some heavenly presence there!

Yes still, dear Friend! (although it seem
To worldly minds a childish dream)
When life is o'er—I love to think
There still may last some mystic link
Between the Living and the Dead,—
Some beam from better regions shed
To lighten with celestial glow
The pilgrim's darkling path below:
Or, if 'tis but a vain belief,
Framed by the phantasies of grief,
A loftier solace is not vain—
Death parts us but to meet again!

Ah, while amid the world's wild strife
We yet may trace that sweeter life,

130

Now fading like a lovely dream,—
Why cannot Memory too redeem
The feelings pure, the thoughts sublime,
That sanctified our early prime?—
Alas! like hues of breaking day
The soul's young visions pass away;
And elder Fancy scarce may dare
To image aught again so fair—
As when that Mother's warblings wild
Had soothed to rest her sickly child,
And o'er my couch I dreamt there hung
Celestial forms, with seraph tongue
Who told of purer happier spheres,
Exempt from pain, unstained with tears!
Or, waking lone at midnight deep,
When heaven's bright host their vigils keep,
I viewed with meek mysterious dread
The moon-beam through the lattice shed—
Deeming 'twas God's eternal Eye,
Bent down to bless us from on high!

And when that gentlest human Friend
No more her anxious eye could bend
On one by young affliction prest
More close to her maternal breast,
I deemed she still beheld afar
My sorrows from some peaceful star,—
In slumber heard her faintly speak,
And felt her kiss upon my cheek.
And oft, when through the solemn wood
My steps the schoolway path pursued,
I paused beneath its quiet shade
To view the spot where she was laid,
And pray, like hers, my life might be
From all ungentle passions free,—

131

It seemed as if I inly felt
That still her presence round me dwelt,
And awed me with a holy dread,
Lest I should sin and grieve the dead.

O sainted Spirit!—(if thy care
An earthly wanderer yet may share!)
Still in celestial dreams return
To bid faith's failing embers burn—
While yet unquenched the smoking brand
By worldly passion's wasting hand!
Oh still,—although around my breast
The snaky coils of care are prest,—
Let fond remembrance oft restore
Each long-lost friend endeared of yore,
And picture o'er the scenes where first
My life and loveliest hopes were nurst;
The heaths which once my fathers trod,
Amidst the wild to worship God;
The tales which fired my boyish eye
With patriot feelings proud and high;
The sacred sabbath's mild repose;
The social evening's saintly close,
When ancient Zion's solemn song
Arose the lonely banks among;
The music of the mountain rills;
The moonlight sleeping on the hills;
The Starry Scriptures of the sky,
By God's own finger graved on high
On Heaven's expanded scroll—whose speech
To every tribe doth knowledge teach,
When silent Night unlocks the seals,
And to forgetful Man reveals
The wonders of eternal might
In living lines of glorious light!

132

Nor yet shall faithful memory fail
To trace the shepherd's homelier tale;

Old John Turnbull, the person alluded to—(for many years my father's shepherd, as his father had been shepherd to my grandfather)—was one of the worthiest, and, in his humble sphere, one of the most generous-hearted men, I ever knew. To the most reverential piety, he also united a rich vein of genuine humour and drollery, combined with a native delicacy of feeling, and regulated by a propriety of demeanour, that might do honour to any station. My old friend, however, was not without some of the hereditary prejudices of his rank and nation. One of his characteristic traits was, a determined detestation of the “Southron” of ancient times, and a sovercign contempt for those of the present; and he always spoke of the Parliamentary Union as the “ruination of Scotland.”

For well I loved each simple strain
Rehearsed by that kind-hearted swain,
Of sports where he a part had borne
In boyhood's blithe and cloudless morn;
Or pious words and spotless worth
Of friends who long have left the earth:
Or legends of the olden times,
And rural jests, and rustic rhymes:
While aye as he the story told
Of Scotland oft betrayed and sold,
With ancient grudge his wrath would glow
Against that “faithless Southron foe!”

Nor shall the enthusiast dreams decay
Which charmed the long and lonely day,
When, wrapt in chequered Border cloak,
On Blaiklaw's ridge I watched the flock,
(What time the harvest toils detain
The Shepherd with the reaper train:)
When, far remote, I loved to lie
And gaze upon the flecker'd sky,
Amid the mountain thyme's perfume,
Where boundless heaths of purple bloom,
Heard but the zephyr's rustling wing
And wild-bee's ceaseless murmuring,
—'Twas there, amid the moorlands wild,
A Fairy found the mountain child,
And oped to its enchanted eyes
Imagination's Paradise.

Even as I muse my bosom burns,
The Past unto my soul returns;

133

And lovely, in the hues of truth,
Return the Scenes, the Friends of Youth!
I see the dusky track afar,
Where, lighted by the evening star,
I sought that home of early love.
The balmy west-wind stirs the grove,
And waves the blossom'd eglantine
I taught around its porch to twine.
I hear kind voices on the breeze,
From the green bower of cherry-trees.
The sire—the kindred band I see—
They rise with smiles to welcome me!
—Again sweet Fancy's dream is gone,
And 'midst the wild I walk alone!

Now scattered far the smiling flowers
That grew around these rustic bowers:
Ungentle hearts, and strangers rude,
Have passed along its solitude!
The hearth is cold, the walls are bare,
That heard my grandsire's evening prayer—
Gone even the trees he planted there!
—Yet still, dear Friend, methinks 'twere sweet
To trace once more that loved retreat;
Still, there, where'er my footsteps roam,
‘My heart untravelled' finds a home:
For 'midst these Border Mountains blue,
And Vales receding from the view,
And lonely Lakes and misty Fells,
Some nameless charm for ever dwells,—
Some spirit that again can raise
The visions of Departed Days,
And thoughts unuttered—undefined—
That gleamed across my infant mind!

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—O, lovely was the blest controul
Which came like music o'er my soul,
While, there,—a rude untutored boy,
With heart tuned high to Nature's joy,—
Subdued by beauty's winning form,
Or kindling 'midst the mountain Storm,—
Alive to Feeling's gentle smart,
Which wakes but does not wound the heart,—
I dreamt not of the workings deep
Of wilder passions yet asleep!

Long from those native haunts estranged,
My home but not my heart is changed—
Amid the city's feverish stir
'Tis still a mountain-wanderer!

At the time these lines were written, in 1811, the Author entertained some thoughts of going abroad, perhaps permanently; but he had not the slightest anticipation of the circumstances which, eight years afterwards, induced him to emigrate with his relatives to South Africa, and so singularly realized the “bodings” he thus expressed.

And though (if bodings be not vain)
Far other roamings yet remain,
In climes where, 'mid the unwonted vales,
No early friend the wanderer hails,
Nor well-known hills arise to bless
His walks of pensive loneliness;
Yet still shall fancy haunt with you
The scenes beloved when life was new,
And oft with tender zeal return,
By yon deserted tomb to mourn;
For, oh, whate'er the lot may be
In Fate's dark book reserved for me,
I feel that nought in later life,—
In Fortune's change, or Passion's strife,
Or proud Ambition's boundless grasp,—
This bosom with a tie can clasp,
So strong—so sacred—as endears
The Scenes and Friends of Early Years!

Edinburgh: August, 1811.

135

STREAMS, WHOSE LONELY WATERS GLIDE.

Streams, whose lonely waters glide
Down Glen-Lynden's wizard dell,
Woods that clothe the mountain's side,
Winged wanderers of the fell,
Tell me in what flowery glade
Shall I find my favourite Maid!

Echo of the haunted rock,
Heard'st thou not my Azla's song?
Sought she not the plighted oak
Lynden's briary banks among?
Lingers she by airy steep,
Or elfin lakelet still and deep?

Rover of the land and sea,
Zephyr! whither dost thou fly!
Bear'st thou home the loaded bee?
Or the lover's secret sigh?
Hast thou not my Azla seen
Through all the mazes thou hast been?

Didst thou perfume, O gentle gale!
In Araby, thy fragrant breath?
In sweeter Teviot's thymy vale?
On Lynden's hills of blossom'd heath?
Or, Zephyr! hast thou dared to sip
The sigh of love from Azla's lip?

136

Young Azla's eye of tender blue
Outvies the crystal fountain bright,—
Her silken locks of sunny hue,
The birch-tree's foliage floating light;
And light her form as bounding fawn,
Just wakened by the vernal dawn.

Like youthful Spring's refreshing green,
Like dewy Morning's smile of gladness,
The radiance of her look serene
Might win to joy the soul of sadness,
But where in nature shall I find
An Image for my Azla's mind?

The azure depths of summer noon
Might paint her pure and happy breast:
Yet, like the melancholy moon,
She loveth pensive pleasures best,
And woos the fairy solitudes
Embosomed in the leafy woods.

The melodies of air and earth,
The hues of mountain, wood, and sky,
And Loneliness more sweet than Mirth,
That leads the mind to musings high,
Give to the sweet enthusiast's face
The charm of more than earthly grace!

But tell me now, ye Woods and Streams,
Fond Echo, and thou sighing Gale,
Why She, the Fairy of my dreams,
Thus in her plighted faith doth fail?
Of all of you I'll jealous be
Should she forget our Trysting Tree!

137

Ah no! She fails not! 'Mong these bowers
Young Love, I ween, delights to dwell,
And spends his most entrancèd hours
In Contemplation's hermit cell;
Where votaries of gentle mood
Find him with Truth and Solitude.

A GRACEFUL FORM, A GENTLE MIEN.

A graceful form, a gentle mien,
Sweet eyes of witching blue;
Dimples where young Love nestles in,
Around a ‘cherry mou:’

The temper kind, the taste refined,
A heart nor vain nor proud;
A face, the mirror of her mind,
Like sky without a cloud:

A fancy pure as virgin snows,
Yet playful as the wind;
A soul alive to others' woes,
But to her own resigned:

This gentle portraiture to frame
Required not Fancy's art:
But do not ask the lady's name—
'Tis hidden in my heart.

138

THE LEGEND OF THE ROSE.

Lady, one who loves thee well
Sent me here with thee to dwell;
I bring with me thy lover's sigh,
I come with thee to live and die;
To live with thee, beloved, carest—
To die upon that gentle breast!
—Sweeter than the myrtle wreath,
Of Love and Joy my blossoms breathe—
Love—whose name thy breast alarms,
Yet who heightens all thy charms,—
Who lends thy cheek its orient dyes,
Who triumphs in thy bashful eyes—
'Twas from him I borrowed, too,
My sweet perfume, my purple hue;
His fragrant breath my buds exhale;
My bloom—Ah, Lady! list my tale.—

I was the summer's fairest pride,
The Nightingale's betrothed Bride;
In Indian bower I sprung to birth
When Love first lighted on the earth,
And then my pure inodorous blossom
Blooming on its thornless tree,
Was snowy as his Mother's bosom
Rising from the emerald sea.

