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Home  »  The English Poets  »  The Buccaneer (from Rokeby)

Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. IV. The Nineteenth Century: Wordsworth to Rossetti

Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)

The Buccaneer (from Rokeby)

[From Canto I.]

  • [Bertram Risingham, the Buccaneer, brings the tidings of Marston Moor, and of his murder of Philip Mortham in the battle, to Oswald Wycliffe, his accomplice, then holding Barnard Castle for the Parliament.]


  • FAR town-ward sounds a distant tread,

    And Oswald, starting from his bed,

    Hath caught it, though no human ear,

    Unsharpen’d by revenge and fear,

    Could e’er distinguish horse’s clank,

    Until it reach’d the castle bank.

    Now nigh and plain the sound appears,

    The warder’s challenge now he hears,

    Then clanking chains and levers tell,

    That o’er the moat the drawbridge fell,

    And, in the castle court below,

    Voices are heard, and torches glow,

    As marshalling the stranger’s way,

    Straight for the room where Oswald lay;

    The cry was,—‘Tidings from the host,

    Of weight—a messenger comes post.’

    Stifling the tumult of his breast,

    His answer Oswald thus express’d—

    ‘Bring food and wine, and trim the fire;

    Admit the stranger, and retire.’

    The stranger came with heavy stride;

    The morion’s plumes his visage hide,

    And the buff-coat, an ample fold,

    Mantles his form’s gigantic mould.

    Full slender answer deigned he

    To Oswald’s anxious courtesy,

    But mark’d, by a disdainful smile,

    He saw and scorn’d the petty wile,

    When Oswald changed the torch’s place,

    Anxious that on the soldier’s face

    Its partial lustre might be thrown,

    To show his looks, yet hide his own.

    His guest, the while, laid low aside

    The ponderous cloak of tough bull’s hide,

    And to the torch glanced broad and clear

    The corslet of a cuirassier;

    Then from his brows the casque he drew,

    And from the dank plume dash’d the dew,

    From gloves of mail relieved his hands,

    And spread them to the kindling brands,

    And, turning to the genial board,

    Without a health, or pledge, or word

    Of meet and social reverence said,

    Deeply he drank, and fiercely fed;

    As free from ceremony’s sway,

    As famish’d wolf that tears his prey.

    With deep impatience, tinged with fear,

    His host beheld him gorge his cheer,

    And quaff the full carouse, that lent

    His brow a fiercer hardiment.

    Now Oswald stood a space aside,

    Now paced the room with hasty stride,

    In feverish agony to learn

    Tidings of deep and dread concern,

    Cursing each moment that his guest

    Protracted o’er his ruffian feast.

    Yet, viewing with alarm, at last,

    The end of that uncouth repast,

    Almost he seem’d their haste to rue,

    As, at his sign, his train withdrew,

    And left him with the stranger, free

    To question of his mystery.

    Then did his silence long proclaim

    A struggle between fear and shame.

    Much in the stranger’s mien appears,

    To justify suspicious fears.

    On his dark face a scorching clime,

    And toil, had done the work of time,

    Roughen’d the brow, the temples bared,

    And sable hairs with silver shared,

    Yet left—what age alone could tame—

    The lip of pride, the eye of flame;

    The full-drawn lip that upward curl’d,

    The eye that seem’d to scorn the world.

    That lip had terror never blench’d;

    Ne’er in that eye had tear-drop quench’d

    The flash severe of swarthy glow,

    That mock’d at pain, and knew not woe.

    Inured to danger’s direst form,

    Tornade and earthquake, flood and storm,

    Death had he seen by sudden blow,

    By wasting plague, by tortures slow,

    By mine or breach, by steel or ball,

    Knew all his shapes, and scorn’d them all.

    But yet, though Bertram’s hardened look,

    Unmoved, could blood and danger brook,

    Still worse than apathy had place

    On his swart brow and callous face;

    For evil passions, cherish’d long,

    Had plough’d them with impressions strong.

    All that gives gloss to sin, all gay

    Light folly, past with youth away,

    But rooted stood, in manhood’s hour,

    The weeds of vice without their flower,

    And yet the soil in which they grew,

    Had it been tamed when life was new,

    Had depth and vigour to bring forth

    The hardier fruits of virtuous worth.

    Not that, e’en then, his heart had known

    The gentler feelings’ kindly tone;

    But lavish waste had been refined

    To bounty in his chasten’d mind,

    And lust of gold, that waste to feed,

    Been lost in love of glory’s meed,

    And, frantic then no more, his pride

    Had ta’en fair virtue for its guide.

    Even now, by conscience unrestrain’d,

    Clogg’d by gross vice, by slaughter stain’d,

    Still knew his daring soul to soar,

    And mastery o’er the mind he bore;

    For meaner guilt, or heart less hard,

    Quail’d beneath Bertram’s bold regard.

    And this felt Oswald, while in vain

    He strove, by many a winding train,

    To lure his sullen guest to show,

    Unask’d, the news he long’d to know,

    While on far other subject hung

    His heart, than falter’d from his tongue.

    Yet nought for that his guest did deign

    To note or spare his secret pain,

    But still, in stern and stubborn sort,

    Return’d him answer dark and short,

    Or started from the theme, to range

    In loose digression wild and strange,

    And forced the embarrass’d host to buy,

    By query close, direct reply.