by Homer
Leave untended the herd,
The flock without shelter;
Leave the corpse uninterr’d,
The bride at the altar; 20
Leave the deer, leave the steer,
Leave nets and barges:
Come with your fighting gear,
Broadswords and targes.
Come as the winds come, when 25
Forests are rended,
Come as the waves come, when
Navies are stranded:
Faster come, faster come,
Faster and faster, 30
Chief, vassal, page and groom,
Tenant and master!
Fast they come, fast they come;
See how they gather!
Wide waves the eagle plume 35
Blended with heather.
Cast your plaids, draw your blades,
Forward each man set!
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu
Knell for the onset! 40
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Border Ballad
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
MARCH, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale,
Why the deil dinna ye march forward in order!
March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale,
All the Blue Bonnets are bound for the Border.
Many a banner spread, 5
Flutters above your head,
Many a crest that is famous in story.
Mount and make ready then,
Sons of the mountain glen,
Fight for the Queen and our old Scottish glory. 10
Come from the hills where your hirsels are grazing,
Come from the glen of the buck and the roe;
Come to the crag where the beacon is blazing,
Come with the buckler, the lance, and the bow.
Trumpets are sounding, 15
War-steeds are bounding,
Stand to your arms, then, and march in good order;
England shall many a day
Tell of the bloody fray,
When the Blue Bonnets came over the Border. 20
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Pride of Youth
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
PROUD Maisie is in the wood,
Walking so early;
Sweet Robin sits on the bush
Singing so rarely.
‘Tell me, thou bonny bird, 5
When shall I marry me?’
— ‘When six braw gentlemen
Kirkward shall carry ye.’
‘Who makes the bridal bed,
Birdie, say truly?’ 10
— ‘The gray-headed sexton
That delves the grave duly.
‘The glowworm o’er grave and stone
Shall light thee steady;
The owl from the steeple sing, 15
Welcome, proud lady.’
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Coronach
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
HE is gone on the mountain,
He is lost to the forest,
Like a summer-dried fountain,
When our need was the sorest.
The font reappearing 5
From the raindrops shall borrow,
But to us comes no cheering,
To Duncan no morrow!
The hand of the reaper
Takes the ears that are hoary, 10
But the voice of the weeper
Wails manhood in glory.
The autumn winds rushing
Waft the leaves that are serest,
But our flower was in flushing 15
When blighting was nearest.
Fleet foot on the correi,
Sage counsel in cumber,
Red hand in the foray,
How sound is thy slumber! 20
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river
Like the bubble on the fountain,
Thou art gone, and for ever.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Lucy Ashton’s Song
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
LOOK not thou on beauty’s charming;
Sit thou still when kings are arming;
Taste not when the wine-cup glistens;
Speak not when the people listens;
Stop thine ear against the singer; 5
From the red gold keep thy finger;
Vacant heart and hand and eye,
Easy live and quiet die.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Answer
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
SOUND, sound the clarion, fill the fife!
To all the sensual world proclaim,
One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Rosabelle
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
O LISTEN, listen, ladies gay!
No haughty feat of arms I tell;
Soft is the note, and sad the lay
That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.
‘Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew! 5
And, gentle lady, deign to stay!
Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.
‘The blackening wave is edged with white;
To inch and rock the sea-mews fly; 10
The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite,
Whose screams forebode that wreck is nigh.
‘Last night the gifted Seer did view
A wet shroud swathed round lady gay;
Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch; 15
Why cross the gloomy firth to-day?’
’Tis not because Lord Lindesay’s heir
Tonight at Roslin leads the ball,
But that my lady-mother there
Sits lonely in her castle-hall. 20
’Tis not because the ring they ride,
And Lindesay at the ring rides well,
But that my sire the wine will chide
If ’tis not fill’d by Rosabelle.’
— O’er Roslin all that dreary night 25
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam;
’Twas broader than the watch-fire’s light,
And redder than the bright moonbeam.
It glared on Roslin’s castled rock,
It ruddied all the copse-wood glen; 30
’Twas seen from Dryden’s groves of oak,
And seen from cavern’d Hawthornden.
Seem’d all on fire that chapel proud
Where Roslin’s chiefs uncoffin’d lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud, 35
Sheathed in his iron panoply.
Seem’d all on fire within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar’s pale;
Shone every pillar foliage-bound,
And glimmer’d all the dead men’s mail. 40
Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair —
So still they blaze, when fate is nigh
The lordly line of high Saint Clair.
There are twenty of Roslin’s barons bold 45
Lie buried within that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold
But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle!
And each Saint Clair was buried there
With candle, with book, and with knell; 50
But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung
The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Hunting Song<
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Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
WAKEN, lords and ladies gay,
On the mountain dawns the day;
All the jolly chase is here
With hawk and horse and hunting-spear;
Hounds are in their couples yelling, 5
Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling,
Merrily merrily mingle they,
‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’
Waken, lords and ladies gay,
The mist has left the mountain gray, 10
Springlets in the dawn are steaming,
Diamonds on the brake are gleaming;
And foresters have busy been
To track the buck in thicket green;
Now we come to chant our lay 15
‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’
‘Waken, lords and ladies gay,
To the greenwood haste away;
We can show you where he lies,
Fleet of foot and tall of size; 20
We can show the marks he made
When ‘gainst the oak his antlers fray’d;
You shall see him brought to bay;
‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’
Louder, louder chant the lay, 25
Waken, lords and ladies gay!
