It was a barren scene and wild, Where naked cliffs were rudely piled: But ever and anon between Lay velvet tufts of loveliest green; And well the lonely infant knew Recesses where the wall-flower grew, And honeysuckle loved to crawl Up the low crag and ruined wall: I deemed such nooks the sweetest shade The sun in all his round surveyed; And still I thought that shattered tower[72] The mightiest work of human power; And marvelled, as the aged hind With some strange tale bewitched my mind, Of forayers who, with headlong force, Down from that strength had spurred their horse, Their southern rapine to renew, Far in the distant Cheviots blue, And, home-returning, filled the hall With revel, wassail-rout, and ball.” There is much feeling in this description; and so might there be, for the early years of the bard were passed in the farmhouse of Sandy-knowe (about a bow-shot from the tower,) with a maternal aunt, whose mind was stored with border legends, which she related to her youthful charge. With this instructress, and by poring incessantly for many years on the relics of antiquity which are to be found in the neighbourhood, it is probable that he first received the impressions that afterwards came forward to such an illustrious maturity, and stored his imagination with those splendid images of chivalry that have since been embodied in imperishable song. The external appearance of the tower may be briefly described. The walls are of a quadrangular shape, and about nine feet in thickness. They have none of the decorations of buttress or turret; and if there were any ornamental carving, time has swept it away. A ruined bartizan, which runs across three angles of the building, near the top, is the only outward addition to the naked square _donjon_. The tower has been entered on the _west_ side, as all the other quarters rise perpendicularly from the lake. Accordingly, there we discern the fragments of a causeway, and the ruins of a broad portal, whence a drawbridge seems to have communicated with an eminence about a hundred yards distant. On this quarter also there may be traced the site of several small booths which contained the retainers or men-at-arms of the feudal lord. On the west side,[73] at a little distance from the Castle, is the Watch Crag, a massive rock, on the top of which a fire was lit to announce the approach of the English forayers to the neighbourhood. It is thus described in the ballad of the Eve of St. John: “The bittern clamoured from the moss, The wind blew loud and shrill; Yet the craggy pathway she did cross To the airy beacon hill. * * * * * I watched her steps, and silent came, Where she sat her all alone; No watchman stood by the dreary flame, It burnèd all alone.”