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MARMION,

A

TALE OF FLODDEN FIELD

A Poem.

IN SIX CANTOS.

Alas! that Scottish maid should sing
The combat where her lover fell!
That Scottish bard should wake the string,
The triumph of our foes to tell!-LEYBET

ΤΟ

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

HENRY, LORD MONTAGUE,

&c. &c. &c.

THIS ROMANCE IS INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR.

ADVERTISEMENT.

Ir is hardly to be expected, that an Author, whom the Public has honoured with some degree of applause, should not be again a trespasser on their kindness. Yet the Author of MARMION must be supposed to feel some anxiety concerning its success, since he is sensible that he hazards, by this second intrusion, any reputation which his first Poem may have procured him. The present Story turns upon the private adventures of a fictitious character; but is called a Tale of Flodden Field, because the hero's fate is connected with that memorable defeat, and the causes which led to it. The design of the Author was, if possible, to apprise his readers, at the outset, of the date of his Story, and to prepare them for the manners of the Age in which it is laid. Any historical narrative, far more an attempt at Epic composition, exceeded his plan of a Romantic Tale; yet he may be permitted to hope, from the popularity of THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL, that an attempt to paint the manners of the feudal times, upon a broader scale, and in the course of a more interesting story, will not be unacceptable to the Public.

The Poem opens about the commencement of August, and concludes with the the defeat of Flodden, 4th September, 1518.

INTRODUCTION TO CANTO FIRST.

TO WILLIAM STEWART ROSE, Esq.

Ashestiel, Ettricke Forest.

NOVEMBER'S Sky is chill and drear,
November's leaf is red and sear:
Late, gazing down the steepy linn,
That hems our little garden in,
Low in its dark and narrow glen,
You scarce the rivulet might ken,
So thick the tangled green-wood grew,
So feeble trilled the streamlet through:
Now, murmuring hoarse, and frequent seen
Through bush and brier, no longer green,
An angry brook, it sweeps the glade,
Brawls over rock and wild cascade,
And, foaming brown with doubled speed,
Hurries its waters to the Tweed.

No longer Autumn's glowing red
Upon our Forest hills is shed;
No more, beneath the evening beam,
Fair Tweed reflects their purple gleam;
Away hath passed the heather-bell,
That bloomed so rich on Needpath-fell;
Sallow his brow, and russet bare
Are now the sister-heights of Yare.
The sheep, before the pinching heaven,
To sheltered dale and down are driven,
Where yet some faded herbage pines,
And yet a watery sun-beam shines:
In meek despondency they eye
The withered sward and wintry sky,
And far beneath their summer hill,
Stray sadly by Glenkinnon's rill;
The shepherd shifts his mantle's fold,
And wraps him closer from the cold;
His dogs no merry circles wheel,
But, shivering, follow at his heel;

A cowering glance they often cast,

As deeper moans the gathering blast.

My imps, though hardy, bold, and wild,
As best befits the mountain child,
Feel the sad influence of the hour,
And wail the daisy's vanished flower;
Their summer gambols tell, and mourn,
And anxious ask,-Will spring return,
And birds and lambs again be gay,
And blossoms clothe the hawthorn spray?

Yes, prattlers, yes. The daisy's flower
Again shall paint your summer bowers
Again the hawthorn shall supply
The garlands you delight to tie;
The lambs upon the lea shall bound,
The wild birds carol to the round,
And while you frolic light as they,
Too short shall seem the summer day.

To mute and to material things
New life revolving summer brings;
The genial call dead Nature hears,
And in her glory re-appears.
But O! my country's wintry state
What second spring shall reuovate?
What powerful call shall bid arise
The buried warlike, and the wise,

The mind, that thought for Britain's weal,
The hand, that grasped the victor steel?
The vernal sun new life bestows

Even on the meanest flower that blows;
But vainly, vainly, may he shine,

Where Glory weeps o'er NELSON's shrines
And vainly pierce the solemn gloom,
That shrouds, O Pitt, thy hallowed tomb

Deep graved in every British heart,
O never let those names depart!
Say to your sons, Lo, here his grave,
Who victor died on Gadite wave;
To him, as to the burning levin,

Short, bright, resistless course was given,
Where'er his country's foes were found,
Was heard the fated thunder's sound,
Till burst the bolt on yonder shore,

Rolled, blazed, destroyed,—and was no more,

Nor mourn ye less his perished worth, Who bade the conqueror go forth, And launched that thunderbolt of war On Egypt, Hafnia,* Trafalgar; Who, born to guide such high emprize, For Britain's weal was early wise; Alas! to whom the Almighty gave, For Britain's sins, an early grave; His worth, who, in his mightiest hour, A bauble held the pride of power, Spurned at the sordid lust of pelf, And served his Albion for herself; Who, when the frantic crowd amain Strained at subjection's bursting rein, O'er their wild mood full conquest gained, The pride, he would not crush, restrained, Showed their fierce zeal a worthier cause, And brought the freeman's arm to aid the freeman's

[laws,

Hadst thou but lived, though stripp'd of power,

A watchman on the lonely tower,

Thy thrilling trump had roused the land,

When fraud or danger were at hand;

By thee, as by the beacon-light,

Our pilots had kept course aright;

As some proud column, though alone,

Thy strength had propp'd the tottering throne.

Now is the stately column broke,

The beacon-light is quenched in smoke,

The trumpet's silver sound is still,

The warder silent on the hill!

Oh, think, how to his latest day,

When Death, just hovering, claimed his prcy,
With Palinure's unaltered mood,

Firm at his dangerous post he stood,

Each call for needful rest repelled,

With dying hand the rudder held,

Till, in his fall, with fateful sway,

The steerage of the realm gave way!
Then, while on Britain's thousand plains,
One unpolluted church remains,

Whose peaceful bells ne'er sent around
The bloody tocsin's maddening sound,

Copenhagen.

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