How warmly) ever more with us to stay;
But Charles intends, 'tis said, in these same parts
To try the fealty of our Highland hearts.
'Tis my belief, that he and all his line
Have-saving to be hang'd—no right divine ;
From whose mad enterprise can only flow
To thousands slaughter, and to myriads wo.
Yet have they stirr'd my father's spirit sore,
He flints his pistols-whets his old claymore-
And longs as ardently to join the fray
As boy to dance who hears the bagpipe play.
Though calm one day, the next, disdaining rule,
He'd gore your red coat like an angry bull:
I told him, and he own'd it might be so,
Your tempers never could in concert flow.
But Mark,' he added, 'Ronald! from our door
Let not this guest depart forlorn and poor;
Let not your souls the niggardness evince
Of lowland pedler, or of German prince;
He gave you life-then feed him as you'd feed
Your very father were he cast in need.'
He gave-you'll find it by your bed to-night,
A leathern purse of crowns, all sterling bright:
You see I do you kindness not by stealth.
My wife-no advocate of squandering wealth
Vows that it would be parricide, or worse,
Should we neglect you-here's a silken purse,
Some golden pieces through the network shine, "Tis proffer'd to you from her heart and mine. But come! no foolish delicacy, no!
We own, but cannot cancel what we oweThis sum shall duly reach you once a year." Poor Allan's furrow'd face, and flowing tear, Confess'd sensations which he could not speak. Old Norman bade him farewell kindly meek.
At morn, the smiling dame rejoiced to pack
With viands full the old soldier's haversack.
He fear'd not hungry grass* with such a load,
And Ronald saw him miles upon his road.
A march of three days brought him to Lochfyne
Argyle, struck with his manly look benign,
And feeling interest in the veteran's lot,
Created him a sergeant on the spot-
An invalid, to serve not-but with pay
(A mighty sum to him,) twelve pence a day
"But have you heard not," said Macallin More,
"Charles Stuart's landed on Eriska's shore,
And Jacobites are arming ?"—" What! indeed!
Arrived!, then I'm no more an invalid;
My new-got halbert I must straight employ
In battle."-" As you please, old gallant boy:
Your gray hairs well might plead excuse, 'tis true,
But now's the time we want such men as you."
In brief, at Innerara Allan stay'd,
And join'd the banners of Argyle's brigade.
Meanwhile, th' old choleric shepherd of Glencoe
Spurn'd all advice, and girt himself to go.
What was't to him that foes would poind their fold,
Their lease, their very beds beneath them sold!
And firmly to his text he would have kept,
Though Ronald argued and his daughter wept.
But midst the impotence of tears and prayer,
Chance snatch'd them from proscription and despair
Old Norman's blood was headward wont to mount
Too rapid from his heart's impetuous fount;
And one day, whilst the German rats he cursed,
An artery in his wise sensorium burst.
The lancet saved him: but how changed, alas,
From him who fought at Killiecrankie's pass!
* When the hospitable Highlanders load a parting guest with provisions, they tell him he will need them, as he has to go over a great deal of hungry grass.
Tame as a spaniel, timid as a child,
He mutter'd incoherent words and smiled;
He wept at kindness, roll'd a vacant eye,
And laugh'd full often when he meant to cry
Poor man! whilst in this lamentable state,
Came Allan back one morning to his gate,
Hale and unburden'd by the woes of eild,
And fresh with credit from Culloden's field.
"Twas fear'd at first, the sight of him might touch
The old Macdonald's morbid mind too much";
But no! though Norman knew him and disclosed,
Ev'n rallying memory, he was still composed;
Ask'd all particulars of the fatal fight,
And only heaved a sigh for Charles's flight;
Then said, with but one moment's pride of air,
It might not have been so had I been there!
Few days elapsed till he reposed beneath
His gray cairn, on the wild and lonely heath;
Son, friends, and kindred of his dust took leave,
And Allan, with the crape bound round his sleeve.
Old Allan now hung up his sergeant's sword,
And sat, a guest for life, at Ronald's board.
He waked no longer at the barrack's drum,
Yet still you'd see, when peep of day was come,
Th' erect tall red-coat, walking pastures round,
Or delving with his spade the garden ground.
Of cheerful temper, habits strict and sage,
He reach'd, enjoy'd a patriarchal age-
Loved to the last by the Macdonalds. Near
Their house, his stone was placed with many a tear
And Ronald's self, in stoic virtue brave,
Scorn'd not to weep at Allan Campbell's grave.
COME, maids and matrons, to caress
Wiesbaden's gentle hind;
And, smiling, deck its glossy neck
With forest flowers entwined.
Your forest flowers are fair to show,
And landscapes to enjoy ;
But fairer is your friendly doe
That watch'd the sleeping boy,··
* I wish I had preserved a copy of the Wiesbaden news. paper in which this anecdote of the "Child and Hind" is recorded; but I have unfortunately lost it. The story, however, is a matter of fact; it took place in 1838: every circumstance mentioned in the following ballad literally happened. I was in Wiesbaden eight months ago, and was shown the very tree under which the boy was found sleeping with a bunch of flowers in his little hand. A similar occurrence is told by tradition, of Queen Genevova's child being preserved by being suckled by a female deer, when that Princess-an early Christian-and now a Saint in the Romish calendar, was chased to the desert by her heathen enemies. The spot assigned to the traditionary event is not a hundred miles from Wiesbaden, where a chapel still stands to her memory.
I could not ascertain whether the Hind that watched my hero"Wilhelm," suckled him or not; but it was generally believed that she had no milk to give him, and that the bov must have been for two days and a half entirely without food unless it might be grass or leaves. If this was the case, the circumstance of the Wiesbaden deer watching the child, was a still more wonderful token of instinctive fondness than that of the deer in the Genevova tradition, who was naturally anxious to be relieved of her milk.
"Twas after church-on Ascension day-
When organs ceased to sound,
Wiesbaden's people crowded gay
The deer-park's pleasant ground.
There, where Elysian meadows smile,
And noble trees upshoot,
The wild thyme and the chamomile
Smell sweetly at their root;
The aspen quivers nervously,
The oak stands stilly bold—
And climbing bindweed hangs on high
His bells of beaten gold.*
Nor stops the eye till mountains shine
That bound a spacious view,
Beyond the lordly, lovely Rhine,
In visionary blue.
There, monuments of ages dark
Awaken thoughts sublime;
Till, swifter than the steaming bark,
We mount the stream of time.
The ivy there old castles shades
That speak traditions high
Of minstrels-tournaments-crusades,
And mail-clad chivalry.
Here came a twelve years' married pair-
And with them wander'd free
Seven sons and daughters, blooming fair,
A gladsome sight to see.
There is only one kind of bindweed that is yellow, and that is the flower here mentioned, the Panicolatus Convolvulus.
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