“Lord Jeffrey has objected to the guard-room scene and its accompanying song as the greatest blemish in the whole poem.  The scene contrasts forcibly with the grace which characterizes the rest; but in a poem which rests its interest upon incident, such a criticism seems overstrained.  It gives us a vigorous picture of a class of men who played a very important part in the history of the time, especially across the Border; men who, many of them outlaws, and fighting, not for country or for king, but for him who paid them best, were humored with every license when they were not on strict military duty.  The requirements of the narrative might have been satisfied without these details, it is true; but the use which Sir Walter has made of them—­to show the power of beauty and innocence, and the chords of tenderness and goodness which lie ready to vibrate in the wildest natures—­may surely reconcile us to such a piece of realism.

“The scene of Roderick’s death harmonizes well with his character.  The minstrel’s account of the battle the poet himself felt to be somewhat long, and yet it is difficult to see how it could be curtailed without spoiling it.  It is full of life and vigor, and our only cause of surprise is that the lay should only come to a sudden stand when it is really completed” (Taylor).

6.  Scaring, etc.  The 1st ed. reads:  “And scaring prowling robbers to their den.”

7.  Battled.  Battlemented; as in ii. 702 above.

9.  The kind nurse of men.  Cf. 2 Hen.  IV. iii. 1. 5: 

        “O sleep, O gentle sleep,
    Nature’s soft nurse,” etc.

23.  Through narrow loop, etc.  The Ms. has “Through blackened arch,” etc.; and below: 

    “The lights in strange alliance shone
     Beneath the arch of blackened stone.”

25.  Struggling with.  Some recent eds. misprint “struggling through.”

47.  Adventurers they, etc.  Scott says:  “The Scottish armies consisted chiefly of the nobility and barons, with their vassals, who held lands under them for military service by themselves and their tenants.  The patriarchal influence exercised by the heads of clans in the Highlands and Borders was of a different nature, and sometimes at variance with feudal principles.  It flowed from the Patria Potestas, exercised by the chieftain as representing the original father of the whole name, and was often obeyed in contradiction to the feudal superior.  James V. seems first to have introduced, in addition to the militia furnished from these sources, the service of a small number of mercenaries, who formed a body-guard, called the Foot-Band.  The satirical poet, Sir David Lindsay (or the person who wrote the prologue to his play of the Three Estaites), has introduced Finlay of the Foot-Band, who after much swaggering upon the stage is at length put to flight by the Fool, who terrifies him by means of a sheep’s skull upon a pole.  I have rather chosen to give them the harsh features of the mercenary soldiers of the period, than of this Scottish Thraso.  These partook of the character of the Adventurous Companions of Froissart, or the Condottieri of Italy.”