'Abide, abide now, Red Rowan, Till of my Lord Scroope I take farewell.' "'Farewell, farew ell, my gude Lord Scroope! My gude Lord Scroope, farewell!' he cried-- 'I'll pay ye for my lodging maill, When first we meet on the Border side.' "Then shoulder high, with shout and cry, We bore him down the ladder lang; At every stride Red Rowan made, I wot the Kinmont's aims played clang! "We scarce had won the Staneshaw-bank, When a' the Carlisle bells were rung, And a thousand men on horse and foot, Cam' wi' the keen Lord Scroope along." But still they held aloof, hesitating to attack the retreating little Scottish band, and Buccleuch and his men, with Willie in their midst, plunged in and safely recrossed the swollen river. "He turned him on the other side, And at Lord Scroope his glove flung he-- 'If ye likena my visit in merry England, In fair Scotland come visit me!'" But Lord Scrope on this night scarcely merited the term, "keen"; he went no farther towards Scotland than the water's edge. "'He is either himself a devil frae hell, Or else his mother a witch maun be; I wadna have ridden that wan water For a' the gowd in Christentie,'" cried he, according to the ballad. Was he, one cannot help wondering, ashamed of the English breach of Border law entailed in the matter of Kinmont's capture, and was he in a measure wilfully playing into Buccleuch's hands? If that were the case, he took on himself a heavy risk. Elizabeth was not exactly the kind of Sovereign who would be likely to be tender hearted and to make allowances for slackness in such an affair, nor one with whom her servants might safely take liberties. {399}As safely might the gambolling lamb play pranks with the drowsing wolf. [Illustration: 0419]