Harp of the North!1 that moldering long hast hung
On the witch-elm2 that shades St. Fillan’s3 spring,
And down the fitful breeze thy numbers flung,
Till envious ivy did around thee cling,
Muffling with verdant ringlet every string, —
O minstrel Harp! still must thine accents sleep?
Mid rustling leaves and fountain’s murmuring,
Still must thy sweeter sounds their silence keep,
Nor bid a warrior smile, nor teach a maid to weep?
Not thus, in ancient days of Caledon,4
Was thy voice mute amid the festal crowd,
When lay of hopeless love, or glory won,
Aroused the fearful, or subdued the proud.
At each according pause, was heard aloud
Thine ardent symphony sublime and high!
Fair dames and crested chiefs attention bow’d;
For still the burden of thy minstrelsy
Was Knighthood’s dauntless deed, and Beauty’s matchless eye.
Oh, wake once more! how rude soe’er the hand
That ventures o’er thy magic maze to stray;
Oh, wake once more! though scarce my skill command
Some feeble echoing of thine earlier lay:
Though harsh and faint, and soon to die away,
And all unworthy of thy nobler strain,
Yet if one heart throb higher at its sway,
The wizard note has not been touch’d in vain.
Then silent be no more! Enchantress, wake again!
The stag at eve had drunk his fill,
Where danced the moon on Monan’s5 rill,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney’s hazel shade;
But, when the sun his beacon red
Had kindled on Benvoirlich’s head,
The deep-mouth’d bloodhound’s heavy bay
Resounded up the rocky way,
And faint, from farther distance borne,
Were heard the clanging hoof and horn.
As Chief, who hears his warder7 call,
“To arms! the foemen storm the wall,”
The antler’d monarch of the waste
Sprung from his heathery8 couch in haste.
But, ere his fleet career he took,
The dewdrops from his flanks he shook;
Like crested leader proud and high,
Toss’d his beam’d9 frontlet to the sky;
A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuff’d the tainted gale,10
A moment listen’d to the cry,
That thicken’d as the chase drew nigh;
Then, as the headmost foes appear’d,
With one brave bound the copse he clear’d,
And, stretching forward free and far,
Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var.
Yell’d on the view the opening12 pack;
Rock, glen, and cavern, paid them back;
To many a mingled sound at once
The awaken’d mountain gave response.
A hundred dogs bay’d deep and strong,
Clatter’d a hundred steeds along,
Their peal the merry horns rung out,
A hundred voices join’d the shout;
With hark and whoop and wild halloo,
No rest Benvoirlich’s echoes knew.
Far from the tumult fled the roe,
Close in her covert cower’d the doe,
The falcon, from her cairn on high,
Cast on the rout13 a wondering eye,
Till far beyond her piercing ken14
The hurricane had swept the glen.
Faint, and more faint, its failing din
Return’d from cavern, cliff, and linn,15
And silence settled, wide and still,
On the lone wood and mighty hill.
Less loud the sounds of silvan war
Disturb’d the heights of Uam-Var,
And roused the cavern, where, ’tis told,
A giant made his den of old;
For ere that steep ascent was won,
High in his pathway hung the sun,
And many a gallant, stay’d perforce,
Was fain to breathe his faltering horse,
And of the trackers of the deer,
Scarce half the lessening pack was near;
So shrewdly16 on the mountain side
Had the bold burst their mettle tried.
The noble stag was pausing now
Upon the mountain’s southern brow,
Where broad extended, far beneath,
The varied realms of fair Menteith.17
With anxious eye he wander’d o’er
Mountain and meadow, moss and moor,
And ponder’d refuge from his toil,
By far Lochard or Aberfoyle.
But nearer was the copsewood gray,
That waved and wept on Loch Achray,
And mingled with the pine trees blue
On the bold cliffs of Benvenue.
Fresh vigor with the hope return’d,
With flying foot the heath he spurn’d,
Held westward with unwearied race,
And left behind the panting chase.
’Twere long to tell what steeds gave o’er,
As swept the hunt through Cambus-more;18
What reins were tighten’d in despair,
When rose Benledi’s ridge in air;
Who flagg’d upon Bochastle’s heath,
Who shunn’d to stem the flooded Teith, —
For twice that day, from shore to shore,
The gallant stag swam stoutly o’er.
Few were the stragglers, following far,
That reach’d the lake of Vennachar;
And when the Brigg19 of Turk was won,
The headmost horseman rode alone.
