Poems by James Hyslop :: :: University of Virginia Library

From the climes and the seas of the fair sunny south,
I returned to the gray hills and green glens of youth:
By mountain graves, musing on days long gone past,
A dreamlike illusion around me was cast.

In a vision it seemed that the chariot of Time
Was rolled back till I stood in the ages of crime,
When the king was a despot who deemed, with his nod,
He would cancel the bonds bound a nation to God.

The religion of Christ, like a lamb, took its flight,
As the horns of the mitre waxed powerful in might;
And the prelates, with priestcraft, men's spirits enchained
Till they feared to complain when their heart's blood was drained.

Stern law made religion no longer a link
The soul to sustain on Eternity's brink;
But the gold of the Gospel was changed to a chain,
The spirit of Scotland to curb and restrain:

A political bridle, the people to check
When the priest or the prince chose to ride on their neck;
A chariot for churchmen in splendour who rolled
At the poor man's expense—whose salvation they sold.

187

From the court, over Scotland, went forth a decree—
“Let the Kirk of the North to the king bend the knee:
To the prince and his priesthood divine right is given
A sceptre to sway both in earth and in Heaven.

“Let no one presume, from the pulpit, to read
The Scriptures, save curates by courtiers decrced;
At their peril, let parents give prccepts to youth,
Till prelates and prayer-books put words in their mouth.

“And none, 'mong the hills of the heather, shall dare
To meet in the moorlands for praises and prayer;
Nor to Heaven, in private, prefer their request,
Except as the prince shall appoint by the priest.”

The nation of Knox held the mandate accursed;
(He the fetters of Popery and priestcraft had burst—
With the stamp of his foot brought their towers to the ground,
Till royalty, trembling, shrunk back when he frowned.

And Melville, the fiery, had fearlessly dared,
In the prince's own presence, his priesthood to beard,
On the archbishop's head made his mitre to shake,
And the circle of courtiers around him to quake.)

So Scotland's Assemblies in council sat down,
God's Word well to weigh with decrees of the Crown;
And a covenant sealed, as they swore by the Lord,
Their Bibles and birthrights to guard with the sword.

These priests, from their kirks, by the prelates were driven,
A shelter to seek with the fowls of the heaven;
The wet mist their covering, the heather their bed,
By the springs of the desert in peril they fed.

At the risk of their lives, with their flocks they would mect,
In storm and in tempest, in rain and in sleet;
Where the mist on the moor-glens lay darkest, 'twas there,
In the thick cloud concealed, they assembled for prayer.

At their wild mountain worship no warning bell rung,
But the sentries were fixed ere the psalm could be sung.
When the preacher his Bible brought forth from his plaid,
On the damp rock beside him his drawn sword he laid.

188

The sleepless assemblies around him who met,
Were houseless and hungry, and weary and wet;
The wilderness wandering, through peril and strife,
To be filled with the word and the water of life.

For in cities the wells of salvation were sealed,
More brightly to burst in the moor and the field;
And the Spirit, which fled from the dwellings of men,
Like a manna-cloud rained round the camp of the glen.

I beheld in my vision a prince on his throne,
Around him, in glory, the mitred heads shone;
And the sovereign assembly said,—“Who shall go forth
In the moorlands to murder the priests of the North?

“Our horsemen have hunted the moor and the wood,
But often they shrink from the shedding of blood;
And some we sent forth with commission to slay,
Have with Renwick remained, in the mountains, to pray.

“Is there no one among us whose soul and whose sword
Will hew down in the desert that priesthood abhorred;
With their blood, on the people's minds, print our decree?
The warrior's reward shall be ‘Viscount Dundee’!”

'Twas a title of darkness, dishonour, and shame;
No warrior would wear it, save Claver'se the Graham.
With the warrant of death, like a demon, he flew
In the blood of his brethren his hands to imbrue.

That mission of murder full well fitted him,
For his black heart with malice boiled up to the brim;
Remorse had his soul made like angels who fell,
And his breast was imbued with the spirit of Hell.

A gleam of its flame in his bosom had glowed.
Till his devilish delight was in cursing of God.
He felt Him a foe, and his soul took a pride
Bridle-deep through the blood of His servants to ride!

His heart, hard as flint, was in cruelty mailed;
No tear of the orphan with him e'er prevailed;
In the blood of its sire while his sword was detiled.
The red blade he waved o'er the widow, and smiled.

189

My vision was changed, and I stood in a glen
Of the moorlands, remote from the dwellings of men,
'Mong Priesthill's bleak scenery, a pastoral abode,
Where the shepherds assembled to worship their God,

A light-hearted maiden met there with her love,
Who had won her affections, and fixed them above:
Concealed 'mong the mist, on the dark mountain side,
Stood Peden the prophet, with Brown and his bride.

A silent assembly encircled the seer,
In breathless expectance, bent forward to hear;
For the glance of his grey eye waxed bright and sublime,
As it fixed on the far-flood of fast-coming Time.

“Oh Scotland! the angel of darkness and death
One hour the Almighty hath stayed on his path:
I see on yon bright cloud his chariot stand still;
But his red sword is naked and lifted to kill.

“In mosses, in mountain, in moor, and in wood,
That sword must be bathed yet in slaughter and blood,
Till the number of saints who shall suffer be sealed,
And the breaches of backsliding Scotland be healed.

“Then a prince of the South shall come over the main,
Who in righteousness over the nation shall reign:
The race of the godless shall fade from the throne,
And the kingdom of Christ shall have kings of its own.