139

Young Love, rambling through the wood,
Found me in my solitude,
Bright with dew and freshly blown,
And trembling to fond Zephyr's sighs;
But, as he stopt to gaze upon
The living gem with longing eyes,
It chanced a Bee was busy there
Searching for its fragrant fare;
When Cupid stooping, too, to sip,
The angry insect stung his lip—
And, gushing from the ambrosial cell,
One bright drop on my bosom fell!

Weeping, to his Mother he
Told the tale of treachery;
And she, her vengeful boy to please,

Camdeo, the Hindoo Cupid, is represented as a beautiful youth, bearing a bow of sugar-cane, with a string of bees, and five arrows, each pointed with an Indian blossom of a pungent quality.

Strung his bow with captive bees;
But placed upon my guiltless stem
The poisoned stings she plucked from them—
And none, since that eventful morn,
Has found the flower without a thorn!

Yet even the sorrows Love doth send
But more divine enchantment lend:
Still in Beauty's sweetest bowers
Blooms the Rose, the Queen of Flowers,
Brightening with the sanguine stains,
Borrowed from celestial veins,—
And breathing of the kiss she caught
From Love's own lips with rapture fraught!

140

THE WREATH.

I sought the garden's gay parterre,
To cull a wreath for Mary's hair;
And thought I surely there might find
Some emblem of her lovely mind,
Where taste displays the varied bloom
Of Flora's beauteous drawing-room.

And, first, of peerless form and hue,
The stately Lily caught my view,
Fair bending from her graceful stem
Like queen with regal diadem:
But though I viewed her with delight,
She seemed too much to woo the sight,—
A fashionable belle—to shine
In some more courtly wreath than mine.

I turned, and saw a tempting row
Of flaunting Tulips full in blow—
But left them with their gaudy dyes
To Nature's beaux—the butterflies.

Bewilder'd 'mid a thousand hues,
Still harder grew the task to choose:
Here, delicate Carnations bent
Their heads in lovely languishment,—
Much as a pensive Miss expresses,
With neck declined, her soft distresses!
There, gay Jonquilles in foppish pride
Stood by the Painted-Lady's side,

141

And Hollyhocks superbly tall
Beside the Crown-Imperial:
But still, 'mid all this gorgeous glow,
Seemed less of sweetness than of show,
While close beside in warning grew
The allegoric Thyme and Rue.

There, too, stood that fair-weather flower,
Which, faithful still in sunshine hour,
With fervent adoration turns
Its breast where golden Phœbus burns—
Base symbol (which I scorned to lift)
Of friends that change as fortunes shift!

Tired of the search, I bent my way
Where Teviot's haunted waters stray;
And from the wild-flowers of the grove
I framed a garland for my Love.
The slender circlet first to twine,
I plucked the rambling Eglantine,
That decked the Cliff in clusters free,
As sportive and as sweet as she:
I stole the Violet from the brook,
Though hid like her in shady nook,
And wove it with the mountain Thyme—
The myrtle of our stormy clime:
The Blue-bell looked like Mary's eye;
The Blush-rose breathed her tender sigh:
And Daisies, bathed in dew, exprest
Her innocent and gentle breast.

And, now, my Mary's brow to braid,
This chaplet in her bower is laid—
A fragrant emblem, fresh and wild,
Of simple Nature's sweetest child.

142

FRAGMENTS OF A DREAM OF FAIRY-LAND.

FYTTE I.

“And see not ye that bonny road
“That winds about the fernie brae?
“That is the road to fair Elfland,
“Where thou and I this night maun gae.”
Thomas the Rhymer.

Thro countreis seir, holtis and rockis hie,
Ouir vaillis, planis, woddis, wallie sey,
Ouir fluidis fair, and mony strait mountane,
We war caryit in twinkling of ane ee;
Our charett flew, and raid nocht, as thocht me.
Gawin Douglas.

'Twas in the leafy month of June,
Ere yet the lark hath hushed his tune;
When fair athwart the summer sky
Bright fleecy clouds sail softly by,
And sweeping shadows lightly pass,
Like spirits dancing o'er the grass;
And new-fledged birds are in the bowers,
And bees are humming round the flowers,
And through the meads is heard the stir
Of the blithe chirring grasshopper:

143

'Twas sweet Midsummer Eve: I lay
Alone by Eildon's haunted brae,
Soothed by the sound of woods and streams;
While, fitful as the shifting gleams,
Of sunshine o'er the forest glade,
Poetic fancies round me played;
And young love's tender reveries
Came fluttering, like the fragrant breeze,
Or wild-dove's wing among the trees.
Thus slumber found me: and I fell
Into a trance, as if some spell
Had rapt my willing soul away
From its cast slough of earthly clay:
Was waking mortal ne'er so blest—
Then, gentle Azla, ‘list, O list!’

Methought a Maid of heavenly mien,
Whose garb bespoke the Elfin Queen,
Appeared—and, with a winning smile
Might well the wariest heart beguile,
Waved o'er me thrice her magic wand,
And summoned me to Fairy-Land.
Who could resist the charming Elf?
She seemed the while my Azla's self!

Now, seated in her wingèd car,
We lightly speed o'er realms afar,
Where alpine ridges wildly rise,
With glaciers gleaming to the skies,
Or sandy deserts, scorched and dun,
Stretch boundless 'neath a fiery sun.
Her fair hand guides the magic rein,
While buoyantly o'er mount and plain,
And over ocean's trackless tides,
Our car like a swift comet glides:

144

Till far beyond the Western Deep
And fair Hesperides we sweep;
Then launch upon the Enchanted Sea,
Which laves the Land of Faërie.

At length, when daylight long has passed,
And the short night is waning fast,
We leap upon the star-lit strand
Of a remote and shadowy land;
Where mountains rear their summits bold
From dark umbrageous forests old;
And streamlets flow with lulling sound
Through verdant valleys opening round?
And breathing myrtles softly twine
Their branches with the clustering vine;
And zephyrs wave with fragrant wing
The tresses of immortal Spring.

Ah Lady! in that lovely Isle
How sweet, methought, to live with Thee!
Where summer skies for ever smile,
And sighing gales just stir the sea,
The silvery sea without a bound
That clasps th' Elysian Isle around! [OMITTED]

145

FYTTE II.

Within an Yle methought I was—
Ful thick of grasse ful soft and swete,
With flouris fele fare undir fete,
And lytel used, it seemed thus,
For bothe Flora and Zephyrus,
They two that makin flouris growe,
Had made ther dwelling there, I trowe.—
—And many a hart and many a hinde
Was both before me and behind,
Of fawnis, sowirs, buckis, does,
Was ful the wodde, and many roes,
And many squirrillis, that sete
Ful high upon the trees and ete.
Chaucer's Dreame.

'Tis day-break! Lo, the Morning Star
Looks o'er the brightening peaks afar;
And now we wander, hand in hand,
Along the shell-besprinkled strand,
To watch Aurora's footsteps dim
Come dancing o'er blue ocean's brim,
With Zephyr, flinging in his mirth
Fresh odours o'er the laughing earth:
And now with upward gaze we mark,
High poised in air, the minstrel lark,
Warbling wild his thrilling strain,
As if his breast could not contain
The out-gushings of his boundless pleasure,—
And, therefore, without stint or measure,
From his oriel in the cloud,
His joyous lay he singeth loud.

Now we walk the groves among,
Rich with fragrance, rife with song,

146

Where the woodbine breathes its balm
'Neath the shadow of the palm;
Where the hum of early bee
Soundeth from the citron tree;
And the squirrel, just awake,
From his fur the dew doth shake,
As he skips from oak to pine
O'er festoons of eglantine.
—Now, ere yet the sun may sip
The fresh dew from the lily's lip,
While the pheasant leaves the brake,
While the wild swan seeks the lake,
While the long cool shadows lean
O'er the dell's delicious green,
Lo, we trace the gurgling rills
To their fountains in the hills;
Where the hart and hind are straying,
Where the antelopes are playing,
Where the flocks which need no folding
Jocundly their games are holding,
As if old Pan the watch were keeping,
While the wanton kids are leaping,
And the rocky cliffs resounding
To their bold hoofs wildly bounding. [OMITTED]

147

FYTTE III.

There the wyse Merlin whylome wont (they say)
To make his wonne, in fearful hollow place,
Under a rock that lyes a little way
From the swift river, tombling down apace
Emongst the woody hilles—
—And there that great magitian had deuiz'd,
By his deep science and hell-dreaded might,
A looking-glassc, right wondrously aguiz'd—
—It vertue had to shew in perfect sight
Whatever thing was in the world contaynd.
Spenser's Faery Queene.

But when up the middle heaven
Sol his glowing car hath driven,
From his fervid searching eye
To the Enchanted Grot we hie,—
Where a solemn river sounds,
Deep amidst the forest bounds,
And romantic rocks are seen
Rising o'er the cedar screen.
Like some temple's ruined pile
Quarried in the cliffs of Nile,
In the mount's basaltic side
Opes the pillared portal wide;
Grooved with sculpture strange and quaint—
Hieroglyphic figures faint,
Interlaced with graceful twine
Of amaranth and jessamine.

At the touch of magic wand,
Slow the granite gates expand;
And, extending far aloof,
Inward springs the archèd roof

148

O'er the high and echoing hall,
Circled by its columned wall
With stalactite frieze bedight:
Fitting lustres dimly light
The dome with gleam of sparry gems,
Like jewelled stars and diadems
Pendent from the pictured ceiling,—
Gorgeous tracery revealing,
Sketched in nature's arabesque
With necromantic shapes grotesque,
Never seen by sea or land,
Never graved by human hand.
—Through that rich and stately room
Hangs a soft yet solemn gloom,
Like the meditative shade
By primeval forests made;
While, with coral crusted o'er,
Spreads the fair mosaic floor,
Round whose ample verge, I ween,
Ne'er was creeping creature seen.

But, behold, an inner aisle
Opens from this shadowy pile,
Deep into the Stygian gloom
Of the mountain's caverned womb;
Whence the rushing of a river
Sounds upon the ear for ever,
Like some prophet's solemn strain
Warning guilty worlds in vain.
—I turned; and to my asking eye
Thus the Fairy made reply:
“'Tis the ceaseless Stream of Time,
Flowing on its path sublime
To the dim and shoreless sea
Of fathomless Eternity:

149

Light as foam on ocean's tide,
Mortals on its current glide;
Nor could an archangel's force
For an instant stay its course.”

While I listen, slowly rise
Wilder wonders to my eyes:
Strange unearthly light is streaming
Down that Delphic cave—and, gleaming
From its dim chaotic shelves,
The Magic Mirror of the Elves
Emerges from the mystic shroud,
Like the broad moon from a cloud.

