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And he, God wot, was forced to stand

       Oft for his right with blade in hand.

       This morning with Lord Moray’s train

       He chased a stalwart stag in vain,

       Outstripped his comrades, missed the deer,

       Lost his good steed, and wandered here.’

       XXX

      Fain would the Knight in turn require

       The name and state of Ellen’s sire.

       Well showed the elder lady’s mien

       That courts and cities she had seen;

       Ellen, though more her looks displayed

       The simple grace of sylvan maid,

       In speech and gesture, form and face,

       Showed she was come of gentle race.

       ‘T were strange in ruder rank to find

       Such looks, such manners, and such mind.

       Each hint the Knight of Snowdoun gave,

       Dame Margaret heard with silence grave;

       Or Ellen, innocently gay,

       Turned all inquiry light away:—

       ‘Weird women we! by dale and down

       We dwell, afar from tower and town.

       We stem the flood, we ride the blast,

       On wandering knights our spells we cast;

       While viewless minstrels touch the string,

       ‘Tis thus our charmed rhymes we sing.’

       She sung, and still a harp unseen

       Filled up the symphony between.

       XXXI

       Song.

      Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,

       Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking;

       Dream of battled fields no more,

       Days of danger, nights of waking.

       In our isle’s enchanted hall,

       Hands unseen thy couch are strewing,

       Fairy strains of music fall,

       Every sense in slumber dewing.

       Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,

       Dream of fighting fields no more;

       Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking,

       Morn of toil, nor night of waking.

      ‘No rude sound shall reach thine ear,

       Armor’s clang or war-steed champing

       Trump nor pibroch summon here

       Mustering clan or squadron tramping.

       Yet the lark’s shrill fife may come

       At the daybreak from the fallow,

       And the bittern sound his drum

       Booming from the sedgy shallow.

       Ruder sounds shall none be near,

       Guards nor warders challenge here,

       Here’s no war-steed’s neigh and champing,

       Shouting clans or squadrons stamping.’

       XXXII

      She paused,—then, blushing, led the lay,

       To grace the stranger of the day.

       Her mellow notes awhile prolong

       The cadence of the flowing song,

       Till to her lips in measured frame

       The minstrel verse spontaneous came.

       Song Continued.

      ‘Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done;

       While our slumbrous spells assail ye,

       Dream not, with the rising sun,

       Bugles here shall sound reveille.

       Sleep! the deer is in his den;

       Sleep! thy hounds are by thee lying;

       Sleep! nor dream in yonder glen

       How thy gallant steed lay dying.

       Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done;

       Think not of the rising sun,

       For at dawning to assail ye

       Here no bugles sound reveille.’

       XXXIII

      The hall was cleared,– the stranger’s bed,

       Was there of mountain heather spread,

       Where oft a hundred guests had lain,

       And dreamed their forest sports again.

       But vainly did the heath-flower shed

       Its moorland fragrance round his head;

       Not Ellen’s spell had lulled to rest

       The fever of his troubled breast.

       In broken dreams the image rose

       Of varied perils, pains, and woes:

       His steed now flounders in the brake,

       Now sinks his barge upon the lake;

       Now leader of a broken host,

       His standard falls, his honor’s lost.

       Then,—from my couch may heavenly might

       Chase that worst phantom of the night!—

       Again returned the scenes of youth,

       Of confident, undoubting truth;

       Again his soul he interchanged

       With friends whose hearts were long estranged.

       They come, in dim procession led,

       The cold, the faithless, and the dead;

       As warm each hand, each brow as gay,

       As if they parted yesterday.

       And doubt distracts him at the view,—

       O were his senses false or true?

       Dreamed he of death or broken vow,

       Or is it all a vision now?

       XXXIV

      At length, with Ellen in a grove

       He seemed to walk and speak of love;

       She listened with a blush and sigh,

       His suit was warm, his hopes were high.

       He sought her yielded hand to clasp,

       And a cold gauntlet met his grasp:

       The phantom’s sex was changed and gone,

       Upon its head a helmet shone;

       Slowly enlarged to giant size,

       With darkened cheek and threatening eyes,

       The grisly visage, stern and hoar,

       To Ellen still a likeness bore.—

       He woke, and, panting with affright,

       Recalled the vision of the night.

       The hearth’s decaying brands were red

       And deep and dusky lustre shed,

       Half showing, half concealing, all

       The uncouth trophies of the hall.

       Mid those the stranger fixed his eye

       Where that huge falchion hung on high,

       And thoughts on thoughts,

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