Up the streets of Aberdeen,
By the kirk and college green,
Rode the laird of Ury;
Close behind him, close beside,
Foul of mouth and evil-eyed,
Pressed the mob in fury.
Flouted him the drunken churl,
Jeered at him the serving-girl,
Prompt to please her master;
And the begging carlin, late
Fed and clothed at...
From “The Purple East”
WHAT profits it, O England, to prevail
In camp and mart and council, and bestrew
With argosies thy oceans, and renew
With tribute levied on each golden gale
Thy treasuries, if thou canst hear the wail
Of women martyred by the turbaned crew,
Whose tenderest mercy was the sword that slew,
And lift no...
Set in this stormy Northern sea,
Queen of these restless fields of tide,
England! what shall men say of thee,
Before whose feet the worlds divide?
The earth, a brittle globe of glass,
Lies in the hollow of thy hand,
And through its heart of crystal pass,
Like shadows through a twilight land,
The spears of crimson-...
God of our fathers, known of old,—
Lord of our far-flung battle line,—
Beneath whose awful hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine,—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget,—lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies,
The captains and the kings depart:
Still stands thine ancient sacrifice,—
An...
She stands, a thousand-wintered tree,
By countless morns impearled;
Her broad roots coil beneath the sea,
Her branches sweep the world;
Her seeds, by careless winds conveyed,
Clothe the remotest strand
With forests from her scatterings made,
New nations fostered in her shade,
And linking land with land.
O ye by...
From the bonny bells of heather
They brewed a drink long-syne,
Was sweeter far than honey,
Was stronger far than wine.
They brewed it and they drank it,
And lay in a blessèd swound
For days and days together
In the dwellings underground.
There rose a king in Scotland,
A fell man to his foes,
He smote...
[James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, was executed in Edinburgh, May 21, 1650, for an attempt to overthrow the Commonwealth and restore Charles II.]
COME hither, Evan Cameron!
Come, stand behind my knee—
I hear the river roaring down
Toward the wintry sea.
There ’s shouting on the mountain-side,
There ’s war within the blast—
Old...
Oh! why left I my hame?
Why did I cross the deep?
Oh! why left I the land
Where my forefathers sleep?
I sigh for Scotia’s shore,
And I gaze across the sea,
But I canna get a blink
O’ my ain countrie.
The palm-tree waveth high,
And fair the myrtle springs;
And, to the Indian maid,
The bulbul...
MY love to fight the Saxon goes,
And bravely shines his sword of steel;
A heron’s feather decks his brows,
And a spur on either heel;
His steed is blacker than the sloe,
And fleeter than the falling star;
Amid the surging ranks he ’ll go
And shout for joy of war.
Twinkle, twinkle, pretty...
It chanced to me upon a time to sail
Across the Southern ocean to and fro;
And, landing at fair isles, by stream and vale
Of sensuous blessing did we ofttimes go.
And months of dreamy joys, like joys in sleep,
Or like a clear, calm stream o’er mossy stone,
Unnoted passed our hearts with voiceless sweep,
And left us yearning still...
