The Visions of England Part 19

--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 Lancas.h.i.+re; . . . 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, Friend mix'd with foe in stormy disarray: Once more the Northern charge a.s.serts its right, As with the driving rain They drive them down the plain: That star alone before Drummossie gilds the night.

16

--Ah! No more!--let others tell The agony of the mortal moor; Death's silent sheepfold dotted o'er With Scotland's best, sleet-shrouded as they fell!

There on the hearts, once mine, the snow-wreaths drift; Night's winter dews at will In bitter tears distil, And o'er the field the stars their squadrons coldly s.h.i.+ft.

17

Faithful in a faithless age!

Yet happier, in that death-dew drench'd, In each rude hand the claymore clench'd, Than who, to soothe a nation's craven rage, To the red scaffold went with steady eye, And the red martyr-grave, For one, who could not save!

Who only lives to weep the weight of life, and die!

18

--He ended, with such grief As fits and honours manhood:--Then, once more Weaving that long romantic lay, told o'er The names of clan and chief Who perill'd all for him, and died;--and how In islets, caves, and clefts, and bare high mountain-brow

19

The wanderer hid, and all His Odyssey of woes!--Then, agonized Not by the wrongs he suffer'd and despised, But for the Cause's fall,-- The faces, loved and lost, that for his sake Were raven-torn and blanch'd, high on the traitor's stake,

20

As on Drummossie drear They fell,--as a dead body falls,--so he; Swoon-senseless at that killing memory Seen across year on year: O human tears! O honourable pain!

Pity unchill'd by age, and wounds that bleed again!

21

--Ah, much enduring heart!

Ah soul, miscounsell'd oft and lured astray, In that long life-despair, from wisdom's way And thy young hero-part!-- --And yet--DILEXIT MULTUM!--In that cry Love's gentler judgment pleads; thine epitaph a sigh!

The sad old age of Prince Charles is described by Lord Mahon [Stanhope]

in his able _History_: ch. x.x.x: and some additional details will be found in Chambers' narrative of the expedition. During later life, an almost entire silence seems to have been maintained by the Prince upon his earlier days and his royal claims. But the bagpipe was occasionally heard in the Roman Palace, and a casual visit, which Lord Mahon fixes in 1785, drew forth the recital which is the subject of this poem. The prince fainted as he recalled what his Highland followers had gone through, and his daughter rus.h.i.+ng in exclaimed to the visitor, 'Sir! what is this! You must have been speaking to my father about Scotland and the Highlanders! No one dares to mention these subjects in his presence:'

(Mahon: ch. xxvi).

St. 2 _Drowsing His thoughts_; The habit of intemperance, common in that century to many who had not Charles Edward's excuses, appear to have been learned during the long privations which accompanied his wanderings, between Culloden and his escape to France.

St. 5 _Hebrides_; Charles landed at Erisca, an islet between Barra and South Uist, in July 1745.

St. 7 _Fettering Forth_; 'Forth,' according to the proverb, 'bridles the wild Highlandman.'--Charles pa.s.sed it at the Ford of Frew, about eight miles above Stirling.--_At Gladsmuir_; or Preston Pans; Sep. 21, 1745.--_White Horse_; The armorial bearing of Hanover.

St. 8 _Clan Colla_; general name for the sept of the Macdonalds.

St. 10 _Caer Luel_; Urien ap Urbgen is an early hero of Strathclyde or Alcluith, the British kingdom lying between Dumbarton and Carlisle, then Caer Luel.

St. 12 _Ben Aille_; a mountain over Loch Ericht in the central Highlands.

St. 13 _Ice-brook-temper'd_; 'It is a sword of Spain, the ice-brook's temper': (_Oth.e.l.lo_: A. 5: S. 2).

St. 14 _At Falkirk_; Jan 17, 1746. 'On the eve after his victory Charles again encamped on Bannockburn.'

St. 16 _The mortal moor_; named Culloden and Drummossie: Ap. 16, 1746.

The cold at that time was very severe.

St. 17 A _nation's craven rage_; See _Appendix_ F.

St. 21 _Love's gentler judgment_; We may perhaps quote on his behalf Vergil's beautiful words

. . . utc.u.mque ferent ea facta minores, Vincet amor patriae laudumque inmensa cupido.

--It is also pleasant to record that over the coffin of Charles in S.

Peter's, Rome, a monument was placed by George the Fourth, upon which, by a graceful and gallant 'act of oblivion,' are inscribed the names of James the Third, Charles the Third, and Henry the Ninth, 'Kings of England.'

On the simple monument set up by his brother Henry in S. Pietro, Frascati, it may be worth notice that Charles is only described as _Paterni iuris et regiae_ _dignitatis successor et heres_:--the t.i.tle, King, (given to his Father in the inscription), not being a.s.signed to Charles, or a.s.sumed by the Cardinal.

TRAFALGAR