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RosabelleRosabelle
Rosabelle
O listen, listen, ladies gay!
No haughty feat of arms I tell;
Soft is the note, and sad the lay
That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.
`Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew!
And, gentle lady, deign to stay!
Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
Nor tempt the stormy firth to - day.
`The blackening wave is edged with white;
To inch and rock the sea - mews fly;
The fishers have heard the Water - Sprite,
Whose screams forebode that wreck is nigh.
`Last night the gifted Seer did view
A wet shroud swathed round lady gay;
Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch;
Why cross the gloomy firth to - day?`
`Tis not because Lord Lindesay`s heir
Tonight at Roslin leads the ball,
But that my lady - mother there
Sits lonely in her castle - hall.
`Tis not because the ring they ride,
And Lindesay at the ring rides well,
But that my sire the wine will chide
If `tis not fill`d by Rosabelle.`
- O`er Roslin all that dreary night
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam;
`Twas broader than the watch - fire`s light,
And redder than the bright moonbeam.
It glared on Roslin`s castled rock,
It ruddied all the copse - wood glen;
`Twas seen from Dryden`s groves of oak,
And seen from cavern`d Hawthornden.
Seem`d all on fire that chapel proud
Where Roslin`s chiefs uncoffin`d lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud,
Sheathed in his iron panoply.
Seem`d all on fire within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar`s pale;
Shone every pillar foliage - bound,
And glimmer`d all the dead men`s mail.
Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
Blazed every rose - carved buttress fair -
So still they blaze, when fate is nigh
The lordly line of high Saint Clair.
There are twenty of Roslin`s barons bold
Lie buried within that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold
But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle!
And each Saint Clair was buried there
With candle, with book, and with knell;
But the sea - caves rung, and the wild winds sung
The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.
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