INTRODUCTION TO CANTO THIRD.
To William Erskine, Esq.1
Ashestiel, Ettrick Forest.
LIKE April morning clouds, that pass,
With varying shadow, o'er the grass,
And imitate, on field and furrow,
Life's chequer'd scene of joy and sorrow;
Like streamlet of the mountain north,
Now in a torrent racing forth,
Now winding slow its silver train,
And almost slumbering on the plain;
Like breezes of the autumn day,
Whose voice inconstant dies away,
And ever swells again as fast,
When the ear deems its murmur past;
1 William Erskine, Esq., advocate, Sheriff-depute of the Orkneys, became a Judge of the Court of Session by the title of Lord Kinnedder, and died at Edinburgh in August, 1822. He had been from early youth the most intimate of the Poet's friends, and his chief confidant and adviser as to all literary matters. See a notice of his life and character by the late Mr. Hay Donaldson, to which Sir Walter Scott contributed several paragraphs.- Ed.
Thus various, my romantic theme
Flits, winds, or sinks, a morning dream.
Yet pleased, our eye pursues the trace
Of Light and Shade's inconstant race;
Pleased, views the rivulet afar,
Weaving its maze irregular;
And pleased, we listen as the breeze
Heaves its wild sigh through Autumn trees;
Then, wild as cloud, or stream, or gale,
Flow on, flow unconfined, my Tale!
Need I to thee, dear Erskine, tell
I love the license all too well,
In sounds now lowly, and now strong,
To raise the desultory song? -1
Oft, when 'mid such capricious chime,
Some transient fit of lofty rhyme
To thy kind judgment seem'd excuse
For many an error of the muse,
Oft hast thou said, "If, still misspent,
Thine hours to poetry are lent,2
Go, and to tame thy wandering course,
Quaff from the fountain at the source;
Approach those masters, o'er whose tomb
Immortal laurels ever bloom:
Instructive of the feebler bard,
Still from the grave their voice is heard;
1 MS." With sound now lowly, and now higher, Irregular to wake the lyre."
2 MS. "Thine hours to thriftless rhyme are lent."
From them, and from the paths they show'd, Choose honour'd guide and practised road; Nor ramble on through brake and maze, With harpers rude of barbarous days.
"Or deem'st thou not our later time1 Yields topic meet for classic rhyme? Hast thou no elegiac verse
For Brunswick's venerable hearse?
What! not a line, a tear, a sigh,
When valour bleeds for liberty?—
Oh, hero of that glorious time,
When, with unrivall'd light sublime, —
Though martial Austria, and though all
The might of Russia, and the Gaul,
Though banded Europe stood her foes-
The star of Brandenburgh arose !
Thou couldst not live to see her beam
For ever quench'd in Jena's stream.
Lamented Chief!-it was not given
To thee to change the doom of Heaven,
And crush that dragon in its birth,
Predestined scourge of guilty earth.
1 MS.-"Dost thou not deem our later day Yields topic meet for classic lay?
Hast thou no elegiac tone
To join that universal moan,
Which mingled with the battle's yell,
Where venerable Brunswick fell ?-
What! not a verse, a tear, a sigh,
When valour bleeds for liberty?"
- not thine the power,
To save in that presumptuous hour,
When Prussia hurried to the field,
And snatch'd the spear, but left the shield!
Valour and skill 'twas thine to try,
And, tried in vain, 'twas thine to die.
Ill had it seem'd thy silver hair
The last, the bitterest pang to share,
For princedoms reft, and scutcheons riven,
And birthrights to usurpers given ;
Thy land's, thy children's wrongs to feel,
And witness woes thou couldst not heal!
On thee relenting Heaven bestows
For honour'd life an honour'd close;1
And when revolves, in time's sure change,
The hour of Germany's revenge,
When, breathing fury for her sake,
Some new Arminius shall awake,
1 MS.-"For honour'd life an honour'd close-
The boon which falling heroes crave,
A soldier's death, a warrior's grave.
Or if, with more exulting swell,
Of conquering chiefs thou lovest to tell,
Give to the harp an unheard strain,
And sing the triumphs of the main
Of him the Red-Cross hero teach,
Dauntless on Acre's bloody breach,
And, scorner of tyrannic power,
As dauntless in the Temple's tower :
Alike to him the sea, the shore,
The brand, the bridle, or the oar,
The general's eye, the pilot's art,
The soldier's arm, the sailor's heart.
Or if to touch such chord be thine," etc.
Her champion, ere he strike, shall come
To whet his sword on Brunswick's tomb.
"Or of the Red-Cross hero 1 teach Dauntless in dungeon as on breach Alike to him the sea, the shore, The brand, the bridle, or the oar: Alike to him the war that calls Its votaries to the shatter'd walls, Which the grim Turk, besmear'd with blood, Against the Invincible made good;
Or that, whose thundering voice could wake
The silence of the polar lake,
When stubborn Russ, and metal'd Swede,
On the warp'd wave their death-game play'd;
Or that, where Vengeance and Affright
Howl'd round the father of the fight,
Who snatch'd, on Alexandria's sand,
The conqueror's wreath with dying hand.2
'Or, if to touch such chord be thine, Restore the ancient tragic line,
And emulate the notes that rung
From the wild harp, which silent hung
By silver Avon's holy shore,
Till twice an hundred years roll'd o'er;
When she, the bold Enchantress,3 came,
With fearless hand and heart on flame!
From the pale willow snatch'd the treasure,
And swept it with a kindred measure,
1 Sir Sidney Smith.
8 Joanna Baillie.
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