judgment
- Rung from heaven by angel hand,
Fell the words of desolation
- On the elders of the land.
Hoary heads were bowed and trembling,
- Withered hands were clasped and wrung:
God had left the old and feeble,
- He had ta'en away the young.
Then the Provost he uprose,
- And his lip was ashen white,
But a flush was on his brow,
- And his eye was full of light.
"Thou hast spoken, Randolph Murray,
- Like a soldier stout and true;
Thou hast done a deed of daring
- Had been perilled but by few.
For thou hast not shamed to face us,
- Nor to speak thy ghastly tale,
Standing—thou, a knight and captain—
- Here, alive within thy mail!
Now, as my God shall judge me,
- I hold it braver done,
Than hadst thou tarried in thy place,
- And died above my son!
Thou needst not tell it: he is dead.
- God help us all this day!
But speak—how fought the citizens
- Within the furious fray?
For, by the might of Mary,
- 'Twere something still to tell
That no Scottish foot went backward
- When the Royal Lion fell!"
"No one failed him! He is keeping
- Royal state and semblance still;
Knight and noble lie around him,
- Cold on Flodden's fatal hill.
Of the brave and gallant-hearted,
- Whom ye sent with prayers away,
Not a single man departed
- From his monarch yesterday.
Had you seen them, O my masters!
- When the night began to fall,
And the English spearmen gathered
- Round a grim and ghastly wall!
As the wolves in winter circle
- Round the leaguer on the heath,
So the greedy foe glared upward,
- Panting still for blood and death.
But a rampart rose before them,
- Which the boldest dared not scale;
Every stone a Scottish body,
- Every step a corpse in mail!
And behind it lay our monarch
- Clenching still his shivered sword:
By his side Montrose and Athole,
- At his feet a southern lord.
All so thick they lay together,
- When the stars lit up the sky,
That I knew not who were stricken,
- Or who yet remained to die,
Few there were when Surrey halted,
- And his wearied host withdrew;
None but dying men around me,
- When the English trumpet blew.
Then I stooped, and took the banner,
- As ye see it, from his breast,
And I closed our hero's eyelids,
- And I left him to his rest.
In the mountains growled the thunder,
- As I leaped the woeful wall,
And the heavy clouds were settling
- Over Flodden, like a pall."
So he ended. And the others
- Cared not any answer then;
Sitting silent, dumb with sorrow,
- Sitting anguish-struck, like men
Who have seen the roaring torrent
- Sweep their happy homes away,
And yet linger by the margin,
- Staring idly on the spray.
But, without, the maddening tumult
- Waxes ever more and more,
And the crowd of wailing women
- Gather round the Council door.
Every dusky spire is ringing
- With a dull and hollow knell,
And the Miserere's singing
- To the tolling of the bell.
Through the streets the burghers hurry,
- Spreading terror as they go;
And the rampart's thronged with watchers
- For the coming of the foe.
From each mountain-top a pillar
- Streams into the torpid air,
Bearing token from the Border
- That the English host is there.
All without is flight and terror,
- All within is woe and fear—
God protect thee, Maiden City,
- For thy latest hour is near!
No! not yet, thou high Dunedin!
- Shalt thou totter to thy fall;
Though thy bravest and thy strongest
- Are not there to man the wall.
No, not yet! the ancient spirit
- Of our fathers hath not gone;
Take it to thee as a buckler
- Better far than steel or stone.
Oh, remember those who perished
- For thy birthright at the time
When to be a Scot was treason,
- And to side with Wallace, crime!
Have they not a voice among us,
- Whilst their hallowed dust is here?
Hear ye not a summons sounding
- From each buried warrior's bier?
"Up!"—they say—"and keep the freedom
- Which we won you long ago:
Up! and keep our graves unsullied
- From the insults of the foe!
Up! and if ye cannot save them,
- Come to us in blood and fire:
Midst the crash of falling turrets,
- Let the last of Scots expire!"
Still the bells are tolling fiercely,
- And the cry comes louder in;
Mothers wailing for thei