To furnish forth your evening cheer.' 'Now, by the rood, my lovely maid, Your courtesy has erred,' he said; 'No right have I to claim, misplaced, The welcome of expected guest. A wanderer here, by fortune tost, My way, my friends, my courser lost, I ne'er before, believe me, fair, Have ever drawn your mountain air, Till on this lake's romantic strand, I found a fay in fairy land!'
XXIII
'I well believe,' the maid replied, As her light skiff approached the side, 'I well believe, that ne'er before Your foot has trod Loch Katrine's shore; But yet, as far as yesternight, Old Allan-bane foretold your plight, A gray-haired sire, whose eye intent Was on the visioned future bent. He saw your steed, a dappled gray, Lie dead beneath the birchen way; Painted exact your form and mien, Your hunting suit of Lincoln green, That tasselled horn so gaily gilt, That falchion's crooked blade and hilt, That cap with heron plumage trim, And yon two hounds so dark and grim. He bade that all should ready be, To grace a guest of fair degree; But light I held his prophecy, And deemed it was my father's horn, Whose echoes o'er the lake were borne.'
XXIV
The stranger smiled: 'Since to your home A destined errant-knight I come, Announced by prophet sooth and old, Doomed, doubtless, for achievement bold, I'll lightly front each high emprise, For one kind glance of those bright eyes. Permit me, first, the task to guide Your fairy frigate o'er the tide.' The maid with smile suppressed and sly, The toil unwonted saw him try; For seldom sure, if e'er before, His noble hand had grasped an oar. Yet with main strength his strokes he drew, And o'er the lake the shallop flew; With heads erect, and whimpering cry, The hounds behind their passage ply. Nor frequent does the bright oar break The dark'ning mirror of the lake, Until the rocky isle they reach, And moor their shallop on the beach.
