  THE GATHERING. I.Time rolls his ceaseless course. The race of yore, Who danced our infancy upon their knee, And told our marveling boyhood legends store, Of their strange ventures happ’d How are they blotted from the things that be! How few, all weak and wither’d of their force, Wait on the verge of dark eternity, Like stranded wrecks, the tide returning hoarse, To sweep them from our sight! Time rolls his ceaseless course. Yet live there still who How, when a mountain chief his bugle blew, Both field and forest, dingle, cliff, and dell, And solitary heath, the signal knew; And fast the faithful clan around him drew, What time What time aloft their kindred banner flew, While clamorous war pipes yell’d the gathering sound, And while the Fiery Cross II.The summer dawn’s reflected hue To purple changed Loch Katrine blue; Mildly and soft the western breeze Just kiss’d the lake, just stirr’d the trees; And the pleased lake, like maiden coy, Trembled but dimpled not for joy; The mountain shadows on her breast Were neither broken nor at rest; In bright uncertainty they lie, Like future joys to Fancy’s eye. The water lily to the light Her chalice rear’d of silver bright; The doe awoke, and to the lawn, Begemm’d with dewdrops, led her fawn; The gray mist left the mountain side, The torrent show’d its glistening pride; Invisible in flecked sky, The lark sent down her revelry; The blackbird and the speckled thrush Good-morrow gave from brake and bush; In answer coo’d the cushat dove Her notes of peace, and rest, and love. III.No thought of peace, no thought of rest, Assuaged the storm in Roderick’s breast. With sheathed broadsword in his hand, Abrupt he paced the islet strand, And eyed the rising sun, and laid His hand on his impatient blade. Was prompt the ritual With deep and deathful meaning fraught; For such Antiquity had taught Was preface meet, ere yet abroad The Cross of Fire should take its road. The shrinking band stood oft aghast At the impatient glance he cast;— Such glance the mountain eagle threw, As, from the cliffs of Benvenue, She spread her dark sails on the wind, And, high in middle heaven reclined, With her broad shadow on the lake, Silenced the warblers of the brake. IV.A heap of wither’d boughs was piled, Of juniper and rowan Mingled with shivers from the oak, Rent by the lightning’s recent stroke. Brian, the Hermit, by it stood, Barefooted, in his frock and hood. His grisled beard and matted hair Obscured a visage of despair; His naked arms and legs, seamed o’er, The scars of frantic penance bore. That monk, of savage form and face, The impending danger of his race Had drawn Far in Benharrow’s But Druid’s, Whose hardened heart and eye might brook On human sacrifice to look; And much, ’twas said, of heathen lore, Mixed in the charms he muttered o’er. The hallow’d creed gave only worse And deadlier emphasis of curse; No peasant sought that Hermit’s prayer, His cave the pilgrim shunn’d with care, The eager huntsman knew his bound, And in mid-chase called off his hound; Or if, in lonely glen or strath, The desert dweller met his path, He pray’d, and signed the cross between, While terror took devotion’s mien. V.Of Brian’s birth strange tales were told. His mother watch’d a midnight fold, Built deep within a dreary glen, Where scatter’d lay the bones of men, In some forgotten battle slain, And bleach’d by drifting wind and rain. It might have tamed a warrior’s heart, To view such mockery of his art! The knot-grass fetter’d there the hand, Which once could burst an iron band; Beneath the broad and ample bone, That buckler’d heart to fear unknown, A feeble and a timorous guest, The field-fare On the fleet limbs that mock’d at time; And there, too, lay the leader’s skull, Still wreathed with chaplet, flush’d and full, For heath-bell, with her purple bloom, Supplied the bonnet and the plume. All night, in this sad glen, the maid Sate, shrouded in her mantle’s shade: —She said, no shepherd sought her side, No hunter’s hand her snood untied, Yet ne’er again, to braid her hair, The virgin snood did Alice wear; Gone was her maiden glee and sport, Her maiden girdle all too short; Nor sought she, from that fatal night, Or holy church, or blessed rite, But lock’d her secret in her breast, And died in travail, unconfess’d. VI.Alone, among his young compeers, Was Brian from his infant years; A moody and heart-broken boy, Estranged from sympathy and joy, Bearing each taunt which careless tongue On his mysterious lineage flung. Whole nights he spent by moonlight pale, To wood and stream his hap to wail, Till, frantic, he as truth received What of his birth the crowd believed, And sought, in mist and meteor fire, To meet and know his Phantom Sire! In vain, to soothe his wayward fate, The cloister oped her pitying gate; In