With fruitless labour, Clara bound, And strove to staunch the gushing wound: The monk with unavailing cares, Exhausted all the Church’s prayers. Ever, he said, that, close and near, A lady’s voice was in his ear, And that the priest he could not hear; For that she ever sung, “_In the lost battle_, _borne down by the flying_ _Where mingles war’s rattle with groans of the dying_!” So the notes rung;— “Avoid thee, Fiend!—with cruel hand, Shake not the dying sinner’s sand! Oh, look, my son, upon yon sign Of the Redeemer’s grace divine! Oh, think on faith and bliss! By many a death-bed I have been, And many a sinner’s parting seen, But never aught like this.” The war, that for a space did fail, Now trebly thundering swelled the gale And—“Stanley!” was the cry; A light on Marmion’s visage spread, And fired his glazing eye: With dying hand, above his head, He shook the fragment of his blade, And shouted “Victory! Charge, Chester, charge! On, Stanley, on!” Were the last words of Marmion. XXXIII. By this, though deep the evening fell, Still rose the battle’s deadly swell, For still the Scots, around their king, Unbroken, fought in desperate ring. Where’s now their victor vaward wing, Where Huntly, and where Home? Oh, for a blast of that dread horn, On Fontarabian echoes borne, That to King Charles did come, When Rowland brave, and Olivier, And every paladin and peer, On Roncesvalles died! Such blast might warn them, not in vain, To quit the plunder of the slain, And turn the doubtful day again, While yet on Flodden side, Afar, the royal standard flies, And round it toils, and bleeds, and dies, Our Caledonian pride! In vain the wish—for far away, While spoil and havoc mark their way, Near Sybil’s Cross the plunderers stray. “Oh, lady,” cried the monk, “away!” And placed her on her steed, And led her to the chapel fair, Of Tillmouth upon Tweed. There all the night they spent in prayer, And at the dawn of morning, there She met her kinsman, Lord Fitz-Clare. XXXIV.