Alone, but with unbated zeal,
That horseman plied the scourge and steel;20
For jaded now, and spent with toil,
Emboss’d with foam, and dark with soil,
While every gasp with sobs he drew,
The laboring stag strain’d full in view.
Two dogs of black St. Hubert’s breed,
Unmatch’d for courage, breath, and speed,
Fast on his flying traces came,
And all but won that desperate game;
For, scarce a spear’s length from his haunch,
Vindictive toil’d the bloodhounds stanch,
Nor nearer might the dogs attain,
Nor farther might the quarry strain.
Thus up the margin of the lake,
Between the precipice and brake,21
O’er stock22 and rock their race they take.
The Hunter mark’d that mountain23 high,
The lone lake’s western boundary,
And deem’d the stag must turn to bay,24
Where that huge rampart barr’d the way;
Already glorying in the prize,
Measured his antlers with his eyes;
For the death wound and death halloo,
Muster’d his breath, his whinyard drew; —
But thundering as he came prepared,
With ready arm and weapon bared,
The wily quarry shunn’d the shock,
And turn’d him from the opposing rock;
Then, dashing down a darksome glen,
Soon lost to hound and Hunter’s ken,
In the deep Trosachs’25 wildest nook
His solitary refuge took.
There, while close couch’d, the thicket shed
Cold dews and wild flowers on his head,
He heard the baffled dogs in vain
Rave through the hollow pass amain,
Chiding the rocks that yell’d26 again.
Close on the hounds the Hunter came,
To cheer them on the vanish’d game;
But, stumbling on27 the rugged dell,
The gallant horse exhausted fell.
The impatient rider strove in vain
To rouse him with the spur and rein,
For the good steed, his labors o’er,
Stretch’d his stiff limbs, to rise no more;
Then, touch’d with pity and remorse,
He sorrow’d o’er the expiring horse.
“I little thought, when first thy rein
I slack’d upon the banks of Seine,28
That Highland eagle e’er should feed
On thy fleet limbs, my matchless steed!
Woe worth29 the chase, woe worth the day,
That costs thy life, my gallant gray!”
Then through the dell his horn resounds,
From vain pursuit to call the hounds.
Back limp’d, with slow and crippled pace,
The sulky leaders of the chase;
Close to their master’s side they press’d,
With drooping tail and humbled crest;
But still the dingle’s hollow throat
Prolong’d the swelling bugle note.
The owlets started from their dream,
The eagles answer’d with their scream,
Round and around the sounds were cast
Till echo seem’d an answering blast;
And on the Hunter hied his way,30
To join some comrades of the day;
Yet often paused, so strange the road,
And wondrous were the scenes it show’d.
The western waves of ebbing day
Roll’d o’er the glen their level way;31
Each purple peak, each flinty spire,
Was bathed in floods of living fire.
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below,
Where twined the path in shadow hid,
Round many a rocky pyramid,
Shooting abruptly from the dell
Its thunder-splinter’d pinnacle;
Round many an insulated32 mass,
The native bulwarks of the pass,
Huge as the tower33 which builders vain
Presumptuous piled on Shinar’s plain.
The rocky summits, split and rent,
Form’d turret, dome, or battlement,
Or seem’d fantastically set
With cupola or minaret,
Wild crests as pagod34 ever deck’d,
Or mosque of Eastern architect.
Nor were these earth-born castles bare,
Nor lack’d they many a banner fair;
For, from their shiver’d brows display’d,
Far o’er the unfathomable glade,
All twinkling with the dewdrop sheen,35
The brier-rose fell in streamers green,
And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes,
Waved in the west wind’s summer sighs.
Boon36 nature scatter’d, free and wild,
Each plant or flower, the mountain’s child.
Here eglantine embalm’d the air,
Hawthorn and hazel mingled there;
The primrose pale and violet flower,
Found in each cleft a narrow bower;
Foxglove and nightshade, side by side,
Emblems of punishment and pride,
Group’d their dark hues with every stain
The weather-beaten crags retain.
With boughs that quaked at every breath,
Gray birch and aspen37 wept beneath;
Aloft, the ash and warrior oak
Cast anchor in the rifted rock;
And, higher yet, the pine tree hung
His shatter’d trunk, and frequent flung,
Where seem’d the cliffs to meet on high,
His boughs athwart the narrow’d sky.
Highest of all, where white peaks glanced,
Where glist’ning streamers waved and danced,
The wanderer’s eye could barely view
The summer heaven’s delicious blue;
So wondrous wild, the whole might seem
The scenery of a fairy dream.
