clenched,
As if some pang his heart-strings wrenched;
Set are his teeth, his fading eye 600
Is sternly fixed on vacancy;
Thus, motionless, and moanless, drew
His parting breath, stout Roderick Dhu!
Old Allan-bane looked on aghast,
While grim and still his spirit passed; 605
But when he saw that life was fled,
He poured his wailing o'er the dead.

XXII

LAMENT

"And art thou cold and lowly laid,
Thy foeman's dread, thy people's aid,
Breadalbane's boast, Clan-Alpine's shade! 610
For thee shall none a requiem say?
--For thee--who loved the minstrel's lay,
For thee, of Bothwell's house the stay,
The shelter of her exiled line,
E'en in this prison-house of thine 615
I'll wail for Alpine's honored Pine!

"What groans shall yonder valleys fill!
What shrieks of grief shall rend yon hill!
What tears of burning rage shall thrill,
When mourns thy tribe thy battles done, 620
Thy fall before the race was won,
Thy sword ungirt ere set of sun!
There breathes not clansman of thy line,
But would have given his life for thine.
O woe for Alpine's honored Pine! 625

"Sad was thy lot on mortal stage!
The captive thrush may brook the cage,
The prisoned eagle dies for rage.
Brave spirit, do not scorn my strain!
And, when its notes awake again, 630
Even she, so long beloved in vain,
Shall with my harp her voice combine,
And mix her woe and tears with mine,
To wail Clan-Alpine's honored Pine."

XXIII

Ellen, the while, with bursting heart, 635
Remained in lordly bower apart,
Where played, with many colored gleams,
Through storied pane the rising beams.
In vain on gilded roof they fall,
And lightened up a tapestried wall, 640
And for her use a menial train
A rich collation spread in vain.
The banquet proud, the chamber gay,
Scarce drew one curious glance astray;
Or if she looked, 'twas but to say, 645
With better omen dawned the day
In that lone isle where waved on high
The dun-deer's hide for canopy;
Where oft her noble father shared
The simple meal her care prepared, 650
While Lufra, crouching by her side,
Her station cla