Slowly o'er the wizard glass
Phantom shapes successive pass,
Groups like these on Grecian Shrine
Graved by sculptor's art divine,
Proudly bearing spear and shield
Helmed and harnessed for the field,
—As more earnestly I look,
Behold, as in a blazoned book,
Pale History unfolds her page—
Down from man's primeval age,
Through the lapse of distant times,
Round the wide globe's many climes,
Blotted with ten thousand crimes.
Still I view, where'er I scan,
Man himself a wolf to man;
Thirsting for his brother's blood,
From Abel's murder to the Flood—
From Nimrod's huntings to the cry
That rent the horror-stricken sky,
When, yesterday, Napoleon's car
Resistless swept the ranks of war,

150

And trampled Europe cowered beneath
The murder-glutted scythe of death.

The piteous scene I pondered well,
Till darkness on my spirit fell;
Then, turning mournfully aside,
I thus addressed my silent Guide:—
“Fair Spirit! shut that page of woe:
It is enough for me to know
That thus, from Adam's day to ours,
Man ever hath abused the powers
Our bounteous Maker to him gave;
His brother's tyrant or his slave,
Still miserable, weak or strong,
Enduring or inflicting wrong!
—My soul is weary of the past:
Prospectively the vision cast,
That my prophetic gaze may trace
The onward fortunes of our race:
Or, from the hidden rolls of fate,
Unfold the destinies that wait
My country, on the perilous track
Whence nations never voyage back.”—
Replied the Fay—“Thou seek'st to scan
Dark knowledge all unmeet for man:
Time's issues I may not reveal,
Bound fast by Fate's mysterious seal.
Let it content thee to explore
The labyrinths of lawful lore;
And learn the Future to forecast
From Wisdom's horoscope—the Past. [OMITTED]

151

FYTTE IV.

And all about grew every flower and tree,
To which sad lovers were transformed of yore.—
—Me seems of those I see the hapless fate
To whom sweet poets' verse hath given endless date.
Spenser's Faery Queene.

The cool breeze from the billowy main
Breathes through the cedar groves again;
When from the grotto's mystic shade
We fare into the forest glade,
And through its wildering mazes glide
Until we gain the farther side,—
Whence the distant view descries,
Dimly seen, the Vale of Sighs.

Winding down, the pathway slow
Leads us to that valley low,
Deep amidst the mountains wending;
Where the silvery willows, bending
O'er the melancholy stream,
Like despairing damsels seem,
With dishevelled tresses swinging,
Evermore their white hands wringing.
All along that lonesome glen,
Tall grey stones like shapes of men,
Rocks with tufts of myrtle crowned,
Cast their shadows o'er the ground—
Shadows strange that seem to fly,
Ghost-like, from my earthly eye;
And, at times, a feeble wail
Floats upon the sighing gale,

152

From those willows by the river
With their tresses waving ever,
Or the myrtle bowers above,
Like voice of one who dies for love.

As we silently pass on,
Fair groups, upon the marble stone
Graven with surpassing skill,
The softened soul with pity fill:
Many a scene of mournful mood,
And acts of generous womanhood,
Such as high bards in ancient days
Sung to the lyre in tender lays,
In magic sculpture tell their tale,
Along that monumental vale,—
Preserved from ravage or decay
While crowns and empires pass away:
—Full many a scene we linger o'er
That thrilled the hearts of classic yore—
Young Thisbe watching in the wood,
Sweet Hero by wild Sestos' flood,
Pale Dido in her frenzied grief,
Deserted by the Trojan chief:
For in that Vale of Sighs appear
All scenes that waken pity's tear,
All tragic tales of gentle strain
Where woman's heart has bled in vain.
—In vain? No! I the word recal:
A lofty moral lives in all
Those stories of the heart's devotion,
Opening sources of emotion
Deeper far than Love can boast
Where his hopes have ne'er been crossed.

153

At length, by the spell-guarded mount,
Where gushes a bright river's fount
Into the limpid pool below,
We pause with faltering step and slow
In that lone dell's remotest bound,
Arrested by a mournful sound;
For there, where clustering forests tall
Embower the deep-voiced waterfall,
Is heard the ever-moaning wail
Of one forlorn. Her tragic tale
In Grecian glen sweet Ovid found-
The Nymph who faded to a sound
For grief of unrequited love.
And lo, her Naiad sisters rove
For ever round the enchanted spot
Where Echo holds her misty grot,
Conversing with the viewless shade
Hovering o'er that haunted glade.
Oft as they tell her hapless story,
Responsive from the cavern hoary,
Loud wailing words of tender woe,
Half heard amidst the waters' flow,
Murmur of love's deceitful arts,
Of blighted forms and broken hearts,
And woman's triumph pure and high
In generous, deathless constancy! [OMITTED]

154

FYTTE V.

What there thou seest, fair creature! is thyself;
With thee it came and goes: but follow me,
And I will lead thee where no shadow stays
Thy coming.
Paradise Lost.

Learn by a mortal yearning to ascend
Towards a higher object.—Love was given,
Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that end:
For this the passion to excess was driven—
That self might be annulled; her bondage prove
The fetters of a dream, opposed to love.
Wordsworth's Laodamia.

Issuing from that pensive vale,
Soon an alpine scene we hail,
Where Olympian peaks arise
Towering to the bright blue skies,
And a rock's romantic mound,
By a ruined temple crowned,
Overhangs the central tide
Whence fair Elfland's rivers glide.
—Girt by cliff and shaggy brake,
Softly lay that silent lake,
In the mountain's stern embrace
Sleeping in its simple grace,
With a pure and placid breast,
Like a dreaming child at rest.

Leaning o'er its lilied side,
Thus began my lovely Guide:
“Listen to a legend hoar
Of far-distant days of yore:
And, while I the story tell,
Ponder thou its purport well.

155

“When first this Eden of the deep,
Was wakened from chaotic sleep,
To be the destined dwelling-place
Of those yclept the Elfin race;
(Beings formed by nature free
From sin and sad mortality;
Yet by ties of mystic birth
Linked unto the sons of Earth;)
On that bright primeval morn,
She of Fays the eldest born,—
Physis erst by mortals named,
Later as Titania famed,—
Roaming through her natal Isle,
Came where yonder votive pile
(A temple reared to Solitude
By the young Naiads of the flood)
O'erlooks the wave. With wondering eye,
She sees what seems a downward sky
Stretching far its depths of blue,
With the stars dim-gleaming through,
Whene'er the sun his brightness shrouds
'Neath some veil of fleecy clouds,
And the shadows come and go
Athwart the liquid plain below.
—As she gazes, still, behold,
Marvels to her eyes unfold;
Massive rocks and towering mountains,
With their woods and sparkling fountains,
In the inverted landscape lie,
Pointing to a nether sky.

“Suddenly, with swan-like flight
Launching from the cliffy height,
On the buoyant air she springs,
(Scorns an elf the aid of wings,)

156

In the middle space upborne,
Like a cloudlet of the morn;
With her vesture floating free,
And her locks luxuriantly
Backward o'er her shoulders flung;
While her face and bosom young
Forward bend with fearless pride
To the fair illusive tide.
—Wherefore, in her downward track,
Starts the Fairy Virgin back—
And, again, with fond surprise,
Waveward casts her wistful eyes?
Lo! to meet her wildered gaze,
Upwards through the lucid maze
Swiftly glides a glorious creature,
Sister-like in form and feature;
In her modest maiden charms,
In her lovely locks and arms,
In her eyes and graceful mien,
An image of that Elfin Queen.
—Fair Physis smiles—and from the wave
The Form returns the smile she gave:
She spreads her arms—with winning grace
The Phantom offers her embrace:
But when she fondly strives to clasp
The beauteous Shade—it flies her grasp,
Amidst the broken billows lost;
And all the enchanting scene is tost
Fantastically, heaving wide
Athwart the bosom of the tide!

“Abashed and sad, upon the strand
The virgin stood—when accents bland
Came, like sweet music on the wind,
From amaranthine groves behind:—

157

‘Grieve no longer, gentle Elf,
For that semblance of thyself!
All that meets the gaze below,
Like that shade an empty show
Formed to charm the finite sense,
Faileth from the grasp intense
Of creature longing for the love
That looks below — but lives above.
—Virgin! upward lift thine eye
Where the peak ascendeth high:
Lo! yon Mount of Vision towers
O'er Elysium's blissful bowers,
Where the flower of beauty bloweth,
Where the fruit immortal groweth.
Behold, I come thy path to guide
Up the mountain's rugged side,
Where for thee thy Lover waits
By the Enchanted Palace gates:
'Tis no shadow there that meets thee—
'Tis thy glorious bridegroom greets thee,
With that pure celestial love
Blessed Genii own above.’” [OMITTED]

158

FYTTE VI.

O pure of heart! thou need'st not ask of me
What this strong music in the soul may be!
What, and wherein it doth exist,
This light, this glory, this fair luminous mist,
This beautiful, and beauty-making power—
—Which wedding Nature to us gives in dower
A new earth and new heaven,
Undreamt of by the sensual and the proud.
Coleridge.

Now Hesper from the blushing west
Leads that sweet hour I love the best,
When birds their fluttering pinions fold,
And wild-bees seek their honied hold,
And deer that never heard a hound
Across the verdant valleys bound,
To couch among the banks of thyme
Where greenwoods to the uplands climb.
—Now by some lawny slope we linger,
While quiet Eve with jealous finger
Closes the curtains of the skies
Till modest Dian deign to rise:
Now by the murmuring beach we walk,
Pausing oft in pensive talk,
To list the hermit nightingale
Entrancing all the moonlight vale:
Or, from some sea-ward hanging steep,
View boundless ocean round us swelling,
Without a wish to cross the deep,
Or leave again that lovely dwelling.

“Behold,” (thus spoke the bright-eyed Fay,)
“Endeth now the Elfin day:

159

Ere the star of morning gleams
Thou must leave this Isle of Dreams:
Yet, before the vision part,
Mortal, let thy listening heart
Devoutly learn to understand
The scenes of this symbolic land;
For here a parable doth lie
In all that meets the ear or eye.”

Ere she ceased, pale Dian's crest,
Slowly waning in the west,
Sank behind the shadowy hill;
And the nightingale was still
On his fragrant orange bough.
It is solemn midnight now;
And the silent landscape lies
Hushed beneath the starry skies,
Like a meek and gentle child
Listening to his mother mild,
While her earnest eyes above
O'er him bend with looks of love,
As she prayeth God to keep
Watch around his midnight sleep.—
Like such heart-hushed little one,
Hung my listening soul upon
Words (which I may not rehearse
In this vain and idle verse)—
Things with deepest meaning fraught
By that Gentle Fairy taught,
In whose mien I then might trace
The sister of man's godlike race,
Ere his half-angelic nature
Lapsed into the lowlier creature,

160

Ere the golden link was riven
That upheld the heart to heaven,
And the ethereal light grew dim
Of the fallen seraphim!
—Lovely lessons there I read,
There I learn a lofty creed,
In the expression of a mind
By a fearless faith refined,
Such as we of mortal strain
Beneath the stars may not attain,
But such themes are all too high
For this lay of Phantasy;
So I close the rambling rhyme
Of my Flight to Fairy Clime.

