Marmion Page 17

  As if he told the price of stocks;

  Or held, in Rome republican,

  The place of Common-councilman.

  All nations have their omens drear,

  Their legends wild of woe and fear.

  To Cambria look-the peasant see,

  Bethink him of Glendowerdy,

  And shun ‘the Spirit’s Blasted Tree.’

  The Highlander, whose red claymore

  The battle turn’d on Maida’s shore,

  Will, on a Friday morn, look pale,

  If ask’d to tell a fairy tale:

  He fears the vengeful Elfin King,

  Who leaves that day his grassy ring:

  Invisible to human ken,

  He walks among the sons of men.

  Did’st e’er, dear Heber, pass along

  Beneath the towers of Franchemont,

  Which, like an eagle’s nest in air,

  Hang o’er the stream and hamlet fair?

  Deep in their vaults, the peasants say,

  A mighty treasure buried lay,

  Amass’d through rapine and through wrong

  By the last Lord of Franchemont.

  The iron chest is bolted hard,

  A Huntsman sits, its constant guard;

  Around his neck his horn is hung,

  His hanger in his belt is slung;

  Before his feet his blood-hounds lie:

  An ‘twere not for his gloomy eye,

  Whose withering glance no heart can brook,

  As true a huntsman doth he look,

  As bugle e’er in brake did sound,

  Or ever hollow’d to a hound.

  To chase the fiend, and win the prize,

  In that same dungeon ever tries

  An aged Necromantic Priest;

  It is an hundred years at least,

  Since ‘twixt them first the strife begun,

  And neither yet has lost nor won.

  And oft the Conjurer’s words will make

  The stubborn Demon groan and quake;

  And oft the bands of iron break,

  Or bursts one lock, that still amain,

  Fast as ‘tis open’d, shuts again.

  That magic strife within the tomb

  May last until the day of doom,

  Unless the Adept shall learn to tell

  The very word that clench’d the spell,

  When Franch’mont lock’d the treasure cell.

  An hundred years are pass’d and gone,

  And scarce three letters has he won.

  Such general superstition may

  Excuse for old Pitscottie say;

  Whose gossip history has given

  My song the messenger from Heaven,

  That warn’d, in Lithgow, Scotland’s King,

  Nor less the infernal summoning;

  May pass the Monk of Durham’s tale,

  Whose Demon fought in Gothic mail;

  May pardon plead for Fordun grave,

  Who told of Gifford’s Goblin-Cave.

  But why such instances to you,

  Who, in an instant, can renew

  Your treasured hoards of various lore,

  And furnish twenty thousand more?

  Hoards, not like theirs whose volumes rest

  Like treasures in the Franch’mont chest,

  While gripple owners still refuse

  To others what they cannot use;

  Give them the priest’s whole century,

  They shall not spell you letters three;

  Their pleasure in the books the same

  The magpie takes in pilfer’d gem.

  Thy volumes, open as thy heart,

  Delight, amusement, science, art,

  To every ear and eye impart;

  Yet who, of all who thus employ them,

  Can like the owner’s self enjoy them?-

  But, hark! I hear the distant drum!

  The day of Flodden Field is come.-

  Adieu, dear Heber! life and health,

  And store of literary wealth.

  CANTO SIXTH.

  THE BATTLE.

  I

  While great events were on the gale,

  And each hour brought a varying tale,

  And the demeanour, changed and cold,

  Of Douglas, fretted Marmion bold,

  And, like the impatient steed of war,

  He snuff’d the battle from afar;

  And hopes were none, that back again

  Herald should come from Terouenne,

  Where England’s King in leaguer lay,

  Before decisive battle-day;

  Whilst these things were, the mournful Clare

  Did in the Dame’s devotions share:

  For the good Countess ceaseless pray’d

  To Heaven and Saints, her sons to aid.

  And, with short interval, did pass

  From prayer to book, from book to mass,

  And all in high Baronial pride,-

  A life both dull and dignified;-

  Yet as Lord Marmion nothing press’d

  Upon her intervals of rest,

  Dejected Clara well could bear

  The formal state, the lengthen’d prayer,

  Though dearest to her wounded heart

  The hours that she might spend apart.

  II.

  I said, Tantallon’s dizzy steep

  Hung o’er the margin of the deep.

  Many a rude tower and rampart there

  Repell’d the insult of the air,

  Which, when the tempest vex’d the sky,

  Half breeze, half spray, came whistling by.

  Above the rest, a turret square

  Did o’er its Gothic entrance bear,

  Of sculpture rude, a stony shield;

  The Bloody Heart was in the Field,

  And in the chief three mullets stood,

  The cognizance of Douglas blood.