vain, the learning of the age Even in its treasures he could find Food for the fever of his mind. Eager he read whatever tells Of magic, cabala, And every dark pursuit allied To curious and presumptuous pride; Till, with fired brain and nerves o’erstrung, And heart with mystic horrors wrung, Desperate he sought Benharrow’s den, And hid him from the haunts of men. VII.The desert gave him visions wild, Such as might suit the specter’s child. Where with black cliffs the torrents toil, He watch’d the wheeling eddies boil, Till, from their foam, his dazzled eyes Beheld the River Demon The mountain mist took form and limb, Of noontide hag, or goblin grim; The midnight wind came wild and dread, Swell’d with the voices of the dead; Far on the future battle heath His eye beheld the ranks of death: Thus the lone Seer, from mankind hurl’d, Shaped forth a disembodied world. One lingering sympathy of mind Still bound him to the mortal kind; The only parent he could claim Of ancient Alpine’s lineage came. The fatal Ben-Shie’s Sounds, Of charging steeds, careering fast Along Benharrow’s shingly side, Where mortal horseman ne’er might ride; The thunderbolt had split the pine,— All augur’d ill to Alpine’s line. He girt his loins, and came to show The signals of impending woe, And now stood prompt to bless or ban, As bade the Chieftain of his clan. VIII.’Twas all prepared; A goat, the patriarch of the flock, Before the kindling pile was laid, And pierced by Roderick’s ready blade. Patient the sickening victim eyed The lifeblood ebb in crimson tide, Down his clogg’d beard and shaggy limb, Till darkness glazed his eyeballs dim. The grisly priest, with murmuring prayer, A slender crosslet form’d with care, A cubit’s The shaft and limbs were rods of yew, Whose parents in Inch-Cailliach Their shadows o’er Clan-Alpine’s grave, And, answering Lomond’s breezes deep, The Cross, thus form’d, he held on high, With wasted hand, and haggard eye, And strange and mingled feelings woke, While his anathema he spoke. IX.“Woe to the clansman who shall view This symbol of sepulchral yew, Forgetful that its branches grew Where weep the heavens their holiest dew On Alpine’s dwelling low! Deserter of his Chieftain’s trust, He ne’er shall mingle with their dust, But, from his sires and kindred thrust, Each clansman’s execration just Shall doom him wrath and woe.” He paused;—the word the vassals took, With forward step and fiery look, On high their naked brands they shook, Their clattering targets wildly strook; And first in murmur low, Then, like the billow in his course, That far to seaward finds his source, And flings to shore his muster’d force, Burst, with loud roar, their answer hoarse, “Woe to the traitor, woe!” Ben-an’s gray scalp the accents knew, The joyous wolf from covert drew, The exulting eagle scream’d afar,— They knew the voice of Alpine’s war. X.The shout was hush’d on lake and fell, The monk resumed his mutter’d spell: Dismal and low its accents came, The while he scathed And the few words that reach’d the air, Although the holiest name was there, Had more of blasphemy than prayer. But when he shook above the crowd Its kindled points, he spoke aloud:— “Woe to the wretch who fails to rear At this dread sign the ready spear! For, as the flames this symbol sear, His home, the refuge of his fear, A kindred fate shall know; Far o’er its roof the volumed flame Clan-Alpine’s vengeance shall proclaim, While maids and matrons on his name Shall call down wretchedness and shame, And infamy and woe.” Then rose the cry of females, shrill As goshawk’s whistle on the hill, Denouncing Mingled with childhood’s babbling trill Of curses stammer’d slow; Answering, with imprecation dread, “Sunk be his home in embers red! And cursed be the meanest shed That e’er shall hide the houseless head, We doom to want and woe!” A sharp and shrieking echo gave, And the gray pass where birches wave On Beala-nam-bo. XI.Then deeper paused the priest anew, And hard his laboring breath he drew, While, with set teeth and clinched hand, And eyes that glow’d like fiery brand, He meditated curse more dread, And deadlier, on the clansman’s head, Who, summon’d to his Chieftain’s aid, The signal saw and disobeyed. The crosslet’s points of sparkling wood He quenched among the bubbling blood, And, as again the sign he rear’d, Hollow and hoarse his voice was heard: "When flits this Cross from man to man, Vich-Alpine’s summons to his clan, Burst be the ear that fails to heed! Palsied the foot that shuns to speed! May ravens tear the careless eyes, Wolves make the coward heart their prize! As sinks that blood stream in the earth, So may his heart’s blood drench his hearth! As dies in hissing gore the spark, Quench thou his light, Destruction dark, And be the grace to him denied, Bought by