The public faith shall save our souls, But when our faith and works fall down, Our acts will bear us up to heaven, SONG.-The Royalist. [Written in 1646.] Come, pass about the bowl to me; A health to our distressed king! When storms do fall, and shall not we? When we are ships and sack 's the sea. Pox on this grief, hang wealth, let's sing, Shall kill ourselves for fear of death? We'll live by the air which songs doth bring, Our sighing does but waste our breath: Then let us not be discontent, Nor drink a glass the less of wine; In vain they'll think their plagues are spent, When once they see we don't repine. We do not suffer here alone, Though we are beggar'd, so's the king; "Tis sin t' have wealth, when he has none; Tush! poverty's a royal thing! When we are larded well with drink, Our heads shall turn as round as theirs, Our feet shall rise, our bodies sink Clean down the wind, like cavaliers. Fill this unnatural quart with sack, Nature all vacuums doth decline, Ourselves will be a zodiac, And every month shall be a sign. Methinks the travels of the glass Are circular like Plato's year, Where everything is as it was; Let's tipple round; and so 'tis here. The fairest action of our human life If we a worthy enemy do find, To yield to worth it must be nobly done; In base revenge there is no honour won. We say our hearts are great, and cannot yield; A noble heart doth teach a virtuous scorn. To scorn to owe a duty overlong; To scorn to be for benefits forborne ; To scorn to lie, to scorn to do a wrong. To scorn to bear an injury in mind; To scorn a free-born heart slave-like to bind. But if for wrongs we needs revenge must have, Then be our vengeance of the noblest kind; Do we his body from our fury save, And let our hate prevail against our mind? What can 'gainst him a greater vengeance be, Than make his foe more worthy far than he ? Had Mariam scorn'd to leave a due unpaid, She would to Herod then have paid her love, And not have been by sullen passion sway'd. To fix her thoughts all injury above Is virtuous pride. Had Mariam thus been proud, Long famous life to her had been allow'd. SCOTTISH POETS. ALEXANDER SCOT. While Sidney, Spenser, Marlow, and other poets, were illustrating the reign of Elizabeth, the muses were not wholly neglected in Scotland. There was, however, so little intercourse between the two nations, that the works' of the English bards seem to have been comparatively unknown in the north, and to have had no Scottish imitators. The country was then in a rude and barbarous state, tyrannised over by the nobles, and torn by feuds and dissensions. In England, the Reformation had proceeded from the throne, and was accomplished with little violence or disorder. In Scotland, it uprooted the whole form of society, and was marked by fierce contentions and lawless turbulence. The absorbing influence of this ecclesiastical struggle was unfavourable to the cultivation of poetry. It shed a gloomy spirit over the nation, and almost proscribed the study of romantic literature. The drama, which in England was the nurse of so many fine thoughts, so much stirring passion, and beautiful imagery, was shunned as a leprosy, fatal to religion and morality. The very songs in Scotland partook of this religious chathat ALEXANDER SCOT, in his New Year Gift to the racter; and so widely was the polemical spirit diffused, Queen, in 1562, says— That limmer lads and little lasses, lo, Will argue baith with bishop, priest, and friar. Scot wrote several short satires, and some miscellaneous poems, the prevailing amatory character of which has caused him to be called the Scottish Anacreon, though there are many points wanting to complete his resemblance to the Teian bard. As specimens of his talents, the two following pieces are presented : Rondel of Love. Lo what it is to luve, Learn ye that list to pruve, By me, I say, that no ways may, The grund of greif remuve. But still decay, both nicht and day; Lo what it is to luve ! Luve is ane fervent fire, Kendillit without desire, Short plesour, lang displesour; Repentance is the hire; Ane pure tressour, without messour; Luve is ane fervent fire. POETS. To luve and to be wise, To rege with gude adwise; Now thus, now than, so goes the game, Incertain is the dice; There is no man, I say, that can Both luve and to be wise. Flee alwayis from the snare, It is ane pain and dowble train To his Heart. Hence, heart, with her that must depart, And hald thee with thy soverain, For I had lever want ane heart, Nor have the heart that does me pain; Therefore go with thy luve remain, And let me live thus unmolest; See