II. FROM GUY MANNERING. THE NATIVITY CHANT. (BY MEG MERRILIES.) Sign wi' cross, and sain wi' mass. Trefoil, vervain, John's-wort, dill, Saint Bride and her brat, 1 THE SPINDLE SONG. (BY MEG MERRILIES.) TWIST ye, twine ye! even so While the mystic twist is spinning, Passions wild, and follies vain, Now they wax, and now they dwindle, THE GIPSY'S DIRGE. (BY MEG MERRILIES.) WASTED, weary, wherefore stay, Wrestling thus with earth and clay? From the body pass away ; Hark! the mass is singing. Fear not snowdrift driving fast, That shall ne'er know waking. Haste thee, haste thee, to be gone, Earth flits fast, and time draws on,Gasp thy gasp, and groan thy groan, Day is near the breaking. Open locks, end strife, Chap. XXVII. THE PROPHECY. (BY MEG MERRILIES.) THE dark shall be light, Shall meet on Ellangowan's height. GLOSSIN sings: GIN by pailfuls, wine in rivers, And three wild lads were we; Chap. XXXIV. OLD ELSPETH sings: III. FROM THE ANTIQUARY. THE AGED CARLE. 'WHY sit'st thou by that ruin'd hall, Thou aged carle so stern and grey? Dost thou its former pride recall, Or ponder how it pass'd away?' 'Know'st thou not me?' the Deep Voice cried ; 'So long enjoy'd, so oft misusedAlternate, in thy fickle pride, Desired, neglected, and accused! 'Before my breath, like blazing flax, Man and his marvels pass away! And changing empires wane and wax, Are founded, flourish, and decay. Redeem mine hours-the space is brief While in my glass the sand-grains shiver, And measureless thy joy or grief When TIME and thou shall part for ever!' Chap. x. ΑΝ ΕΡΙΤΑΡΗ. HEIR lyeth John o' ye Girnell; He deled a boll o' bear in firlottis fyve, Four for ye halie kirke and ane for pure mennis wyvis. Chap. XI. 1441 'THE herring loves the merry moonlight, The mackerel loves the wind, But the oyster loves the dredging sang, For they come of a gentle kind.' Now haud your tongue, baith wife and carle, And listen, great and sma', The cronach 's cried on Bennachie, And hieland and lawland may mournfu' be For the sair field of Harlaw. They saddled a hundred milk-white steeds, They hae bridled a hundred black, With a chafron of steel on each horse's head, And a good knight upon his back. They hadna ridden a mile, a mile, Wi' twenty thousand men. Their tartans they were waving wide, The great Earl in his stirrups stood, May prove a jeopardie: 'What would'st thou do, my squire To turn the rein were sin and shame, To fight were wond'rous peril ; 'Be brave,' she cried, 'you yet may be our guest. What would ye do now, Roland Our haunted room was ever held the Cheyne, Were ye Glenallan's Earl?' If they hae twenty thousand blades, 'My horse shall ride through ranks sae rude, As through the moorland fern,Then ne'er let the gentle Norman blude Grow cauld for Highland kerne.' He turn'd him right and round again, Said-Scorn na at my mither; Light loves I may get mony a ane, But minnie ne'er anither. Chap. XL. MOTTOES. I KNEW Anselmo. He was shrewd and prudent, Wisdom and cunning had their shares of him; IF you fail honour here, Never presume to serve her any more; Bid farewell to the integrity of arms, And the honourable name of soldier But he was shrewish as a wayward Fall from you, like a shiver'd wreath child, And pleased again by toys which childhood please; As-book of fables graced with print of wood, Or else the jingling of a rusty medal, Or the rare melody of some old ditty, of laurel By thunder struck from a desertlesse forehead. ? A Faire Quarrel. Chap. xx. THE Lord Abbot had a soul That first was sung to please King Subtile and quick, and searching as Pepin's cradle. On Title-page. the fire: By magic stairs he went as deep as hell, And if in devils' possession gold be Then in our lair, when Time hath chill'd our joints, kept, He brought some sure from thence And maim'd our hope of combat, or 'tis hid in caves, of flight, We hear her deep-mouth'd bay, Of wrath, and woe, and punishment, Chap. XXXIII. STILL in his dead hand clench'd remain the strings That thrill his father's heart-e'en as the limb, Lopp'd off and laid in grave, retains, they tell us, Strange commerce with the mutilated Whose nerves are twingeing still in TELL me not of it, friend-when the young weep, Their tears are lukewarm brine;from our old eyes Sorrow falls down like hail-drops of the North, Chilling the furrows of our wither'd : cheeks, Cold as our hopes, and harden'd as our feeling: Theirs, as they fall, sink sightless-ours recoil, Heap the fair plain, and bleaken all before us. Old Play. Chap. xxxiv. LIFE, with you, Glows in the brain and dances in the arteries; 'Tis like the wine some joyous guest hath quaff'd, That glads the heart and elevates the fancy: Mine is the poor residuum of the cup, Vapid, and dull, and tasteless, only soiling With its base dregs the vessel that contains it. Through the wild labyrinth of youthful But, since the good dame 's blind, she shall excuse me frenzy, Unheard, perchance, until old age If, time and reason fitting, I prove dumb ; hath tamed us; LIFE ebbs from such old age, unmark'd and silent, As the slow neap-tide leaves yon stranded galley. Late she rock'd merrily at the least impulse That wind or wave could give; but now her keel Is settling on the sand, her mast has ta'en An angle with the sky, from which it shifts not. Each wave receding shakes her less and less, Till, bedded on the strand, she shall remain Useless as motionless. Chap. XI. Old Play. So, while the Goose, of whom the fable told, Incumbent, brooded o'er her eggs of gold, |