The fight upon the hill-side which follows the passage
just transcribed, the skirmish of Beal' an Duin,'
Bannockbum,' and half a dozen other scenes which
are thrown into the shade only by Flodden Field
itself, mark him out as the one latter-day inheritor
of Homer's martial lyre. " His poetry," as John
Wilson declared, " might make a very coward fear-
less." * Nowhere else do we get the same vigour
and breadth, the same thrill of excitement, the same
realisation of the " stern joy " of combat ; by no other
such verse, and this in spite of Scott's habit of
slurring over or omitting altogether the harsher
features of his picture, are we given a more vivid
feeling of the rush and turmoil of the field. This
much may be freely admitted even by those of us
to whom the war-sentiment itself is thoroughly

1 The Lady oftht Lake^ v. 9. « Ibid,, vi. 15-21.
< Th€ lord if the Isles, « Blackwood's MagoMim^ July 1818.
SCOTT AS A POET 251

abhorrent, and who would be deh'ghted if they could
only believe in a coming reign of universal peace.
