_Art_ thou forgot? and hath thy worth Without its glory pass’d from earth? Rest with the brave, whose names belong To the high sanctity of song! Charter’d our reverence to control, And traced in sunbeams on the soul, _Thine_, Wallace! while the heart hath still One pulse a generous thought can thrill-- While youth’s warm tears are yet the meed Of martyr’s death or hero’s deed, Shall brightly live from age to age, Thy country’s proudest heritage! Midst her green vales thy fame is dwelling, Thy deeds her mountain winds are telling, Thy memory speaks in torrent-wave, Thy step hath hallow’d rock and cave, And cold the wanderer’s heart must be That holds no converse there with thee! Yet, Scotland! to thy champion’s shade Still are thy grateful rites delay’d; From lands of old renown, o’erspread With proud memorials of the dead, The trophied urn, the breathing bust, The pillar guarding noble dust, The shrine where art and genius high Have labour’d for eternity-- The stranger comes: his eye explores The wilds of thy majestic shores, Yet vainly seeks one votive stone Raised to the hero all thine own. Land of bright deeds and minstrel-lore! Withhold that guerdon now no more. On some bold height of awful form, Stern eyrie of the cloud and storm, Sublimely mingling with the skies, Bid the proud Cenotaph arise: Not to _record_ the name that thrills Thy soul, the watchword of thy hills; Not to assert, with needless claim, The bright _for ever_ of its fame; But, in the ages yet untold, When _ours_ shall be the days of old, To rouse high hearts, and speak thy pride In him, for thee who lived and died. [64] _Advertisement by the Author._--“A native of Edinburgh, and member of the Highland Society of London, with a view to give popularity to the project of rearing a suitable national monument to the memory of Wallace, lately offered prizes for the three best poems on the subject of that illustrious patriot inviting Bruce to the Scottish throne. The following poem obtained the first of these prizes. It would have appeared in the same form in which it is now offered to the public, under the direction of its proper editor, the giver of the prize; but his privilege has, with pride as well as pleasure, been yielded to a lady of the author’s own country, who solicited permission to avail herself of this opportunity of honouring and further remunerating the genius of the poet; and, at the same time, expressing her admiration of the theme in which she has triumphed. “It is a noble feature in the character of a generous and enlightened people, that, in England, the memory of the patriots and martyrs of Scotland has long excited an interest not exceeded in strength by that which prevails in the country which boasts their birth, their deeds, and their sufferings.”