The Brownie of Bodsbeck, and Other Tales (Vol. 1 of 2)

To Her, whose bounty oft hath shed
Joy round the peasant’s lowly bed,
When trouble press’d and friends were few,
And God and Angels only knew—
To Her, who loves the board to cheer,
And hearth of simple Cottager;
Who loves the tale of rural kind,
And wayward visions of his mind,
I dedicate, with high delight,
The themes of many a winter night.

What other name on Yarrow’s vale
Can Shepherd choose to grace his tale?
There other living name is none
Heard with one feeling,—one alone.
Some heavenly charm must name endear
That all men love, and all revere!
Even the rude boy of rustic form,
And robes all fluttering to the storm,
Whose roguish lip and graceless eye
Inclines to mock the passer by,
Walks by the Maid with softer tread,
And lowly bends his burly head,
Following with eye of milder ray
The gentle form that glides away.
The little school–nymph, drawing near,
Says, with a sly and courteous leer,
As plain as eye and manner can,
“Thou lov’st me—bless thee, Lady Anne!”
Even babes catch the beloved theme,
And learn to lisp their Lady’s name.

The orphan’s blessing rests on thee;
Happy thou art, and long shalt be!
’Tis not in sorrow, nor distress,
Nor Fortune’s power, to make thee less.
The heart, unaltered in its mood,
That joys alone in doing good,
And follows in the heavenly road,
And steps where once an Angel trode,—
The joys within such heart that burn,
No loss can quench, nor time o’erturn!
The stars may from their orbits bend,
The mountains rock, the heavens rend,—
The sun’s last ember cool and quiver,
But these shall glow, and glow for ever!

Then thou, who lov’st the shepherd’s home,
And cherishest his lowly dome,
O list the mystic lore sublime,
Of fairy tales of ancient time.
I learned them in the lonely glen,
The last abodes of living men;
Where never stranger came our way
By summer night, or winter day;
Where neighbouring hind or cot was none,
Our converse was with Heaven alone,
With voices through the cloud that sung,
And brooding storms that round us hung.

O Lady, judge, if judge you may,
How stern and ample was the sway
Of themes like these, when darkness fell,
And gray–hair’d sires the tales would tell!
When doors were barr’d, and eldron dame
Plied at her task beside the flame,
That through the smoke and gloom alone
On dim and umber’d faces shone—
The bleat of mountain goat on high,
That from the cliff came quavering by;
The echoing rock, the rushing flood,
The cataract’s swell, the moaning wood,
That undefined and mingled hum—
Voice of the desart, never dumb!—
All these have left within this heart
A feeling tongue can ne’er impart;
A wilder’d and unearthly flame,
A something that’s without a name.

And, Lady, thou wilt never deem
Religious tale offensive theme;
Our creeds may differ in degree,
But small that difference sure can be!
As flowers which vary in their dyes,
We all shall bloom in Paradise.
As sire who loves his children well,
The loveliest face he cannot tell,—
So ’tis with us. We are the same,
One faith, one Father, and one aim.

And had’st thou lived where I was bred,
Amid the scenes where martyrs bled,
Their sufferings all to thee endear’d
By those most honour’d and revered;
And where the wild dark streamlet raves,
Had’st wept above their lonely graves,
Thou would’st have felt, I know it true,
As I have done, and aye must do.
And for the same exalted cause,
For mankind’s right, and nature’s laws,
The cause of liberty divine,
Thy fathers bled as well as mine.

Then be it thine, O noble Maid,
On some still eve these tales to read;
And thou wilt read, I know full well,
For still thou lovest the haunted dell;
To linger by the sainted spring,
And trace the ancient fairy ring
Where moonlight revels long were held
In many a lone sequester’d field,
By Yarrow dens and Ettrick shaw,
And the green mounds of Carterhaugh.

