A bartizan, or projecting gallery, before the windows of her parlour, served to illustrate another of Rose’s pursuits; for it was crowded with flowers of different kinds, which she had taken under her special protection.  A projecting turret gave access to this Gothic balcony, which commanded a most beautiful prospect.  The formal garden, with its high bounding walls, lay below, contracted, as it seemed, to a mere parterre; while the view extended beyond them down a wooded glen, where the small river was sometimes visible, sometimes hidden in copse.  The eye might be delayed by a desire to rest on the rocks, which here and there rose from the dell with massive or spiry fronts, or it might dwell on the noble, though ruined tower, which was here beheld in all its dignity, frowning from a promontory over the river.  To the left were seen two or three cottages, a part of the village, the brow of the hill concealed the others.  The glen, or dell, was terminated by a sheet of water, called Loch Veolan, into which the brook discharged itself, and which now glistened in the western sun.  The distant country seemed open and varied in surface, though not wooded; and there was nothing to interrupt the view until the scene was bounded by a ridge of distant and blue hills, which formed the southern boundary of the strath or valley.  To this pleasant station Miss Bradwardine had ordered coffee.

The view of the old tower, or fortalice, introduced some family anecdotes and tales of Scottish chivalry, which the Baron told with great enthusiasm.  The projecting peak of an impending crag which rose near it had acquired the name of Saint Swithin’s Chair.  It was the scene of a peculiar superstition, of which Mr. Rubrick mentioned some curious particulars, which reminded Waverley of a rhyme quoted by Edgar in King Lear; and Rose was called upon to sing a little legend, in which they had been interwoven by some village poet,

    Who, noteless as the race from which he sprung,
    Saved others’ names, but left his own unsung.

The sweetness of her voice, and the simple beauty of her music, gave all the advantage which the minstrel could have desired, and which his poetry so much wanted.  I almost doubt if it can be read with patience, destitute of these advantages, although I conjecture the following copy to have been somewhat corrected by Waverley, to suit the taste of those who might not relish pure antiquity.

Saint Swithin’s Chair

      On Hallow-Mass Eve, ere ye boune ye to rest,
      Ever beware that your couch be bless’d;
      Sign it with cross, and sain it with bead,
      Sing the Ave, and say the Creed.

      For on Hallow-Mass Eve the Night-Hag will ride,
      And all her nine-fold sweeping on by her side,
      Whether the wind sing lowly or loud,
      Sailing through moonshine or swath’d in the cloud.

      The Lady she sat in Saint Swithin’s Chair,
      The dew of the night has damp’d her hair: 
      Her cheek was pale; but resolved and high
      Was the word of her lip and the glance of her eye.