XV.
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is giant form like ruined tower,Though fall’n its muscles’ brawny vaunt,Huge-boned, and tall, and grim, and gaunt,Seemed o’er the gaudy scene to lower:His locks and beard in silver grew;His eyebrows kept their sable hue.Near Douglas when the monarch stood,His bitter speech he thus pursued:“Lord Marmion, since these letters sayThat in the north you needs must stayWhile slightest hopes of peace remain,Uncourteous speech it were, and stern,To say—return to LindisfarneUntil my herald come again.Then rest you in Tantallon Hold;Your host shall be the Douglas bold—A chief unlike his sires of old.He wears their motto on his blade,Their blazon o’er his towers displayed;Yet loves his sovereign to oppose,More than to face his country’s foes.And, I bethink me, by Saint Stephen,But e’en this morn to me was givenA prize, the first-fruits of the war,Ta’en by a galley from Dunbar,A bevy of the maids of Heaven.Under your guard these holy maidsShall safe return to cloister shades;And, while they at Tantallon stay,Requiem for Cochrane’s soul may say.”And with the slaughtered favourite’s nameAcross the monarch’s brow there cameA cloud of ire, remorse, and shame.
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