line 490. Science appears to support this theory. See various examples in Sir Erasmus Wilson’s little work, ‘Healthy Skin.’ Many of the cases are within the writer’s own knowledge, and all the others are historical or otherwise well authenticated. He mentions Sir T. More the night before his execution; two cases reported by Borellus; three by Daniel Turner; one by Dr. Cassan; and in a note he recalls John Libeny, a would-be assassin of the Emperor of Austria, ‘whose hair turned snow-white in the forty-eight hours preceding his execution.’ See ‘Notes and Queries,’ 6th S. vols. vi. to ix., and 7th S. ii. Not only fear but sorrow is said to cause the hair to turn white very suddenly. Byron makes his Prisoner of Chillon say that his white hairs have not come to him‘In a single night,As men’s have grown from sudden fears.’Stanza XXIX. line 506. ‘St. Regulus (Scottice, St. Rule), a monk of Patrae, in Achaia, warned by a vision, is said, A. D. 370, to have sailed westward, until he landed at St. Andrews, in Scotland, where he founded a chapel and tower. The latter is still standing; and, though we may doubt the precise date of its foundation, is certainly one of the most ancient edifices in Scotland. A cave, nearly fronting the ruinous castle of the Archbishops of St. Andrews, bears the name of this religion person. It is difficult of access; and the rock in which it is hewed is washed by the German Ocean. It is nearly round, about ten feet in diameter, and the same in height. On one side is a sort of stone altar; on the other an aperture into an inner den, where the miserable ascetic, who inhabited this dwelling, probably slept. At full tide, egress and regress are hardly practicable. As Regulus first colonised the metropolitan see of Scotland, and converted the inhabitants in the vicinity, he has some reason to complain that the ancient name of Killrule (Cella Reguli) should have been superseded, even in favour of the tutelar saint of Scotland. The reason of the change was, that St. Rule is said to have brought to Scotland the relics of Saint Andrew.’-SCOTT.line 509. ‘St. Fillan was a Scottish saint of some reputation. Although Popery is, with us, matter of abomination, yet the common people still retain some of the superstitions connected with it. There are in Perthshire several wells and springs dedicated to St. Fillan, which are still places of pilgrimage and offerings, even among the Protestants. They are held powerful in cases of madness; and, in some of very late occurrence, lunatics have been left all night bound to the holy stone, in confidence that the saint would cure and unloose them before morning. [See various notes to the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.]’-SCOTT.line 513. Cp. Macbeth, v. 3. 40:-‘Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased?’and Lear, iii. 4. 12:-‘The tempest in my mindDoth from my senses take all feeling elseSave what beats there.’Stanza XXX. line 515. With ‘midnight draught,’ cp. Macbeth’s ‘drink,’ ii. 1. 31, and the ‘posset,’ ii. 2. 6. See notes to these passages in Clarendon Press Macbeth.Stanza XXXI. line 534. ‘In Catholic countries, in order to reconcile the pleasures of the great with the observances of religion, it was common, when a party was bent for the chase, to celebrate mass, abridged and maimed of its rites, called a hunting-mass, the brevity of which was designed to correspond with the impatience of the audience.’-Note to ‘The Abbot,’ new edition.line 538. Stirrup-cup, or stirrup-glass, is a parting-glass of liquor given to a guest when on horseback and ready to go.INTRODUCTION TO CANTO SECOND.The Rev. John Marriott, A. M., to whom this introductory poem is dedicated, was tutor to George Henry, Lord Scott, son of Charles, Earl of Dalkeith, afterwards fourth Duke of Buccleuch and sixth of Queensberry. Lord Scott died early, in 1808. Marriott, while still at Oxford, proved himself a capable poet, and Scott shewed his appreciation of him by including two of his ballads at the close of the ‘Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.’ The concluding lines of this Introduction refer to Marriott’s ballads.line 2. ‘Ettrick Forest, now a range of mountainous sheep-walks, was anciently reserved for the pleasure of the royal chase. Since it was disparked, the wood has been, by degrees, almost totally destroyed, although, wherever protected from the sheep, copses soon arise without any planting. When the King hunted there, he often summoned the array of the country to meet and assist his sport. Thus, in 1528, James V “made proclamation to all lords, barons, gentlemen, landward-men, and freeholders, that they should compear at Edinburgh, with a month’s victuals, to pass with the King where he pleased, to danton the thieves of Tiviotdale, Annandale, Liddisdale, and other parts of that country; and also warned all gentlemen that had good dogs to bring them, that he might hunt in the said country as he pleased: The whilk the Earl of Argyle, the Earl of Huntley, the Earl of Athole, and so all the rest of the gentlemen of the Highland, did, and brought their hounds with them in like manner, to hunt with the King, as he pleased.‘“The second day of June the King past out of Edinburgh to the hunting, with many of the nobles and gentlemen of Scotland with him, to the number of twelve thousand men; and then past to Meggitland, and hounded and hawked all the country and bounds; that is to say, Crammat, Pappert-law, St. Mary-laws, Carlavirick, Chapel, Ewindoores, and Langhope. I heard say, he slew, in these bounds, eighteen score of harts.” PITSCOTTIE’SHistory of Scotland, folio edition, p. 143.‘These huntings had, of course, a military character, and attendance upon them was part of the duty of a vassal. The act for abolishing ward or military tenures in Scotland, enumerates the services of hunting, hosting, watching and warding, as those which were in future to be illegal.’-SCOTT.lines 5-11. Cp. Wordsworth’s ‘Thorn’:-‘There is a Thorn-it looks so old,In truth, you’d find it hard to sayHow it could ever have been young,It looks so old and grey.’There is a special suggestion of antiquity in the wrinkled, lichen-covered thorn of a wintry landscape, and thus it is a fitting object to stir and sustain the poet’s tendency to note ‘chance and change’ and to lament the loss of the days that are no more. The exceeding appropriateness of this in a narrative poem dealing with departed habits and customs must be quite apparent. The thorn grows to a very great age, and many an unpretentious Scottish homestead receives a pathetic grace and dignity from the presence of its ancestral thorn-tree.line 15. The rowan is the mountain ash. One of the most tender and haunting of Scottish songs is Lady Nairne’s ‘Oh, Rowan tree!’-‘How fair wert thou in summer time, wi’ a’ thy clusters white,How rich and gay thy autumn dress, wi’ berries red and bright.’line 27. There are some notable allusions in the poets to the moonlight baying of dogs and wolves. Cp. Julius Caesar, iv. 3. 27:-‘I had rather be a dog and bay the moon.’See also Shield’s great English song, ‘The Wolf’:-‘While the wolf, in nightly prowl,Bays the moon with hideous howl!’One of the best lines in English verse on the wolf-both skilfully onomatopoeic and suggestively picturesque-is Campbell’s, line 66 of ‘Pleasures of Hope’:-‘The wolf’s long howl from Oonalaska’s shore.’line 30. Cp. the movement of this line with line 3 in ‘Sang of the Outlaw Murray’:-‘There’s hart and hynd, and dae and rae.’line 31. ‘Grene wode’ is a phrase of the ‘Robyn Hode Ballads.’ Cp.:--‘She set her on a gode palfray,Togrene wodeanon rode she.’line 32. The ruins of Newark Castle are above the confluence of the Ettrick and the Yarrow, on the latter river, and a few miles from Selkirk. Close by is Bowhill, mentioned below, 73. See Prof. Minto’s ‘Lay of the Last Minstrel’ (Clarendon Press), pp. 122-3. In the days of the ‘last minstrel’ it was appropriate to describe this ‘riven’ relic as ‘Newark’s stately tower.’line 33. James II built Newark as a fortress.line 41. The gazehound or greyhound hunts by sight, not scent. The Encyclopedic Dictionary quotes Tickell ‘On Hunting’:-‘See’st thou thegazehound!how with glance severeFrom the close herd he marks the destined deer.’line 42. ‘Bratchet, slowhound.’-SCOTT. The older spelling is brachet (frombrachorbrache), as:-‘Brachetesbayed that best, as bidden the maystarez.’Sir Gaw. and the Green Knyght, 1603.In contrast with the gazehound the brachet hunts by scent.line 44. Cp. Julius Caesar, iii. I. 273, ‘Let slip the dogs of war.’line 48. Harquebuss, arquebus, or hagbut, a heavy musket. Cp. below, V. 54.line 49. Cp. Dryden’s ‘Alexander’s Feast,’ ‘The vocal hills reply.’line 54. Yarrow stream is the ideal scene of Border romance. See the Border Minstrelsy, and cp. the works of Hamilton of Bangour, John Leyden, Wordsworth’s Yarrow poems, the poems of the Ettrick Shepherd, Prof. Veitch, and Principal Shairp. John Logan’s ‘Braes of Yarrow’ also deserves special mention, and many singers of Scottish song know Scott Riddell’s ‘Dowie Dens o’ Yarrow.’line 61. Holt, an Anglo-Saxon word for wood or grove, has been a favourite with poet’s since Chaucer’s employment of it (Prol. 6):-‘Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breetheEnspired hath in everyholteand heetheThe tendre croppes.’See Dr. Morris’s Glossary to Chaucer’s Prologue, &c. (Clarendon Press).line 68. Cp. Wordsworth’s two Matthew poems, ‘The Two April Mornings’ and ‘The Fountain’; also Matthew Arnold’s ‘Thyrsis’-‘Too rare, too rare grow now my visits here!But once I knew each field, each flower, each stick;And with the country-folk acquaintance madeBy barn in threshing-time, by new-built rick,Here, too, our shepherd-pipes we first assay’d.’line 82. Janet in the ballad of ‘The Young Tamlane’ in the Border Minstrelsy. The dissertation Scott prefixed to this ballad is most interesting and valuable.line 84. See above, note on Rev. J. Marriott.line 85. Scott was sheriff-substitute of Selkirkshire. As the law requires residence within the limits of the sheriffdom, Scott dwelt at Ashestiel at least four months of every year. Prof. Veitch, in his descriptive poem ‘The Tweed,’ writes warmly on Ashestiel, as Scott’s residence in his happiest time:-‘Sweet Ashestiel! that peers ‘mid woody braes,And lists the ripple of Glenkinnon’s rill-Fair girdled by Tweed’s ampler gleaming wave-His well loved home of early happy days,Ere noon of Fame, and ere dark Ruin’s eve,When life lay unrevealed, with hopeful thrillOf all that might be in the reach of powersWhose very flow was a continued joy-Strong-rushing as the dawn, and fresh and fairIn outcome as that morning of the world,Which gilded all his kindled fancy’s dream!’line 88. Harriet, Countess of Dalkeith, afterwards Duchess of Buccleuch. A suggestion of hers led to the composition of the ‘Lay of the Last Minstrel.’ See Prof. Minto’s Introduction to Clarendon Press edition of the poem, p. 8.lines 90-93. ‘These lines were not in the original MS.’-LOCKHART.line 106. ‘The late Alexander Pringle, Esq., of Whytbank-whose beautiful seat of the Yair stands on the Tweed, about two miles below Ashestiel.’-LOCKHART.line 108. ‘The sons of Mr. Pringle of Whytbank.’-LOCKHART.line 113. Cp. VI. 611, below.line 115. ‘There is, on a high mountainous ridge above the farm of Ashestiel, a fosse called Wallace’s Trench.’-SCOTT.line 124. Cp. Gray’s ‘Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College,’ especially lines 6l-2:-‘These shall the fury Passions tear,The vultures of the mind.’lines 126-33. Cp. Wordsworth variously, particularly in the Matthew poems, the Ode on Intimations of Immortality, and Tintern Abbey, especially in its last twenty-five lines:-‘Therefore let the moonShine on thee in thy solitary walk,’ &c.line 143. Cp. I Kings xix. 12.lines 147-73. ‘This beautiful sheet of water forms the reservoir from which the Yarrow takes its source. It is connected with a smaller lake, called the Loch of the Lowes, and surrounded by mountains. In the winter, it is still frequented by flights of wild swans; hence my friend Mr. Wordsworth’s lines:-“The swan on sweet St. Mary’s lakeFloats double, swan and shadow.”Near the lower extremity of the lake are the ruins of Dryhope tower, the birth-place of Mary Scott, daughter of Philip Scott of Dryhope, and famous by the traditional name of the Flower of Yarrow. She was married to Walter Scott of Harden, no less renowned for his depredations than his bride for her beauty. Her romantic appellation was, in latter days, with equal justice, conferred on Miss Mary Lilias Scott, the last of the elder branch of the Harden family. The author well remembers the talent and spirit of the latter Flower of Yarrow, though age had then injured the charms which procured her the name. The words usually sung to the air of “Tweedside,” beginning “What beauties does Flora disclose,” were composed in her honour.’-SCOTT.Quoting from memory, Scott gives ‘sweet’ forstillin Wordsworth’s lines. Mr. Aubrey de Vere, in ‘Essays Chiefly on Poetry,’ ii. 277, reports an interview with Wordsworth, in which the poet, referring to St. Mary’s Lake, says: ‘The scene when I saw it, with its still and dim lake, under the dusky hills, was one of utter loneliness; there was one swan, and one only, stemming the water, and the pathetic loneliness of the region gave importance to the one companion of that swan-its own white image in the water.’ For a criticism, deeply sympathetic and appreciative, of Scott’s description of St. Mary’s Loch in calm, see Prof. Veitch’s ‘Feeling for Nature in Scottish Poetry,’ ii. 196. The scene remains very much what it was in Scott’s time, ‘notwithstanding that the hand of the Philistine,’ says Prof. Veitch, ‘has set along the north shore of St. Mary’s, as far as his power extended, a strip of planting.’line 177. ‘The chapel of St. Mary of the Lowes {de lacubus} was situated on the eastern side of the lake, to which it gives name. It was injured by the clan of Scott, in a feud with the Cranstouns; but continued to be a place of worship during the seventeenth century. The vestiges of the building can now scarcely be traced; but the burial-ground is still used as a cemetery. A funeral, in a spot so very retired, has an uncommonly striking effect. The vestiges of the chaplain’s house are yet visible. Being in a high situation, it commanded a full view of the lake, with the opposite mountain of Bourhope, belonging, with the lake itself, to Lord Napier. On the left hand is the tower of Dryhope, mentioned in a preceding note.’-SCOTT.line 187. See ‘Il Penseroso,’ line 167.line 197. Cp. Thomson’s ‘Winter,’ line 66:-‘Along the woods, along the moorish fens,Sighs the sad genius of the coming storm;And up among the loose disjointed cliffs,And fractured mountains wild, the brawling brookAnd cave, presageful, send a hollow moan,Resounding long in listening fancy’s ear.’line 204. ‘At one corner of the burial-ground of the demolished chapel, but without its precincts, is a small mound, calledBinrams Corse, where tradition deposits the remains of a necromantic priest, the former tenant of the chaplainry. His story much resembles that of Ambrosio in “The Monk,” and has been made the theme of a ballad by my friend Mr. James Hogg, more poetically designed theEttrick Shepherd. To his volume, entitled “The Mountain Bard,” which contains this, and many other legendary stories and ballads of great merit, I refer the curious reader.’