King Guthrum cried, “’Twas Alfred’s own;
  Thy song befits the brave: 
  The King who cannot guard his throne
  Nor wine nor song shall have.” 
  The minstrel took the goblet bright,
  And said, “I drink the wine
  To him who owns by justest right
  The cup thou bid’st be mine. 
  To him, your Lord, O shout ye all! 
  His meed be deathless praise! 
  The King who dares not nobly fall,
  Dies basely all his days.”

  “The praise thou speakest,” Guthrum said,
  “With sweetness fills mine ear;
  For Alfred swift before me fled,
  And left me monarch here. 
  The royal coward never dared
  Beneath mine eye to stand. 
  O, would that now this feast he shared,
  And saw me rule his land!”

  Then stern the minstrel rose, and spake,
  And gazed upon the King,—­
  “Not now the golden cup I take,
  Nor more to thee I sing. 
  Another day, a happier hour,
  Shall bring me here again: 
  The cup shall stay in Guthrum’s power,
  Till I demand it then.”

  The Harper turned and left the shed,
  Nor bent to Guthrum’s crown;
  And one who marked his visage said
  It wore a ghastly frown. 
  The Danes ne’er saw that Harper more,
  For soon as morning rose,
  Upon their camp King Alfred bore,
  And slew ten thousand foes.

JOHN STERLING.

* * * * *

CHEVY-CHACE.

[A modernized form of the old ballad of the “Hunting o’ the Cheviot.”  Some circumstances of the battle of Olter-bourne (A.D. 1388) are woven into the ballad, and the affairs of the two events are confounded.  The ballad preserved in the “Percy Reliques” is probably as old as 1574.  The one following is not later than the time of Charles II]

  God prosper long our noble king,
    Our lives and safeties all;
  A woful hunting once there did
    In Chevy-Chace befall.

  To drive the deer with hound and horn
    Earl Piercy took his way;
  The child may rue that is unborn
    The hunting of that day.

  The stout Earl of Northumberland
    A vow to God did make,
  His pleasure in the Scottish woods
    Three summer days to take,—­

  The chiefest harts in Chevy-Chace
    To kill and bear away. 
  These tidings to Earl Douglas came,
    In Scotland where he lay;

  Who sent Earl Piercy present word
    He would prevent his sport. 
  The English earl, not fearing that,
    Did to the woods resort.

  With fifteen hundred bowmen bold,
    All chosen men of might,
  Who knew full well in time of need
    To aim their shafts aright.

  The gallant greyhounds swiftly ran
    To chase the fallow deer;
  On Monday they began to hunt,
    When daylight did appear;

  And long before high noon they had
    A hundred fat bucks slain;
  Then, having dined, the drovers went
    To rouse the deer again.