With all her joyful female band Had Lady Margaret sought the strand. Loose on the breeze their tresses flew, And high their snowy arms they threw, As echoing back with shrill acclaim, And chorus wild, the Chieftain's name; While, prompt to please, with mother's art The darling passion of his heart, The Dame called Ellen to the strand, To greet her kinsman ere he land: 'Come, loiterer, come! a Douglas thou, And shun to wreathe a victor's brow?' Reluctantly and slow, the maid The unwelcome summoning obeyed, And when a distant bugle rung, In the mid-path aside she sprung:-- 'List, Allan-bane! From mainland cast I hear my father's signal blast. Be ours,' she cried, 'the skiff to guide, And waft him from the mountain-side.' Then, like a sunbeam, swift and bright, She darted to her shallop light, And, eagerly while Roderick scanned, For her dear form, his mother's band, The islet far behind her lay, And she had landed in the bay. XXII. Some feelings are to mortals given With less of earth in them than heaven; And if there be a human tear From passion's dross refined and clear, A tear so limpid and so meek It would not stain an angel's cheek, 'Tis that which pious fathers shed Upon a duteous daughter's head! And as the Douglas to his breast His darling Ellen closely pressed, Such holy drops her tresses steeped, Though 't was an hero's eye that weeped. Nor while on Ellen's faltering tongue Her filial welcomes crowded hung, Marked she that fear--affection's proof-- Still held a graceful youth aloof; No! not till Douglas named his name, Although the youth was Malcolm Graeme. XXIII.