Fitting pause from minstrel task,
Now, sweet Azla, let me ask:
But if thou wilt deign to smile
On this Dream of Elfin Isle,
Haply, in an altered strain,
I may touch the harp again;
Richer veins of thought revealing,
Deeper springs of love unsealing,
Where the Passions have their strife
'Midst ‘the bosom-scenes of life;’
For the poet's art must borrow
Spells of might from Fear and Sorrow,
Since our nature seeks relief
From Pleasure in ‘the Joy of Grief.’

161

LINES, WRITTEN ON HEARING OF THE DEATH OF AN EARLY FRIEND.

Was this sad fate the only fruit
Of thy brief, feverish life's pursuit?
To gain—for years in travel worn—
For dangers braved and troubles borne—
For all, 'mid mankind's conflicts rude,
That chills the soul or chafes the blood—
For wounded feeling's bitter smart—
For scenes that wring or sear the heart—
To gain—in a drear distant clime,
A nameless grave before thy prime!

Was this—was this the bridal bed
To which thy cruel mistress led—
The Fiend Ambition? she who brings
A chaplet wreathed with scorpion's stings
To crown her lovers!—she whose waist
And bosom are with snakes enlaced!
Who scatters wide her victim's bones
O'er blighting swamps—o'er burning zones—
Where on the stranger's loveless bier,
No friend shall drop a parting tear,
Nor sister come to watch and weep,
And break with sobs the silence deep!

Yet why o'er thy untimely urn
With vain regret thus weakly mourn?

162

Struck by the bolt that levels all,
What recks it how or where we fall?
Are they not blest, the early dead,
Wherever fate their pall may spread?
More blest than those whom long decay
Detains—slow lingering by the way,
Without a wish to wake the soul;
Yet shuddering at the dreary goal
To which with viewless pace they steal,
Dragged on by Time's resistless wheel,
Watching each early comrade sink,
Till they upon the desert brink
Stand desolate!

Ay! there are hours
When life's horizon round us lowers—
When yet afresh the wounds we feel
Which Time may close, but cannot heal,
That recklessly we seek relief
By draining e'en the dregs of grief,
(The bitter dregs which human pride
Infuses in affliction's tide,)
Repiningly upbraid the doom
Which on our loved ones shuts the tomb,
And half accuse long-suffering fate
That opens not for us its gate.

This morbid mood, then, shall we nurse,
That in affliction finds a curse?
Shall we, when Providence destroys,
Like Jonah's gourd, our cherished joys,
The wisdom frowardly arraign
That warps our web of life with pain?
No! let us with a pious trust,
Though bent by sorrow to the dust,

163

Confide, while we submissive bow,
That He will cheer who chastens now;
And to a loftier faith give scope,
Not mourn as those who have no hope.

1813.

A PARTING DIRGE.

In joyous Love's delicious spring,
I said, ‘I will of sorrow sing;’
For hearts too happy seek relief
From joy itself in fancied grief.
Alas! was there a Demon near,
That listened with malignant ear,
That looked on us with evil eye,
And laughed at coming misery?
Ah! little wist I that my song
Should be our parting dirge ere long;
And all thy lover's minstrel art
The murmurs of a breaking heart!

So fondly loved—so sweetly won—
And art Thou then for ever gone!
And what on earth remains behind
To cheer the darkening waste of mind?
What wish can Wealth or Glory wake,
Though once I prized them for thy sake?
Is there no balm by Friendship lent
To heal the hearts which fate hath rent?
Can Fancy's power no spell combine
To hide that parting look of thine?

164

Ay, other feelings may control
The inward current of the soul;
Passion in apathy may die,
This lonely breast forget to sigh,
And changes o'er my spirit pass—
But ne'er the heart be what it was,
Ere the fell fingers of Despair
Had writ their cruel legend there!

And yet, had I again to choose,
I scarce could wish this lot to lose;
Love, even though joy and hope are past,
Retains enchantment to the last:
But wherefore glows his living spark
With rapture's light to set so dark!

I heard the tempest's rising wrath—
But Thou wert then to light my path;
And what from Fortune could I fear,
While hope was kind and Thou wert near?
While round us breathed Elysium's bloom,
How could I heed the gathering gloom?
Sweet dwelt on mine thy melting eyes,
Love's golden torch illumed the skies,
And, dazzled by the enchanting ray,
I thought the storm had passed away:
Alas! 'twas like the rainbow's beam,
Quenched in the lightning's lurid gleam!

165

ELEGIAC STANZAS.

Of thee to think—with thee to rove,
In fancy, through the gentle bowers
That witnessed once our vows of love,
In joyous youth's enchanted hours:

To picture manhood's ardent toils
By love's endearing looks repaid;
While fancy culled her fairest spoils
To deck thy home's domestic shade:

To think how sweetly thy control
Had soothed the wound that aches unseen;
While griefs that waste the secret soul
Had passed—perhaps had never been!

To dream of hours for ever past,
And all that ne'er again can be—
My best beloved; is this the last,
The only solace left to me?

It must not be—I may not trust
My fancy with the fond review—
Go, perish in the silent dust,
Ye dreams, that bright with transport grew!

Ay! vain regrets shall soon be o'er,
And sterner cares the tumult quell:
And this lone bosom throb no more
With love and grief's alternate swell.

166

Silent and sad, I go to meet
What life may bring of woe or bliss;
No other hope can be so sweet,
No parting e'er so sad as this!

Ambition's strife,—without an aim,—
No longer can allure me now—
I only sought the wreaths of fame
To bind them round thy gentle brow!

167

II. PART II. SONGS AND SONNETS.

SONGS.

I. LOVE AND SOLITUDE.

[_]

Air—“Oh tell me the way how to woo.”

I love the free ridge of the mountain
When Dawn lifts her fresh dewy eye;
I love the old ash by the fountain
When Noon's summer fervours are high:
And dearly I love when the grey-mantled gloaming
Adown the dim valley glides slowly along,
And finds me afar by the pine-forest roaming,
A-list'ning the close of the grey-linnet's song.

When the moon from her fleecy cloud scatters
Over ocean her silvery light,
And the whisper of woodlands and waters
Comes soft through the silence of night,
I love by the ruined tower lonely to linger,
A-dreaming to fancy's wild witchery given,
And hear, as if swept by some seraph's pure finger,
The harp of the winds breathing accents of heaven!

168

Yet still, mid sweet fancies o'erflowing,
Oft bursts from my lone breast the sigh—
I yearn for the sympathies glowing
When hearts to each other reply!
Come, Friend of my bosom! with kindred devotion
To worship with me by wild mountain and grove;
Oh, come, my Eliza! with dearer emotion—
With rapture to hallow the chaste home of love!

II. MAID OF MY HEART, A LONG FAREWELL.

[_]

Air—“Logan Water.”

Maid of my heart—a long farewell!
The bark is launched, the billows swell,
And the vernal gales are blowing free
To bear me far from love and thee!

I hate Ambition's haughty name,
And the heartless pride of Wealth and Fame;
Yet now I haste through ocean's roar
To woo them on a distant shore.

Can pain or peril bring relief
To him who bears a darker grief?
Can absence calm this feverish thrill?
—Ah, no!—for thou wilt haunt me still!

Thy artless grace, thy open truth,
Thy form that breathed of love and youth,
Thy voice by Nature framed to suit
The tone of Love's enchanted lute!

169

Thy dimpling cheek and deep blue eye,
Where tender thought and feeling lie!
Thine eye-lid like an evening cloud
That comes the star of love to shroud!

Each witchery of soul and sense,
Enshrined in angel innocence,
Combined to frame the fatal spell—
That blest and broke my heart!—Farewell!

III. I'LL BID MY HEART BE STILL.

[_]

Air—“Farewell, ye fading flowers!”

I'll bid my heart be still,
And check each struggling sigh;
And there's none e'er shall know
My soul's cherish'd woe,
When the first tears of sorrow are dry.

They bid me cease to weep—
For glory gilds his name;
But the deeper I mourn,
Since he ne'er can return
To enjoy the bright noon of his fame!

While minstrels wake the lay
For peace and freedom won,
Like my lost lover's knell
The tones seem to swell,
And I hear but his death-dirge alone!

170

My cheek has lost its hue,
My eye grows faint and dim;
But 'tis sweeter to fade
In grief's gloomy shade,
Than to bloom for another than him!

IV. O THE EWE-BUGHTING'S BONNY.

[_]

Air—“The Yellow-hair'd Laddie.”

O the ewe-bughting's bonny, both e'ening and morn,
When our blithe shepherds play on the bog-reed and horn;
While we're milking they're lilting sae jocund and clear;
But my heart's like to break when I think o' my dear
O the shepherds take pleasure to blow on the horn,
To raise up their flocks i' the fresh simmer morn:
On the steep ferny banks they feed pleasant and free—
But alas! my dear heart, all my sighing's for thee!

O the sheep-herding's lightsome amang the green braes
Where Cayle wimples clear 'neath the white-blossomed slaes,
Where the wild-thyme and meadow-queen scent the saft gale
And the cushat croods leesomely down in the dale.
There the lintwhite and mavis sing sweet frae the thorn,
And blithe lilts the laverok aboon the green corn,
And a' things rejoice in the simmer's glad prime—
But my heart's wi' my love in the far foreign clime!

171

O the hay-making's pleasant, in bright sunny June—
The hay-time is cheery when hearts are in tune—
But while others are joking and laughing sae free,
There's a pang at my heart and a tear i' my ee.
At e'en i' the gloaming, adown by the burn,
Fu' dowie and wae, aft I daunder and mourn;
Amang the lang broom I sit greeting alane,
And sigh for my dear and the days that are gane.

O the days o' our youthheid were heartsome and gay,
When we herded thegither by sweet Gaitshaw brae,
When we plaited the rushes and pu'd the witch-bells
By the Cayle's ferny howms and on Hounam's green fells.
But young Sandy bood gang to the wars wi' the laird,
To win honour and gowd—(gif his life it be spared!)
Ah! little care I for walth, favour, or fame,
Gin I had my dear shepherd but safely at hame!