this sign to all beside!" He ceased; no echo gave agen The murmur of the deep Amen. XII.Then Roderick, with impatient look, From Brian’s hand the symbol took: “Speed, Malise, speed!” he said, and gave The crosslet to his henchman brave. “The muster-place be Lanrick mead Instant the time—speed, Malise, speed!” Like heath bird, when the hawks pursue, A barge across Loch Katrine flew; High stood the henchman on the prow; So rapidly the barge-men row, The bubbles, where they launch’d the boat, Were all unbroken and afloat, Dancing in foam and ripple still, When it had near’d the mainland hill; And from the silver beach’s side Still was the prow three fathom wide, When lightly bounded to the land The messenger of blood and brand. XIII.XVI.CORONACH. He is gone on the mountain, He is lost to the forest, Like a summer-dried fountain, When our need was the sorest. The font, reappearing, From the raindrops shall borrow, But to us comes no cheering, To Duncan no morrow! The hand of the reaper Takes the ears that are hoary, But the voice of the weeper Wails manhood in glory. The autumn winds rushing Waft the leaves that are searest, But our flower was in flushing, When blighting was nearest. XVII.See Stumah, His master’s corpse with wonder eyed, Poor Stumah! whom his least halloo Bristles his crest, and points his ears, As if some stranger step he hears. ’Tis not a mourner’s muffled tread, Who comes to sorrow o’er the dead, But headlong haste, or deadly fear, Urge the precipitate career. All stand aghast:—unheeding all, The henchman bursts into the hall; Before the dead man’s bier he stood; Held forth the Cross besmear’d with blood: “The muster-place is Lanrick mead; Speed forth the signal! clansmen, speed!” XVIII.Angus, the heir of Duncan’s line, Sprung forth and seized the fatal sign. In haste the stripling to his side His father’s dirk and broadsword tied; But when he saw his mother’s eye Watch him in speechless agony, Back to her open’d arms he flew, Press’d on her lips a fond adieu— “Alas!” she sobb’d,—“and yet, begone, And speed thee forth, like Duncan’s son!” One look he cast upon the bier, Dash’d from his eye the gathering tear, Breathed deep to clear his laboring breast, And toss’d aloft his bonnet crest, Then, like the high-bred colt, when, freed, First he essays his fire and speed, He vanish’d, and o’er moor and moss Sped forward with the Fiery Cross. Suspended was the widow’s tear, While yet his footsteps she could hear; Wet with unwonted sympathy, “Kinsman,” she said, “his race is run, That should have sped thine errand on; The oak has fall’n,—the sapling bough Is all Duncraggan’s shelter now. Yet trust I well, his duty done, The orphan’s God will guard my son.— And you, in many a danger true, At Duncan’s hest To arms, and guard that orphan’s head! Let babes and women wail the dead.” Then weapon clang, and martial call, Resounded through the funeral hall, While from the walls the attendant band Snatch’d sword and targe, with hurried hand; And short and flitting energy Glanced from the mourner’s sunken eye, As if the sounds to warrior dear Might rouse her Duncan from his bier. But faded soon that borrow’d force; Grief claim’d his right, and tears their course. XIX.Benledi saw the Cross of Fire, It glanced like lightning up Strath-Ire. O’er dale and hill the summons flew, Nor rest nor pause young Angus knew; The tear that gather’d in his eye He left the mountain breeze to dry; Until, where Teith’s young waters roll, Betwixt him and a wooded knoll, That graced the sable strath with green, The chapel of St. Bride was seen. But Angus paused not on the edge; Though the dark waves danced dizzily, Though reel’d his sympathetic eye, He dash’d amid the torrent’s roar: His right hand high the crosslet bore, His left the poleax grasp’d, to guide And stay his footing in the tide. He stumbled twice—the foam splash’d high, With hoarser swell the stream raced by; And had he fall’n,—forever there, Farewell Duncraggan’s orphan heir! But still, as if in parting life, Firmer he grasp’d the Cross of strife, Until the opposing bank he gain’d, And up the chapel pathway strain’d. XX.A blithesome rout, that morning tide, Had sought the chapel of St. Bride. Her troth Tombea’s To Norman, heir of Armandave, And, issuing from the Gothic arch, The bridal In rude, but glad procession, came Bonneted sire and coif-clad dame; And plaided youth, with jest and jeer, Which snooded maiden would not hear; And children, that, unwitting Lent the gay shout their shrilly cry; And minstrels, that in measures vied Before the young and bonny bride, The tear and blush of morning rose. With virgin step, and bashful hand, She held the kerchief’s snowy band; The gallant bridegroom, by her side, Beheld his prize with victor’s pride, And the glad mother in her ear Was closely whispering word of cheer. XXI.Who meets them at the churchyard gate? The messenger of fear and fate! Haste in his hurried accent lies, And grief is swimming in his eyes. All dripping from the recent flood, Panting and travel-soil’d he stood, The fatal sign of fire and sword Held forth, and spoke the appointed word: “The muster-place is Lanrick mead— Speed forth the signal! Norman, speed!” And must he change so soon the hand, Just link’d to his by holy band, For the fell Cross of blood and brand? And must the day, so blithe that rose, And promised rapture in the close, Before its setting hour, divide The bridegroom from the plighted bride? O fatal doom!