Marmion

To town and tower, to down and dale, 
To tell red Flodden’s dismal tale, 
And raise the universal wail.

Tradition, legend, tune, and song, 
Shall many an age that wail prolong:

Still from the sire the son shall hear 
Of the stern strife, and carnage drear, 
  Of Flodden’s fatal field, 
Where shiver’d was fair Scotland’s spear, 
And broken was her shield!

XXXV.

Day dawns upon the mountain’s side:- 
There, Scotland! lay thy bravest pride,

Chiefs, knights, and nobles, many a one: 
The sad survivors all are gone.?             
View not that corpse mistrustfully, 
Defaced and mangled though it be;

Nor to yon Border castle high, 
Look northward with upbraiding eye; 
  Nor cherish hope in vain,                  
That, journeying far on foreign strand, 
The Royal Pilgrim to his land 
  May yet return again.

He saw the wreck his rashness wrought; 
Reckless of life, he desperate fought,    
  And fell on Flodden plain: 
And well in death his trusty brand, 
Firm clench’d within his manly hand, 
  Beseem’d the monarch slain. 
But, O! how changed since yon blithe night! 
Gladly I turn me from the sight, 
  Unto my tale again.

XXXVI.

Short is my tale:-Fitz-Eustace’ care 
A pierced and mangled body bare 
To moated Lichfield’s lofty pile;  
And there, beneath the southern aisle, 
A tomb, with Gothic sculpture fair, 
Did long Lord Marmion’s image bear, 
(Now vainly for its site you look; 
‘Twas levell’d, when fanatic Brook 
The fair cathedral storm’d and took; 
But, thanks to Heaven, and good Saint Chad, 
A guerdon meet the spoiler had!)

There erst was martial Marmion found, 
His feet upon a couchant hound,          
  His hands to Heaven upraised; 
And all around, on scutcheon rich, 
And tablet carved, and fretted niche, 
  His arms and feats were blazed.

And yet, though all was carved so fair, 
And priest for Marmion breathed the prayer, 
The last Lord Marmion lay not there. 
From Ettrick woods, a peasant swain 
Follow’d his lord to Flodden plain,-

One of those flowers, whom plaintive lay 
In Scotland mourns as ‘wede away’:

Sore wounded, Sybil’s Cross he spied, 
And dragg’d him to its foot, and died, 
Close by the noble Marmion’s side.

The spoilers stripp’d and gash’d the slain,