CANTO FIRST

I

THE moon is in her summer glow,
But hoarse and high the breezes blow,
And, racking o'er her face, the cloud
Varies the tincture of her shroud;
On Barnard's towers and Tees's stream,
She changes as a guilty dream,
When Conscience with remorse and fear
Goads sleeping Fancy's wild career.
Her light seems now the blush of shame,
Seems now fierce anger's darker flame,
Shifting that shade to come and go,
Like apprehension's hurried glow;
Then sorrow's livery dims the air,
And dies in darkness, like despair.
Such varied hues the warder sees
Reflected from the Woodland Tees,
Then from old Baliol's tower looks forth,
Sees the clouds mustering in the north,
Hears upon turret-roof and wall
By fits the plashing rain-drop fall,
Lists to the breeze's boding sound,
And wraps his shaggy mantle round.

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II

Those towers, which in the changeful gleam

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Throw murky shadows on the stream,
Those towers of Barnard hold a guest,
The emotions of whose troubled breast,
In wild and strange confusion driven,
Rival the flitting rack of heaven.
Ere sleep stern OSWALD's senses tied,
Oft had he changed his weary side,
Composed his limbs, and vainly sought
By effort strong to banish thought.
Sleep came at length, but with a train
Of feelings true and fancies vain,
Mingling, in wild disorder cast,
The expected future with the past.
Conscience, anticipating time,
Already rues the enacted crime,
And calls her furies forth to shake
The sounding scourge and hissing snake; 44
While her poor victim's outward throes
Bear witness to his mental woes,

And show what lesson may be read
Beside a sinner's restless bed.

III

Thus Oswald's laboring feelings trace Strange changes in his sleeping face, Rapid and ominous as these

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With which the moonbeams tinge the Tees.
There might be seen of shame the blush,
There anger's dark and fiercer flush,
While the perturbed sleeper's hand
Seemed grasping dagger-knife or brand.
Relaxed that grasp, the heavy sigh,
The tear in the half-opening eye,
The pallid cheek and brow, confessed
That grief was busy in his breast:
Nor paused that mood a sudden start
Impelled the life-blood from the heart;
Features convulsed and mutterings dread
Show terror reigns in sorrow's stead.
That pang the painful slumber broke,
And Oswald with a start awoke.

IV

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He woke, and feared again to close
His eyelids in such dire repose;
He woke, to watch the lamp, and tell
From hour to hour the castle-bell,
Or listen to the owlet's cry,
Or the sad breeze that whistles by,
Or catch by fits the tuneless rhyme
With which the warder cheats the time, 70
And envying think how, when the sun
Bids the poor soldier's watch be done,
Couched on his straw and fancy-free,
He sleeps like careless infancy.

V

Far townward sounds a distant tread,
And Oswald, starting from his bed,
Hath caught it, though no human ear,
Unsharpened by revenge and fear,
Could e'er distinguish horse's clank,
Until it reached the castle bank.
Now nigh and plain the sound appears,
The warder's challenge now he hears,
Then clanking chains and levers tell
That o'er the moat the drawbridge fell,
And, in the castle court below,
Voices are heard, and torches glow,
As marshalling the stranger's way
Straight for the room where Oswald lay;
The cry was, 'Tidings from the host,
Of weight- -a messenger comes post.'
Stifling the tumult of his breast,

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VI

The stranger came with heavy stride;
The morion's plumes Lis visage hide,
And the buff-coat in ample fold
Mantles his form's gigantic mould.
Full slender answer deigned he
To Oswald's anxious courtesy,
But marked by a disdainful smile
He saw and scorned the petty wile,
When Oswald changed the torch's place,
Anxious that on the soldier's face
Its partial lustre might be thrown,
To show his looks yet hide his own.
His guest the while laid slow aside
The ponderous cloak of tongh buli's hide,
And to the torch glanced broad and clear
The corselet of a cuirassier;

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Then from his brows the casque he drew
And from the dank plume dashed the dew,
From gloves of mail relieved his hands
And spread them to the kindling brands,
And, turning to the genial board,
Without a health or pledge or word
Of meet and social reverence said,
Deeply he drank and fiercely fed,
As free from ceremony's sway
As famished wolf that tears his prey.

VII

With deep impatience, tinged with fear,
His host beheld him gorge his cheer,
And quaff the full carouse that lent
His brow a fiercer hardiment.
Now Oswald stood a space aside,
Now paced the room with hasty stride,
In feverish agony to learn
Tidings of deep and dread concern,
Cursing each moment that his guest
Protracted o'er his ruffian feast,
Yet, viewing with alarm at last
The end of that uncouth repast,
Almost he seemed their haste to rue
As at his sign his train withdrew,
And left him with the stranger, free
To question of his mystery.
Then did his silence long proclaim
A struggle between fear and shame.

VIII

Much in the stranger's mien appears
To justify suspicious fears.
On his dark face a scorching clime
And toil had done the work of time,
Roughened the brow, the temples bared,
And sable hairs with silver shared,

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strong.

All that gives gloss to sin, all gay Light folly, past with youth away, But rooted stood in manhood's hour The weeds of vice without their flower. And yet the soil in which they grew, Had it been tamed when life was new, Had depth and vigor to bring forth The hardier fruits of virtuous worth. Not that e'en then his heart had known The gentler feelings' kindly tone; But lavish waste had been refined To bounty in his chastened mind, And lust of gold, that waste to feed, Been lost in love of glory's meed, And, frantic then no more, his pride Had ta'en fair virtue for its guide.

