What ail'st thou ?-Speak!"-For as he took
The charge, a strong emotion shook
His frame; and, ere reply,
They heard a faint, yet shrilly tone,
Like distant clarion feebly blown,
That on the breeze did die ;
And loud the Abbess shrieked in fear,
"Saint Withold save us !-What is here!
Look at yon city cross;
See on its battled tower appear
Phantoms, that scutcheons seem to rear,
And blazoned banners toss !"
Dun-Edin's cross, a pillar'd stone,
Rose on a turret octagon;
(But now is razed that monument,
Whence royal edict rang,
And voice of Scotland's law was sent
In glorious trumpet clang.
O! be his tomb as lead to lead,
Upon its dull destroyer's head!—
A minstrel's malison is said.-)
Then on its battlements they saw
A vision, passing Nature's law,
Strange, wild, and dimly seen;
Figures, that seemed to rise and die,
Gibber and sign, advance and fly,
While nought confirmed could ear or eye
Discern of sound or mien.
Yet darkly did it seem, as there
Heralds and Pursuivants prepare,
With trumpet sound, and blazon fair,
A summons to proclaim;
But indistinct the pageant proud,
As fancy forms of midnight cloud,
When flings the moon upon her shroud
A wavering tinge of flame;
It flits, expands, and shifts, till loud,
From midmost of the spectre crowd,
This awful summons came :
Prince, prelate, potentate, and peer,
Whose names I now shall call,
Scottish, or foreigner, give ear!
Subjects of him who sent me here,
At his tribunal to appear,
I summon one and all:
I cite you, by each deadly sin,
That e'er hath soiled your hearts within;
I cite you, by each brutal lust,
That e'er defiled your earthly dust,-
By wrath, by pride, by fear,
By each o'er-mastering passion's tone,
By the dark grave, and dying groan!
When forty days are past and gone,
I cite you, at your Monarch's throne,
To answer and appear.”—
Then thundered forth a roll of names:
The first was thine, unhappy James!
Then all thy nobles came;
Crawford, Glencairn, Montrose, Argyle,
Ross, Bothwell, Forbes, Lennox, Lyle,—
Why should I tell their separate style?
Each chief of birth and fame,
Of Lowland, Highland, Border, Isle,
Fore-doomed to Flodden's carnage pile,
Was cited there by name;
And Marmion, Lord of Fontenaye,
Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbay,
De Wilton, erst of Aberley,
The self-same thundering voice did say.—
But then another spoke :
Thy fatal summons I deny, And thine infernal lord defy, Appealing me to Him on High,
Who burst the sinner's yoke.”
At that dread accent, with a scream,
Parted the pageant like a dream,
The summoner was gone.
Prone on her face the Abbess fell,
And fast, and fast, her beads did tell;
Her nuns came, startled by the yell,
And found her there alone.
She marked not, at the scene aghast,
What time, or how, the Palmer passed.
Shift we the scene.—The camp doth move,
Dun-Edin's streets are empty now,
Save, when, for weal of those they love,
Το pray the prayer, and vow the vow,
The tottering child, the anxious fair,
The grey-haired sire with pious care,
To chapels and to shrines repair.——
Where is the Palmer now? and where
The Abbess, Marmion, and Clare?—
Bold Douglas! to Tantallon fair
They journey in thy charge:
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