Nor could prose give us the hunting of
the deer and the long gallop over hillside and down valley, with
which the "Lady of the Lake" begins, opening thereby the enchanted
gates of the Highlands to the world. "The Lady of the Lake," except
in the battle-piece, is told in a less rapid metre than that of the
"Lay," less varied than that of "Marmion." "Rokeby" lives only by
its songs; the "Lord of the Isles" by Bannockburn, the "Field of
Waterloo" by the repulse of the Cuirassiers. But all the poems are
interspersed with songs and ballads, as the beautiful ballad of
"Alice Brand"; and Scott's fame rests on THESE far more than on his
later versified romances. Coming immediately after the very tamest
poets who ever lived, like Hayley, Scott wrote songs and ballads as
wild and free, as melancholy or gay, as ever shepherd sang, or gipsy
carolled, or witch-wife moaned, or old forgotten minstrel left to
the world, music with no maker's name. For example, take the
Outlaw's rhyme -
"With burnished brand and musketoon,
So gallantly you come,
I read you for a bold dragoon
That lists the tuck of drum.
I list no more the tuck of drum,
No more the trumpet hear;
But when the beetle sounds his hum,
My comrades take the spear.
And, oh, though Brignal banks be fair,
And Greta woods be gay,
Yet mickle must the maiden dare,
Would reign my Queen of May!"
How musical, again, is this! -
"This morn is merry June, I trow,
The rose is budding fain;
But she shall bloom in winter snow,
Ere we two meet again.
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