“O Bothwell banks! that bloom so bright,
    Beneath the sun of May,
  The heaviest cloud that ever blew
    Is bound for you this day.

  “And, Scotland, thou may’st veil thy head
    In sorrow and in pain;
  The sorest stroke upon thy brow
    Hath fallen this day in Spain!

  “We’ll bear them back unto our ship,
    We’ll bear them o’er the sea,
  And lay them in the hallowed earth,
    Within our own countrie.

  “And be thou strong of heart, Lord King,
    For this I tell thee sure,
  The sod that drank the Douglas’ blood
    Shall never bear the Moor!”

  The King he lighted from his horse,
    He flung his brand away,
  And took the Douglas by the hand,
    So stately as he lay.

  “God give thee rest, thou valiant soul,
    That fought so well for Spain;
  I’d rather half my land were gone,
    So thou wert here again!”

  We bore the good Lord James away,
    And the priceless heart he bore,
  And heavily we steer’d our ship
    Towards the Scottish shore.

  No welcome greeted our return,
    Nor clang of martial tread,
  But all were dumb and hushed as death
    Before the mighty dead.

  We laid our chief in Douglas Kirk,
    The heart in fair Melrose;
  And woeful men were we that day—­
    God grant their souls repose!

THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE

It is very much to be regretted that no competent person has as yet undertaken the task of compiling a full and authentic biography of Lord Viscount Dundee.  His memory has consequently been left at the mercy of misrepresentation and malignity; and the pen of romance has been freely employed to portray, as a bloody assassin, one of the most accomplished men and gallant soldiers of his age.

It was the misfortune of Claverhouse to have lived in so troublous an age and country.  The religious differences of Scotland were then at their greatest height, and there is hardly any act of atrocity and rebellion which had not been committed by the insurgents.  The royal authority was openly and publicly disowned in the western districts:  the Archbishop of St. Andrew’s, after more than one hairbreadth escape, was waylaid, and barbarously murdered by an armed gang of fanatics on Magus Muir; and his daughter was wounded and maltreated while interceding for the old man’s life.  The country was infested by banditti, who took every possible opportunity of shooting down and massacring any of the straggling soldiery:  the clergy were attacked and driven from their houses; so that, throughout a considerable portion of Scotland, there was no security either for property or for life.  It is now the fashion to praise and magnify the Covenanters as the most innocent and persecuted of men; but those who are so ready with their sympathy, rarely take the pains to satisfy themselves, by reference to the