His locks and beard in silver grew; His eyebrows kept their sable hue. Near Douglas when the Monarch stood, His bitter speech he thus pursued :‘Lord Marmion, since these letters say That in the North you needs must stay, While slightest hopes of peace remain, Uncourteous speech it were, and stern, To say-Return to Lindisfarne, Until my herald come again.- Then rest you in Tantallon Hold; Your host shall be the Douglas bold,- A chief unlike his sires of old.He wears their motto on his blade, Their blazon o’er his towers display’d;Yet loves his sovereign to oppose, More than to face his country’s foes.And, I bethink me, by Saint Stephen, But e’en this morn to me was given A prize, the first fruits of the war, Ta’en by a galley from Dunbar, A bevy of the maids of Heaven.Under your guard, these holy maids Shall safe return to cloister shades, And, while they at Tantallon stay, Requiem for Cochran’s soul may say.’And, with the slaughter’d favourite’s name, Across the Monarch’s brow there came A cloud of ire, remorse, and shame.
XVI.
In answer nought could Angus speak; His proud heart swell’d wellnigh to break: He turn’d aside, and down his cheek A burning tear there stole. His hand the Monarch sudden took, That sight his kind heart could not brook: ‘Now, by the Bruce’s soul,Angus, my hasty speech forgive! For sure as doth his spirit live, As he said of the Douglas old, I well may say of you,- That never King did subject hold, In speech more free, in war more bold, More tender and more true:Forgive me, Douglas, once again.’- And, while the King his hand did strain, The old man’s tears fell down like rain. To seize the moment Marmion tried, And whisper’d to the King aside:‘Oh! let such tears unwonted plead For respite short from dubious deed! A child will weep a bramble’s smart, A maid to see her sparrow part, A stripling for a woman’s heart:But woe awaits a country, when She sees the tears of bearded men. Then, oh! what omen, dark and high, When Douglas wets his manly eye!’