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Even now, by conscience unrestrained, Clogged by gross vice, by slaughter stained, Still knew his daring soul to soar, And mastery o'er the mind he bore; For meaner guilt or heart less hard Quailed beneath Bertram's bold regard. And this felt Oswald, while in vain He strove by many a winding train To lure his sullen guest to show Unasked the news he longed to know, While on far other subject hung His heart than faltered from his tongue. Yet nought for that his guest did deign To note or spare his secret pain,

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'Good am I deemed at trumpet sound,
And good where goblets dance the round,
Though gentle ne'er was joined till now
With rugged Bertram's breast and brow.
But I resume. The battle's rage

Was like the strife which currents wage
Where Orinoco in his pride
Rolls to the main no tribute tide,
But 'gainst broad ocean urges far
A rival sea of roaring war;
While, in ten thousand eddies driven,
The billows fling their foam to heaven,
And the pale pilot seeks in vain
Where rolls the river, where the main
Even thus upon the bloody field
The eddying tides of conflict wheeled
Ambiguous, till that heart of flame,
Hot Rupert, on our squadrons came,
Hurling against our spears a line
Of gallants fiery as their wine;
Then ours, though stubborn in their zeal,
In zeal's despite began to reel.
What wouldst thou more?

tost,

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in tumult

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The wrath his art and fear suppressed
Now blazed at once in Wycliffe's breast,
And brave from man so meanly born
Roused his hereditary scorn.
'Wretch! hast thou paid thy bloody debt?
PHILIP OF MORTHAM, lives he yet?
False to thy patron or thine oath,
Traitorous or perjured, one or both.
Slave! hast thou kept thy promise plight,
To slay thy leader in the fight?'
Then from his seat the soldier sprung,
And Wycliffe's hand he strongly wrung;
His grasp, as hard as glove of mail,
Forced the red blood-drop from the nail -
'A health!' he cried; and ere he quaffed
Flung from him Wycliffe's hand and
laughed

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'Now, Oswald Wycliffe, speaks thy heart! Now play'st thou well thy genuine part! Worthy, but for thy craven fear,

Like me to roam a buccaneer.

What reck'st thou of the Cause divine,
If Mortham's wealth and lands be thine?
What carest thou for beleaguered York,
If this good hand have done its work?
Or what though Fairfax and his best
Are reddening Marston's swarthy breast, 330
If Philip Mortham with them lie,
Lending his life-blood to the dye? -
Sit, then! and as mid comrades free
Carousing after victory,

When tales are told of blood and fear
That boys and women shrink to hear,

From point to point I frankly tell The deed of death as it befell.

XVI

When purposed vengeance I forego,
Terin me a wretch, nor deem me foe; 340
And when an insult I forgive,

Then brand me as a slave and live! —
Philip of Mortham is with those
Whom Bertram Risingham calls foes;
Or whom more sure revenge attends,
If numbered with ungrateful friends.
As was his wont, ere battle glowed,
Along the marshalled ranks he rode,
And wore his visor up the while.
I saw his melancholy smile
When, full opposed in front, he knew
Where ROKEBY's kindred banner flew.
"And thus," he said, "will friends di-
vide!"-

I heard, and thought how side by side
We two had turned the battle's tide
In many a well-debated field

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Where Bertram's breast was Philip's shield.

I thought on Darien's deserts pale
Where death bestrides the evening gale;
How o'er my friend my cloak I threw,
And fenceless faced the deadly dew;
I thought on Quariana's cliff

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Where, rescued from our foundering skiff,
Through the white breakers' wrath I bore
Exhausted Mortham to the shore;
And, when his side an arrow found,
I sucked the Indian's venomed wound.
These thoughts like torrents rushed along,
To sweep away my purpose strong.

XVII

'Hearts are not flint, and flints are rent; 370 Hearts are not steel, and steel is bent. When Mortham bade me, as of yore, Be near him in the battle's roar, I scarcely saw the spears laid low, I scarcely heard the trumpets blow; Lost was the war in inward strife, Debating Mortham's death or life. 'Twas then I thought how, lured to come As partner of his wealth and home, Years of piratic wandering o'er, With him I sought our native shore. But Mortham's lord grew far estranged From the bold heart with whom he ranged; Doubts, horrors, superstitious fears, Saddened and dimmed descending years;

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The wily priests their victim sought, And damned each free-born deed and thought.

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Then must I seek another home,
My license shook his sober dome;
If gold he gave, in one wild day
I revelled thrice the sum away.
An idle outcast then I strayed,
Unfit for tillage or for trade.
Deemed, like the steel of rusted lance,
Useless and dangerous at once.
The women feared my hardy look,
At my approach the peaceful shook;
The merchant saw my glance of flame,
And locked his hoards when Bertram came;
Each child of coward peace kept far
From the neglected son of war.

XVIII

'But civil discord gave the call,
And made my trade the trade of all.
By Mortham urged, I came again
His vassals to the fight to train.
What guerdon waited on my care?
I could not cant of creed or prayer;
Sour fanatics each trust obtained,
And I, dishonored and disdained,
Gained but the high and happy lot
In these poor arms to front the shot!-
All this thou know'st, thy gestures tell;
Yet hear it o'er and mark it well.
'T is houor bids me now relate
Each circumstance of Mortham's fate.

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'Thoughts, from the tongue that slowly
part,
Glance quick as lightning through the heart.
As my spur pressed my courser's side,
Philip of Mortham's cause was tried,
And ere the charging squadrons mixed
His plea was cast, his doom was fixed.
I watched him through the doubtful fray,
That changed as March's moody day,
Till, like a stream that bursts its bank,
Fierce Rupert thundered on our flank.
'T was then, midst tumult, smoke, and