expression of admiration or love for the beautiful country to which he belongs, is put, if we rightly remember, into the mouth of one of his southern favourites. Independently of this, we think that too little pains is taken to distinguish the Scottish character and manners from the English, or to give expression to the general feeling of rivalry and mutual jealousy which at that time existed between the two countries.
If there be any truth in what we have now said, it is evident that the merit of this poem cannot consist in the story. And yet it has very great merit, and various kinds of merit, both in the picturesque representation of visible objects, in the delineation of manners and characters, and in the description of great and striking events. After having detained the reader so long with our own dull remarks, it will be refreshing to him to peruse a few specimens of Mr. Scott's more enlivening strains. The opening stanzas of the whole poem contain a good picture.
"Day set on Norham's castled steep,
And Tweed's fair river, broad and deep,
And Cheviot's mountains lone:
The battled towers, the Donjon keep,
The loop-hole grates where captives weep,
The flanking walls that round it sweep,
In yellow lustre shone.
The warriours on the turrets high,
Moving athwart the evening sky,
Seemed forms of giant height:
Their armour, as it caught the rays,
Flashed back again the western blaze,
In lines of dazzling light.
St. George's banner, broad and gay,
Now faded, as the fading ray
Less bright, and less, was flung;
The evening gale had scarce the power
To wave it on the Donjon tower,
The scouts had parted on their search,
The castle gates were barr'd;
Above the gloomy portal arch,
Timing his footsteps to a march,
The warder kept his guard,
Low humming as he paced along,
Some ancient Border gathering song." p. 23, 24.
The first presentment of the mysterious Palmer is also laudable.
"The summoned Palmer came in place;
His sable cowl o'erbung his face;
In his black mantle was he clad,
With Peter's keys, in cloth of red,
On his broad shoulders wrought;
The scallop shell his cap did deck;
The crucifix around his neck
Was from Loretto brought;
His sandals were with travel tore,
Staff, budget, bottle, scrip, he wore;
The faded palm branch in his hand,
Showed pilgrim from the Holy Land.
When as the palmer came in hall,
Nor lord, nor knight, was there more tall,
Or had a statelier step withal,
Or looked more high and keen;
For no saluting did he wait,
But strode across the hall of state,
And fronted Marmion where he sate,
As he his peer had been.
But his gaunt frame was worn with toil;
His cheek was sunk, alas the while!
And when he struggled at a smile,
His eye looked haggard wild." p. 49-51.
The voyage of the Lady Abbess and her nuns presents a picture in a very different style of colouring, but of at least equal merit.
""Twas sweet to see these holy maids,
Like birds escaped to green wood shades,
Their first flight from the cage,
How timid, and how curious too;
For all to them was strange and new,
And all the common sights they view,
Their wonderment engage.
One eyed the shrouds and swelling sail,
With many a benedicite;
One at the rippling surge grew pale,
And would for terrour pray;
Then shrieked, because the sea dog, nigh,
His round black head, and sparkling eye,
Reared o'er the foaming spray;
And one would still adjust her veil
Disordered by the summer gale,
Perchance lest some more worldly eye
Her dedicated charms might spy;
Perchance, because such action graced
Her fair-turned arm and slender waist.
Light was each simple bosom there," &c. p. 78, 79.
"And now the vessel skirts the strand
Of mountainous Northumberland;
Towns, towers, and halls successive rise,
And catch the nuns' delighted eyes.
Monk-Wearmouth soon behind them lay,
And Tynemouth's priory and bay;
They marked, amid her trees, the hall
Of lofty Seaton Delaval;
They saw the Blythe and Wansbeck floods,
Rush to the sea through sounding woods;
They past the tower of Widderington,
Mother of many a valiant son;
At Coquet's-isle their beads they tell,
To the good Saint who owned the cell;
Then did the Alne attention claim,
And Warkworth, proud of Percy's name;
And next, they cross themselves, to hear
The whitening breakers sound so near,
Where, boiling through the rocks, they roar,
On Dunstanborough's caverned shore;
Thy tower, proud Bamborough, marked they there,
King Ida's castle, huge and square,
From its tall rock look grimly down,
And on the swelling ocean frown;
Then from the coast they bore away,
And reached the Holy Island's bay." p. 84-86.
The picture of Constance before her judges, though more laboured, is
hot, to our taste, so pleasing; though it has beauty of a kind fully as
"When thus her face was given to view,
(Although so pallid was her hue,
It did a ghastly contrast bear,
To those bright ringlets glistering fair)
Her look composed, and steady eye,
Bespoke a matchless constancy;
And there she stood so calm and pale,
That, but her breathing did not fail,
And motion slight of eye and head,
And of her bosom, warranted,
That neither sense nor pulse she lacks,
You might have thought a form of wax,
Wrought to the very life, was there;
So still she was, so pale, so fair." p. 100.
"Twice she essayed, and twice, in vain :
Her accents might no utterance gain;
Nought but imperfect murmurs slip
From her convulsed and quivering lip,
"Twixt each attempt all was so still,
You seemed to hear a distant rill;-
'Twas ocean's swells and falls;
For though this vault of sin and fear
Was to the sounding surge so near,
A tempest there you scarce could hear,
So massive were the walls.
At length, an effort sent apart
The blood that curdled to her heart,
And light came to her eye,
And colour dawned upon her cheek,
A hectick and a fluttered streak,
Like that left on the Cheviot peak,
By autumn's stormy sky;
And when her silence broke at length,
Still as she spoke she gathered strength,
And arm'd herself to bear.
