ought,
As summit-boulders glide
Riddling the forest-side,
And in one moment's crash an army melts to nought!

9

--Ah gay nights of Holyrood!
Star-eyes of Scotland's fairest fair,
Sun-glintings of the golden hair,
Life's tide at full in that brief interlude!
Then as a bark slips from her natural coast
Deep into seas unknown,
Scotland went forth alone,
Unfriended, unallied; a handful 'gainst a host.

10

By the Bolder moorlands bare,
By faithless Solway's glistening sands,
And where Caer Luel's dungeon stands,
Huge keep of ancient Urien, huge, foursquare:--
Preston, and loyal Lancashire; . . . and then
From central Derby down,
To strike the royal town,
And to his German realm the usurper thrust again!

11

--O the lithesome mountaineers,
Wild hearts with kingly boyhood high,
And victory in each forward eye,
While stainless honour his white banner rears!
Then all the air with mountain-music thrill'd,
The bonnets o'er the brow,--
My gallant clans! . . . and now
The voices closed in earth, in death the pibroch still'd!

12

--As beneath Ben Aille's crest
The west wind weaves its roof of gray,
And all the glory of the day
Blooms off from loch and copse and green hill-breast;
So, when that craven council spoke retreat,
The fateful shameful word
They heard,--and scarcely heard!
At Scotland's name how should the blood refuse to beat?

13

--O soul-piercing stroke of shame!
O last, last, chance,--and wasted so!
Work wanting but the final blow,--
And, then, the hopeless hope, the crownless name,
The heart's desire defeated!--What boots now
That ice-brook-temper'd will,
Indomitable still
As on through snow and storm their path the dalesmen plough?

14

--Yet again the tartans hail
One smile of Scotland's ancient face;
One favour waits the faithful race,--
One triumph more at Falkirk crowns the Gael!
And O! what drop of Scottish blood that runs
Could aught, save do or die,
And Bannockburn so nigh?
What cause to higher height could animate her sons?

15

Up the gorse-embattled brae,
With equal eager feet they dash,
And on the moorland summit clash,