—it must! it must! Clan-Alpine’s cause, her Chieftain’s trust, Her summons dread, brook no delay; Stretch to the race—away! away! XXII.Yet slow he laid his plaid aside, And, lingering, eyed his lovely bride, Speak woe he might not stop to cheer; Then, trusting not a second look, In haste he sped him up the brook, Nor backward glanced, till on the heath Where Lubnaig’s lake supplies the Teith. —What in the racer’s bosom stirr’d? The sickening pang of hope deferr’d, And memory, with a torturing train Of all his morning visions vain. Mingled with love’s impatience, came The manly thirst for martial fame; The stormy joy of mountaineers, Ere yet they rush upon the spears; And zeal for Clan and Chieftain burning, And hope, from well-fought field returning, With war’s red honors on his crest, To clasp his Mary to his breast. Stung by such thoughts, o’er bank and brae, Like fire from flint he glanced away, While high resolve, and feeling strong, Burst into voluntary song. XXIII.SONG. The heath this night must be my bed, The bracken curtain for my head, My lullaby the warder’s tread, Far, far from love and thee, Mary; To-morrow eve, more stilly laid, My couch may be my bloody plaid, My vesper song thy wail, sweet maid! It will not waken me, Mary! The grief that clouds thy lovely brow; I dare not think upon thy vow, And all it promised me, Mary. No fond regret must Norman know; When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe, His heart must be like bended bow, His foot like arrow free, Mary. A time will come with feeling fraught, For, if I fall in battle fought, Thy hapless lover’s dying thought Shall be a thought of thee, Mary. And if return’d from conquer’d foes, How blithely will the evening close, How sweet the linnet sing repose, To my young bride and me, Mary! XXIV.Not faster o’er thy heathery braes, Balquhidder, speeds the midnight blaze, Rushing, in conflagration strong, Thy deep ravines and dells along, Wrapping thy cliffs in purple glow, And reddening the dark lakes below; Nor faster speeds it, nor so far, As o’er thy heaths the voice of war. The signal roused to martial coil The sullen margin of Loch Voil, Waked still Loch Doine, and to the source Alarm’d, Balvaig, thy swampy course; Thence southward turn’d its rapid road Till rose in arms each man might claim A portion in Clan-Alpine’s name, From the gray sire, whose trembling hand Could hardly buckle on his brand, To the raw boy, whose shaft and bow Were yet scarce terror to the crow. Each valley, each sequester’d glen, Muster’d its little horde of men, That met as torrents from the height In Highland dales their streams unite, Still gathering, as they pour along, A voice more loud, a tide more strong, Till at the rendezvous they stood By hundreds prompt for blows and blood; Each train’d to arms since life began, Owning no tie but to his clan, No oath, but by his Chieftain’s hand, No law, but Roderick Dhu’s command. XXV.That summer morn had Roderick Dhu Survey’d the skirts of Benvenue, And sent his scouts o’er hill and heath, To view the frontiers of Menteith. All backward came with news of truce; In Rednock No banner waved on Cardross On Duchray’s Nor scared the herons from Loch Con; All seemed at peace.—Now wot ye why The Chieftain, with such anxious eye, This western frontier scann’d with care?— In Benvenue’s most darksome cleft, A fair, though cruel, pledge was left; For Douglas, to his promise true, That morning from the isle withdrew, And in a deep sequester’d dell Had sought a low and lonely cell. By many a bard, in Celtic tongue, Has Coir-nan-Uriskin A softer name the Saxons gave, And called the grot the Goblin-cave. XXVI.It was a wild and strange retreat, As e’er was trod by outlaw’s feet. The dell, upon the mountain’s crest, Yawn’d like a gash on warrior’s breast; Its trench had stayed full many a rock, Hurl’d by primeval earthquake shock From Benvenue’s gray summit wild, And here, in random ruin piled, They frown’d incumbent o’er the spot, And form’d the rugged silvan grot. The oak and birch, with mingled shade, At noontide there a twilight made, Unless when short and sudden shone Some