Then up and spoke the Cameron,
And gave him his hand again: 
“There shall never a man in Scotland
Set faith in me in vain;
And whatever man you have slaughtered,
Of whatever name or line,
By my sword and yonder mountain,
I make your quarrel mine. {3a}
I bid you in to my fireside,
I share with you house and hall;
It stands upon my honour
To see you safe from all.”

It fell in the time of midnight,
When the fox barked in the den
And the plaids were over the faces
In all the houses of men,
That as the living Cameron
Lay sleepless on his bed,
Out of the night and the other world,
Came in to him the dead.

“My blood is on the heather,
My bones are on the hill;
There is joy in the home of ravens
That the young shall eat their fill. 
My blood is poured in the dust,
My soul is spilled in the air;
And the man that has undone me
Sleeps in my brother’s care.”

“I’m wae for your death, my brother,
But if all of my house were dead,
I couldnae withdraw the plighted hand,
Nor break the word once said.”

“O, what shall I say to our father,
In the place to which I fare? 
O, what shall I say to our mother,
Who greets to see me there? 
And to all the kindly Camerons
That have lived and died long-syne —
Is this the word you send them,
Fause-hearted brother mine?”

“It’s neither fear nor duty,
It’s neither quick nor dead
Shall gar me withdraw the plighted hand,
Or break the word once said.”

Thrice in the time of midnight,
When the fox barked in the den,
And the plaids were over the faces
In all the houses of men,
Thrice as the living Cameron
Lay sleepless on his bed,
Out of the night and the other world
Came in to him the dead,
And cried to him for vengeance
On the man that laid him low;
And thrice the living Cameron
Told the dead Cameron, no.

“Thrice have you seen me, brother,
But now shall see me no more,
Till you meet your angry fathers
Upon the farther shore. 
Thrice have I spoken, and now,
Before the cock be heard,
I take my leave for ever
With the naming of a word. 
It shall sing in your sleeping ears,
It shall hum in your waking head,
The name—­Ticonderoga,
And the warning of the dead.”

Now when the night was over
And the time of people’s fears,
The Cameron walked abroad,
And the word was in his ears. 
“Many a name I know,
But never a name like this;
O, where shall I find a skilly man
Shall tell me what it is?”
With many a man he counselled
Of high and low degree,
With the herdsmen on the mountains
And the fishers of the sea. 
And he came and went unweary,
And read the books of yore,
And the runes that were written of old
On stones upon the moor. 
And many a name he was told,