that thou come not back again, But bide with her thou luvis best. Sen she that I have servit lang, Though this belappit body here Be bound to servitude and thrall, My faithful heart is free inteir, And mind to serve my lady at all. Wald God that I were perigall 2 Under that redolent rose to rest! Yet at the least, my heart, thou sall Abide with her thou luvis best. Sen in your garth3 the lily whyte Adieu the succour that may me save; Adieu the fragrant balmie suaif,4 And lamp of ladies lustiest ! My faithful heart she sall it have, To bide with her it luvis best. Deplore, ye ladies clear of hue, Her absence, sen she must depart, And specially ye luvers true, That wounded be with luvis dart. For ye sall want you of ane heart As weil as I, therefore at last Do go with mine, with mind inwart, SIR RICHARD MAITLAND. Lethington Castle. daughter acted as amanuensis to the aged poet. His familiar style reminds us of that of Lyndsay. Satire on the Town Ladies. Some wifis of the borowstoun And of fine silk their furrit clokis, Their wilicoats maun weel be hewit, I trow wha wald the matter speir, Their woven hose of silk are shawin, Sometime they will beir up their gown, Their collars, carcats, and hause beidis !4 Their shoon of velvet, and their muilis ! And some will spend mair, I hear say, Leave, burgess men, or all be lost, ALEXANDER MONTGOMERY. ALEXANDER MONTGOMERY was known as a poet in 1568; but his principal work, The Cherry and the Slae, was not published before 1597. The Cherry and the Slae is an allegorical poem, representing virtue and vice. The allegory is poorly managed; but some of Montgomery's descriptions are lively and vigorous; and the style of verse adopted in this poem was afterwards copied by Burns. Divested of some of the antique spelling, parts of the poem seem as modern, and as smoothly versified, as the Scottish poetry of a century and a-half later. The cushat crouds, the corbie cries, The jargon of the jangling jays, They deave't me with their din. Can on his May-cock call; The turtle wails on wither'd trees, Repeating, with greeting, His shadow in the well. I saw the hurcheon and the hare The bearded buck clamb up the brae Some feeding, some dreading Had trinkled mony a tear; Wherewith their heavy heads declined Some knoping, some dropping Of balmy liquor sweet, Excelling and smelling Through Phoebus' wholesome heat. Cry till their eyes become red. * Burns, in describing the opening scene of his Holy Fair, has • The hares were hirpling down the furs.' ALEXANDER HUME. ALEXANDER HUME, who died, minister of Logie, in 1609, published a volume of Hymns or Sacred Songs, in the year 1599. He was of the Humes of Polwarth, Logie Kirk. and, previous to turning clergyman, had studied the law, and frequented the court; but in his latter years he was a stern and even gloomy Puritan. The most finished of his productions is a description of a summer's day, which he calls the Day Estival. The various objects of external nature, characteristic of a Scottish landscape, are painted with truth and clearness, and a calm devotional feeling is spread over the poem. It opens as follows: O perfect light, which shed away Thy glory, when the day forth flies, The shadow of the earth anon Syne in the east, when it is gone, Whilk soon perceive the little larks, The lapwing and the snipe; And tune their song like Nature's clerks, The summer day of the poet is one of unclouded splendour. The time so tranquil is and clear, That nowhere shall ye find, Save on a high and barren hill, An air of passing wind. All trees and simples, great and small, Than they were painted on a wall, The rivers fresh, the caller streams The condition of the Scottish labourer would seem to have been then more comfortable than at present, and the climate of the country warmer, for Hume describes those working in the fields as stopping at mid-day, 'noon meat and sleep to take,' and refreshing themselves with 'caller wine' in a cave, and 'sallads steep'd in oil.' As the poet lived four years in France previous to his settling in Scotland, in mature life, we suspect he must have been drawing on his continental recollections for some of the features in this picture. At length the gloaming comes, the day is spent,' and the poet concludes in a strain of pious gratitude and delight: 6 What pleasure, then, to walk and see The perfect form of every tree The salmon out of cruives and creels, The bells and circles on the weills O sure it were a seemly thing, All labourers draw hame at even, Thanks to the gracious God of heaven, KING JAMES VI. In 1584, the Scottish