  The turret held a narrow stair,

  Which, mounted, gave you access where

  A parapet’s embattled row

  Did seaward round the castle go.

  Sometimes in dizzy steps descending,

  Sometimes in narrow circuit bending,

  Sometimes in platform broad extending,

  Its varying circle did combine

  Bulwark, and bartisan, and line,

  And bastion, tower, and vantage-coign:

  Above the booming ocean leant

  The far-projecting battlement;

  The billows burst, in ceaseless flow,

  Upon the precipice below.

  Where’er Tantallon faced the land,

  Gate-works, and walls, were strongly mann’d;

  No need upon the sea-girt side;

  The steepy rock, and frantic tide,

  Approach of human step denied;

  And thus these lines, and ramparts rude,

  Were left in deepest solitude.

  III.

  And, for they were so lonely, Clare

  Would to these battlements repair,

  And muse upon her sorrows there,

  And list the sea-bird’s cry;

  Or slow, like noontide ghost, would glide

  Along the dark-grey bulwarks’ side,

  And ever on the heaving tide

  Look down with weary eye.

  Oft did the cliff, and swelling main,

  Recall the thoughts of Whitby’s fane,―

  A home she ne’er might see again;

  For she had laid adown,

  So Douglas bade, the hood and veil,

  And frontlet of the cloister pale,

  And Benedictine gown:

  It were unseemly sight, he said,

  A novice out of convent shade.-

  Now her bright locks, with sunny glow,

  Again adorn’d her brow of snow;

  Her mantle rich, whose borders, round,

  A deep and fretted broidery bound,

  In golden foldings sought the ground;

  Of holy ornament, alon
e

  Remain’d a cross with ruby stone;

  And often did she look

  On that which in her hand she bore,

  With velvet bound, and broider’d o’er,

  Her breviary book.

  In such a place, so lone, so grim,

  At dawning pale, or twilight dim,

  It fearful would have been

  To meet a form so richly dress’d,

  With book in hand, and cross on breast,

  And such a woeful mien.

  Fitz-Eustace, loitering with his bow,

  To practise on the gull and crow,

  Saw her, at distance, gliding slow,

  And did by Mary swear,-

  Some love-lorn Fay she might have been,

  Or, in Romance, some spell-bound Queen;

  For ne’er, in work-day world, was seen

  A form so witching fair.

  IV.

  Once walking thus, at evening tide,

  It chanced a gliding sail she spied,

  And, sighing, thought-‘The Abbess, there,

  Perchance, does to her home repair;

  Her peaceful rule, where Duty, free,

  Walks hand in hand with Charity;

  Where oft Devotion’s tranced glow

  Can such a glimpse of heaven bestow,

  That the enraptured sisters see

  High vision, and deep mystery;

  The very form of Hilda fair,

  Hovering upon the sunny air,

  And smiling on her votaries’ prayer.

  O! wherefore, to my duller eye,

  Did still the Saint her form deny!

  Was it, that, sear’d by sinful scorn,

  My heart could neither melt nor burn?

  Or lie my warm affections low,

  With him, that taught them first to glow?

  Yet, gentle Abbess, well I knew,

  To pay thy kindness grateful due,

  And well could brook the mild command,

  That ruled thy simple maiden band.

  How different now! condemn’d to bide

  My doom from this dark tyrant’s pride.-

  But Marmion has to learn, ere long,

  That constant mind, and hate of wrong,

  Descended to a feeble girl,

  From Red De Clare, stout Gloster’s Earl:

  Of such a stem, a sapling weak,

  He ne’er shall bend, although he break.

  V.

  ‘But see!-what makes this armour here?’-

  For in her path there lay

  Targe, corslet, helm;-she view’d them near.-

  ‘The breast-plate pierced!-Ay, much I fear,

  Weak fence wert thou ‘gainst foeman’s spear,

  That hath made fatal entrance here,

  As these dark blood-gouts say.-

  Thus Wilton!-Oh! not corslet’s ward,

  Not truth, as diamond pure and hard,

  Could be thy manly bosom’s guard,

  On yon disastrous day!’-

  She raised her eyes in mournful mood,-

  WILTON himself before her stood!

  It might have seem’d his passing ghost,

  For every youthful grace was lost;

  And joy unwonted, and surprise,

  Gave their strange wildness to his eyes.-

  Expect not, noble dames and lords,

  That I can tell such scene in words:

  What skilful limner e’er would choose

  To paint the rainbow’s varying hues,

  Unless to mortal it were given

  To dip his brush in dyes of heaven?