Onward, amid the copse ’gan peep
A narrow inlet, still and deep,
Affording scarce such breadth of brim
As served the wild duck’s brood to swim.
Lost for a space, through thickets veering,
But broader when again appearing,
Tall rocks and tufted knolls their face
Could on the dark-blue mirror trace;
And farther as the Hunter stray’d,
Still broader sweep its channel made.
The shaggy mounds no longer stood,
Emerging from the tangled wood,
But, wave-encircled, seem’d to float,
Like castle girdled with its moat;
Yet broader floods extending still
Divide them from their parent hill,
Till each, retiring, claims to be
An islet in an inland sea.
And now, to issue from the glen,
No pathway meets the wanderer’s ken,
Unless he climb, with footing nice,38
A far projecting precipice.
The broom’s39 tough roots his ladder made,
The hazel saplings lent their aid;
And thus an airy point he won,
Where, gleaming with the setting sun,
One burnish’d sheet of living gold,
Loch Katrine lay beneath him roll’d,
In all her length far winding lay,
With promontory, creek, and bay,
And islands that, empurpled bright,40
Floated amid the livelier light,
And mountains, that like giants stand,
To sentinel enchanted land.
High on the south, huge Benvenue
Down on the lake in masses threw
Crags, knolls, and mounds, confusedly hurl’d,
The fragments of an earlier world;
A wildering forest feather’d o’er
His ruin’d sides and summit hoar,
While on the north, through middle air,
Ben-an41 heaved high his forehead bare.
From the steep promontory gazed
The stranger, raptured and amazed,
And, “What a scene were here,” he cried,
“For princely pomp, or churchman’s pride!
On this bold brow, a lordly tower;
In that soft vale, a lady’s bower;
On yonder meadow, far away,
The turrets of a cloister gray;
How blithely might the bugle horn
Chide, on the lake, the lingering morn!
How sweet, at eve, the lover’s lute
Chime, when the groves were still and mute!
And, when the midnight moon should lave
Her forehead in the silver wave,
How solemn on the ear would come
The holy matins’42 distant hum,
While the deep peal’s commanding tone
Should wake, in yonder islet lone,
A sainted hermit from his cell,
To drop a bead43 with every knell —
And bugle, lute, and bell, and all,
Should each bewilder’d stranger call
To friendly feast, and lighted hall.
“Blithe were it then to wander here!
But now, – beshrew yon nimble deer, —
Like that same hermit’s, thin and spare,
The copse must give my evening fare;
Some mossy bank my couch must be,
Some rustling oak my canopy.
Yet pass we that; the war and chase
Give little choice of resting place; —
A summer night, in greenwood spent,
Were but to-morrow’s merriment:
But hosts may in these wilds abound,
Such as are better miss’d than found;
To meet with Highland plunderers here
Were worse than loss of steed or deer. —
I am alone; – my bugle strain
May call some straggler of the train;
Or, fall44 the worst that may betide,
Ere now this falchion has been tried.”
But scarce again his horn he wound,
When lo! forth starting at the sound,
From underneath an aged oak,
That slanted from the islet rock,
A damsel guider of its way,
A little skiff shot to the bay,
That round the promontory steep
Led its deep line in graceful sweep,
Eddying, in almost viewless wave,
The weeping willow twig to lave,
And kiss, with whispering sound and slow,
The beach of pebbles bright as snow.
The boat had touch’d this silver strand,
Just as the Hunter left his stand,
And stood conceal’d amid the brake,
To view this Lady of the Lake.
The maiden paused, as if again
She thought to catch the distant strain.
With head upraised, and look intent,
And eye and ear attentive bent,
And locks flung back, and lips apart,
Like monument of Grecian art,
In listening mood, she seem’d to stand,
The guardian Naiad45 of the strand.
And ne’er did Grecian chisel trace
A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace,46
Of finer form, or lovelier face!
What though the sun, with ardent frown,
Had slightly tinged her cheek with brown, —
The sportive toil, which, short and light,
Had dyed her glowing hue so bright,
Served too in hastier swell to show
Short glimpses of a breast of snow:
What though no rule of courtly grace
To measured mood had train’d her pace, —
A foot more light, a step more true,
Ne’er from the heath flower dash’d the dew,
E’en the slight harebell raised its head,
Elastic from her airy tread:
What though upon her speech there hung
The accents of the mountain tongue, —
Those silver sounds, so soft, so dear,
The list’ner held his breath to hear!
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