Then, round our wee cot though gruff winter sould roar,
And poortith glowr in like a wolf at the door;
Though our toom purse had barely twa boddles to clink,
And a barley-meal scone were the best on our bink;
Yet, he wi' his hirsel, and I wi' my wheel,
Through the howe o' the year we wad fend unco weel;
Till the lintwhite, and laverok, and lambs bleating fain,
Brought back the blithe time o' ewe-bughting again.

The first verse of this song is old. It was transcribed by the editor, from a fragment in the handwriting of the celebrated Lady Grisel Baillie, inclosed in a letter written from Scotland to her brother Patrick, who was at that time an exile in Holland along with her father (afterwards Earl of Marchmont) and her future husband, Baillie of Jerviswood. The style is not unlike that of her own sweet song —“O were na my heart light I wad dee.” The other four verses are an attempt to complete the simple ditty in the same pastoral strain.—T. P.

172

V. MARY OF GLEN-FYNE.

[_]

Gaelic Air—“O mo Mhairi Luogh.”

Oh , my lovely Mary! Mary of Glen-Fyne!
Oh, my gentle Mary! Mary, thou art mine!
Oh, enchanting maiden! thou dost far outshine
All who wear the plaiden in this glen of thine!

By Loch-Moraig's wild wood young affection grew,
Ere our simple childhood love's sweet language knew:
Kindness still grew stronger, till its depth was more
Than was known to lovers in this world before!

Oh, my lovely Mary! &c.

Cushats, fondly cooing, taught me how to woo;
The soft art of suing woodlarks taught me too;
And the laverok, thrilling in the sky above,
Told the tender accents of impassioned love!

Oh, my lovely Mary! &c.

I am but the herdsman of Loch-Moraig's flock;
She, my mountain rosebud, boasts no gentle stock;
But for rank or riches I shall ne'er repine
While that priceless jewel, Mary's heart, is mine!

Oh, my lovely Mary! &c.

173

VI. COME AWA, COME AWA!

[_]

Air—“Haud awa frae me, Donald.”

Come awa, come awa,
An' o'er the march wi' me, lassie:
Leave your Southron wooers a',
My winsome bride to be, lassie.
Lands nor gear I proffer you,
Nor gauds to busk ye fine, lassie,
But I've a heart that's leal an' true,
And a' that heart is thine, lassie.

Come awa, come awa,
An' see the kindly North, lassie,
Out o'er the peaks o' Lammerlaw,
An' by the links o' Forth, lassie;
And when we tread the heather bell
Aboon Demayat lea, lassie,
You'll view the land o' flood and fell—
The noble North Countrie, lassie!

Come awa, come awa,
An' leave your Southland hame, lassie;
The kirk is near, the ring is here—
An' I'm your Donald Græme, lassie,
Rock and reel and spinning wheel,
And English cottage trig, lassie,
Haste, leave them a', wi' me to speel
The braes 'yont Stirling brig, lassie.

174

Come awa, come awa,
I ken your heart is mine, lassie,
And true luve sall make up for a'
For whilk ye might repine, lassie.
Your father—he has gien consent,
Your step-dame looks na kind, lassie—
Oh, that our foot were on the bent,
An' the Lowlands far behind, lassie!

Come awa, come awa!
Ye'll ne'er hae cause to rue, lassie;
My cot blinks blithe beneath the shaw,
My bonny Avondhu, lassie:
There's birk and slae on ilka brae,
And brakens waving fair, lassie;
And gleaming lochs and mountains grey—
Can aught wi' them compare, lassie!
Come awa, come awa, &c.

VII. THE HIGHLANDS!

[_]

Air—“My heart's in the Highlands.”

The Highlands! the Highlands!—O gin I were there;
Tho' the mountains an' moorlands be rugged an' bare,
Tho' bleak be the clime, an' but scanty the fare,
My heart's in the Highlands—O gin I were there!

The Highlands! the Highlands!—My full bosom swells
When I think o' the streams gushing wild through the dells,
And the hills towering proudly, the lochs gleaming fair!
My heart's in the Highlands!—O gin I were there!

175

The Highlands! the Highlands!—Far up the grey glen
Stands a cozy wee cot, wi' a but and a ben,
An' a deas at the door, wi' my auld mother there,
Crooning—“Haste ye back, Donald, an' leave us nae mair!”
The Highlands! the Highlands! &c.

VIII. THE DARK-HAIRED MAID.

[_]

Gaelic Air—“Mo Nighean dhu.”

O sweet is she who thinks on me,
Behind yon dusky mountain;
In greenwood bower, at gloaming hour,
We'll meet by Morag's Fountain.

My hounds are on the hills of deer—
My heart is in the valley,
Where dark-hair'd Mary roams to hear
The woodlarks singing gaily.

O sweet is she, &c.

My hawks around the forest fly,
And wonder that I tarry,
While lone on thymy banks I lie
And dream of dark-haired Mary!

O sweet is she, &c.

Her step so light—her eye so bright—
Her smile so sweet and tender—
Her voice like music heard by night
As o'er the wilds I wander!

O sweet is she, &c.

176

Her neck which silken ringlets shroud—
Her bosom's soft commotion—
Like sea-mew hovering in the cloud,
Or heaving on the ocean!

O sweet is she, &c.

Her heart as gay as fawn at play,
Among the braes of braiken—
Yet mildly dear as melting tear
That minstrel tales awaken!

O sweet is she, &c.

And she is mine—the dark-haired Maid!
My bright, my beauteous Mary!—
The flower of Ardyn's lowly glade,
Shall bloom in high Glengary!

O sweet is she, &c.

IX. OH! NOT WHEN HOPES ARE BRIGHTEST.

[_]

Air—“The Rose Tree.”

Oh! not when hopes are brightest
Is all love's sweet enchantment known;
Oh! not when hearts are lightest,
Is all fond woman's fervour shown:
But when life's clouds o'ertake us,
And the cold world is clothed in gloom;
When summer friends forsake us,
The rose of love is best in bloom.

177

Love is no wandering vapour,
That lures astray with treacherous spark;
Love is no transient taper,
That lives an hour and leaves us dark:
But, like the lamp that lightens
The Greenland hut beneath the snow,
The bosom's home it brightens
When all beside is chill below.

X. PLEASANT TEVIOTDALE.

[_]

Air—“Jock o' Hazeldean.”

Her light touch wakes the tuneful keys,
She sings some simple lay,
That tells of scenes beyond the seas,
In Scotland far away,—
By “Ettrick banks,” or “Cowden knowes,”
Or “The briery braes o' Cayle,”
Or “Maxwell's bonny haughs and howes,”
In pleasant Teviotdale.

O gentle wind ('tis thus she sings)
That blowest to the west,
Oh could'st thou waft me on thy wings
To the land that I love best,
How swiftly o'er the ocean foam
Like a sea-bird I would sail,
And lead my loved one blithely home
To pleasant Teviotdale!

From spicy groves of Malabar
Thou greet'st me, fragrant breeze,
What time the bright-eyed evening star
Gleams o'er the orange trees;

178

Thou com'st to whisper of the rose
And love-sick nightingale—
But my heart is where the hawthorn grows,
In pleasant Teviotdale.

O that I were by Teviot side,
As when in Springwood bowers
I bounded, in my virgin pride,
Like fawn among the flowers;
When the beauty of the budding trees,
And the cuckoo's vernal tale,
Awoke the young heart's ecstacies,
In pleasant Teviotdale.

O that I were where blue-bells grow
On Roxburgh's ferny lea,
Where gowans glent and crow-flowers blow
Beneath the Trysting Tree;
Where blooms the birk upon the hill,
And the wild-rose down the vale,
And the primrose peeps by every rill,
In pleasant Teviotdale.

O that I were where Cheviot-fells
Rise o'er the uplands grey,
Where moors are bright with heather-bells,
And broom waves o'er each brae;
Where larks are singing in the sky,
And milkmaids o'er the pail,
And shepherd swains pipe merrily,
In pleasant Teviotdale.

O listen to my lay, kind love—
Say, when shall we return
Again to rove by Maxwell grove,
And the links of Wooden-burn?

179

Nay, plight thy vow unto me now,
Or my sinking heart will fail—
When I gaze upon thy pallid brow,
Far, far from Teviotdale!

Oh haste aboard! the favouring wind
Blows briskly from the shore.
Leave India's dear-bought dross behind
To such as prize it more:
Ah! what can India's lacs of gold
To withered hearts avail?
Then haste thee, love, ere hope wax cold,
And hie to Teviotdale!

XI. DEAREST LOVE! BELIEVE ME.

[_]

Gaelic Air—“O mo Mhairi luogh.”

Dearest love! believe me,
Though all else depart,
Nought shall e'er deceive thee
In this faithful heart:
Beauty may be blighted,
Youth must pass away,
But the vows we plighted
Ne'er shall know decay.

Tempests may assail us
From affliction's coast,
Fortune's breeze may fail us
When we need it most;

180

Fairest hopes may perish,
Firmest friends may change;
But the love we cherish
Nothing shall estrange.

Dreams of fame and grandeur
End in bitter tears;
Love grows only fonder
With the lapse of years:
Time, and change, and trouble,
Weaker ties unbind,
But the bands redouble
True affection twined.

181

SONNETS.

In truth, the prison, unto which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is; and hence to me,
In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound
Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground:
Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
Should find short solace there, as I have found.
Wordsworth.

I. TO AN EARLY FRIEND.

They called us brother bards: The same blue streams
Witnessed our youthful sports: our tears have sprung
Together, when those ancient tales were sung
That tinged our fancy's first and sweetest dreams—
Two simple boys bewitched with magic themes!
And still as riper years and judgment came,
On mutual couch we planned our mutual schemes,
Our tastes, our friendships, and our joys the same.
But not the same our task: Thy venturous lyre,
Which with the tide of genius swells or falls,
Shall charm tumultuous camps and courtly halls,
And rouse the warrior's arm and patriot's ire—
While I shall chant my simple madrigals
To smiling circles round the cottage fire.

1812.

182

II. TO THE RIVER EARN.

Thou mountain Stream, whose early torrent course
Hath many a drear and distant region seen,
Windest thy downward way with slackened force,
As with the journey thou hadst wearied been;
And, all enamoured of these margins green,
Delight'st to wander with a sportive tide;
Seeming with refluent current still to glide
Around the hazel banks that o'er thee lean.
Like thee, wild Stream! my wearied soul would roam
(Forgetful of life's dark and troublous hour)
Through scenes where Fancy frames her fairy bower,
And Love, enchanted, builds his cottage-home:
But time and tide wait not—and I, like thee,
Must go where tempests rage, and wrecks bestrew the sea!

1812.

