IX

ROSABELLE.

O listen, listen, ladies gay!

No haughty feat of arms I tell; Soft is the note, and sad the lay

That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.

"Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew,
And, gentle lady, deign to stay!
Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.

"The blackening wave is edged with white;
To inch and rock the sea-mews fly;
The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite
Whose screams forbode that wreck is nigh.

"Last night the gifted seer did view

A wet shroud swathed round lady gay; Then stay thee, fair, in Ravensheuch; Why cross the gloomy firth to-day?"

""Tis not because Lord Lindesay's heir
To-night at Roslin leads the ball,
But that my lady-mother there
Sits lonely in her castle hall.

""Tis not because the ring they ride (And Lindesay at the ring rides well), But that my sire the wine will chide If 'tis not filled by Rosabelle."

O'er Roslin hall that dreary night

A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam; 'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light, And redder than the bright moonbeam.

It glared on Roslin's castled rock,

It ruddied all the copse-wood glen; 'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak, And seen from caverned Hawthornden.

Seemed all on fire that chapel proud
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffined lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud,
Sheathed in his iron panoply.

Seemed all on fire, within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar's pale;
Shone every pillar foliage-bound,

And glimmered all the dead men's mail.

Blazed battlement and pinnet high, Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair So still they blaze, when fate is nigh The lordly line of high St. Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold
Lie buried within that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold,

But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle !

And each St. Clair was buried there

With candle, with book, and with knell; But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.

SIR W. SCOTT.

X

SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT.

Southward with fleet of ice,
Sailed the corsair Death;

Wild and fast blew the blast,

And the east wind was his breath.

His lordly ships of ice

Glistened in the sun;

On each side, like pennons wide,
Flashing crystal streamlets run.

His sails of white sea-mist

Dripped with silver rain;

But where he passed, there were cast
Leaden shadows o'er the main.

C

Eastward from Campobello

Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed; Three days or more seaward he bore; Then, alas! the land-wind failed.

Alas! the land-wind failed,
And ice-cold grew the night;
And never more, on sea or shore,
Should Sir Humphrey see the light.

He sat upon the deck,

The Book was in his hand; "Do not fear! Heaven is as near," He said, “by water as by land!

In the first watch of the night,
Without a signal's sound,

Out of the sea, mysteriously,

The fleet of Death rose all around.

The moon and the evening star

Were hanging in the shrouds;

Every mast, as it passed,

Seemed to rake the passing clouds.

They grappled with their prize,

At midnight bleak and cold! As of a rock was the shock:

Heavily the ground-swell rolled.

Southward through day and dark,
They drift in close embrace,

With mist and rain, to the Spanish Main;
Yet there seems no change of place.

Southward, for ever southward,

They drift through dark and day;
And like a dream, in the Gulf Stream
Sinking, vanish all away.

LONGFELLOW.

ΧΙ

THE MOUNTAIN BOY.

The shepherd of the Alps am I!
The castles far below me lie;

Here first the ruddy sunlight gleams,

Here linger last the parting beams
The mountain boy am I!

Here is the river's fountain-head;
I drink it from its stony bed;

As forth it leaps with joyous shout

I seize it ere it gushes out.

The mountain boy am I!

The mountain is my own domain;
It calls its storms from sea and plain,
From north and south they howl afar;
My voice is heard amid their war.

The mountain boy am I!