straggling beam on cliff or stone, With such a glimpse as prophet’s eye Gains on thy depth, Futurity. No murmur waked the solemn still, Save tinkling of a fountain rill; But when the wind chafed with the lake, A sullen sound would upward break, The incessant war of wave and rock. Suspended cliffs, with hideous sway, Seem’d nodding o’er the cavern gray. From such a den the wolf had sprung, In such the wild-cat leaves her young; Yet Douglas and his daughter fair Sought for a space their safety there. Gray Superstition’s whisper dread Debarr’d the spot to vulgar tread; For there, she said, did fays resort, And satyrs By moonlight tread their mystic maze, And blast the rash beholder’s gaze. XXVII.Now eve, with western shadows long, Floated on Katrine bright and strong, When Roderick, with a chosen few, Repass’d the heights of Benvenue. Above the Goblin-cave they go, Through the wild pass of Beal-nam-bo: The prompt retainers speed before, To launch the shallop from the shore, For ’cross Loch Katrine lies his way To view the passes of Achray, And place his clansmen in array. Yet lags the Chief in musing mind, Unwonted sight, his men behind. A single page, to bear his sword, Alone attended on his lord; The rest their way through thickets break, And soon await him by the lake. To view them from the neighboring height, By the low-level’d sunbeam’s light! For strength and stature, from the clan Each warrior was a chosen man, As even afar might well be seen, By their proud step and martial mien. Their feathers dance, their tartans float, Their targets gleam, as by the boat A wild and warlike group they stand, That well became such mountain strand. XXVIII.Their Chief, with step reluctant, still Was lingering on the craggy hill, Hard by where turn’d apart the road To Douglas’s obscure abode. It was but with that dawning morn, That Roderick Dhu had proudly sworn To drown his love in war’s wild roar, Nor think of Ellen Douglas more; But he who stems And fetters flame with flaxen band, Has yet a harder task to prove— By firm resolve to conquer love! Eve finds the Chief, like restless ghost, Still hovering near his treasure lost; For though his haughty heart deny A parting meeting to his eye, Still fondly strains his anxious ear, The accents of her voice to hear, And inly did he curse the breeze That waked to sound the rustling trees. It is the harp of Allan-Bane, That wakes its measure slow and high, Attuned to sacred minstrelsy. What melting voice attends the strings? ’Tis Ellen, or an angel, sings. XXIX.HYMN TO THE VIRGIN. Ave Maria! Listen to a maiden’s prayer! Thou canst hear though from the wild, Thou canst save amid despair. Safe may we sleep beneath thy care, Though banish’d, outcast, and reviled— Maiden! hear a maiden’s prayer! Mother, hear a suppliant child! Ave Maria! Ave Maria! undefiled! The flinty couch we now must share Shall seem with down of eider If thy protection hover there. The murky cavern’s heavy air Shall breathe of balm if thou hast smiled; Then, Maiden! hear a maiden’s prayer! Mother, list a suppliant child! Ave Maria! Foul demons of the earth and air, From this their wonted haunt exiled, Shall flee before thy presence fair. We bow us to our lot of care, Beneath thy guidance reconciled; Hear for a maid a maiden’s prayer! And for a father hear a child! Ave Maria! XXX.Died on the harp the closing hymn.— Unmoved in attitude and limb, As list’ning still, Clan-Alpine’s lord Stood leaning on his heavy sword, Until the page, with humble sign, Twice pointed to the sun’s decline. Then while his plaid he round him cast, “It is the last time—’tis the last,” He mutter’d thrice,—“the last time e’er That angel voice shall Roderick hear!” It was a goading thought—his stride Hied hastier down the mountain side; Sullen he flung him in the boat, And instant ’cross the lake it shot. They landed in that silvery bay, And eastward held their hasty way, Till, with the latest beams of light, The band arrived on Lanrick height, Where muster’d, in the vale below, Clan-Alpine’s men in martial show. XXXI.A various scene the clansmen made; Some sate, some stood, some slowly stray’d; But most, with mantles folded round, Were couch’d to rest upon the ground, From the deep heather where they lie, So well was match’d the tartan screen With heath bell dark and brackens green; Unless where, here and there, a blade, Or lance’s point, a glimmer made, Like glowworm twinkling through the shade. But when, advancing through the gloom, They saw the Chieftain’s eagle plume, Their shout of welcome, shrill and wide, Shook the steep mountain’s steady side. Thrice it arose, and lake and fell Three times return’d the martial yell; It died upon Bochastle’s plain, And Silence claim’d her evening reign. |
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