Although admitting of much poetical ornament, it is clear that this legend would have formed but an unhappy foundation for a prose story, and must have degenerated into a mere fairy tale. Dr. John Leyden has beautifully introduced the tradition in his “Scenes of Infancy”:— “Mysterious Rhymer, doomed by fate’s decree Still to revisit Eildon’s fated tree, Where oft the swain, at dawn of Hallow-day, Hears thy fleet barb with wild impatience neigh,— Say, who is he, with summons long and high, Shall bid the charmed sleep of ages fly, Roll the long sound through Eildon’s caverns vast, While each dark warrior kindles at the blast, The horn, the falchion, grasp with mighty hand, And peal proud Arthur’s march from Fairy-land?”[*] [* Scenes of Infancy, Part I.] In the same cabinet with the preceding fragment, the following occurred among other _disjecta membra_. It seems to be an attempt at a tale of a different description from the last, but was almost instantly abandoned. The introduction points out the time of the composition to have been about the end of the eighteenth century. THE LORD OF ENNERDALE. IN A FRAGMENT OF A LETTER FROM JOHN B______, ESQ., OF THAT ILK, TO WILLIAM G______, F.R.S.E. “Fill a bumper,” said the knight; “the ladies may spare us a little longer. Fill a bumper to the Archduke Charles.” The company did due honour to the toast of their landlord. “The success of the archduke,” said the muddy vicar, “will tend to further our negotiation at Paris; and if—” “Pardon the interruption, Doctor,” quoth a thin, emaciated figure, with somewhat of a foreign accent; “but why should you connect those events, unless to hope that the bravery and victories of our allies may supersede the necessity of a degrading treaty?” “We begin to feel, Monsieur L’Abbé,” answered the vicar, with some asperity, “that a Continental war entered into for the defence of an ally who was unwilling to defend himself, and for the restoration of a royal family, nobility, and priesthood who tamely abandoned their own rights, is a burden too much even for the resources of this country.” “And was the war, then, on the part of Great Britain,” rejoined the Abbé, “a gratuitous exertion of generosity? Was there no fear of the wide-wasting spirit of innovation which had gone abroad? Did not the laity tremble for their property, the clergy for their religion, and every loyal heart for the Constitution? Was it not thought necessary to destroy the building which was on fire, ere the conflagration spread around the vicinity?” “Yet if upon trial,” said the doctor, “the walls were found to resist our utmost efforts, I see no great prudence in persevering in our labour amid the smouldering ruins.” “What, Doctor,” said the baronet, “must I call to your recollection your own sermon on the late general fast? Did you not encourage us to hope that the Lord of Hosts would go forth with our armies, and that our enemies, who blasphemed him, should be put to shame?”