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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,

       Wrought with the badge of Scotland’s crown,

       The thistle brave, of old renown;

       His trusty blade, Toledo right,

       Descended from a baldric 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.

       IX

      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 shortlived pain,

       For monarchs seldom sigh in vain.

       I said he joyed in banquet bower;

       But, ‘mid his mirth, ‘twas often strange

       How suddenly his cheer would change,

       His look o’ercast and lower,

       If, in a sudden turn, he felt

       The pressure of his iron belt,

       That bound his breast in penance pain,

       In memory of his father slain.

       Even so ‘twas strange how, evermore,

       Soon as the passing pang was o’er

       Forward he rushed, with double glee,

       Into the stream of revelry:

       Thus dim-seen object of affright

       Startles the courser in his flight,

       And half he halts, half springs aside;

       But feels the quickening spur applied,

       And, straining on the tightened rein,

       Scours doubly swift o’er hill and plain.

       X

      O’er James’s heart, the courtiers say,

       Sir Hugh the Heron’s wife held sway:

       To Scotland’s Court she came,

       To be a hostage for her lord,

       Who Cessford’s gallant heart had gored,

       And with the king to make accord

       Had sent his lovely dame.

       Nor to that lady free alone

       Did the gay king allegiance own;

       For the fair Queen of France

       Sent him a turquoise ring and glove,

       And charged him, as her knight and love,

       For her to break a lance;

       And strike three strokes with Scottish brand,

       And march three miles on Southron land,

       And bid the banners of his band

       In English breezes dance.

       And thus for France’s queen he drest

       His manly limbs in mailed vest;

       And thus admitted English fair

       His inmost counsels still to share:

       And thus, for both, he madly planned

       The ruin of himself and land!

       And yet, the sooth to tell,

       Nor England’s fair, nor France’s Queen,

       Were worth one pearl-drop, bright and sheen,

       From Margaret’s eyes that fell,

       His own Queen Margaret, who, in Lithgow’s bower,

       All lonely sat, and wept the weary hour.

       XI

      The queen sits lone in Lithgow pile,

       And weeps the weary day,

       The war against her native soil,

       Her monarch’s risk in battle broil;

       And in gay Holyrood the while

       Dame Heron rises with a smile

       Upon the harp to play.

       Fair was her rounded arm, as o’er

       The strings her fingers flew;

       And as she touched and tuned them all,

       Ever her bosom’s rise and fall

       Was plainer given to view;

       For, all for heat, was laid aside

       Her wimple, and her hood untied.

       And first she pitched her voice to sing,

       Then glanced her dark eye on the king,

       And then around the silent ring;

       And laughed, and blushed, and oft did say

       Her pretty oath, By yea and nay,

       She could not, would not, durst not play!

       At length upon the harp with glee,

       Mingled with arch simplicity,

       A soft yet lively air she rung,

       While thus the wily lady sung: -

       XII.—LOCHINVAR

      Oh! young Lochinvar is come out of the west,

       Through all the wide Border his steed was the best;

       And save his good broadsword, he weapons had none,

       He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone;

       So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,

       There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

      He stayed not for brake, and he stopped not for stone;

       He swam the Esk river, where ford there was none;

       But ere he alighted at Netherby gate,

       The bride had consented, the gallant came late;

       For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war,

       Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

      So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall,

       Among bride’s-men, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all;

       Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword -

       For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word -

       “Oh! come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,

       Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?”

      “I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied;

       Love swells like the Solway,

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