‘He that shall sound that horn and draw that sword,’ said the stranger, who now intimated that he was the famous Thomas of Hersildoune, ’shall, if his heart fail him not, be king over all broad Britain.  So speaks the tongue that cannot lie.  But all depends on courage, and much on your taking the sword or the horn first.’

Dick was much disposed to take the sword, but his bold spirit was quailed by the supernatural terrors of the hall, and he thought to unsheath the sword first might be construed into defiance, and give offence to the powers of the Mountain.  He took the bugle with a trembling hand, and [sounded] a feeble note, but loud enough to produce a terrible answer.  Thunder rolled in stunning peals through the immense hall; horses and men started to life; the steeds snorted, stamped, grinded their bits, and tossed on high their heads; the warriors sprung to their feet, clashed their armour, and brandished their swords.  Dick’s terror was extreme at seeing the whole army, which had been so lately silent as the grave, in uproar, and about to rush on him.  He dropped the horn, and made a feeble attempt to seize the enchanted sword; but at the same moment a voice pronounced aloud the mysterious words: 

    ’Woe to the coward, that ever he was born,
    Who did not draw the sword before he blew the horn!’

At the same time a whirlwind of irresistible fury howled through the long hall, bore the unfortunate horse-jockey clear out of the mouth of the cavern, and precipitated him over a steep bank of loose stones, where the shepherds found him the next morning, with just breath sufficient to tell his fearful tale, after concluding which he expired.

This legend, with several variations, is found in many parts of Scotland and England; the scene is sometimes laid in some favourite glen of the Highlands, sometimes in the deep coal-mines of Northumberland and Cumberland, which run so far beneath the ocean.  It is also to be found in Reginald Scott’s book on “Witchcraft,” which was written in the sixteenth century.  It would be in vain to ask what was the original of the tradition.  The choice between the horn and sword, may perhaps, include as a moral that it is foolhardy to awaken danger before we have arms in our hands to resist it.

Although admitting of much poetical ornament, it is clear that this legend would have formed but an unhappy foundation for a prose story, and must have degenerated into a mere fairy tale.  Doctor John Leyden has beautifully introduced the tradition in his Scenes of Infancy:—­

    Mysterious Rhymer, doom’d by fate’s decree,
    Still to revisit Eildon’s fated tree;
    Where oft the swain, at dawn of Hallow-day,
    Hears thy fleet barb with wild impatience neigh;
    Say who is he, with summons long and high. 
    Shall bid the charmed sleep of ages fly,
    Roll the long sound through Eildon’s caverns vast,
    While each dark warrior kindles at the blast: 
    The horn, the falchion grasp with mighty hand,
    And peal proud Arthur’s march from Fairy-land?