“But think not, ye righteous, your sufferings are past;
In the midst of the furnace ye yet must be cast;
But the seed we have sown, in affliction and tears,
Shall be gathered in gladness in far distant years.

“On the scroll of the Covenant blood must be spilt,
Till its red hues shall cancel the backslider's guilt.
Remember my warning. Around me are some
Who may watch, for they know not the hour he shall come.

“And thou, pretty maiden, rejoice in the truth
Of the lover I link for thy husband of youth.
Be kind while he lives, clasp him close to thy heart;
For the time is not far when the fondest must part.

190

“The seal of the Saviour is printed too deep
On the brow of thy bridegroom for thee long to keep.
The wolf round the sheepfold will prowl for his prey,
And the lamb be led forth for the lion to slay.

“His winding-sheet linen keep woven by thee;
It will soon be required, and it bloody will be.
A morning of terror and tears is at hand,
But the Lord will give strength, in thy trial, to stand.”

My vision was changed: happy summers had fled
O'er the heath-circled home where the lovers were wed;
Affection's springs bursting from hearts in their prime,
The stream of endearment grew deeper with time.

At the door of his home, in a glad summer night,
With his children to play was the father's delight;
One dear little daughter he fondly caressed,
For she looked like the young bride who slept on his breast.

Of her sweet smiling offspring the mother was fain,
Each added a new link to love's wedded chain;
One clung to her bosom, one play'd round her knee,
And one 'mong the heather ran chasing the bee.

In union of warm hearts, of wishes, of thought,
The prophet's prediction was almost forgot;
With wedded affection their hearts overflowed,
And their lives pass'd in rearing their offspring to God.

The mist of May morning lay dark on the mountains;
The lambs cropt the flowers springing fresh by the fountains;
The waters, the wood, and the green holms of hay lay
In sunshine asleep down in Wellwood's wild valley.

In Priesthill, at dawning, the psalm had ascended,
The chapter been read, and the humble knee bended;
Now in moors thick with mist, at his pastoral employment,
The meek soul of Brown with his God found enjoyment.

At home, Isabella was busy preparing
The meal, with a husband so sweet aye in sharing;
On the floor, at her feet, in the cradle lay smiling
Her infant, her wild songs its fancies beguiling.

191

His daughter went forth in the dews of the morning,
To meet on the footpath her father returning;
Alone 'mong the mist she expected to find him.
But horsemen in armour came riding behind him.

The mother, in trembling, in tears, and dismay,
Clasped her babe to her bosom, and hasted away;
She clung to her husband, distracted and dumb,
For she felt that the hour of her trial was come.

But vain her distractions, her tears, and her prayer,
Her sufferings by Claver'se were held light as air;
With his little ones weeping around him, he brought
The fond father forth, in their sight to be shot.

“Bid farewell to thy family, and welcome thy death,
Since thou choosest so fondly to cherish thy faith;
Some minutes my mercy permits thee for prayer,
Let six of my horsemen their pistols prepare.”

“My widow, my orphans, O God, I resign
To Thy care, and the babe yet unborn, too, is Thine;
Let Thy blessing be round them, to guard and to keep,
When, over my green grave, forsaken they weep.”

At the door of his home, on the heather he knelt;
His prayer for his family the pitiless felt;
The rough soldiers listened with tears and with sighs,
Till Claverhouse cursed him, and caused to rise.

For the last time the lips of his young ones he kissed,
His dear little daughter he clasped to his breast;
“To thy mother be kind, read thy Bible, and pray;
The Lord will protect thee when I am away.

“Isabella, farewell! Thou shalt shortly behold
Thy love on the heather stretched bloody and cold,
The hour I've long looked for hath come at the last—
Art thou willing to part?—all its anguish is past.”

“Yes, willing,” she said, and she sought his embrace,
While the tears trickled down on her little one's face,
“'Tis the last time I ever shall cling to thy heart,
Yet with thee I am willing, yes, willing to part!”

192

'Twas a scene would have softened a savage's ire;
But Claver'se commanded his horsemen to fire;
As they cursed his command, turning round to retreat,
The demon himself shot him dead at his feet.

His temples, all shattered and bleeding, she bound,
While Claver'se with insult his cruelty crowned;
“Well, what thinkest thou of thy heart's cherished pride?
It were justice to lay thee in blood by his side.”

“I doubt not, if God gave permission to thee,
That thou gladly would'st murder my offspring and me;
But thy mouth He hath muzzled, and doomed thee, in vain,
Like a blood-hound, to bay at the end of thy chain.

“Thou, friendless, forsaken, hast left me and mine,
Yet my lot is a blest one when balanced with thine,
With the viper Remorse on thy vitals to prey,
And the blood on thy hands that will ne'er wash away.

“Thy fame shall be wafted to far future time,
A proverb for cruelty, cursing, and crime;
Thy dark picture, painted in blood, shall remain
While the heather waves green o'er the graves of the slain!

“Thy glory shall wither; its wreaths have been gained
By the slaughter of shepherds, thy sword who disdained:
That sword thou hast drawn on thy country for hire,
And the title it brings shall in blackness expire!

“Thy name shall be Claver'se, the blood-thirsty Scot,
The godly, the guiltless, the gray-haired, who shot.
Round my Brown's bloody brow glory's garlands shall wave,
When the muse marketh ‘murderer’ over thy grave!”