-SCOTT.line 239. ‘Loch-skene is a mountain lake, of considerable size, at the head of the Moffat-water. The character of the scenery is uncommonly savage; and the earn, or Scottish eagle, has, for many ages, built its nest yearly upon an islet in the lake. Loch-skene discharges itself into a brook, which, after a short and precipitate course, falls from a cataract of immense height and gloomy grandeur, called, from its appearance, the “Grey Mare’s Tail.” The “Giant’s Grave,” afterwards mentioned, is a sort of trench, which bears that name, a little way from the foot of the cataract. It has the appearance of a battery designed to command the pass.’-SCOTT.Cp. ‘Loch Skene,’ a descriptive and meditative poem by Thomas Tod Stoddart, well known as poet and angler on the Borders during the third quarter of the nineteenth century:-‘Like a pillar of Parian stone,That in some old temple shone,Or a slender shaft of living star,Gleams that foam-fall from afar;But the column is melted down belowInto a gulf of seething snow,And the stream steals away from its whirl of hoar,As bright and as lovely as before.’CANTO SECOND.lines 1-6. The earlier editions have a period at the end of line 5, and neither Scott himself nor Lockhart changed that punctuation. But, undoubtedly, the first sentence ends with line 11, ‘roll’d’ in the second line being a part, and not a finite verb. Mr. Rolfe is the first to punctuate the passage thus.line 9. ‘The Abbey of Whitby, in the Archdeaconry of Cleaveland, on the coast of Yorkshire, was founded A. D. 657, in consequence of a vow of Oswy, King of Northumberland. It contained both monks and nuns of the Benedictine order; but, contrary to what was usual in such establishments, the abbess was superior to the abbot. The monastery was afterwards mined by the Danes, and rebuilded by William Percy, in the reign of the Conqueror. There were no nuns there in Henry the Eighth’s time, nor long before it. The ruins of Whitby Abbey are very magnificent.’-SCOTT.line 10. ‘Lindisfarne, an isle on the coast of Northumberland, was called Holy Island, from the sanctity of its ancient monastery, and from its having been the episcopal seat of the see of Durham during the early ages of British Christianity. A succession of holy men held that office: but their merits were swallowed up in the superior fame of St. Cuthbert, who was sixth bishop of Durham, and who bestowed the name of his “patrimony” upon the extensive property of the see. The ruins of the monastery upon Holy Island betoken great antiquity. The arches are, in general, strictly Saxon, and the pillars which support them, short, strong, and massy. In some places, however, there are pointed windows, which indicate that the building has been repaired at a period long subsequent to the original foundation. The exterior ornaments of the building, being of a light sandy stone, have been wasted, as described in the text. Lindisfarne is not properly an island, but rather, as the Venerable Bede has termed it, a semi-isle; for, although surrounded by the sea at full tide, the ebb leaves the sands dry between it and the opposite coast of Northumberland, from which it is about three miles distant.’-SCOTT.The monastery, of which the present ruins remain, was built, between 1093 and 1120, by Benedictine monks under the direction of William Carileph, Bishop of Durham. There were sixteen bishops in Holy Island between St. Aidan (635 A. D.) and Eardulph (875 A. D.). The Christians were dispersed after the violent inroad of the Danes in 868, and for two centuries Lindisfarne suffered apparent relapse. Lindisfarne (Gael.farne, a retreat) signifies ‘a place of retreat by the brook Lindis.’ The name Holy Island was given by Carileph’s monks, to commemorate, they said, ‘the sacred blood which had been shed by the Danes.’ See Raine’s ‘History of North Durham,’ F. R. Wilson’s ‘Churches of Lindisfarne,’ and Mr. Keeling’s ‘Lindisfarne, or Holy Island: its History and Associations.’line 17. Cp. Coleridge’s ‘Ancient Mariner’:-‘The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,The farrow followed free.’line 20. For Saint Hilda, see below, note on line 244.Stanza II. line 33. sea-dog, the seal.line 36. still. Cp. above, I. 430.line 44. A Novice is one under probation for a term extending to at least a year, and it may extend to two or three years, after which vows are either taken or declined.Stanza IV. line 70. Benedictine school. St. Benedict founded his order-sometimes, because of their dark garb, called Black Friars-in the beginning of the sixth century. Benedict of Aniana, in the eighth century, reformed the discipline of the order.line 74. Cp. Chaucer’s Prioress in the Prologue:-‘And sikerly sche was of gret disport,And ful plesaunt, and amyable of port.’Stanza V. line 90. Cp. Spenser’s Una, ‘Faery Queene,’ I. iv:-‘A lovely Ladie rode him faire beside.* * *As one that inly mournd, so was she sad,And heavie sat upon her palfrey slow.’Stanza VI. With this ‘brown study,’ cp. Wordsworth’s ‘Reverie of Poor Susan.’Stanza. VII. line 114. Reference to the lion of ‘Faery Queene,’ I. iii:-‘Forsaken Truth long seekes her love,And makes the Lyon mylde.’line 124. bowl and knife. Poisoning and stabbing.Stanza VIII. Monk-Wearmouth. A monastery, founded here in 674 A. D., was destroyed by the Danes in the ninth century, and restored after the Norman Conquest. ForTynemouth, see below, 371,Seaton-Delaval, the seat of the Delavals, who by marriage came into possession of Ford Castle.Widderington. It was a ‘squyar off Northombarlonde, Ric. Wytharynton,’ that showed notable valour and persistent endurance at Chevy Chase:-‘For Wetharryngton my harte was wo,That ever he slayne shulde be;For when both his leggis wear hewyne in te,He knyled and fought on hys kne.’Butler, fully appreciating this doughty champion, uses him in a descriptive illustration, ‘Hudibras,’ I. iii. 95:-‘As Widdrington, in doleful dumps,Is said to fight upon his stumps.’Widderington Castle, with the exception of one tower, was destroyed by fire.Warkworth Castleis about a mile from the mouth of the Alne, and is the seat of the Duke of Northumberland.Bamborough, the finest specimen of a feudal castle in the north of England, is said to have been founded by King Ida about the middle of the sixth century. Lord Crewe, Bishop of Durham, purchased the Bamborough estates between 1709 and 1720, and left them for charitable purposes. This charity maintains,inter alia, a national school in the village of Bamborough, and an officer to fire a cannon from the dangerous rocks every fifteen minutes in foggy weather, besides providing for the education of thirty girls within the castle walls.Stanza IX. line 164. battled. See above, I. 4.Stanza X. line 173. Pointed or Gothic architecture came in towards the end of the twelfth century.Stanza XII. line 215. Suppose we= Let us suppose. This is an Elizabethanism. Cp. Macbeth, i. I. 10:-‘Hover through the fog and filthy air,’wherehover= hover we.Stanza XIII. line 234. Scott quotes from ‘A True Account,’ circulated at Whitby, concerning the consequences of a boar-hunt on Eskdale-side, belonging to the Abbot of Whitby. The boar, being hard pressed, made for a hermitage and died just within the door. Coming up, the three leaders-William de Bruce, Lord of Uglebarnby, Ralph de Percy, Lord of Smeaton, and a freeholder named Allatson-in their disappointment and wrath set upon the hermit, whom they fatally wounded. When the abbot afterwards came to the dying hermit, and told him his assailants would suffer extreme penalty for their ruthless conduct, the hermit asked the gentlemen to be sent for, and said he would pardon them on certain conditions. ‘The gentlemen being present bade him save their lives.