Colder and louder blew the wind,
A gale from the North-east;
The snow fell hissing in the brine,

And the billows froth'd like yeast.

Down came the storm, and smote amain
The vessel in its strength;

She shudder'd and paused, like a frighted steed,
Then leap'd her cable's length.

'Come hither! come hither! my little daughter, 'And do not tremble so !

'For I can weather the roughest gale,
'That ever wind did blow.'

He wrapp'd her warm in his seaman's coat
Against the stinging blast;

He cut a rope from a broken spar,

And bound her to the mast.

'O father! I hear the church-bells ring,

'O say, what may it be?'

''Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast !'And he steer'd for the open sea.

'O father! I hear the sound of guns, 'O say, what may it be?'

'-Some ship in distress that cannot live

'In such an angry sea!'

'O father! I see a gleaming light,

'O say what may it be?'

But the father answer'd never a word,

A frozen corpse was he.

Lash'd to the helm, all stiff and stark,

With his face to the skies,

The lantern gleam'd through the gleaming snow On his fix'd and glassy eyes.

39 fog-bell, rung in thick weather to warn ships

Then the maiden clasp'd her hands and pray'd
That savéd she might be;

And she thought of Christ, who still'd the waves
On the Lake of Galilee.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear,
Through the whistling sleet and snow,
Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept
Towards the reef of Norman's Woe.

And ever the fitful gusts between
A sound came from the land;
It was the sound of the trampling surf,
On the rocks and the hard sea-sand.

The breakers were right beneath her bows,
She drifted a dreary wreck,

And a whooping billow swept the crew
Like icicles from her deck.

She struck where the white and fleecy waves
Look'd soft as carded wool,

But the cruel rocks they gored her sides
Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling shrouds all sheathed in ice,
With the masts went by the board;
Like a vessel of glass she stove and sank,
Ho! ho! the breakers roar'd.

At day-break on the bleak sea-beach
A fisherman stood aghast,
To see the form of a maiden fair
Lash'd close to a drifting mast.

60 reef, bank of half-covered rock 65 bows, forepart

73 shrouds, mast-ropes 75 stove, was broken in

61 fitful, rising and falling 70 carded, combed fine

74 went clean over the deck

78 aghast, horrified

The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair like the brown sea-weed

On the billows fall and rise.

H. W. Longfellow

O LISTEN, listen, ladies gay!
No haughty feat of armsI tell;
Soft is the note, and sad the lay
That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.

'Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew,
'And, gentle lady, deign to stay!
'Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
'Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.

'The blackening wave is edged with white;
'To inch and rock the sea-mews fly;
'The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite,
'Whose screams forebode that wreck is nigh.

'Last night the gifted Seer did view
'A wet shroud swathed round lady gay;
'Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch;
'Why cross the gloomy firth to-day?'

'Tis not because Lord Lindesay's heir
'To-night at Roslin leads the ball;
'But that my lady-mother there
'Sits lonely in her castle-hall.

"Tis not because the ring they ride,
'And Lindesay at the ring rides well,
'But that my sire the wine will chide
'If 'tis not fill'd by Rosabelle.'

2 feat, deed

8 firth, strait

6 deign, be kind enough
13 seer, prophet

10 inch, island

22 ring, a game in which riders drove through a ring

O'er Roslin all that weary night

A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam; 'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light, And redder than the bright moonbeam.

It glared on Roslin's castled rock,

It ruddied all the copse-wood glen ;
'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak,
And seen from cavern'd Hawthornden.

Seem'd all on fire that chapel proud,
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud,
Sheathed in his iron panoply.

Seem'd all on fire within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar's pale;
Shone every pillar foliage-bound,
And glimmer'd all the dead men's mail.

Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair-
So still they blaze, when fate is nigh
The lordly line of high Saint Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold
Lie buried within that proud chapelle ;
Each one the holy vault doth hold,—
But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle !

And each Saint Clair was buried there

With candle, with book, and with knell; But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.

36 panoply, complete coat of armour

38 sacristy, vestry: pale, space round altar 39 foliage-bound, carved with leaves

41 pinnet, pinnacle

50 with the old funeral service

Sir W. Scott

40 mail, chain-armour

43 fate, death

52 dirge, funeral chant

*16*

GLENCOE

'O TELL me, Harper, wherefore flow
Thy wayward notes of wail and woe
Far down the desert of Glencoe,

Where none may list their melody?
Say, harp'st thou to the mists that fly,
Or to the dun-deer glancing by,
Or to the eagle that from high
Screams chorus to thy minstrelsy?'

-'No, not to these, for they have rest :--
The mist-wreath has the mountain-crest,
The stag his lair, the erne her nest,
Abode of lone security.

But those for whom I pour the lay,

Not wild-wood deep, nor mountain gray,
Not this deep dell, that shrouds from day,
Could screen from treach'rous cruelty.

'Their flag was furl'd, and mute their drum :
The very household dogs were dumb,
Unwont to bay at guests that come

In guise of hospitality.

His blithest notes the piper plied,
Her gayest snood the maiden tied,
The dame her distaff flung aside,.
To tend her kindly housewifery.
'The hand that mingled in the meal,
At midnight drew the felon steel,
And gave the host's kind breast to feel
Meed, for his hospitality!

3 see end

15 shrouds, hides 20 guise, look

8 screams in answer

17 mute, silent

11 erne, eagle

19 unwont, not accustomed

22 snood, hair-ribbon worn by girls

26 felon, base, treacherous

28 meed, reward