Than William of Deloraine, good at need, Lay of the Last Minstrel, Canto II. St. 16. "I've fought, Lord-Lion, many a day, In single fight, and mix'd affray, Have borne me as a knight; But when this unexpected foe I trembled with affright." Marmion, Canto IV. St. 20. When the guard which was leading Francis Osbaldistone prisoner fell into the Highland ambuscade: "I clambered,' says the narrator, until out of breath ; 'for a continued spattering fire, in which every shot was * multiplied by a thousand echoes, the hissing of the kindled fuses of the grenades, and the successive explosion of those ❝ missiles, mingled with the huzzas of the soldiers, and the yells and cries of their Highland antagonists, formed a 'contrast which added-I do not shame to own it-wings 'to my desire to reach a place of safety,'-Rob Roy, vol. iii. ch. 3. "What thought was Roland's first when fell, In that deep wilderness, the knell Upon his startled ear? To slander warrior were I loth, Yet must I hold my minstrel troth, It was a thought of fear." Bridal of Triermain, Canto III. St. 6. Many more instances might be selected; among these I would point out in particular the description of FitzJames following Roderick Dhu, after having witnessed the sudden apparition of the concealed clansmen; the detail of Morton's sensations when about to be put to death by the covenanters; and of Lovel's, on the eve of his duel with Hector*. The preternatural acuteness of the senses in moments of strong mental excitement, is a circumstance often touched upon in these works. "Far townward sounds a distant tread, Rokeby, canto i. st. 5. In a note upon this passage, the poet says that he has had 'occasion to remark, in real life, the effect of keen and fer'vent anxiety, in giving acuteness to the organs of sense.' It is the gallopping of horse,' said Morton to himself, his sense of hearing rendered acute by the dreadful situation in which he stood; God grant they may come as my de'liverers!' Tales of My Landlord, 1st Series, vol. iv. ch. 4. "Hark! I hear the trampling of horse; he comes! he * comes!' she exclaimed, jumping up in ecstacy. "I cannot think it is he,' said Varney; or that you can hear the tread of his horse through the closely-mantled 'casements.' * Lady of the Lake, canto v. st. 11; Tales of my Landlord, 1st series, vol. iv. ch. 4; Antiquary, vol. ii. ch. 5. FF "Stop me not, Varney; my ears are keener than thine"it is he!''-Kenilworth, vol. i. ch. 6. We find the same thought in the ballad of the Maid of Neidpath*. "Before the watch-dog pricked his ear, She heard her lover's riding." The following thought, derived, I believe, from Miss Baillie's Count Basil, is found in Rokeby, and in the Abbot: "She comes not; he will wait the hour Her shade is o'er the lattice cast." Rokeby, Canto i. St. 29. 'A twinkling light still streamed from the casement of • Catherine Seyton's apartment, obscured at times for a mo'ment, as the shadow of the fair inhabitant passed betwixt the taper and the window. At length the light was re'moved or extinguished, and that object of speculation was ' also withdrawn from the eyes of the meditative lover.”— Abbot, vol. iii. ch. 3. Bois-Guilbert, listening unseen to the hymn of Rebecca (Ivanhoe, vol. iii. ch. 9), forms a picture very similar, except in costume, to Sir Roderick, overhearing the sacred chaunt of Ellen Douglas, (Lady of the Lake, Canto iii. St. 28, &c.) * Published with The Vision of Don Roderick.; Edinburgh, 1811. Of the next two passages, the second is little more than a prose version of the first: "The air was sad; but sadder still It fell on Marmion's ear, And plain'd as if disgrace and ill, His thoughts I scan not; but I ween, That, could their import have been seen, Would scarce have wish'd to be their prey, Marmion, Canto iii. St. 12. • Leicester resumed his place, envied and admired, beside 'the person of his Sovereign. But, could the bosom of him 'whom they universally envied, have been laid open before ⚫ the inhabitants of the crowded hall, with all its dark 'thoughts-which of them, from the most ambitious noble ' in the courtly circle, down to the most wretched menial, who lived by shifting of trenchers, would have desired to change 'characters with the favourite of Elizabeth, and the Lord ' of Kenilworth!'-Kenilworth, vol. iii. ch. 13, Of that malevolent ignorance which, not content with being insensible, is also hostile to the majesty or beauty of antique monuments, both writers express the same virtuous abomination; and in nearly the same manner; "Dun-Edin's Cross, a pillar'd stone, Rose on a turret octagon; (But now is razed that monument, And voice of Scotland's law was sent A minstrel's malison is said.") Marmion, Canto v. St. 25; and see the Note on this Stanza. 'A sulky churlish boor has destroyed the ancient statue, or rather bas-relief, popularly called Robin of Redesdale. It seems Robin's fame attracted more visitants than was ⚫ consistent with the growth of the heather, upon a moor "worth a shilling an acre. Reverend as you write yourself, 'be revengeful for once, and pray that he may be with me, 'visited with such a fit of the stone, as if he had all the fragments of poor Robin in that region of his viscera 'where the disease holds its seat. Tell this not in Gath, 'lest the Scots rejoice that they have at length found a ' parallel instance among their neighbours, to that barbarous deed which demolished Arthur's oven.'-Ivanhoe, Dedicatory Epistle. Robin's effigy is also alluded to in Rokeby, Canto I. St. 20, and fully described in a note referring to the passage, The tomb of Marmion at Lichfield was "Levell'd, when fanatic Brook The fair cathedral storm'd and took ;- Marmion, Canto vi. St. 36. being, as the royalists observed, killed by a shot from St. Chad's cathedral, on St. Chad's day, and receiving his death |