-Then said the hermit, “You and yours shall hold your lands of the Abbot of Whitby, and his successors, in this manner: That, upon Ascension-day, you, or some of you, shall come to the wood of the Stray-heads, which is in Eskdale-side, the same day at sun-rising, and there shall the abbot’s officer blow his horn, to the intent that you may know where to find him; and he shall deliver unto you, William de Bruce, ten stakes, eleven strout stowers, and eleven yethers, to be cut by you, or some of you, with a knife of one penny price: and you, Ralph de Percy, shall take twenty-one of each sort, to be cut in the same manner; and you, Allatson, shall take nine of each sort, to be cut as aforesaid, and to be taken on your backs and carried to the town of Whitby, and to be there before nine of the clock the same day before mentioned. At the same hour of nine of the clock, if it be full sea, your labour and service shall cease; and if low water, each of you shall set your stakes to the brim, each stake one yard from the other, and so yether them on each side with your yethers; and so stake on each side with your strout stowers, that they may stand three tides, without removing by the force thereof. Each of you shall do, make, and execute the said service, at that very hour, every year, except it be fall sea at that hour; but when it shall so fall out, this service shall cease. You shall faithfully do this, in remembrance that you did most cruelly slay me; and that you may the better call to God for mercy, repent unfeignedly of your sins, and do good works. The officer of Eskdale-side shall blow,Out on you! Out on you! Out on you!for this heinous crime. If you, or your successors, shall refuse this service, so long as it shall not be full sea at the aforesaid hour, you or yours shall forfeit your lands to the Abbot of Whitby, or his successors. This I entreat, and earnestly beg, that you may have lives and goods preserved for this service: and I request of you to promise, by your parts in Heaven, that it shall be done by you and your successors, as is aforesaid requested; and I will confirm it by the faith of an honest man.”-Then the hermit said, “My soul longeth for the Lord: and I do as freely forgive these men my death, as Christ forgave the thieves on the cross.” And, in the presence of the abbot and the rest, he said moreover these words: “In manus tuos, Domine, commendo spiritum meum, a vinculis enim mortis redemisti me, Domine veritatis, Amen.”-So he yielded up the ghost the eighth day of December, anno Domini 1159, whose soul God have mercy upon. Amen.‘“This service,” it is added, “still continues to be performed with the prescribed ceremonies, though not by the proprietors in person. Part of the lands charged therewith are now held by a gentleman of the name of Herbert.”‘-SCOTT.line 244. Edelfled ‘was the daughter of King Oswy, who, in gratitude to Heaven for the great victory which he won in 655, against Penda, the pagan King of Mercia, dedicated Edelfleda, then but a year old, to the service of God, in the monastery of Whitby, of which St. Hilda was then abbess. She afterwards adorned the place of her education with great magnificence.’-SCOTT.line 251. ‘These two miracles are much insisted on by all ancient writers who have occasion to mention either Whitby or St. Hilda. The relics of the snakes, which infested the precincts of the convent, and were at the abbess’s prayer not only beheaded but petrified, are still found about the rocks, and are termed by Protestant fossilists,Ammonitae.‘The other miracle is thus mentioned by Camden: “It is also ascribed to the power of her sanctity, that these wild geese, which, in the winter, fly in great flocks to the lakes and rivers unfrozen in the southern parts, to the great amazement of every one, fall down suddenly upon the ground, when they are in their flight over certain ‘neighbouring fields hereabouts: a relation I should not have made, if I had not received it from several credible men. But those who are less inclined to heed superstition, attribute it to some occult quality in the ground, and to somewhat of antipathy between it and the geese, such as they say is betwixt wolves and scyllaroots: for that such hidden tendencies and aversions, as we call sympathies and antipathies, are implanted in many things by provident Nature for the preservation of them, is a thing so evident, that everybody grants it.” Mr. Chariton, in his History of Whitby, points out the true origin of the fable, from the number of sea-gulls that, when flying from a storm, often alight near Whitby; and from the woodcocks, and other birds of passage, who do the same upon their arrival on shore, after a long flight.’-SCOTT.Stanza XIV. line 257. ‘St. Cuthbert was, in the choice of his sepulchre, one of the most mutable and unreasonable saints in the Calendar. He died A. D. 688, in a hermitage upon the Farne Islands, having resigned the bishopric of Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, about two years before.{1}His body was brought to Lindisfarne, where it remained until a descent of the Danes, about 793, when the monastery was nearly destroyed. The monks fled to Scotland, with what they deemed their chief treasure, the relics of St. Cuthbert. The Saint was, however, a most capricious fellow-traveller; which was the more intolerable, as, like Sinbad’s Old Man of the Sea, he journeyed upon the shoulders of his companions. They paraded him through Scotland for several years, and came as far west as Whithorn, in Galloway, whence they attempted to sail for Ireland, but were driven back by tempests. He at length made a halt at Norham; from thence he went to Melrose, where he remained stationary for a short time, and then caused himself to be launched upon the Tweed in a stone coffin, which landed him at Tilmouth, in Northumberland. This boat is finely shaped, ten feet long, three feet and a half in diameter, and only four inches thick; so that, with very little assistance, it might certainly have swam: it still lies, or at least did so a few years ago, in two pieces, beside the ruined chapel at Tilmouth. From Tilmouth, Cuthbert wandered into Yorkshire; and at length made a long stay at Chester-le-street, to which the bishop’s see was transferred. At length, the Danes continuing to infest the country, the monks removed to Rippon for a season; and it was in return from thence to Chester-le-street, that, passing through a forest called Dunholme, the Saint and his carriage became immovable at a place named Wardlaw, or Wardilaw. Here the Saint chose his place of residence; and all who have seen Durham must admit, that, if difficult in his choice, he evinced taste in at last fixing it. It is said, that the Northumbrian Catholics still keep secret the precise spot of the Saint’s sepulture, which is only intrusted to three persons at a time. When one dies the survivors associate to them, in his room, a person judged fit to be the depositary of so valuable a secret.’-SCOTT.‘The resting-place of the remains of this Saint is not now matter of uncertainty. So recently as 17th May, 1827,-1139 years after his death-their discovery and disinterment were effected. Under a blue stone, in the middle of the shrine of St. Cuthbert, at the eastern extremity of the choir of Durham Cathedral, there was then found a walled grave, containing the coffins of the Saint. The first, or outer one, was ascertained to be that of 1541, the second of 1041; the third, or inner one, answering in every particular to the description of that of 698, was found to contain, not indeed, as had been averred then, and even until 1539, the incorruptible body, but the entire skeleton of the Saint; the bottom of the grave being perfectly dry, free from offensive smell, and without the slightest symptom that a human body had ever undergone decomposition within its walls. The skeleton was found swathed in five silk robes of emblematical embroidery, the ornamental parts laid with gold leaf, and these again covered with a robe of linen. Beside the skeleton were also deposited several gold and silver insignia, and other relics of the Saint.‘(The Roman Catholics now allow that the coffin was that of St. Cuthbert.)