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Worth splendid chair and canopy;

       Nor would my footstep spring more gay

       In courtly dance than blithe strathspey,

       Nor half so pleased mine ear incline

       To royal minstrel’s lay as thine.

       And then for suitors proud and high,

       To bend before my conquering eye,—

       Thou, flattering bard! thyself wilt say,

       That grim Sir Roderick owns its sway.

       The Saxon scourge, Clan-Alpine’s pride,

       The terror of Loch Lomond’s side,

       Would, at my suit, thou know’st, delay

       A Lennox foray—for a day.’—

       XII

      The ancient bard her glee repressed:

       ‘Ill hast thou chosen theme for jest!

       For who, through all this western wild,

       Named Black Sir Roderick e’er, and smiled?

       In Holy-Rood a knight he slew;

       I saw, when back the dirk he drew,

       Courtiers give place before the stride

       Of the undaunted homicide;

       And since, though outlawed, hath his hand

       Full sternly kept his mountain land.

      Who else dared give—ah! woe the day,

       That I such hated truth should say!—

       The Douglas, like a stricken deer,

       Disowned by every noble peer,

       Even the rude refuge we have here?

       Alas, this wild marauding

       Chief Alone might hazard our relief,

       And now thy maiden charms expand,

       Looks for his guerdon in thy hand;

       Full soon may dispensation sought,

       To back his suit, from Rome be brought.

       Then, though an exile on the hill,

       Thy father, as the Douglas, still

       Be held in reverence and fear;

       And though to Roderick thou’rt so dear

       That thou mightst guide with silken thread.

       Slave of thy will, this chieftain dread,

       Yet, O loved maid, thy mirth refrain!

       Thy hand is on a lion’s mane.’—

       XIII

      Minstrel,’ the maid replied, and high

       Her father’s soul glanced from her eye,

       ‘My debts to Roderick’s house I know:

       All that a mother could bestow

       To Lady Margaret’s care I owe,

       Since first an orphan in the wild

       She sorrowed o’er her sister’s child;

       To her brave chieftain son, from ire

       Of Scotland’s king who shrouds my sire,

       A deeper, holier debt is owed;

       And, could I pay it with my blood, Allan!

       Sir Roderick should command

       My blood, my life,—but not my hand.

       Rather will Ellen Douglas dwell

       A votaress in Maronnan’s cell;

       Rather through realms beyond the sea,

       Seeking the world’s cold charity

       Where ne’er was spoke a Scottish word,

       And ne’er the name of Douglas heard

       An outcast pilgrim will she rove,

       Than wed the man she cannot love.

       XIV

      ‘Thou shak’st, good friend, thy tresses gray,—

       That pleading look, what can it say

       But what I own?—I grant him brave,

       But wild as Bracklinn’s thundering wave;

       And generous, –save vindictive mood

       Or jealous transport chafe his blood:

       I grant him true to friendly band,

       As his claymore is to his hand;

       But O! that very blade of steel

       More mercy for a foe would feel:

       I grant him liberal, to fling

       Among his clan the wealth they bring,

       When back by lake and glen they wind,

       And in the Lowland leave behind,

       Where once some pleasant hamlet stood,

       A mass of ashes slaked with blood.

       The hand that for my father fought

       I honor, as his daughter ought;

       But can I clasp it reeking red

       From peasants slaughtered in their shed?

       No! wildly while his virtues gleam,

       They make his passions darker seem,

       And flash along his spirit high,

       Like lightning o’er the midnight sky.

       While yet a child,—and children know,

       Instinctive taught, the friend and foe,—

       I shuddered at his brow of gloom,

       His shadowy plaid and sable plume;

       A maiden grown, I ill could bear

       His haughty mien and lordly air:

       But, if thou join’st a suitor’s claim,

       In serious mood, to Roderick’s name.

       I thrill with anguish! or, if e’er

       A Douglas knew the word, with fear.

       To change such odious theme were best,—

       What think’st thou of our stranger guest? ‘—

       XV

      ‘What think I of him?—woe the while

       That brought such wanderer to our isle!

       Thy father’s battle-brand, of yore

       For Tineman forged by fairy lore,

       What time he leagued, no longer foes

       His Border spears with Hotspur’s bows,

       Did, self-unscabbarded, foreshow

       The footstep of a secret foe.

       If courtly spy hath harbored here,

       What may we for the Douglas fear?

       What for this island, deemed of old

       Clan-Alpine’s last and surest hold?

       If neither spy nor foe, I pray

       What yet may jealous Roderick say?—

       Nay, wave not thy disdainful head!

       Bethink thee of the discord dread

       That kindled when at Beltane game

       Thou least the dance with Malcolm Graeme;

       Still, though thy sire the peace renewed

       Smoulders in Roderick’s breast the feud:

       Beware!—But hark! what sounds are these?

      

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