"No rude sound shall reach thine ear,
Armor's clang, or war steed champing,
Trump nor pibroch[79] summon here
Mustering clan, or squadron tramping.
Yet the lark's shrill fife may come
At the daybreak from the fallow,[80]
And the bittern[81] sound his drum,
Booming from the sedgy shallow.
Ruder sounds shall none be near,
Guards nor warders challenge here,
Here's no war steed's neigh and champing,
Shouting clans, or squadrons stamping."
[78] Refreshing.
[79] The Highlanders' battle air, played upon the bagpipes.
[80] Untilled land.
[81] A kind of heron said to utter a loud and peculiar booming note.
XXXII.
She paused--then, blushing, led the lay
To grace the stranger of the day.
Her mellow notes awhile prolong
The cadence of the flowing song,
Till to her lips in measured frame
The minstrel verse spontaneous came.
SONG CONTINUED.
"Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done;
While our slumbrous spells assail ye,
Dream not, with the rising sun,
Bugles here shall sound reveille.[82]
Sleep! the deer is in his den;
Sleep! thy hounds are by thee lying;
Sleep! nor dream in yonder glen,
How thy gallant steed lay dying.
Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done,
Think not of the rising sun,
For at dawning to assail ye,
Here no bugles sound reveille."
[82] (_Rē-vāl´yĕ._) The morning call to soldiers to arise.
XXXIII.
The hall was clear'd--the stranger's bed
Was there of mountain heather spread,
Where oft a hundred guests had lain,
And dream'd their forest sports again.
But vainly did the heath flower shed
Its moorland fragrance round his head;
Not Ellen's spell had lull'd to rest
The fever of his troubled breast.
In broken dreams the image rose
Of varied perils, pains, and woes:
His steed now flounders in the brake,
Now sinks his barge upon the lake;
Now leader of a broken host,
His standard falls, his honor's lost.
Then,--from my couch may heavenly might
Chase that worse phantom of the night!--
Again return'd the scenes of youth,
Of confident undoubting truth;
Again his soul he interchanged
With friends whose hearts were long estranged.
They come, in dim procession led,
The cold, the faithless, and the dead;
As warm each hand, each brow as gay,
As if they parted yesterday.
And doubt distracts him at the view--
Oh, were his senses false or true?
Dream'd he of death, or broken vow,
Or is it all a vision now?
XXXIV.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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