III. OF LOVE AND LOVE'S DELIGHT.

Of love and love's delight no more I sing;
Nor praise Eliza's soft bewitching eye,
And sunny locks descending gracefully
O'er that fair bosom, like an angel's wing
Floating in light. Alas! the joyous string,
That breathed responsive to love's blissful sigh,
Ill suits the heart where hope and fancy die,
Like flowers untimely blighted in their spring.
Yet doth the memory of those gentle days
In its fixed sadness soothe my darkened mind,
And tempt oft-times to meditate the lays
In hours of happiness for her designed,
Whose lovely image, neither fates unkind,
Nor time, nor absence, from my breast can raze.

183

IV. LONG YEARS OF SORROW.

Long years of sorrow and slow-wasting care
Have stol'n from thy soft cheek its vermeil hue;
And somewhat changed the glossy locks that threw
Their shadowy beauty round thy temples fair;
And lent to those sweet eyes a sadder air,
That, from their long dark fringes laughing, blue,
Once looked like violets fresh-bathed in dew,
And seemed as they might even enchant despair!
Sickness and grief have touched thee; yet so mildly,
That though some graces of thy youth are gone,
The loveliness that witched my heart so wildly
In life's romantic spring—is still thine own:
And those meek pensive eyes, in their revealings,
Speak now of higher thoughts and deeper feelings.

V. THE EMBLEM.

Seest thou, belovèd! yonder cheerless Oak
Above the river's torrent-course reclined,
Where the fair ivy tenderly hath twined
Its arms around each bough the storm had broke,—
Hiding the ravage of the thunder stroke,
And shielding its young blossoms from the wind?
Vain care!—for, by the current undermined,
Beneath already nods th' unstable rock.
Alas! it is the emblem of our fate;
For oh! I feel thee twined around my soul,
Like yon green ivy o'er the wounded tree:
And thou must leave me, ere it be too late—
While I, in evil fortune's harsh controul,
Drift down the stream of dark adversity.

184

VI. TO LORD LYNEDOCH, On his return to Spain, March 1813.

Warrior—thou seek'st again the battle-field
Where freedom hails afar thy soul of flame;
And fall'n Iberia kindles at thy name,
As 'neath the shade of England's guardian shield,
She girds her armour on, and strives to wield
Her long-forgotten lance. Yes, there thy fame
Shall in the hymn of kindred hosts be sung
Round Spain's romantic shores, when she hath thrust
The Spoiler from her homes, and proudly hung
Her falchion on the wall—no more to rust!
Bright gleams that vengeful blade, as when of yore
It smote the Crescent on the Moslem's brow:
Warrior! she hails in thee her Cid once more,
To conquer in a fiercer conflict now!

VII. TO A FEMALE RELATIVE.

Lady, when I behold thy thoughtful eye
Dwelling benignantly upon thy Child,
Or hear thee, in maternal accents mild,
Speak of Departed Friends so tenderly—
It seems to me as years now long gone by
Were come again, with early visions fraught,
And hopes sublime, and heavenly musings, caught
From those kind eyes that watch'd my infancy!
Friend of my Mother! often in my heart
Thy kindred image shall with hers arise,
The throb of holier feeling to impart!
And aye that gentle Maid, whom sweetest ties
Of human care around thy soul entwine,
Shall with a brother's love be bound to mine.

1813.

185

VIII. TO AFFLICTION.

(Written during a dangerous Illness.)

O thou! with wakening step and withering eye,
And chalice drugg'd with wormwood to the brim,
Who com'st to probe the nerve and rack the limb,
And wring from bruised hearts the bursting sigh,—
From thee in vain affrighted mortals fly!
Thou breath'st upon them, and their senses swim
In giddy horror—while thy comrades grim,
Anguish and Dread, their snaky scourges ply.
Affliction! though I fear and hate thy hand,
And fain would shun the bitter cup thou bear'st,
Physician harsh! thy merits too I own;
For thou dispell'st illusions that withstand
Milder coercion,—and the roots uptear'st
Of cancerous ills that have the heart o'ergrown.

IX. ON PARTING WITH A FRIEND GOING ABROAD.

O, I could wish, in that light bark with thee,
Now while the stormy night-wind rages loud,
And the dim moon gleams through the dusky cloud,
To travel o'er the wild and trackless sea!
What joy, before the strong gale drifting free,
To feel the soul (long cumber'd 'mid the crowd
Of earthward-pressing cares) emerging proud,
To picture bliss and glory yet to be!
—And yet, with lingering gaze upon that shore,
To weep for all the friendly hearts we leave—
And leave even those we love not with a sigh—
As parting spirits look to earth once more
With human love—exulting while they grieve—
From the dim Ocean of Eternity!

186

X. TO THE POET CAMPBELL.

Campbell! I much have loved thy fervid strain,
Fraught with high thought, and generous feeling pure;
Rousing young hearts to dare, and to endure
All things for Truth and Freedom; to disdain
Ambition's vulgar trophies—the vile train
Of sordid baits that servile souls allure;
Intent a nobler guerdon to secure,
And live like those who have not lived in vain.
Ah! wherefore silent that inspiring shell,
Round which our souls with young entrancement hung?
The thrilling chords thy touch can wake so well
To patriot strains—why slumber they unstrung?
What, though thou hast achieved a deathless name?
God and mankind have yet a holier claim!

1819.

XI. POETS ARE NATURE'S PRIESTS.

Poets are Nature's Priests: their hallow'd eyes
Behold her Mercy-Seat within the Veil;
From their melodious lips the nations hail
Her oracles, and learn her mysteries.
With pure and pious hearts, then let them prize
Their consecration: Shall they hold for sale
The gift of Heaven? and tempt mankind to rail
At glorious powers—profaned for lusts or lies!
Thus Phineas and Hophni dared profane
God's altar—till their father's house was cursed,
And they destroy'd; and even the Ark was ta'en
From the lewd nation that such vileness nursed.
Men highly privileged are prone to ill:
Yet Israel then had Samuel—we have Wordsworth still.

1820.

187

III. PART III. MISCELLANEOUS PIECES.

THE SPAEWIFE.

Where Grubet's ancient copsewood skirts the vale,
Fringing the thymy braes of pastoral Cayle,
Near to the spot where oft, in other times,
Our gentle Thomson tuned his youthful rhymes,
(Deserted now, for good Sir William's race

Sir William Bennet, of Grubet, was the early patron of the poets Thomson and Allan Ramsay. It was at his seat on Cale-Water, a branch of the Teviot, that Thomson is said to have written several of his juvenile pieces; and there is still a tradition current in the vicinity, that the impressive description, in his “Winter,” of a man perishing in the snows, was suggested by an affecting incident of this sort which occurred at Wideopen, a neighbouring farm, during one of the poet's Christmas visits. Grubet is now a mere pastoral hamlet. The last of Sir William's descendants was “gathered to his place,” as the country people quaintly but touchingly express it, about seventy years ago.

Are ‘wed away’ and ‘gathered to their place;’)
Beyond the hamlet, 'neath an aged tree,
Crooning some scrap of ballad minstrelsy,
Sits the old crone—prepared with cunning tale
To cozen simple damsels of the dale,
Whose smiles but half conceal the fluttering qualm
With which they yield in turn the anxious palm;
While o'er the pale, sly Sandy of the Mill
Lends in a hint to help the gipsy's skill.

Old Madge the Spaewife,

Madge the Spaewife is not a sketch from fancy but from real life; although I have, in some respects, blended the features of two different gipsies of this name and vocation, who were personally known to me in early youth.

though now worn and frail,
Can travel still her rounds from Jed to Cayle;
With panniered donkey trudging o'er the moors
To bear her almous-bag for winter stores;
While frugal housewives, scolding as they give
The wonted handful, add—‘Poor Madge maun live;’

188

And maidens, though demure, are willing still
To purchase sixpence-worth of gipsy skill,
Even at the hazard of a stern rebuke,
Should such colleaguings meet some elder's look.
—Thus Madge contrives to ‘make a fend.’ But time
Has sadly changed her since her stalwart prime,
When straight and tall, with locks like raven's wing,
She roamed, the jocund mate of gipsy king;
Now bent and palsied, cowering in her cloak,
While 'neath the hood steals out the silvery lock.
We scarce can recognise the form and mien
Of her who once was ‘every inch a queen.’
Yet still she tells, as from the chimney nook
She awes the rustics with a sibyl's look,
How, in the blithe and boisterous days of old,
Ere clanship's links were broke or blood grew cold,
A hundred kinsmen drank her bridal ale
To whom both Tweed and Tyne had paid black-mail;
And how her friends, from Humber to the Tay,
Sped at her call to lykewake or to fray.
“But times are changed,” she adds; “Och! weel I trow,
Kin are grown fremit—blood's but water now!”

Poor Madge!—And yet, perchance in other guise,
Our own regrets are not a whit more wise.
Comparing the dull present with the past,
The afternoon of life seems overcast:
Not that the sun his brightness has withdrawn,
But we have lost the freshness of our dawn.

Ay! while I dally with this idle strain,
Blithe schoolboy days come back to me again;
Th' adventurous rambles high o'er Hounam fells;
The feast of blaeberries by Wearie's Wells;

189

The harrying of hawk-nests on Græmeslaw rock;
The hunts in Clifton woods of tod or brock;
Long quiet days of lonely angling sport;
Long hours by mirthful converse rendered short,—
When by the Manse, beside the cherry trees,
We tilled our little plots 'mong flowers and bees,
With hearts like that fair garden in the spring
When buds unfold and birds break forth to sing;
And he, the good old pastor, smiling nigh,
And lifting aye, at times, our thoughts on high—
“How happily the years of Thalaba went by!”

But where's our Spaewife?—With her tawny brood,
I see her sitting 'neath old Gaitshaw wood;
Her asses grazing down the broomy dale,
And Faa, her husband, angling in the Cayle.

'Tis thirty years since, near that very spot,
Just where the stream sweeps round old Elshie's cot,
Madge stopped me at the ford to spae my lot;
And, poring o'er my palm with earnest look,
Said that my name should be in printed book;
For I (a scape-grace, then some nine years old)
Should travel to far lands, and gather gold;
Should be a scholar—wed a “gentle bride”—
And build a castle on fair Teviot's side:
—“And this shall sooth betide,” quoth black-browed Madge,
“Ere nine times thrice the haw grows on the hedge!”

My Sibyl's spae-weird, like Pelides' prayer,
Was half fulfilled, half lost in empty air:
I grew a scholar—such as Madge foretold;
Became a traveller—but caught no gold;
Was wedded—but (thank Heaven!) with happier fate
Than to be matched with a patrician mate,

190

Though here my fortune, faithful to the letter,
Failing the gipsy's meaning, found a better.
—But, castle-building!—that has been my joy,
In all my wanderings ever since a boy;
Not in the Greek or Gothic style restored,
Or on Sir Walter's plan at Abbotsford,—
But, scorning line and plummet, rule and square,
I build ('tis most convenient) in the air!

1829.

LINES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM.

