| |
(From Scenes of Infancy)
WHERE Bortha hoarse, that loads the meads with sand, | |
| Rolls her red tide to Teviot’s western strand, | |
| Through slaty hills, whose sides are shagged with thorn, | |
| Where springs, in scattered tufts, the dark-green corn, | |
| Towers wood-girt Harden, far above the vale, | 5 |
| And clouds of ravens o’er the turrets sail. | |
| A hardy race, who never shrunk from war, | |
| The Scott, to rival realms a mighty bar, | |
| Here fixed his mountain-home;—a wide domain, | |
| And rich the soil, had purple heath been grain; | 10 |
| But what the niggard ground of wealth denied, | |
| From fields more blessed his fearless arm supplied. | |
| |
| The waning harvest-moon shone cold and bright; | |
| The warder’s horn was heard at dead of night; | |
| And as the massy portals wide were flung, | 15 |
| With stamping hoofs the rocky pavement rung. | |
| What fair, half-veiled, leans from her latticed hall, | |
| Where red the wavering gleams of torchlight fall? | |
| ’T is Yarrow’s fairest Flower, who, through the gloom, | |
| Looks, wistful, for her lover’s dancing plume. | 20 |
| Amid the piles of spoil, that strewed the ground, | |
| Her ear, all anxious, caught a wailing sound; | |
| With trembling haste the youthful matron flew, | |
| And from the hurried heaps an infant drew. | |
| |
| Scared at the light, his little hands he flung | 25 |
| Around her neck, and to her bosom clung; | |
| While beauteous Mary soothed, in accents mild, | |
| His fluttering soul, and clasped her foster child. | |
| Of milder mood the gentle captive grew, | |
| Nor loved the scenes that scared his infant view; | 30 |
| In vales remote, from camps and castles far, | |
| He shunned the fearful shuddering joy of war; | |
| Content the loves of simple swains to sing, | |
| Or wake to fame the harp’s heroic string. | |
| |
| His are the strains whose wandering echoes thrill | 35 |
| The shepherd, lingering on the twilight hill, | |
| When evening brings the merry folding hours, | |
| And sun-eyed daisies close their winking flowers. | |
| He lived o’er Yarrow’s Flower to shed the tear, | |
| To strew the holly leaves o’er Harden’s bier: | 40 |
| But none was found above the minstrel’s tomb, | |
| Emblem of peace, to bid the daisy bloom; | |
| He, nameless as the race from which he sprung, | |
| Saved other names, and left his own unsung. | |
| |
