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'Bravely, old man, this health has sped,
But why does Allan trembling stand?
Come, drink remembrance of the dead,
And raise thy cup with firmer hand."

The crimson glow of Allan's face

Was turn'd at once to ghastly hue;
The drops of death each other chase
Adown in agonizing dew.

Thrice did he raise the goblet high,
And thrice his lips refused to taste;
For thrice he caught the stranger's eye
On his with deadly fury placed..

"And is it thus a brother hails

A brother's fond remembrance here?
If thus affection's strength prevails,
What might we not expect from fear?"

Roused by the sneer, he raised the bowl;
"Would Oscar now could share our mirth!"

Internal fear appall'd his soul,

He said, and dash'd the cup to earth.

"T is he! I hear my murderer's voice,"
Loud shrieks a darkly gleaming Form;
"A murderer's voice!" the roof replies,
And deeply swells the bursting storm.

The tapers wink, the chieftains shrink,
The stranger 's gone; amidst the crew
A Form was seen in tartan green,
And tall the shade terrific grew.

His waist was bound with a broad belt round,
His plume of sable stream'd on high;

But his breast was bare, with the red wounds there,
And fix'd was the glare of his glassy eye.

And thrice he smiled, with his eye so wild,
On Angus, bending low the knee;

And thrice he frown'd on a Chief on the ground,
Whom shivering crowds with horror see.

The bolts loud roll, from pole to pole,
The thunders through the welkin ring;

And the gleaming Form, through the mist of the storm,
Was borne on high by the whirlwind's wing.

Cold was the feast, the revel ceased;
Who lies upon the stony floor?
Oblivion press'd old Angus' breast;
At length his life-pulse throbs once more.

Ambition nerved young Allan's hand,
Exulting demons wing'd his dart,
While Envy waved her burning brand,
And pour'd her venom round his heart.

Swift is the shaft from Allan's bow;

Whose streaming life-blood stains his side? Dark Oscar's sable crest is low,

The dart has drunk his vital tide.

She bade his wounded pride rebel : Alas! that eyes which beam'd with love Should urge the soul to deeds of Hell.

Lo! seest thou not a lonely tomb,

Which rises o'er a warrior dead?

It glimmers through the twilight gloom;
Oh! that is Allan's nuptial bed.

Far, distant far, the noble grave,

Which held his clan's great ashes, stood;

And o'er his corse no banners wave,

For they were stain'd with kindred blood.

What minstrel grey, what hoary bard,

Shall Allan's deeds on harp-strings raise? The song is glory's chief reward,

But who can strike a murderer's praise?

1

Unstrung, untouch'd, the harp must stand,
No minstrel dare the theme awake;
Guilt would benumb his palsied hand,

His harp in shuddering chords would break.

No lyre of fame, no hallow'd verse,

Shall sound his glories high in air:

A dying father's bitter curse,

A brother's death-groan echoes there.

LINES ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG LADY.

[As the author was discharging his pistols in a garden, two ladies passing near the spot were alarmed by the sound of a bullet hissing near them; to one of whom the following stanzas were addressed the next morning.]*

DOUBTLESS, sweet girl! the hissing lead,
Wafting destruction o'er thy charms,
And hurtling + o'er thy iovely head,
Has fill'd that breast with fond alarms.

Surely some envious demon's force,
Vex'd to behold such beauty here,
Impell'd the bullet's viewless course,
Diverted from its first career.

Yes! in that nearly fatal hour

The ball obey'd some hell-born guide;
But Heaven, with interposing power,
In pity turn'd the death aside.

Yet, as perchance one trembling tear
Upon that thrilling bosom fell;
Which I, th' unconscious cause of fear,
Extracted from its glistening cell:

Say, what dire penance can atone
For such an outrage done to thee?
Arraign'd before thy beauty's throne,
What punishment wilt thou decree?

* The occurrence took place at Southwell, and the beautiful lady to whom the lines were addressed was Miss Houson.-E.

This word is used by Gray, in his poem to the Fatal Sisters :

"Iron sleet of arrowy shower

Hurtles through the darken'd air."

Might I perform the judge's part,
The sentence I should scarce deplore;
It only would restore a heart

Which but belong'd to thee before.

The least atonement I can make

Is to become no longer free;
Henceforth I breathe but for thy sake,
Thou shalt be all in all to me.

But thou, perhaps, may'st now reject
Such expiation of my guilt:
Come then, some other mode elect;
Let it be death, or what thou wilt.

Choose then, relentless! and I swear
Nought shall thy dread decree prevent;
Yet hold-one little word forbear!
Let it be aught but banishment.

TO A LADY

WHO PRESENTED TO THE AUTHOR A LOCK OF HAIR BRAIDED WITH HIS OWN, AND APPOINTED A NIGHT IN DECEMBER TO MEET HIM IN THE GARDEN.*

THESE locks, which fondly thus entwine,
In firmer chains our hearts confine,
Than all th' unmeaning protestations
Which swell with nonsense love orations.
Our love is fix'd, I think we 've proved it,
Nor time, nor place, nor art have moved it;
Then wherefore should we sigh and whine,
With groundless jealousy repine,
With silly whims and fancies frantic,
Merely to make our love romantic?

Why should you weep like Lydia Languish,
And fret with self-created anguish?
Or doom the lover you have chosen,
On winter nights to sigh half-frozen;
In leafless shades to sue for pardon,
Only because the scene 's a garden?

* See ante, p. 188, note.

For gardens seem, by one consent,
Since Shakspeare set the precedent,
Since Juliet first declared her passion,
To form the place of assignation.*
Oh! would some modern muse inspire,
And seat her by a sea-coal fire;
Or had the bard at Christmas written,
And laid the scene of love in Britain,
He surely in commiseration,

Had changed the place of declaration.
In Italy I've no objection;
Warm nights are proper for reflection;
But here our climate is so rigid,
That love itself is rather frigid:
Think on our chilly situation,
And curb this rage for imitation;
Then let us meet as oft we 've done,
Beneath the influence of the sun;
Or, if at midnight I must meet you,
Within your mansion let me greet you:
There we can love for hours together,
Much better, in such snowy weather,
Than placed in all th' Arcadian groves
That ever witness'd rural loves;
Then if my passion fail to please,
Next night I'll be content to freeze;
No more I'll give a loose to laughter,
But curse my fate for ever after. †

* In the above little piece the author has been accused by some candid readers of introducing the name of a lady from whom he was some hundred miles distant at the time this was written; and poor Juliet, who has slept so long in "the tomb of all the Capulets," has been converted, with a trifling alteration of her name, into an English damsel, walking in a garden of their own creation, during the month of December, in a village where the author never passed a winter. Such has been the candour of some ingenious critics. We would advise these liberal commentators on taste and arbiters of decorum to read Shakspeare.

† Having heard that a very severe and indelicate censure has been passed on the above poem, I beg leave to reply in a quotation from an admired work, "Carr's Stranger in France."-" As we were contemplating a painting on a large scale, in which, among other figures, is the uncovered whole length of a warrior, a prudishlooking lady, who seemed to have touched the age of desperation, after having attentively surveyed it through her glass, observed to her party, that there was a great deal of indecorum in that picture. Madame S. shrewdly whispered in my ear, 'that the indecorum was in the remark.'"