Lady of the Lake

XXI

Now wound the path its dizzy ledge
Around a precipice's edge,
When lo! a wasted female form, 
Blighted by wrath of sun and storm,
In tattered weeds and wild array,
Stood on a cliff beside the way,
And glancing round her restless eye,
Upon the wood, the rock, the sky, 
Seemed naught to mark, yet all to spy.

Her brow was wreathed with gaudy broom;
With gesture wild she waved a plume
Of feathers which the eagles fling
To crag and cliff from dusky wing; 

Such spoils her desperate step had sought,
Where scarce was footing for the goat.
The tartan plaid she first descried,
And shrieked till all the rocks replied;

As loud she laughed when near they drew, 
For then the Lowland garb she knew;
And then her hands she wildly wrung,
And then she wept, and then she sung—

She sung!—the voice, in better time,
Perchance to harp or lute might chime; 
And now, though strained and roughened, still
Rung wildly sweet to dale and hill.

XXII

SONG

They bid me sleep, they bid me pray,
They say my brain is warped and wrung—
I cannot sleep on Highland brae, 
I cannot pray in Highland tongue.

But were I now where Allan glides,
Or heard my native Devan's tides,
So sweetly would I rest, and pray
That Heaven would close my wintry day!

'Twas thus my hair they bade me braid,
They made me to the church repair;
It was my bridal morn they said,
And my true love would meet me there.

But woe betide the cruel guile 
That drowned in blood the morning smile!
And woe betide the fairy dream!
I only waked to sob and scream.

XXIII

'Who is this maid? what means her lay?
She hovers o'er the hollow way, 
And flutters wide her mantle gray,
As the lone heron spreads his wing,
By twilight, o'er a haunted spring.'

''Tis Blanche of Devan,' Murdoch said,
'A crazed and captive Lowland maid, 
Ta'en on the morn she was a bride,
When Roderick forayed Devan side.

The gay bridegroom resistance made,
And felt our Chief's unconquered blade.
I marvel she is now at large, 
But oft she 'scapes from Maudlin's charge.

Hence, brain-sick fool!'—he raised his bow.
'Now, if thou strik'st her but one blow,