‘The bones of the Saint were again restored to the grave in a new coffin, amid the fragments of the former ones. Those portions of the inner coffin which could be preserved, including one of its rings, with the silver altar, golden cross, stole, comb, two maniples, bracelets, girdle, gold wire of the skeleton, and fragments of the five silk robes, and seme of the rings of the outer coffin made in 1541, were deposited in the library of the Dean and Chapter, where they are now preserved.’-LOCKHART.For ample details regarding St. Cuthbert, see ‘St. Cuthbert,’ by James Raine, M. A. (4to, Durham, 1828).line 263. For ‘fair Melrose’ see opening of Canto II, ‘Lay of the Last Minstrel,’ and Prof. Minto’s note in the Clarendon Press edition.Stanza XV. line 292. ‘Every one has heard, that when David I, with his son Henry, invaded Northumberland in 1136, the English host marched against them under the holy banner of St. Cuthbert; to the efficacy of which was imputed the great victory which they obtained in the bloody battle of Northallerton, or Cuton-moor. The conquerors were at least as much indebted to the jealousy and intractability of the different tribes who composed David’s army; among whom, as mentioned in the text, were the Galwegians, the Britons of Strath-Clyde, the men of Teviotdale and Lothian, with many Norman and German warriors, who asserted the cause of the Empress Maud. See Chalmers’s “Caledonia,” vol. i. p. 622; a most laborious, curious, and interesting publication, from which considerable defects of style and manner ought not to turn aside the Scottish antiquary.‘Cuthbert, we have seen, had no great reason, to spare the Danes, when opportunity offered. Accordingly, I find in Simeon of Durham, that the Saint appeared in a vision to Alfred, when lurking in the marches of Glastonbury, and promised him assistance and victory over his heathen enemies; a consolation which, as was reasonable, Alfred, after the battle of Ashendown, rewarded, by a royal offering at the shrine of the Saint. As to William the Conqueror, the terror spread before his army, when he marched to punish the revolt of the Northumbrians, in 1096, had forced the monks to fly once more to Holy Island with the body of the Saint. It was, however, replaced before William left the north; and, to balance accounts, the Conqueror having intimated an indiscreet curiosity to view the Saint’s body, he was, while in the act of commanding the shrine to be opened, seized with heat and sickness, accompanied with such a panic terror, that, notwithstanding there was a sumptuous dinner prepared for him, he fled without eating a morsel (which the monkish historian seems to have thought no small part both of the miracle and the penance,) and never drew his bridle till he got to the river Tees.’-SCOTT.Stanza XVI. line 300. ‘Although we do not learn that Cuthbert was, during his life, such an artificer as Dunstan, his brother in sanctity, yet, since his death, he has acquired the reputation of forging thoseEntrochiwhich are found among the rocks of Holy Island, and pass there by the name of St. Cuthbert’s Beads. While at this task, he is supposed to sit during the night upon a certain rock, and use another as his anvil. This story was perhaps credited in former days; at least the Saint’s legend contains some not more probable.’-SCOTT.See in Mr. Aubrey de Vere’s ‘Legends of the Saxon Saints’ a fine poem entitled ‘How Saint Cuthbert kept his Pentecost at Carlisle.’ The ‘beads’ are there referred to thus:-‘And many an age, when slept that Saint in death,Passing his isle by night the sailor heardSaint Cuthbert’s hammer clinking on the rock.’The recognised name of these shells is still ‘St. Cuthbert’s beads.”Stanza XVII. line 316. ‘Ceolwolf, or Colwulf, King of Northumberland, flourished in the eighth century. He was a man of some learning; for the venerable Bede dedicates to him his “Ecclesiastical History.” He abdicated the throne about 738, and retired to Holy Island, where he died in the odour of sanctity. Saint as Colwulf was, however, I fear the foundation of the penance-vault does not correspond with his character; for it is recorded among his memorabilia, that, finding the air of the island raw and cold, he indulged the monks, whose rule had hitherto confined them to milk or water, with the comfortable privilege of using wine or ale. If any rigid antiquary insists on this objection, he is welcome to suppose the penance-vault was intended by the founder for the more genial purposes of a cellar.‘These penitential vaults were theGeissel-gewolbeof German convents. In the earlier and more rigid times of monastic discipline, they were sometimes used as a cemetery for the lay benefactor of the convent, whose unsanctified corpses were then seldom permitted to pollute the choir. They also served as places of meeting for the chapter, when measures of uncommon severity were to be adopted. But their most frequent use, as implied by the name,was as places for performing penances, or undergoing punishment.’-SCOTT.Stanza XVIII. line 350. ‘Antique chandelier.’-SCOTT.Stanza XIX. line 371. ‘That there was an ancient priory at Tynemouth is certain. Its ruins are situated on a high rocky point; and, doubtless, many a vow was made to the shrine by the distressed mariners, who drove towards the iron-bound coast of Northumberland in stormy weather. It was anciently a nunnery; for Virca, abbess of Tynemouth, presented St. Cuthbert (yet alive) with a rare winding-sheet, in emulation of a holy lady called Tuda, who had sent him a coffin: but, as in the case of Whitby, and of Holy Island, the introduction of nuns at Tynemouth, in the reign of Henry VIII, is an anachronism. The nunnery of Holy Island is altogether fictitious. Indeed, St. Cuthbert was unlikely to permit such an establishment; for, notwithstanding his accepting the mortuary gifts above mentioned, and his carrying on a visiting acquaintance with the abbess of Coldingham, he certainly hated the whole female sex; and, in revenge of a slippery trick played to him by an Irish princess, he, after death, inflicted severe penances on such as presumed to approach within a certain distance of his shrine.’-SCOTT.line 376. ruth(A. S.hreow, pity) in Early and Middle English was used both for ‘disaster’ and ‘pity.’ These two shades of meaning are illustrated by Spenser in F. Q., Bk. ii. I. Introd. to Canto where Falsehood beguiles the Red Cross Knight, and ‘workes him woefull ruth,’ and in F. Q. I. v. 9:‘Greatruthin all the gazers hearts did grow.’Milton (Lycidas, 163) favours the poetical employment of the word, which modern poets continue to use. Cp. Wordsworth, ‘Ode for a General Thanksgiving’:-‘Assaulting withoutruthThe citadels of truth;’and Tennyson’s ‘Geraint and Enid,’ II. 102:-‘Ruthbegan to workAgainst his anger in him, while he watch’dThe being he lov’d best in all the world.’Stanza XX. line 385. doublet, a close-fitting jacket, introduced from France in the fourteenth century, and fashionable in all ranks till the time of Charles II. Cp. As You Like It, ii. 4. 6:-’Doublet and hose ought to show itself courageous to petticoat.’line 398. Fontevraud, on the Loire, 8 miles from Saumur, had one of the richest abbeys in France. It was a retreat for penitents of both sexes, and presided over by an abbess. ‘The old monastic buildings and courtyards, surrounded by walls, and covering from 40 to 50 acres, now form one of the larger prisons of France, in which about 2000 men and boys are confined, and kept at industrial occupations.’ See Chambers’s ‘Encyclopaedia,’ s. v., andChambers’s Edinburgh Journal, 2d. S, I. 104.Stanza XXI. line 408. but= except that. Cp. Tempest, i. 2. 414:-‘And, but he’s something stain’dWith grief that’s beauty’s canker, thou might’st call himA goodly person.’line 414. Byron, writing to Murray on 3 Feb., 1816, expresses his belief that he has unwittingly imitated this passage in ‘Parisina.’ ‘I had,’ he says, ‘completed the story on the passage from Gibbon, which indeed leads to a like scene naturally, without a thought of the kind; but it comes upon me not very comfortably.’ Byron is quite right in his assertion that, if he had taken this striking description of Constance as a model for his Parisina, he would have been attempting ‘to imitate that which is inimitable.’ See ‘Parisina,’ st. xiv:-‘She stood, I said, all pale and still,The living cause of Hugo’s ill.’Stanza XXII. line 415. a sordid soul, &c. For such a character in the drama see Lightborn in Marlowe’s Edward II, and those trusty agents in Richard III, whose avowed hardness of heart drew from Gloucester the appreciative remark:-‘Your eyes drop millstones, when fools’ eyes drop tears.’Richard III, i. 3. 353.Stanza XXIII. line 438. grisly, grim, horrible; still an effective poetic word. It is, e.g., very expressive in Tennyson’s ‘Princess,’ sect. vi, where Ida sees‘The haggard father’s face and reverend beardOfgrislytwine, all dabbled with the blood,’ &c.See below, III. 382.Stanza XXV. line 468. ‘It is well known, that the religious, who broke their vows of chastity, were subjected to the same penalty as the Roman vestals in a similar case. A small niche, sufficient to enclose their bodies, was made in the massive wall of the convent; a slender pittance of food and water was deposited in it, and the awful words, VADE IN PACE, were the signal for immuring the criminal. It is not likely that, in latter times, this punishment was often resorted to; but among the ruins of the abbey of Coldingham, were some years ago discovered the remains of a female skeleton, which, from the shape of the niche, and position of the figure, seemed to be that of an immured nun.’-SCOTT.Lockhart adds:-‘The Edinburgh Reviewer, on st. xxxii,post, suggests that the proper reading of the sentence isvade in pacem-notpart in peace, butgo into peace, or eternal rest, a pretty intelligible mittimus to another world.’Stanza XXVII. line 506. my= ‘of me,’ retains the old genitive force as in Elizabethan English. Cp. Julius Caesar, i. I. 55:-‘InhiswayThat comes in triumph over Pompey’s blood.’line 516. The very old fancy of a forsaken lover’s revenge has been powerfully utilized in D. G. Rossetti’s fascinating ballad, ‘Sister Helen’:-‘Pale, pale her cheeks, that in pride did glow,Sister Helen,‘Neath the bridal-wreath three days ago.’‘One morn for pride and three days for woe,Little brother!’Stanza XXVIII. line 520. plight, woven, united, as in Spenser F. Q., II. vi. 7:-‘Fresh flowerets dightAbout her necke, or rings of rushesplight.’lines 524-40. The reference in these lines is to what was known as the appeal to the judgment of God. On this subject, Scott at the close of the second head in his ‘Essay on Chivalry,’ says, ‘In the appeal to this awful criterion, the combatants, whether personally concerned, or appearing as champions, were understood, in martial law, to take on themselves the full risk of all consequences. And, as the defendant, or his champion, in case of being overcome, was subjected to the punishment proper to the crime of which he was accused, so the appellant, if vanquished, was, whether a principal or substitute, condemned to the same doom to which his success would have exposed the accused. Whichever combatant was vanquished he was liable to the penalty of degradation; and, if he survived the combat, the disgrace to which he was subjected was worse than death. His spurs were cut off close to his heels, with a cook’s cleaver; his arms were baffled and reversed by the common hangman; his belt was cut to pieces, and his sword broken. Even his horse shared his disgrace, the animal’s tail being cut off, close by the rump, and thrown on a dunghill. The death-bell tolled, and the funeral service was said for a knight thus degraded as for one dead to knightly honour. And if he fell in the appeal to the judgment of God, the same dishonour was done to his senseless corpse. If alive, he was only rescued from death to be confined in the cloister. Such at least were the strict roles of Chivalry, though the courtesy of the victor, or the clemency of the prince, might remit them in favourable cases.’For illustration of forms observed at such contests, see Richard II, i. 3.line 524. Each knight declared on oath that he ‘had his quarrel just.’ The fall of an unworthy knight is referred to below, VI. 961.Stanza XXIX. line 545. This illustrates Henry’s impulsive and imperious character, and is not, necessarily, a premonition of his final attitude towards Roman Catholicism.line 555. dastard(Icel.doestr= exhausted, breathless; O. Dut.dasaert= a fool) is very appropriately used here, after the description above, St. xxii, to designate the poltroon that quails only before death. Cp. Pope’s Iliad, II. 427:-‘And die the dastard first, who dreads to die.’Stanza XXX. line 568. Cp. Julius Caesar, ii. 2. 35:-‘It seems to me most strange that men should fear;Seeing that death, a necessary end,Will come when it will come.’Stanza XXXI. line 573. the fiery Dane. See note on line 10 above. Passing northwards after destroying York and Tynemouth, the Danes in 875 burned the monastery on Lindisfarne. The bishop and monks, with their relics and the body of St. Cuthbert, fled over the Kylve hills. See Raine, &c.line 576. the crosier bends. Crosier (O. Fr.croiser; Fr.croix= cross) is used both for the staff of an archbishop with a cross on the top, and for the staff of a bishop or an abbot, terminating in a carved or ornamented curve or crook. The word is used here metaphorically for Papal power, as Bacon uses it, speaking of Anselm and Becket, ‘who with theircrosiersdid almost try it with the king’s sword.’ Constance’s prophecy refers to Henry VIII’s victorious collision with the Pope.Stanza XXXII. lines 585-91. It is impossible not to connect this striking picture with that of Virgil’s Sibyl (Aeneid, VI. 45):-‘Ventum erat ad limen, cum virgo, ‘poscere fataTempus,’ ait; ‘deus, ecce, deus.’ Cui talia fantiAnte fores subito non voltus, non color unus,Non comptae mansere comae; sed pectus anhelum,Et rabie fera corda tument; maiorque videriNec mortale sonans, adflata est numine quandoIam propiore dei.’line 588. Stared, stood up stiffly. Cp. Julius Caesar, iv. 3. 280, and Tempest, i. 2. 213, ‘with hairupstaring.’line 600. See above, line 468, and note.Stanza XXXIII. line 616. for terror’s sake= because of terror. Cp. ‘For fashion’s sake,’ As You Like It, iii. 2. 55.line 620. The custom of ringing thepassingbell grew out of the belief that a church bell, rung when the soul was passing from the body, terrified the devils that were waiting to attack it at the moment of its escape. ‘The tolling of the passing bell was retained at the Reformation; and the people were instructed that its use was to admonish the living, and excite them to pray for the dying. But by the beginning of the l8th century the passing bell in the proper sense of the term had almost ceased to be heard. ‘A mourning bell is still rung during funeral services as a mark of respect. Sees. v.‘Bell,’ Chambers’s Encyclopaedia. Cp. Byron’s ‘Parisina,’ St. xv.‘The convent bells are ringing,But mournfully and slow;In the grey square turret swingingWith a deep sound to and fro.’In criticising ‘Marmion,’ in theEdinburgh Review, Lord Jeffrey says that the sound of the knell rung for Constance ‘is described with great force and solemnity;’ while a writer in theScots Magazineof 1808 considers that ‘the whole of this trial and doom presents a high-wrought scene of horror, which, at the close, rises almost to too great a pitch.’INTRODUCTION TO CANTO THIRD.‘William Erskine, Esq. advocate, sheriff-depute of the Orkneys, became a Judge of the Court of Session by the title of Lord Kinnedder, and died in Edinburgh in August, 1823. He had been from early youth the most intimate of the Poet’s friends, and his chief confidant and adviser as to all literary matters. See a notice of his life and character by the late Mr. Hay Donaldson, to which Sir Walter Scott contributed several paragraphs.’