It was a fearful sight to see
Such high resolve and constancy,
In form so soft and fair." p. 104, 105.
The sound of the knell that was rung for the parting soul of this victim of seduction, is described with great force and solemnity.
"Slow o'er the midnight wave it swung,
Northumbrian rocks in answer rung;
To Warckworth cell the echoes rolled,
His beads the wakeful hermit told,
The Bamborough peasant raised his head,
But slept ere half a prayer he said;
So far was heard the mighty knell,
The stag sprung up on Cheviot Fell,
Spread his broad nostril to the wind,
Listed before, aside, behind;
Then couched him down beside the hind,
And quaked among the mountain fern,
To hear that sound so dull and stern." p. 112, 113.
The following introduction to the squire's song is sweet and tender.
"A deep and mellow voice he had,
The air he chose was wild and sad;
Such have I heard, in Scottish land,
Rise from the busy harvest band,
When falls before the mountaineer,
On lowland plains, the ripened ear.
Now one shrill voice the notes prolong,
Now a wild chorus swells the song:
Oft have I listened and stood still,
As it came softened up the hill,
And deemed it the lament of men
Who languished for their native glen;
And thought how sad would be such sound.
On Susquehanna's swampy ground,
Kentucky's wood-encumbered brake,
Or wild Ontario's boundless lake,
Where heart-sick exiles, in the strain,
Recalled fair Scotland's hills again!" p. 140, 141.
The view of the camp and city from the top of Blackford Hill, is very striking; but we cannot make room for the whole of it.
"Marmion might hear the mingled hum
Of myriads up the mountain come;
The horses' tramp, and tinkling clank,
Where chiefs reviewed their vassal rank
And charger's shrilling neigh;
And see the shifting line's advance,
While frequent flashed, from shield and lance.
The sun's reflected ray.
“Thin curling in the morning air,
The wreaths of failing smoke declare,
To embers now the brands decayed,
Where the night watch their fires had made,
They saw, slow rolling on the plain
Full many a baggage cart and wain,
And dire artillery's clumsy car,
By sluggish oxen tugged to war." p. 215.
"Still on the spot Lord Marmion stayed,
For fairer scene he ne'er surveyed.
When sated with the martial show
That peopled all the plain below,
The wandering eye could o'er it go,
And mark the distant city glow
With gloomy splendour red;
For on the smoke-wreaths, huge and slow,
That round her sable turrets flow,
The morning beams were shed,
And tinged them with a lustre proud
Like that which streaks a thunder cloud.
Such dusky grandeur clothed the height,
Where the huge castle holds its state,
And all the steep slope down,
Whose ridgy back heaves to the sky,
Piled deep and massy, close and high,
Mine own romantick town!
But northward far, with
purer blaze, On Ochil mountains fell the rays,
And as each heathy top they kissed,
It gleemed a purple amethyst.
Yonder the shores of Fife you saw;
Here Preston-Bay, and Berwick-Law;
And broad between them rolled,
The gallant Frith the eye might note,
Whose islands on its bosom float,
Like emeralds chased in gold.
Fitz-Eustace's heart felt closely pent;
As if to give his rapture vent,
The spur he to his charger lent,
And raised his bridle hand,
And, making demi-volte in air,
Cried, "Where's the coward that would not dare
To fight for such a land!" p. 218-220.
The picture of the court, and the person of the prince, is very spirited
With long-eared cap and motley vest,
The licensed fool retailed his jest ;
His magick tricks the juggler plied;
At dice and draughts the gallants vied;
While some, in close recess apart
Courted the ladies of their heart,
Nor courted them in vain;
For often, in the parting hour,
Victorious love asserts his power
O'er coldness and disdain;
And flinty is her heart, can view
To battle march a lover true,-
Can hear, perchance, his last adieu,
Nor own her share of pain.
Through this mixed crowd of glee and game,
The king to greet Lord Marmion came,
While, reverend, all made room.
An easy task it was, I trow,
King James's manly form to know,
Although, his courtesy to show,
He doffed, to Marmion bending low,
His broidered cap and plume.
For royal were his garb and mein,
His cloak of crimson velvet piled,
Trimmed with the fur of martin wild;
His vest, of changeful satin sheen,
The dazzled eye beguiled;
His gorgeous collar hung adown,
Bearing the badge of Scotland's crown,
The Thistle brave, of old renown;
His trusty blade, Toledo right,
Descended from a baldriek bright;
White were his buskins, on the heel
His spurs inlaid of gold and steel;
His bonnet, all of crimson fair,
Was buttoned with a ruby rare :
And Marmion deemed he ne'er had seen,
A prince of such a noble mien.
The monarch's form was middle size;
For feat of strength, or exercise,
Shaped in proportion fair;
And hazel was his eagle eye,
And auburn of the darkest dye,
His short curled beard and hair.
Light was his footstep in the dance,
And firm his stirrup in the lists;
And, oh he had that merry glance,
That seldom lady's heart resists.
Lightly from fair to fair he flew,.
And loved to plead, lament, and sue;
Suit lightly won, and short-lived pain!
For monarchs seldom sigh in vain." p. 251-254.
The description of Lady Heron, the favourite of this amorous monarch, and the very lively and characteristick ballad she sings, afford so pleasing a proof of Mr. Scott's talents for lighter composition, that we insert the whole of it, at the risk of extending this article to a length which our severer readers may think insufferable.
Fair was her rounded arm, as o'er
The strings her fingers flew;
And as she touched, and turned them all,
Ever her bosom's rise and fall
Was plainer given to view;
|