And martial murmurs, from below,
Proclaim'd the approaching Southern foe.
Through the dark wood, in mingled tone,
Were Border pipes and bugles blown;
The coursers' neighing he could ken,
A measured tread of marching men ;
While broke at times the solemn hum,
The Almayn's sullen kettle-drum;

And banners tall, of crimson sheen,

Above the copse appear;

And, glistening through the hawthorns green,
Shine helm, and shield, and spear.

Light forayers, first, to view the ground,
Spurr'd their fleet coursers loosely round;
Behind, in close array and fast,
The Kendal archers, all in green,
Obedient to the bugle blast,

Advancing from the wood were seen.
To back and guard the archer band,
Lord Dacre's bill-men were at hand:
A hardy race, on Irthing bred,
With kirtles white, and crosses red,
Array'd beneath the banner tall,

That stream'd o'er Acre's conquer'd wall;

And minstrels, as they march'd in order,

Play'd, "Noble Lord Dacre, he dwells on the Border."

Behind the English bill and bow,

The mercenaries, firm and slow,

Moved on to fight, in dark array,

By Conrad led of Wolfenstein,

Who brought the band from distant Rhine,

And sold their blood for foreign pay.

The camp their home, their law the sword,
They knew no country, own'd no lord:
They were not arm'd like England's sons,
But bore the levin-darting guns;

Buff coats, all frounced and 'broider'd o'er,
And morsing-horns and scarfs they wore;
Each better knee was bared, to aid
The warriors in the escalade;

All, as they marched, in rugged tongue,
Songs of Teutonic feuds they sung."1

It is in verse of this sort that Scott is at his best. The pageantry of war, the pomp of military display, appealed to him very strongly. His poetry does not touch the deeper feelings, but deals chiefly with externals. He fills the eye with brilliant pictures of glittering warriors and prancing chargers. He makes you hear the blare of trumpets, the rattle of armor, and the clash of arms. He stirs all your savage fighting instincts, and wakens in you the enthusiasm of the young volunteer. For the time you are lifted up out of your workaday duties, breathe the stimulating atmosphere of this realm of romance, and return refreshed to the everyday world. Scott should be read for entertainment, and approached in this spirit The Lay of the Last Minstrel will yield a profitable return.

1 Canto IV, 282-325.

III. BOOKS FOR REFERENCE

BIOGRAPHICAL.

Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart., J. G. Lock. hart.

Scott (English Men of Letters), R. H. Hutton.

Scott (Great Writers' Series), C. D. Yonge.

CRITICAL.

Review of the Lay in Edinburgh Review, April, 1805, Francis
Jeffrey.

Sir Walter Scott (essay in London and Westminster Review),
Thomas Carlyle.

Hours in a Library, Vol. I, Leslie Stephen.

A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century, H. A. Beers.

Modern Painters, Vol. III, John Ruskin.

Essays in Little, Andrew Lang.

Introduction to Scott's "Lyrics and Ballads," Andrew
Lang.

The Spirit of the Age, William Hazlitt.

GENERAL.

An Illustrated History of English Literature, Garnett and
Gosse.

Literary History of England in the XVIIIth and XIXth
Centuries, Mrs. Oliphant.

Familiar Anecdotes of Sir Walter Scott, James Hogg.
Abbotsford, Washington Irving.

The Scott Country, W. S. Crockett.

R., River. W., Water (=Stream). B., Burn (=Brook).