Row, vassals, row, for the pride of the Highlands! 
Stretch to your oars for the ever-green pine! 
Oh, that the rosebud that graces yon islands
Were wreathed in a garland around him to twine! 
O that some seedling gem,
Worthy such noble stem,
Honour’d and bless’d in their shadow might grow! 
Loud should Clan-Alpine then
Ring from the deepmost glen,
Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! ieroe!

[78] The “boat song” in the second canto of “The Lady of the Lake.”  It may be sung to the air of “The Banks of the Devon.”

THE HEATH THIS NIGHT MUST BE MY BED.[79]

    The heath this night must be my bed,
    The bracken curtains for my head,
    My lullaby the warder’s tread,
      Far, far from love and thee, Mary.

    To-morrow eve, more stilly laid,
    My couch may be the bloody plaid,
    My vesper song, thy wail, sweet maid! 
      It will not waken me, Mary!

    I may not, dare not, fancy now
    The grief that clouds thy lovely brow,
    I dare not think upon thy vow,
      And all it promised me, Mary.

    No fond regret must Norman know;
    When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe,
    His heart must be like bended bow,
      His foot like arrow free, Mary.

    A time will come with feeling fraught,
    For if I fall in battle fought,
    Thy hapless lover’s dying thought
      Shall be a thought on thee, Mary.

    And if return’d from conquer’d foes,
    How blithely will the evening close,
    How sweet the linnet sing repose
      To my young bride and me, Mary!

[79] Song of Norman in “The Lady of the Lake,” canto third.

THE IMPRISONED HUNTSMAN.[80]

    My hawk is tired of perch and hood,
    My idle greyhound loathes his food,
    My horse is weary of his stall,
    And I am sick of captive thrall;
    I wish I were as I have been,
    Hunting the hart in forest green,
    With bended bow and bloodhound free,
    For that ’s the life is meet for me.

    I hate to learn the ebb of time
    From yon dull steeple’s drowsy chime,
    Or mark it as the sunbeams crawl,
    Inch after inch, along the wall. 
    The lark was wont my matins ring,
    The sable rook my vespers sing: 
    These towers, although a king’s they be,
    Have not a hall of joy for me.

    No more at dawning morn I rise
    And sun myself in Ellen’s eyes,
    Drive the fleet deer the forest through,
    And homeward wend with evening dew;
    A blithesome welcome blithely meet
    And lay my trophies at her feet,
    While fled the eve on wing of glee—­
    That life is lost to love and me!

[80] “The Lady of the Lake,” canto sixth.