Tell them youth and mirth and glee
Run a course as well as we;
Time, stern huntsman! who can baulk,
Stanch as hound and fleet as hawk; 30
Think of this, and rise with day
Gentle lords and ladies gay!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Lochinvar
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
OH! young Lochinvar is come out of the west,
Through all the wide Border his steed was the best;
And save his good broadsword he weapons had none.
He rode all unarmed and he rode all alone.
So faithful in love and so dauntless in war, 5
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.
He stayed not for brake and he stopped not for stone,
He swam the Eske river where ford there was none,
But ere he alighted at Netherby gate
The bride had consented, the gallant came late: 10
For a laggard in love and a dastard in war
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.
So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall,
Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all:
Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword, — 15
For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word, —
‘Oh! come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?’ —
‘I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied;
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide — 20
And now am I come, with this lost love of mine,
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.’
The bride kissed the goblet; the knight took it up, 25
He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup,
She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh,
With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand ere her mother could bar, —
‘Now tread we a measure!’ said young Lochinvar. 30
So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume;
And the bride-maidens whispered ‘‘Twere better by far 35
To have matched our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.’
One touch to her hand and one word in her ear,
When they reached the hall-door, and the charger stood near;
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung,
So light to the saddle before her he sprung! 40
‘She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur;
They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,’ quoth young Lochinvar.
There was mounting ‘mong Graemes of the Netherby clan;
Fosters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran:
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee, 45
But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see.
So daring in love and so dauntless in war,
Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Bonny Dundee
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
TO the Lords of Convention ’twas Claver’se who spoke.
‘Ere the King’s crown shall fall there are crowns to be broke;
So let each Cavalier who loves honour and me,
Come follow the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, come fill up my can, 5
Come saddle your horses, and call up your men;
Come open the West Port and let me gang free,
And it’s room for the bonnets of Bonny Dundee!’
Dundee he is mounted, he rides up the street,
The bells are rung backward, the drums they are beat; 10
But the Provost, douce man, said, ‘Just e’en let him be,
The Gude Town is weel quit of that Deil of Dundee.’
Come fill up my cup, etc.
As he rode down the sanctified bends of the Bow,
Ilk carline was flyting and shaking her pow; 15
But the young plants of grace they looked couthie and slee,
Thinking luck to thy bonnet, thou Bonny Dundee!
Come fill up my cup, etc.
With sour-featured Whigs the Grass-market was crammed,
As if half the West had set tryst to be hanged; 20
There was spite in each look, there was fear in each e’e,
As they watched for the bonnets of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, etc.
These cowls of Kilmarnock had spits and had spears,
And lang-hafted gullies to kill cavaliers; 25
But they shrunk to close-heads and the causeway was free,
At the toss of the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, etc.
He spurred to the foot of the proud Castle rock,
And with the gay Gordon he gallantly spoke; 30
‘Let Mons Meg and her marrows speak twa words or three,
For the love of the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.’
Come fill up my cup, etc.
The Gordon demands of him which way he goes —
‘Where’er shall direct me the shade of Montrose! 35
Your Grace in short space shall hear tidings of me,
Or that low lies the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, etc.
‘There are hills beyond Pentland and lands beyond Forth,
If there’s lords in the Lowlands, there’s chiefs in the North; 40
There are wild Duniewassals three thousand times three,
Will cry hoigh! for the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, etc.
‘There’s brass on the target of barkened bull-hide;
There’s steel in the scabbard that dangles beside; 45
The brass shall be burnished, the steel shall flash free,
At the toss of the bonnet of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, etc.
‘Away to the hills, to the caves, to the rocks —
Ere I own an usurper, I’ll couch with the fox; 50
And tremble, false Whigs, in the midst of your glee,
You have not seen the last of my bonnet and me!’
Come fill up my cup, etc.
He waved his proud hand, the trumpets were blown,
The kettle-drums clashed and the horsemen rode on, 55
Till on Ravelston’s cliffs and on Clermiston’s lee
Died away the wild war-notes of Bonny Dundee.
Come fill up my cup, come fill up my can,
Come saddle the horses, and call up the men,
Come open your gates, and let me gae free, 60
For it’s up with the bonnets of Bonny Dundee!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Datur Hora Quieti
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
THE SUN upon the lake is low,
The wild birds hush their song,
The hills have evening’s deepest glow,
Yet Leonard tarries long.
Now all whom varied toil and care 5
From home and love divide,
In the calm sunset may repair
Each to the loved one’s side.
The noble dame, on turret high,
Who waits her gallant knight, 10
Looks to the western beam to spy
The flash of armour bright.
The village maid, with hand on brow
The level ray to shade,
Upon the footpath watches now 15
For Colin’s darkening plaid.
Now to their mates the wild swans row,
By day they swam apart,
And to the thicket wanders slow
The hind beside the hart. 20