With her yellow hair, that glittered fair, She dried the trickling tear;

He shot the roebuck on the lee,

The dun deer on the law; The glamour sure was in his ee When Ringan nigh did draw.

O'er heathy edge, through rustling sedge,
He sped till day was set;
And he thought it was his merry-men tru
When he the spearmen met.

Far from relief, they seized the chief;
His men were far away;
Through Hermitage slack they sent hia

back

To Soulis' castle gray;

Syne onward fure for Branxholm tower Where all his merry-men lay.

Now, welcome, noble Branxholm's heir! Thrice welcome,' quoth Soulis, 'to me.

The youth that loved her dear.

Now, be content, my bonny May,

And take it for your hame;

Or ever and aye shall ye rue the day, You heard young Branxholm's name. 'O'er Branxholm tower, ere the morning hour,

When the lift is like lead sae blue, The smoke shall roll white on the weary

night,

And the flame shall shine dimly through.'

Syne he's ca'd on him Ringan Red,

A sturdy kemp was he;

From friend, or foe, in Border feid,

Who never a foot would flee.

Red Ringan sped, and the spearmen led Up Goranberry slack;

Ay, many a wight, unmatched in fight, Who never more came back.

And bloody set the westering sun,

And bloody rose he up;

But little thought young Branxholm's heir Where he that night should sup.

They heated it red and fiery hot,

Till the burnished brass did glimmer and shine.

They rolled him up in a sheet of lead,
A sheet of lead for a funeral pall:
They plunged him in the cauldron red,
And melted him, lead, and bones and
all.

At the Skelf-hill, the cauldron still

The men of Liddesdale can show ; And on the spot, where they boil'd the pot, The spreat and the deer-hair ne'er shall grow.