  Far less can my weak line declare

  Each changing passion’s shade;

  Brightening to rapture from despair,

  Sorrow, surprise, and pity there,

  And joy, with her angelic air,

  And hope, that paints the future fair,

  Their varying hues display’d:

  Each o’er its rival’s ground extending,

  Alternate conquering, shifting, blending,

  Till all, fatigued, the conflict yield,

  And mighty Love retains the field,

  Shortly I tell what then he said,

  By many a tender word delay’d,

  And modest blush, and bursting sigh,

  And question kind, and fond reply:-

  VI.

  De Wilton’s History.

  ‘Forget we that disastrous day,

  When senseless in the lists I lay.

  Thence dragg’d,-but how I cannot know,

  For sense and recollection fled,

  I found me on a pallet low,

  Within my ancient beadsman’s shed.

  Austin,-remember’st thou, my Clare,

  How thou didst blush, when the old man,

  When first our infant love began,

  Said we would make a matchless pair?-

  Menials, and friends, and kinsmen fled

  From the degraded traitor’s bed,-

  He only held my burning head,

  And tended me for many a day,

  While wounds and fever held their sway.

  But far more needful was his care,

  When sense return’d to wake despair;

  For I did tear the closing wound,

  And dash me frantic on the ground,

  If e’er I heard the name of Clare.

  At length, to calmer reason brought,

  Much by his kind attendance wrought,

  With him I left my native strand,

  And, in a Palmer’s weeds array’d

  My hated name and form to shade,

  I journey’d many a land;

  No more a lord of rank and birth,

  But mingled with the dregs of earth.

  Oft Austin for my reason fear’d,

  When I would sit, and deeply brood

  On dark revenge, and deeds of blood,

  Or wild mad schemes uprear’d.

  My friend at length fell sick, and said,

  God would remove him soon:

  And, while upon his dying bed,

  He begg’d of me a boon-

  If e’er my deadliest enemy

  Beneath my brand should conquer’d lie,

  Even then my mercy should awake,

  And spare his life for Austin’s sake.

  VII.

  ‘Still restless as a second Cain,

  To Scotland next my route was ta’en,

  Full well the paths I knew.

  Fame of my fate made various sound,

  That death in pilgrimage I found,

  That I had perish’d of my wound,-

  None cared which tale was true:

  And living eye could never guess

  De Wilton in his Palmer’s dress;

  For now that sable slough is shed,

  And trimm’d my shaggy beard and head,

  I scarcely know me in the glass.

  A chance most wondrous did provide,

  That I should be that Baron’s guide-

  I will not name his name!-

  Vengeance to God alone belongs;

  But, when I think on all my wrongs,

  My blood is liquid flame!

  And ne’er the time shall I forget,

  When in a Scottish hostel set,

  Dark looks we did exchange:

  What were his thoughts I cannot tell;

  But in my bosom muster’d Hell

  Its plans of dark revenge.

  VIII.

  ‘A word of vulgar augury,

  That broke from me, I scarce knew why,

  Brought on a village tale;

  Which wrought upon his moody sprite,

  And sent him armed forth by night.

  I borrow’d steed and mail,

  And weapons, from his sleeping band;

  And, passing from a postern door,

  We met, and ‘counter’d, hand to hand,-

  He fell on Gifford-moor.

  For the death-stroke my brand I drew,

 
(O then my helmed head he knew,

  The Palmer’s cowl was gone,)

  Then had three inches of my blade

  The heavy debt of vengeance paid,-

  My hand the thought of Austin staid;

  I left him there alone.-

  O good old man! even from the grave,

  Thy spirit could thy master save:

  If I had slain my foeman, ne’er

  Had Whitby’s Abbess, in her fear,

  Given to my hand this packet dear,

  Of power to clear my injured fame,

  And vindicate De Wilton’s name.-

  Perchance you heard the Abbess tell

  Of the strange pageantry of Hell,

  That broke our secret speech-

  It rose from the infernal shade,

  Or featly was some juggle play’d,

  A tale of peace to teach.

  Appeal to Heaven I judged was best,

  When my name came among the rest.

  IX.

  ‘Now here, within Tantallon Hold,

  To Douglas late my tale I told,

  To whom my house was known of old.

  Won by my proofs, his falchion bright

  This eve anew shall dub me knight.

  These were the arms that once did turn

  The tide of fight on Otterburne,

  And Harry Hotspur forced to yield,

  When the Dead Douglas won the field.

  These Angus gave-his armourer’s care,

  Ere morn, shall every breach repair;

  For nought, he said, was in his halls,

  But ancient armour on the walls,