’Thou shak’st, good friend, thy tresses gray,—­
That pleading look, what can it say
But what I own?—­I grant him brave,
But wild as Bracklinn’s thundering wave;
And generous, —–­save vindictive mood
Or jealous transport chafe his blood: 
I grant him true to friendly band,
As his claymore is to his hand;
But O! that very blade of steel
More mercy for a foe would feel: 
I grant him liberal, to fling
Among his clan the wealth they bring,
When back by lake and glen they wind,
And in the Lowland leave behind,
Where once some pleasant hamlet stood,
A mass of ashes slaked with blood. 
The hand that for my father fought
I honor, as his daughter ought;
But can I clasp it reeking red
From peasants slaughtered in their shed? 
No! wildly while his virtues gleam,
They make his passions darker seem,
And flash along his spirit high,
Like lightning o’er the midnight sky. 
While yet a child,—­and children know,
Instinctive taught, the friend and foe,—­
I shuddered at his brow of gloom,
His shadowy plaid and sable plume;
A maiden grown, I ill could bear
His haughty mien and lordly air: 
But, if thou join’st a suitor’s claim,
In serious mood, to Roderick’s name. 
I thrill with anguish! or, if e’er
A Douglas knew the word, with fear. 
To change such odious theme were best,—­
What think’st thou of our stranger guest? ’—­

XV.

’What think I of him?—­woe the while
That brought such wanderer to our isle! 
Thy father’s battle-brand, of yore
For Tine-man forged by fairy lore,
What time he leagued, no longer foes
His Border spears with Hotspur’s bows,
Did, self-unscabbarded, foreshow
The footstep of a secret foe. 
If courtly spy hath harbored here,
What may we for the Douglas fear? 
What for this island, deemed of old
Clan-Alpine’s last and surest hold? 
If neither spy nor foe, I pray
What yet may jealous Roderick say?—­
Nay, wave not thy disdainful head! 
Bethink thee of the discord dread
That kindled when at Beltane game
Thou least the dance with Malcolm Graeme;
Still, though thy sire the peace renewed
Smoulders in Roderick’s breast the feud: 
Beware!—­But hark! what sounds are these? 
My dull ears catch no faltering breeze
No weeping birch nor aspens wake,
Nor breath is dimpling in the lake;
Still is the canna’s hoary beard,
Yet, by my minstrel faith, I heard—­
And hark again! some pipe of war
Sends the hold pibroch from afar.’

XVI.