This fair Volume to our eye
Human life may typify.
View the new-born infant's face
Ere yet Mind hath stamped its trace,
Or the young brain begun to think—
'Tis like this book ere touched by ink.
Look again: As time flows by
Expression kindles in the eye,
And dawning Intellect appears
Gleaming through its smiles and tears;
Lightening up the living clay,
Year by year, and day by day;
While the Passions, as they change,
Write inscriptions deep and strange,
Telling to observant eyes
Life's eventful histories.

Lady, even so thy book
By degrees shall change its look,

191

As each following leaf is fraught
With some penned or pictured thought,
Or admits the treasured claims
Of endeared and honoured names;
While gleams of genius and of grace,
Like fine expression in a face,
Lend even to what is dark or dull
Some bright tinge of the beautiful.

Farther still in graver mood
Trace we the similitude?
Apter yet the emblem grows
As we trace it to a close.
Life, with all its freaks and follies,
Mummeries and melancholies,
Fond conceits, ill-sorted matches,
Is—a book of shreds and patches;
Stained, perchance, with many a blot,
And passages were well forgot,
And vain repinings for the past:
While Time, who turns the leaves so fast,
(The hour-glass in his other hand
With its ever-oozing sand,)
Presents full soon the final page
To the failing eye of Age,
Scribbled closely to the ending—
And, if marred, past hope of mending.

1828.

192

A POET'S FAVOURITE.

Oh she is guileless as the birds
That sing beside the summer brooks!
With music in her gentle words,
With magic in her winsome looks.

With beauty by all eyes confessed,
With grace beyond the reach of art;
And, better still than all the rest,
With perfect singleness of heart.

With kindness like a noiseless spring
That faileth ne'er in heat or cold;
With fancy like the wild-dove's wing,
As innocent as it is bold.

With sympathies that have their birth
Where woman's best affections lie;
With hopes that hover o'er the earth,
But fix their resting-place on high.

And if, with all that thus exalts
A soul by sweet thoughts sanctified,
This dear one has her human faults,
They ever ‘lean to Virtue's side.’

1826.

193

ON A VIEW OF SPOLETO.

A scene such as we picture in our dreams:
Grey castled rocks, green woods, and glittering streams;
Mountains in massive grandeur towering high;
Spires gleaming in the soft Ausonian sky;
Groves, gardens, villas, in their rich array;
Majestic ruins, glorious in decay;
Marvels by Art and Nature jointly wrought—
And every stone instinct with teeming thought:
Such look'st thou, fair Spoleto!—And the Art
That through the eye speaks volumes to the heart,
Lifting the veil that envious distance drew,
Reveals thee, bathed in beauty, to our view;
Each feature so distinct—so freshly fair,
We almost seem to scent thy mountain air—
Breathing upon us from yon clump of pines,
Where the blithe goatherd 'mid his flock reclines.

How rich the landscape!—opening, as we look,
To many a sacred fane and sylvan nook;
While through the vale, by antique arches spanned,
The river, like some stream of Fairyland,
Pours its bright waters,—with deep solemn sound,
As if rehearsing to the rocks around
The tale of other times. Methinks I hear
Its dream-like murmur melting on the ear,—
Telling of mighty chiefs whose deeds sublime
Loom out gigantic o'er the gulfs of Time;
Of the stern African whose conquering powers
Recoiled abashed from these heroic towers;

194

Of him who, when Rome's glorious days were gone,
Built yon grim pile to prop his Gothic throne;
Of Belisarius, Narses—But 'twere vain
To weave such names into this idle strain;
These mouldering mounds their towering aims proclaim,
—The historic Muse hath given their acts to fame.

Spoleto! midst thy hills and storied piles,
Thy classic haunts and legendary aisles,
'Twere sweet, methinks, ere life hath passed away,
To spend one long, reflective summer's day;
Beneath those quiet shades my limbs to cast,
And muse o'er all that links thee to the past;
To linger on, through twilight's wizard hour,
Till the wan moon gleamed high o'er rock and tower,
And, with her necromantic lustre strange,
Lit up the landscape with a solemn change—
Gilding its grandeur into sad relief,
Like a pale widow stately in her grief.

So rose this scene on Rogers' classic eye—
And thus, embalmed in words that ne'er could die,
Its touching image had remained enshrined,
Had he to verse transferred it from his mind.
Far other fate awaits this rustic lay,
Framed for the passing purpose of a day:
Enough for me if he its tone commend
Whom 'tis a pride and grace to call my Friend.

1829.

195

VERSES, ON THE RESTORATION OF DESPOTISM IN SPAIN, IN 1823.

'Tis the old tale! perfidious wars,
And forts and fields for tyrants gain'd;
And kings, and emperors, and czars,
Colleagued to hold mankind enchain'd.

'Tis the old tale!—an abject race,
To wisdom, virtue, mercy blind,
Resumes the jealous despot's place,
Triumphant o'er man's soaring mind.

And Freedom's hopes again are crush'd,
All soil'd the flag she late unfurl'd,
Her song upon the mountains hush'd,—
While sullen gloom pervades the world.

And, one by one, each glorious light
Is quench'd at foul Oppression's nod,
Whose league unhallow'd courts the night,
To clinch the chain and ply the rod.

Thus sink the stars in sickening gloom,
And poisonous fogs the heavens infold,
When fiends and ghouls forsake the tomb,
Their hellish sacrament to hold!

196

And now, as erst in elder days,
The patriot earns a traitor's fame;
And Mina, like sad Brutus, says—
“Virtue is but an empty name!”

Alas, for Spain! that fiercely fought,
Nor vainly, 'gainst a nobler foe;
Now, by the Bourbon sold and bought,
And shamed and sunk without a blow.

Degraded Spain! a fitting fate
A waits her with her recreant chief;
Foul superstition, fraud, and hate,
And mockery amidst her grief.

Alas, for craven Italy!
That chants in Austria's iron cage
Her soft voluptuous minstrelsy,
To charm the brutal Vandal's rage.

And thou, betray'd, insulted Pole,
And Saxon of the Elbe and Rhine,
I see the iron pierce your soul,
The tears commingling with your wine.

I hear deep curses mutter'd low,
See fingers grasp the warrior's brand,
To burst the bondman's chain—But, no!
Ye have the heart without the hand.

But now my glance to England turns,
Whose beacon light, 'midst ocean set
Impregnable, for ever burns,
To tell where Freedom lingers yet.

197

And to that guardian Isle, the eye
Of fetter'd Europe fondly bends,
Waiting for England's battle cry
To rouse the earth's remotest ends.

And slumberest thou, my Native Land!
While Slaves and Despots league around?
Ah! where is Chatham's high command,
To bid thy warning trumpet sound?

And where is Chatham's mighty Son?
And he—the thunderbolt of war
That shiver'd all he struck upon—
The Chief of Nile and Trafalgar!

And where are Fox and Sheridan—
Of Freedom's friends were they the last?
Remains there not a living man
Still fit to sound that signal blast?

Yes, hark!—it sounds!—I hear it now—
And Britain rouses at the peal,
And binds the helmet on her brow,
And grasps once more the glittering steel

Her mighty voice is on the breeze—
Her martial step is on the plain—
Her flag's afloat upon the seas—
To bid the world be free again!

Uprise the nations at her call,—
As once they started with a bound
To hurl to earth the tyrant Gaul,
Who fiercely trod them to the ground.

198

But not, as then, to stoop their necks
Again beneath the despot's yoke;
And idly champ the curb—that checks
The fretful spirit it has broke.

No! Courts and Congresses must yield
To Nations bursting from their chain—
And, under Britain's guardian shield,
Law, Freedom, Truth, begin their reign.

1823.

THE REFUGEES.

'Tis Summer—'neath the brilliant sky
Of fair Castile or Italy.
The sighing breeze just stirs the bower,
Rich with the spoils of fruit and flower;
Above, the marble porch is gleaming;
Below, the sparkling fount is streaming:
And circling woodlands stretch their shade
O'er linpid stream and lawny glade.

It is a lovely spot; and there
Are happy hearts its joys to share:
Yon group that o'er the lakelet's brim
Watch where the swans in beauty swim;
And, there the sage released from toils,
The warrior won from battle broils.
The lady in her matron charms,
The laughing girl with clasping arms

199

Around her brother's neck,—and she
Who dandles on her dancing knee
The infant crowing wild with glee.

A graceful group—a joyous scene!—
But turn we now from what hath been,
And follow far that gentle band
In exile from their native land,
'Midst wreck of those who dared proclaim
To trampled nations Freedom's name.

It was their crime to hope too high
Of their fall'n country's destiny:
And villany was prompt and strong,
And England held her hand too long,
Till, quenched once more in blood and shame,
Expired fair Freedom's rising flame;
And now the remnant of her train
From Naples, Portugal, and Spain,
The high of heart, the fair, the young,
Like sea-weed by the waters flung,
Upon our British shores are lying—
For famine in our land are dying!

These lines were written in September, 1828, when the Spanish and Italian refugees in England were reduced to extreme destitution; and they were adapted to a picture in “Friendship's Offering,” and published there with the view of aiding, however humbly, the appeal then made in England for pecuniary support to them.

God of our fathers! and shall we
The offspring of the brave and free—
Of men who freely poured their veins
To ransom us from servile chains—
Shall we in this their evil day
From these sad exiles turn away?
From their despair our faces hide,
Besotted with our selfish pride,
And shut our sordid hearts and hands,
When man implores and God commands?

200

Oh, no! the thought I will not brook
That gentle eyes, which here may look
On pictured scene or poet's lay,
Will turn in apathy away,
While thus the stranger, at our gate,
Sinks destitute and desolate!
No! though the train of pampered pride
Pass by “upon the other side,”
As did the Pharisee of old,
Yet there are hearts of better mould
High throbbing in Old England's breast—
Ten thousand hearts that will not rest
Till they have succoured the distressed—
To whom even this brief hurried strain
I know will not appeal in vain:
And foremost of that generous band
Are they, the ladies of our land,
Whose bounty, like the dew of heaven,
Though silently is freely given.

Enough—the blush—the starting tear
Reveal the purpose nobly dear!
And see! the Exile's languid eyes
Are lightened up in glad surprise,
As, wakening from despair's wild trance,
Kind faces meet his wildered glance.
—Enough!—here let the curtain fall:
Hearts that can feel will picture all—
All that my verse may not unfold
Of meeting minds of generous mould.

Sept. 1828.

201

SPANIARDS, YIELD NOT TO DESPAIR.

[_]

(WRITTEN FOR MUSIC.)

Spaniards, yield not to despair!
Sink not, Portuguese, forlorn!
Wintry nights are worst to bear
Just before the break of morn.

