Alone, among his young compeers, Was Brian from his infant years; A moody and heart-broken boy, Estranged from sympathy and joy, Bearing each taunt which careless tongue On his mysterious lineage flung. Whole nights he spent by moonlight pale, To wood and stream his hap to wail, Till, frantic, he as truth received What of his birth the crowd believed, And sought, in mist and meteor fire, To meet and know his Phantom Sire! In vain, to soothe his wayward fate, The cloister oped her pitying gate; In vain, the learning of the age Unclasp'd the sable-lettered[175] page; Even in its treasures he could find Food for the fever of his mind. Eager he read whatever tells Of magic, cabala,[176] and spells, And every dark pursuit allied To curious and presumptuous pride; Till, with fired brain and nerves o'erstrung, And heart with mystic horrors wrung, Desperate he sought Benharrow's den, And hid him from the haunts of men. [175] Black letter, the name of the Old English or modern Gothic letters used in old manuscript and early printed books. [176] Mysteries. VII. The desert gave him visions wild, Such as might suit the specter's child. Where with black cliffs the torrents toil, He watch'd the wheeling eddies boil, Till, from their foam, his dazzled eyes Beheld the River Demon[177] rise; The mountain mist took form and limb, Of noontide hag, or goblin grim; The midnight wind came wild and dread, Swell'd with the voices of the dead; Far on the future battle heath His eye beheld the ranks of death: Thus the lone Seer, from mankind hurl'd, Shaped forth a disembodied world. One lingering sympathy of mind Still bound him to the mortal kind; The only parent he could claim Of ancient Alpine's lineage came. Late had he heard, in prophet's dream, The fatal Ben-Shie's[178] boding scream; Sounds,[179] too, had come in midnight blast, Of charging steeds, careering fast Along Benharrow's shingly side, Where mortal horseman ne'er might ride; The thunderbolt had split the pine,-- All augur'd ill to Alpine's line. He girt his loins, and came to show The signals of impending woe, And now stood prompt to bless or ban,[180] As bade the Chieftain of his clan. [177] A malicious spirit supposed by the superstitious Scotch people to inhabit lakes and rivers, and to forebode calamity. [178] A fairy supposed to indicate coming death or disaster by her lamentations. [179] Sounds of the same foreboding character. [180] Curse. VIII.