O for one kindred heart that thought
As minstrel must, and lady ought,
That loves like thee the whispering wood,
And range of mountain solitude!
Think how more wild the greenwood scene,
If times were still as they have been;
If fairies, at the fall of even,
Down from the eye–brow of the heaven,
Or some aËrial land afar,
Came on the beam of rising star;
Their lightsome gambols to renew,
From the green leaf to quaff the dew,
Or dance with such a graceful tread,
As scarce to bend the gowan’s head!

Think if thou wert, some evening still,
Within thy wood of green Bowhill—
Thy native wood!—the forest’s pride!
Lover or sister by thy side;
In converse sweet the hour to improve
Of things below and things above,
Of an existence scarce begun,
And note the stars rise one by one.
Just then, the moon and daylight blending,
To see the fairy bands descending,
Wheeling and shivering as they came,
Like glimmering shreds of human frame;
Or sailing, ’mid the golden air,
In skiffs of yielding gossamer.

O, I would wander forth alone
Where human eye hath never shone,
Away o’er continents and isles
A thousand and a thousand miles,
For one such eve to sit with thee,
Their strains to hear and forms to see!
Absent the while all fears of harm,
Secure in Heaven’s protecting arm;
To list the songs such beings sung,
And hear them speak in human tongue;
To see in beauty, perfect, pure,
Of human face the miniature,
And smile of being free from sin,
That had not death impress’d within.
Oh, can it ever be forgot
What Scotland had, and now has not!

Such scenes, dear Lady, now no more
Are given, or fitted as before,
To eye or ear of guilty dust;
But when it comes, as come it must,
The time when I, from earth set free,
Shall turn the spark I fain would be;
If there’s a land, as grandsires tell,
Where Brownies, Elves, and Fairies dwell,
There my first visit shall be sped—
Journeyer of earth, go hide thy head!
Of all thy travelling splendour shorn,
Though in thy golden chariot borne!
Yon little cloud of many a hue
That wanders o’er the solar blue,
That curls, and rolls, and fleets away
Beyond the very springs of day,—
That do I challenge and engage
To be my travelling equipage,
Then onward, onward, far to steer,
The breeze of Heaven my charioteer;
The soul’s own energy my guide,
Eternal hope my all beside.
At such a shrine who would not bow!
Traveller of earth, where art thou now?

Then let me for these legends claim,
My young, my honour’d Lady’s name;
That honour is reward complete,
Yet I must crave, if not unmeet,
One little boon—delightful task
For maid to grant, or minstrel ask!

One day, thou may’st remember well,
For short the time since it befel,
When o’er thy forest–bowers of oak,
The eddying storm in darkness broke;
Loud sung the blast adown the dell,
And Yarrow lent her treble swell;
The mountain’s form grew more sublime,
Wrapt in its wreaths of rolling rime;
And Newark Cairn, in hoary shroud,
Appear’d like giant o’er the cloud:
The eve fell dark, and grimly scowl’d,
Loud and more loud the tempest howl’d;
Without was turmoil, waste, and din,
The kelpie’s cry was in the linn,
But all was love and peace within!
And aye, between, the melting strain
Pour’d from thy woodland harp amain,
Which, mixing with the storm around,
Gave a wild cadence to the sound.

That mingled scene, in every part,
Hath so impressed thy shepherd’s heart,
With glowing feelings, kindling bright
Some filial visions of delight,
That almost border upon pain,
And he would hear those strains again.
They brought delusions not to last,
Blending the future with the past;
Dreams of fair stems, in foliage new,
Of flowers that spring where others grew
Of beauty ne’er to be outdone,
And stars that rise when sets the sun;
The patriarchal days of yore,
The mountain music heard no more,
With all the scene before his eyes,
A family’s and a nation’s ties—
Bonds which the Heavens alone can rend,
With Chief, with Father, and with Friend.
No wonder that such scene refin’d
Should dwell on rude enthusiast’s mind!
Strange his reverse!—He little wist—
Poor inmate of the cloud and mist!
That ever he, as friend, should claim
The proudest Caledonian name.

J. H.

Eltrive Lake, April 1st, 1818.

THE BROWNIE OF BODSBECK.

Clyx.com