Introduction to Canto Fourth

      To JAMES SKENE, ESQ. Ashestiel, Ettrick Forest.

       Table of Contents

      An ancient minstrel sagely said,

       “Where is the life which late we led?”

       That motley clown in Arden wood,

       Whom humorous Jaques with envy viewed,

       Not even that clown could amplify,

       On this trite text, so long as I.

       Eleven years we now may tell,

       Since we have known each other well;

       Since, riding side by side, our hand,

       First drew the voluntary brand;

       And sure, through many a varied scene,

       Unkindness never came between.

       Away these winged years have flown,

       To join the mass of ages gone;

       And though deep marked, like all below,

       With checkered shades of joy and woe;

       Though thou o’er realms and seas hast ranged,

       Marked cities lost, and empires changed,

       While here, at home, my narrower ken

       Somewhat of manners saw, and men;

       Though varying wishes, hopes, and fears,

       Fevered the progress of these years,

       Yet now, days, weeks, and months but seem

       The recollection of a dream,

       So still we glide down to the sea

       Of fathomless eternity.

       Even now it scarcely seems a day,

       Since first I tuned this idle lay;

       A task so often thrown aside,

       When leisure graver cares denied,

       That now, November’s dreary gale,

       Whose voice inspired my opening tale,

       That same November gale once more

       Whirls the dry leaves on Yarrow shore.

       Their vexed boughs streaming to the sky,

       Once more our naked birches sigh,

       And Blackhouse heights, and Ettrick Pen,

       Have donned their wintry shrouds again:

       And mountain dark, and flooded mead,

       Bid us forsake the banks of Tweed.

       Earlier than wont along the sky,

       Mixed with the rack, the snow mists fly;

       The shepherd, who in summer sun,

       Had something of our envy won,

       As thou with pencil, I with pen,

       The features traced of hill and glen; -

       He who, outstretched the livelong day,

       At ease among the heath-flowers lay,

       Viewed the light clouds with vacant look,

       Or slumbered o’er his tattered book,

       Or idly busied him to guide

       His angle o’er the lessened tide; -

       At midnight now, the snowy plain

       Finds sterner labour for the swain.

       When red hath set the beamless sun,

       Through heavy vapours dark and dun;

       When the tired ploughman, dry and warm,

       Hears, half-asleep, the rising storm

       Hurling the hail, and sleeted rain,

       Against the casement’s tinkling pane;

       The sounds that drive wild deer, and fox,

       To shelter in the brake and rocks,

       Are warnings which the shepherd ask

       To dismal and to dangerous task.

       Oft he looks forth, and hopes, in vain,

       The blast may sink in mellowing rain;

       Till, dark above, and white below,

       Decided drives the flaky snow,

       And forth the hardy swain must go.

       Long, with dejected look and whine,

       To leave the hearth his dogs repine;

       Whistling and cheering them to aid,

       Around his back he wreathes the plaid:

       His flock he gathers, and he guides,

       To open downs, and mountainsides,

       Where, fiercest though the tempest blow,

       Least deeply lies the drift below.

       The blast that whistles o’er the fells,

       Stiffens his locks to icicles;

       Oft he looks back, while, streaming far,

       His cottage window seems a star -

       Loses its feeble gleam,—and then

       Turns patient to the blast again,

       And, facing to the tempest’s sweep,

       Drives through the gloom his lagging sheep.

       If fails