-LOCKHART.There are frequent references to Erskine throughout Lockhart’s Life of Scott. The critics of the time were of his opinion that Scott as a poet was not giving his powers their proper direction. Jeffrey considered Marmion ‘a misapplication in some degree of extraordinary talents.’ Fortunately, Scott decided for himself in the matter, and the self-criticism of this Introduction is characterised not only by good humour and poetic beauty but by discrimination and strong common-sense.line 14. a morning dream. This may simply be a poetic way of saying that his method is unsystematic, but Horace’s account of the vision he saw when he was once tempted to write Greek verses is irresistibly suggested by the expression:-‘Vetuit me tali voce QuirinusPost mediam noctem visus, cum somnia vera:“In silvam non ligna feras insanius, ac siMagnas Graecorum malis implere catervas?’Sat. I. x. 32.line 24. all too well. This use of ‘all too’ is a development of the Elizabethan expression ‘all-to’ =altogether, quite, as ‘all to topple,’ Pericles, iii. 2. 17; ‘all to ruffled,’ Comus, 380. In this usage the original force oftoas a verbal prefix is lost sight of. Chaucer has ‘The pot to breaketh’ in Prologue to Chanon Yeomanes Tale. See note in Clarendon Press Milton, i. 290.line 26. Desultory song may naturally command a very wide class of those intelligent readers, for whom the Earl of Iddesleigh, in ‘lectures and Essays,’ puts forward a courageous plea in his informing and genial address on the uses of Desultory Reading.line 28. The reading of the first edition is ‘loftier,’ which conveys an estimate of his own achievements more characteristic of Scott than the bare assertion of his ability to ‘build the lofty rhyme’ which is implied in the line as it stands. Perhaps the expression just quoted from ‘Lycidas’ may have led to the reading of all subsequent editions.line 46. The Duke of Brunswick commanded the Prussian forces at Jena, 14 Oct., 1806, and was mortally wounded. He was 72. For ‘hearse,’ cp. above, Introd. to I. 199.line 54. The reigning house of Prussia comes from the Electors of Brandenburg. In 1415 Frederick VI. of Hohenzollern and Nuremberg became Frederick the First, Elector of Brandenburg. The Duchy of Prussia fell under the sway of the Elector John Sigismund (1608-19), and from that time to the present there has been a very remarkable development of government and power. See Carlyle’s ‘Frederick the Great,’ and Mr. Baring-Gould’s ‘Germany’ in the series ‘Stories of the Nations.’lines 57-60. The Duke of Brunswick was defeated at Valmy in 1792, and so failed to crush the dragon of the French Revolution in its birth, as in all likelihood he would have done had he been victorious on the occasion.line 64. Prussia, without an ally, took the field instead of acting on the defensive.line 67. seem’d= beseemed, befitted; as in Spenser’s May eclogue, ‘Nought seemeth sike strife,’ i.e. such strife is not befitting or seemly.line 69. Various German princes lost their dominions after Napoleon conquered Prussia.line 78. By defeating Varus, A. D. 9, Arminius saved Germany from Roman conquest. See the first two books of the Annals of Tacitus, at the close of which this tribute is paid to the hero: ‘liberator haud dubie Germaniae et qui non primordia populi Romani, sicut alii reges ducesque, sed florentissimum imperium lacessierit, proeliis ambiguus, bello non victus.’lines 46-80. This undoubtedly vigorous and well-sustained tribute is not without its special purpose. The Princess Caroline was daughter of the Duke of Brunswick, and Scott was one of those who believed in her, in spite of that ‘careless levity’ which he did not fail to note in her demeanour when presented at her Court at Blackheath in 1806. This passage on the Duke of Brunswick had been read by the Princess before the appearance of ‘Marmion.’ Lockhart (Life of Scott, ii. 117) says: ‘He seems to have communicated fragments of the poem very freely during the whole of its progress. As early as the 22nd February, 1807, I find Mrs. Hayman acknowledging, in the name of the Princess of Wales, the receipt of a copy of the Introduction to Canto III, in which occurs the tribute to her Royal Highness’s heroic father, mortally wounded the year before at Jena-a tribute so grateful to her feelings that she herself shortly after sent the poet an elegant silver vase as a memorial of her thankfulness.’line 81. The Red-Cross hero is Sir Sidney Smith, the famous admiral, who belonged to the Order of Knights Templars. The eight-pointed Templar’s cross which he wore throughout his career is said to have belonged to Richard Coeur-de-Lion. In early life, with consent of the Government, Smith distinguished himself with the Swedes in their war with Russia. He was frequently entrusted with the duty of alarming the French coast, and once was captured and imprisoned, in the Temple at Paris, for two years. His escape was effected by a daring stratagem on the part of the French Royalist party. He and his sailors helped the Turks to retain St. Jean d’Acre against Napoleon, till then the ‘Invincible,’ who retired baffled after a vain siege of sixty days (May, 1799). Had Acre been won, said Napoleon afterwards, ‘I would have reached Constantinople and the Indies-I would have changed the face of the world.’ See Scott’s ‘Life of Napoleon,’ chap. xiii.line 91. Formetal’dsee above, Introd. to I. 308.line 92. For warped = ‘frozen,’ cp. As You Like It, ii. 7. 187, where, addressing the bitter sky, the singer says:-‘Though thou the waters warp,Thy sting is not so sharp,As friends remember’d not.’line 94. The reference is to Sir Ralph Abercromby, who commanded the expedition to Egypt, 1800-1, and fell at the battle of Alexandria. Sir Sidney Smith was wounded in the same battle, and had to go home.lines 100-10. Scott pays compliment to his friend Joanna Baillie (1764-1851), with chivalrous courtesy asserting that she is the first worthy successor of Shakespeare. ‘Count Basil’ and ‘De Montfort’ are the two most remarkable of her ‘Plays of the Passions,’ of which she published three volumes. ‘De Montfort’ was played in London, Kemble enacting the hero. Several of Miss Baillie’s Scottish songs are among standard national lyrics.line 100. Cp. opening of ‘Lady of the Lake.’lines 115-28. Lockhart notes the resemblance between this passage and Pope’s ‘Essay on Man,’ II. 133-148.line 134. Cp. Goldsmith’s ‘Traveller,’ 293:-‘The slow canal, the yellow-blossom’d vale,The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail.’Batavia is the capital of the Dutch East Indies, with canals, architecture, &c., after the home model.line 137. hind, from Early Eng.hyne, servant (A. S.hina) is quite distinct from hind, a female stag. Gavin Douglas, translatingTyrii coloniof Aen. I. 12, makes them ‘hynis of Tyre.’ Shakespeare (Merry Wives, iii. 5. 94) uses the word as servant, ‘A couple of Ford’s knaves, hishinds, were called forth.’ The modern usage implies a farm-bailiff or simply a farm-servant.line 149. Lochaber is a large district in the south of Invernesshire, having Ben Nevis and other Grampian heights within its compass. It is a classic name in Scottish literature owing to Allan Ramsay’s plaintive lyric, ‘Lochaber no more.’line 153. For early influences, see Lockhart’s Life, vol. i.line 178. ‘Smailholm Tower, in Berwickshire, the scene of the author’s infancy, is situated about two miles from Dryburgh Abbey.’