sovereign, KING JAMES VI., ventured into the magic circle of poesy himself, and weak at arguments, and the rules and cautelis' of the royal author are puerile and ridiculous. His majesty's verses, considering that he was only in his eighteenth year, are more creditable to him, and we shall quote one from the volume alluded to. Ane Schort Poeme of Tyme. [Original Spelling.] As I was pansing in a morning aire, And could not sleip nor nawyis take me rest, Furth for to walk, the morning was so faire, Athort the fields, it seemed to me the best. The East was cleare, whereby belyve I gest That fyrie Titan cumming was in sight, Obscuring chaste Diana by his light. Who by his rising in the azure skyes, Did dewlie helse all thame on earth do dwell. As beasts to feid, and birds to sing with beir, I wald we sould bestow it into that The favourite early residence of King James VI. published a volume entitled, Essayes of a Prentice in the Divine art of Poesie, with the Rewlis and Cautelis to be pursued and avoided. Kings are generally, as Milton has remarked, though strong in legions, but EARL OF ANCRUM-EARL OF STIRLING. Two Scottish noblemen of the court of James were devoted to letters, namely, the EARL OF ANCRUM (1578-1654) and the EARL OF STIRLING (1580-1640). The first was a younger son of Sir Andrew Ker of Ferniehurst, and he enjoyed the favour of both James and Charles I. The following sonnet by the earl was addressed to Drummond the poet in 1624. It shows how much the union of the crowns under James had led to the cultivation of the English style and language: Sonnet in Praise of a Solitary Life. Sweet solitary life! lovely, dumb joy, That need'st no warnings how to grow more wise By other men's mishaps, nor the annoy Which from sore wrongs done to one's self doth rise. The morning's second mansion, truth's first friend, The court's great earthquake, the griev'd truth of change, Nor none of falsehood's savoury lies dost hear; Nor knows hope's sweet disease that charms our sense, Nor its sad cure-dear-bought experience ! The Earl of Stirling (William Alexander of Menstrie, created a peer by Charles I.) was a more prolific poet. In 1637, he published a complete edition of his works, in one volume folio, with the title of Recreations with the Muses, consisting of tragedies, a heroic poem, a poem addressed to Prince Henry (the favourite son of King James), another heroic poem entitled Jonathan, and a sacred poem, in twelve parts, on the Day of Judgment. One of the Earl of Stirling's tragedies is on the subject of Julius Cæsar. It was first published in 1606, and contains several passages resembling parts of Shakspeare's tragedy of the same name, but it has not been ascertained which was first published. The genius of Shakspeare did not disdain to gather hints and expressions from obscure authors-the lesser lights of the age-and a famous passage in the Tempest is supposed (though somewhat hypercritically) to be also derived from the Earl of Stirling. In the play of Darius, there occurs the following reflection Let Greatness of her glassy sceptres vaunt, The lines of Shakspeare will instantly be recalled And like this insubstantial pageant, faded, None of the productions of the Earl of Stirling touch the heart or entrance the imagination. He has not the humble but genuine inspiration of Alexander Hume. Yet we must allow him to have been a calm and elegant poet, with considerable fancy, and an ear for metrical harmony. The following is one of his best sonnets: I swear, Aurora, by thy starry eyes, And by those golden locks, whose lock none slips, And by the coral of thy rosy lips, And by the naked snows which beauty dyes; I swear by all the jewels of thy mind, Whose like yet never worldly treasure bought, The lady whom the poet celebrated under the name of Aurora, did not accept his hand, but he was married to a daughter of Sir William Erskine. The earl concocted an enlightened scheme for colonising Nova Scotia, which was patronised by the king, yet was abandoned from the difficulties attending its accomplishment. Stirling held the office of secretary of state for Scotland for fifteen years, from 1626 to 1641-a period of great difficulty and delicacy, when Charles attempted to establish episcopacy in the and English poetry, and imbued with true literary taste and feeling, Drummond soared above a mere local or provincial fame, and was associated in friendship and genius with his great English contemporaries. His father, Sir John Drummond, was gentleman usher to king James; and the poet seems to have inherited his reverence for royalty. No author |