Though down-trampled in the dust
By the traitor's cruel heel,
Freedom's cause ye hold in trust—
Falter not for rack or wheel.
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

Hunted from your native strand
By the Blood-hounds Hate and Fear,
Sink not yet, high-hearted band,
Retribution's hour is near.
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

Lo! yon perjured caitiff slaves,
While they clinch their country's chain,
Tremble even amidst the graves
Of the victims they have slain.
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

Let them tremble!—they have cause
Loudest when they rant and boast;
Freedom on her march may pause,
But her battle ne'er is lost.
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

202

Though the tyrant's bitter taunt
Sting you like a viper foul,
Though Despite and Famine gaunt
Like hyænas round you howl—
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

Though your dearest blood may flow,
On the scaffold or the plain,
Though your bravest be laid low
Ere their country rise again—
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

Ne'er in vain the patriot dies:
Pours he not life's fountain free
Servile millions to baptize
Proselytes of Liberty!
Spaniards, yield not to despair!

1829.

OUR NEIGHBOUR.

LUKE X. 29.

“Who is my neighbour?”—Selfishness replies,
“The man who best can aid your steps to rise;
The powerful—for whose favour all contend;
The wealthy—who may prove a useful friend;
The fashionable—whose notice is a grace;
In short, whoe'er is forward in the race
Of worldly honour. Such as lag behind,
The poor, th' oppressed, the wretched of mankind,—
If you are prudent, from their presence fly—
Leave them to Providence, and pass them by.”

203

MEMENTO.

My Son, be this thy simple plan:
Serve God, and love thy brother man;
Forget not in temptation's hour,
That Sin lends Sorrow double power;
Count life a stage upon thy way,
And follow Conscience, come what may:
Alike with heaven and earth sincere,
With hand, and brow, and bosom clear,
‘Fear God—and know no other fear.’

THE VALLEY OF HUMAN LIFE.

A FRAGMENT.

“O see ye not yon narrow road,
So thick beset with thorns and briars?
That is the path of Righteousness,
Though after it but few enquires.

“And see ye not that braid braid road,
That lies across that lily leven?
That is the path of Wickedness,
Though some call it the road to heaven.”
Old Ballad.

Methought a valley wild and wide,
With granite cliffs on either side
Embattled, stretched from sea to sea:
Old Ocean's voice came dreamily

204

From its dim openings east and west,
Where clouds and misty vapours rest:
And from beneath the eastern cloud
Of human kind a countless crowd,
Methought, were landing evermore,
Like seafowl flocking to the shore,
And up that vale incessant wending
In a train that had no ending.

Then, lifting up my eyes to view
The path this multitude pursue,
I straight beheld a giant mound
Stretching across the valley ground,
So high the eagle's wing would fail
Its sky-topt battlements to scale.
Soon by that rampart's frowning wall
I stood, and heard a herald's call;
While, like the current of a river,
The human tide rolled on for ever.

Two passages received that tide;
The one, a gateway large and wide,
Like a triumphal arch bestrode
The level highway, sweeping broad
Right through the rampart to the left:
The other, like some fissure cleft
By earthquake or volcanic fires,
All overgrown with thorns and briars,
Appeared so dismal, strange, and rude,
That of the countless multitude,
Methought, comparatively few
Sought there to find a passage through.

But by that rugged entrance stood
A herald, grave, yet mild of mood,

205

Proclaiming, in high solemn strain,
That all who peace and rest would gain,
Or 'scape the fierce Pursuer's wrath,
Must enter by the Narrow Path.
And, as he cried aloud, I saw
That many heard the voice with awe,
Hushed a brief space their boisterous din,
And turned, as if to enter in
By that rude portal; till amain
From the great gate some mirthful strain
Lured back their giddy hearts again.

Then, looking to the left, a blaze
Of dazzling lustre caught my gaze,
Where by the gate a lady sate,
In queenly guise, on throne of state:
She wore a crown of gems and gold;
Her robe was loose, her looks were bold;
And round her a voluptuous train
Of bacchanals and jugglers vain
Were dancing to a Lydian measure:
It was the court of Worldly Pleasure.
And thus unto the passing crowd
The cunning Sorceress cried aloud:—

“Heed not, my friends, the frantic call
Of that old maniac, by the wall!
The dismal chasm he calls a path
(A relic of some earthquake's wrath)
'Mong savage rocks and grottoes wending,
Must end—if it has any ending—
In some dark gulf or dreary bourne
Whence living wight shall ne'er return!

Come hither; this way bends the road,
Well-paved and pleasant, smooth and broad,

206

Which none but madmen would forsake
For yon wild track by cliff and brake.
Come hither; cast off foolish fear;
The Land of Pleasure lieth here.
Look through the gate: behold the bowers
Of citron, shedding fruits and flowers;
The groves of palm by limpid brooks;
The grottoes cool, the grassy nooks;
The banks where joyous groups recline,
With music solaced and with wine.
Come, enter freely the domain
Where I, indulgent empress, reign:
Each moment lost is wasted time,
Till you have gained that luscious clime:
Haste then, and every sense employ—
For life was given you to enjoy.”

The Enchantress thus: and, with a shout
Of high acclaim, the heedless rout
Pressed through the portal's mighty jaws.
Yet many made a doubtful pause,
And some (too few, alas! were they)
Recoiled, and took the Narrow Way.
The rest irresolutely stand,
Gazing on the delicious land
Within: yet blushing, as with shame,
To look on that seductive dame,
And those who danced around her throne
With drunken gait and loosened zone:
And oft, as if with sudden fright,
They glanced with terror to the right,
Whence rose the herald's warning cry—
“From the Betrayer hither fly!”

Then that Witch with smiling malice
Quickly seized a golden chalice,

207

And its charmèd mixture threw,
Sprinkling all that hapless crew—
Those alike who hasten in
And those who halt, but fly not sin—
“Thus,” she said, “I make you mine
By a sure baptismal sign!”
Then, submissive to her call,
Through the huge gate hurried all.

Soon or slow the fiendish spell
Wrought on all on whom it fell:
While I gazed, a fearful change
Came o'er all with aspect strange:
By degrees the human face
Lost each intellectual trace,
And the features took the cast
Of the bestial kind at last.
Yet still within the eyes there dwelt
A look as if the wretches felt
A hateful consciousness of harm,
Produced by that prevailing charm,
Which gave man's countenance divine
The expression of the wolf or swine.

208

LINES TO THE MEMORY OF THE REV. DR. WAUGH.

Whoe'er thou art whose eye may hither bend,
If thou art human, here behold a friend.
Art thou of Christ's disciples? He was one
Like him whose bosom Jesus leant upon.
Art thou a sinner burthened with thy grief?
His life was spent proclaiming sin's relief.
Art thou an unbeliever? He could feel
Much for the patient whom he could not heal.
Whate'er thy station, creed, condition be,
This man of God has cared and prayed for thee.

Do riches, honours, pleasures, smile around?
He would have shown thee where alone is found
Their true enjoyment—on the Christian plan
Of holiness to God and love to man.
Are poverty, disease, disgrace, despair,
The ills, the anguish to which flesh is heir,
Thy household inmates?—Yea, even such as thee
He hailed as brothers of humanity;
And gave his hand and heart, and toiled and pled,
Till nakedness was clothed and hunger fed;
Till pain was soothed, and even the fiend Despair
Confessed a stronger arm than his was there.

And ye far habitants of heathen lands,
For you he raised his voice and stretched his hands;
And taught new-wakened sympathy to start
With generous throb through many a British heart;

209

Till wide o'er farthest oceans waved the sail
That bade in Jesus' name the nations hail.
And Afric's wastes and wildered Hindostan
Heard the glad tidings of good will to man.

Such was his public ministry. And they
Through life who loved him till his latest day,
Of many a noble, gentle trait can tell,
That, as a man, friend, father, marked him well:
The frank simplicity; the cordial flow
Of kind affection; the enthusiast glow
That love of Nature or his Native Land
Would kindle in those eyes so bright and bland;
The unstudied eloquence that from his tongue
Fell like the fresh dews by the breezes flung
From fragrant woodlands; the benignant look
That like a rainbow beamed through his rebuke—
Rebuke more dreaded than a despot's frown,
For sorrow more than anger called it down;
The winning way, the kindliness of speech,
With which he wont the little ones to teach,
As round his chair like clustering doves they clung—
For, like his Master, much he loved the young.

These, and unnumbered traits like these, my verse
Could fondly dwell upon: but o'er his hearse
A passing wreath I may but stop to cast,
Of love and grateful reverence the last
Poor earthly token. Weeping mourners here
Perchance may count such frail memorial dear,
Though vain and valueless it be to him
Who tunes his golden harp amidst the seraphim!

1827.

210

A HYMN.

When morn awakes our hearts,
To pour the matin prayer;
When toil-worn day departs,
And gives a pause to care;
When those our souls love best
Kneel with us, in thy fear,
To ask thy peace and rest—
Oh God our Father, hear!

When worldly snares without,
And evil thoughts within,
Stir up some impious doubt,
Or lure us back to sin;
When human strength proves frail,
And will but half sincere;
When faith begins to fail—
Oh God our Father, hear!

When in our cup of mirth
The drop of trembling falls,
And the frail props of earth
Are crumbling round our walls;
When back we gaze with grief,
And forward glance with fear;
When faileth man's relief—
Oh God our Father, hear!

211

When on the verge we stand
Of the eternal clime,
And Death with solemn hand
Draws back the veil of Time;
When flesh and spirit quake
Before Thee to appear—
For the Redeemer's sake,
Oh God our Father, hear!

1830.

INSCRIPTION, FOR A TOMB-STONE IN THE BURIAL-GROUND AT DRYBURGH ABBEY.

A Scottish patriarch lies buried here;
An upright man, a Christian sincere;
A frugal husbandman of th' olden style,
Who lived and died near this monastic pile.
A stone-cast from this spot his dwelling stood;
His farm lay down the margin of the flood;
Those moss-grown abbey orchards filled his store,
Though now scarce blooms a tree he trained of yore;
Amidst these ivied cloisters hived his bees;
Here his young children gambolled round his knees;
And duly here, at morn and evening's close,
His solemn hymn of household worship rose.

His memory now hath perished from this place,
And over many lands his venturous race
Are scatter'd widely: some are in the grave;
Some still survive in Britain; ocean's wave
Hath wafted many to far Western woods
Laved by Ohio's and Ontario's floods:

212

Another band beneath the Southern skies
Have built their homes where Caffer mountains rise,
And taught wild Mancazana's willowy vale
The simple strains of Scottish Teviotdale.

A wanderer of the race, from distant climes
Revisiting this spot, hath penned these rhymes,
And raised this stone, to guard, in hallowed trust,
His kindred's memory and great-grandsire's dust;
Resting in hope, that at the Saviour's feet
They yet may re-unite, when Zion's pilgrims meet.

1830.

219

THE END.