The Lady of the Lake. Walter Scott

When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe,

       His heart must be like bended bow,

       His foot like arrow free, Mary.

       A time will come with feeling fraught,

       For, if I fall in battle fought,

       Thy hapless lover's dying thought

       Shall be a thought on thee, Mary.

       And if returned from conquered foes,

       How blithely will the evening close,

       How sweet the linnet sing repose,

       To my young bride and me, Mary!

      XXIV.

       Not faster o'er thy heathery braes

       Balquidder, speeds the midnight blaze,

       Rushing in conflagration strong

       Thy deep ravines and dells along,

       Wrapping thy cliffs in purple glow,

       And reddening the dark lakes below;

       Nor faster speeds it, nor so far,

       As o'er thy heaths the voice of war.

       The signal roused to martial coil

       The sullen margin of Loch Voil,

       Waked still Loch Doine, and to the source

       Alarmed, Balvaig, thy swampy course;

       Thence southward turned its rapid road

       Adown Strath-Gartney's valley broad

       Till rose in arms each man might claim

       A portion in Clan-Alpine's name,

       From the gray sire, whose trembling hand

       Could hardly buckle on his brand,

       To the raw boy, whose shaft and bow

       Were yet scarce terror to the crow.

       Each valley, each sequestered glen,

       Mustered its little horde of men

       That met as torrents from the height

       In Highland dales their streams unite

       Still gathering, as they pour along,

       A voice more loud, a tide more strong,

       Till at the rendezvous they stood

       By hundreds prompt for blows and blood,

       Each trained to arms since life began,

       Owning no tie but to his clan,

       No oath but by his chieftain's hand,

       No law but Roderick Dhu's command.

      XXV.

       That summer morn had Roderick Dhu

       Surveyed the skirts of Benvenue,

       And sent his scouts o'er hill and heath,

       To view the frontiers of Menteith.

       All backward came with news of truce;

       Still lay each martial Graeme and Bruce,

       In Rednock courts no horsemen wait,

       No banner waved on Cardross gate,

       On Duchray's towers no beacon shone,

       Nor scared the herons from Loch Con;

       All seemed at peace.—Now wot ye wily

       The Chieftain with such anxious eye,

       Ere to the muster he repair,

       This western frontier scanned with care?—

       In Benvenue's most darksome cleft,

       A fair though cruel pledge was left;

       For Douglas, to his promise true,

       That morning from the isle withdrew,

       And in a deep sequestered dell

       Had sought a low and lonely cell.

       By many a bard in Celtic tongue

       Has Coir-nan-Uriskin been sung

       A softer name the Saxons gave,

       And called the grot the Goblin Cave.

      XXVI.

       It was a wild and strange retreat,

       As e'er was trod by outlaw's feet.

       The dell, upon the mountain's crest,

       Yawned like a gash on warrior's breast;

       Its trench had stayed full many a rock,

       Hurled by primeval earthquake shock

       From Benvenue's gray summit wild,

       And here, in random ruin piled,

       They frowned incumbent o'er the spot

       And formed the rugged sylvan "rot.

       The oak and birch with mingled shade

       At noontide there a twilight made,

       Unless when short and sudden shone

       Some straggling beam on cliff or stone,

       With such a glimpse as prophet's eye

       Gains on thy depth, Futurity.

       No murmur waked the solemn still,

       Save tinkling of a fountain rill;

       But when the wind chafed with the lake,

       A sullen sound would upward break,

       With dashing hollow voice, that spoke

       The incessant war of wave and rock.

       Suspended cliffs with hideous sway

       Seemed nodding o'er the cavern gray.

       From such a den the wolf had sprung,

       In such the wild-cat leaves her young;

       Yet Douglas and his daughter fair

       Sought for a space their safety there.

       Gray Superstition's whisper dread

       Debarred the spot to vulgar tread;

       For there, she said, did fays resort,

       And satyrs hold their sylvan court,

       By moonlight tread their mystic maze,

       And blast the rash beholder's gaze.

      XXVII.

       Now eve, with western shadows long,

       Floated on Katrine bright and strong,

       When Roderick with a chosen few

       Repassed the heights of Benvenue.

       Above the Goblin Cave they go,

       Through the wild pass of Beal-nam-bo;

       The prompt retainers speed before,

       To launch the shallop from the shore,

       For 'cross Loch Katrine lies his way

       To view the passes of Achray,

       And place his clansmen in array.

       Yet lags the Chief in musing mind,

       Unwonted sight, his men behind.

       A single page, to bear his sword,

       Alone attended on his lord;

       The rest their way through thickets break,

       And soon await him by the lake.

       It was a fair and gallant sight

       To view them from the neighboring height,

       By the low-levelled sunbeam's light!

       For strength and stature, from the clan

       Each warrior was a chosen man,

       As even afar might well be