-LOCKHART.line 180. The aged hind was ‘Auld Sandy Ormiston,’ the cow-herd on Sandyknows, Scott’s grandfather’s farm. ‘If the child saw him in the morning,’ says Lockhart, ‘he could not be satisfied unless the old man would set him astride on his shoulder, and take him to keep him company as he lay watching his charge.’line 183. strength, stronghold. Cp. Par. Lost, vii. 141:-‘This inaccessible high strength...He trusted to have seiz’d.’line 194. slights, as pointed out by Mr. Rolfe, was ‘sleights’ in the original, and, as lovers’ stratagems are manifestly referred to, this is the preferable reading. But both spellings occur in this sense.line 201. The Highlanders displayed such valour at Killiecrankie (1689), and Prestonpans (1745).line 207. ‘See notes on theEve of St. John, in the Border Minstrelsy, vol. iv; and the author’s Introduction to the Minstrelsy, vol. i. p. 101.’-LOCKHART.line 211. ‘Robert Scott of Sandyknows, the grandfather of the Poet.’-LOCKHART.line 216. doom, judgment or decision. ‘Discording,’ in the sense of disagreeing, is still in common use in Scotland both as an adj. and a participle. ‘They discorded’ indicates that two disputants approached without quite reaching a serious quarrel. In a note to the second edition of the poem Scott states that the couplet beginning ‘whose doom’ is ‘unconsciously borrowed from a passage in Dryden’s beautiful epistle to John Driden of Chesterton.’ Dryden’s lines are:-‘Just, good, and wise, contending neighbours come,From your award to wait their final doom.’line 221. ‘Mr. John Martin, minister of Mertoun, in which parish Smailholm Tower is situated.’-LOCKHART. With the tribute to the clergyman’s worth, cp. Walton’s eulogy on George Herbert, ‘Thus he lived, and thus he died, like a saint,’ &c.line 225. Forimp, cp. above Introd. to I. 37. A ‘grandame’s child’ is almost certainly spoiled. Shakespeare (King John, ii. i. 161) utilizes the fact:-‘It grandam willGive it a plum, a cherry, and a fig.’CANTO THIRD.Stanza I. Mr. Guthrie Wright, advocate, prosaically objected to the indirect route chosen by the poet for his troopers. Scott gave the true poetic answer, that it pleased him to take them by the road chosen. He is careful, however, to assign (11.6-8) an adequate reason for his preference.line 16. wan, won, gained; still used in Scotland. Cp. Principal Shairp’s ‘Bush Aboon Traquair’:-‘And then theywana rest,The lownest an’ the best,I’ Traquair kirkyard when a’ was dune.’line 19. Lammermoor. ‘See notes to the Bride of Lammermoor, Waverley Novels, vols. xiii. and xiv.’-LOCKHART.line 22. ‘The village of Gifford lies about four miles from Haddington; close to it is Yester House, the seat of the Marquis of Tweeddale, and a little farther up the stream, which descends from the hills of Lammermoor, are the remains of the old castle of the family.’-LOCKHART.Many hold that Gifford and not Gifford-gate, at the outskirts of Haddington, was the birthplace of John Knox.Stanza II. line 31. An ivy-bush or garland was a tavern sign, and the flagon is an appropriate accompaniment. Chaucer’s Sompnour (Prol. 666) suggested the tavern sign by his head-gear:-‘A garland hadde he set upon his heed,As gret as it were for anale-stake.’See note in Clarendon Press ed., and cp. Epilogue of As You Like It (and note) in same series:-’If it be true that good wine needs no bush,’ &c.line 33. ‘The accommodations of a Scottish hostelrie, or inn, in the sixteenth century, may be collected from Dunbar’s admirable tale of “The Friars of Berwick.” Simon Lawder, “the gay ostlier,” seems to have lived very comfortably; and his wife decorated her person with a scarlet kirtle, and a belt of silk and silver, and rings upon her fingers; and feasted her paramour with rabbits, capons, partridges, and Bourdeaux wine. At least, if the Scottish inns were not good, it was not from want of encouragement from the legislature; who, so early as the reign of James I, not only enacted, that in all boroughs and fairs there be hostellaries, having stables and chambers, and provision for man and horse, but by another statute, ordained that no man, travelling on horse or foot, should presume to lodge anywhere except in these hostellaries; and that no person, save innkeepers, should receive such travellers, under the penalty of forty shillings, for exercising such hospitality. But, in spite of these provident enactments, the Scottish hostels are but indifferent, and strangers continue to find reception in the houses of individuals.’-SCOTT.It is important to supplement this note by saying that the most competent judges still doubt whether Dunbar wrote ‘The Friars of Berwick.’ It is printed among his doubtful works.Stanza III. Such a kitchen as that described was common in Scotland till recent times, and relics of a similar interior exist in remote parts still. The wide chimney, projecting well into the floor, formed a capacious tunnel to the roof, and numerous sitters could be accommodated with comfort in front and around the fire. Smoke and soot from the wood and peat fuel were abundant, and the ‘winter cheer,’-hams, venison, &c.-hung from the uncovered rafters, were well begrimed before coming to the table.line 48. The solan goose frequents Scottish haunts in summer. There are thousands of them on Ailsa Craig, in the Frith of Clyde, and on the Bass Rock, in the Frith of Forth, opposite Tantallon.line 49. gammon(O. Fr.gambon, Lat.gamba, ‘joint of a leg’), the buttock or thigh of a hog salted and dried; the lower end of a flitch.Stanza IV. line 73. ‘The winds of March’ (Winter’s Tale, iv. 3. 120), are a prominent feature of the month. Thefreshnessof May has fascinated the poets since it was told by Chaucer (Knightes’ Tale, 175) how Emelie arose one fine morning in early summer:-‘Emilie, that fairer was to sceneThan is the lilie on hire stalke grene,And fresscher than the May with floures newe.’line 76. Cp. ‘Jock o’ Hazeldean’:-‘His step is first in peaceful ha’,His sword in battle keen.’line 78. buxom(A. S.bocsum, flexible, obedient, frombugan, to bend) here means lively, fresh, brisk. Cp. Henry V, iii. 6. 27:-‘Bardolph, a soldier firm and sound of heart,And ofbuxomvalour.Stanza VII. line 112. Cp. Spenser’s Epithalamium:-‘Yet never day so long but late would passe,Ring ye the bels to make it weare away.’A familiar instance of ‘speed’ as a trans. verb is in Pope’s Odyssey, XV. 83:-’Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest.’Stanza VIII. line 120. St. Valentine’s day is Feb. 14, when birds pair and lovers (till at any rate recent times) exchange artistic tokens of affection. The latter observance is sadly degenerated. See Professor Skeat’s note to ‘Parlement of Foules,’ line 309, in Chaucer’s Minor Poems (Clarendon Press).line 122. The myth of Philomela has been a favourite with English sentimental poets. The Elizabethan Barnefield writes the typical lyric on the theme. These lines contain the myth :--‘She, poor bird, as all forlorn,Lean’d her breast against a thorn,And there sung the dolefullest dittyThat to hear it was great pity.’Stanza IX. In days when harvesting was done with the sickle, reapers from the Highlands and from Ireland came in large numbers to the Scottish Lowlands and cut the crops. At one time a piper played characteristic melodies behind the reapers to give them spirit for their work. Hence comes-‘Wha will gar our shearers shear?Wha will bind up the brags of weir?’in a lyric by Hamilton of Gilbertfield (1665-1751). The reaper’s song is the later representative of this practice. See Wordsworth’s ‘Solitary Highland Reaper’-immortalized by her suggestive and memorable singing-and compare the pathetic ‘Exile’s Song’ of Robert Gilfillan (1798-1850):-‘Oh! here no Sabbath bellAwakes the Sabbath morn;Nor song of reapers heardAmong the yellow corn.’For references to Susquehanna and the home-longing of the exile, see Campbell’s ‘Gertrude of Wyoming,’ I. i.-vi. The introduction of reaping-machines has minimised the music and poetry of the harvest field.Stanzas X, XI. The two pictures in the song are very effectively contrasted both in spirit and style. The lover’s resting-place has features that recall the house of Morpheus, ‘Faery Queene,’ I. i. 40-1. Note the recurrence of the traitor’s doom in Marmion’s troubled thoughts, in VI. xxxii. The burden