Poetry > Lady of the lake

Canto I.
THE CHASE.
61
XXXIY.
At length, with Ellen in a grove
He seem’d to walk, and speak of love;
She listen’d with a hlnsh and sigh,
His suit was warm, his hopes were high.
He sought her yielded hand to clasp,
And a cold gauntlet met his grasp:
The phantom’s sex was changed and gone,
Upon its head a helmet shone;
Slowly enlarged to giant size,
With darkened cheek and threatning eyes,
The grisly visage, stem and hoar,
To Ellen still a likeness bore.—
He woke, and, panting with affright,
Recall’d the vision of the night.1
But chief, awhile, O ! lend us from the tomb
Those long-lost friends for whom in love we smart,
And fill with pious awe and joy-mixt woe the heart.
“ Or are you sportive ?—bid the morn of youth
Rise to new light, and beam afresh the days
Of innocence, simplicity, and truth ;
To cares estranged, and manhood’s thorny ways.
What transport, to retrace our boyish plays,
Our easy bliss, when each thing joy supplied;
The woods, the mountains, and the warbling maze
Of the wild brooks?”—Castle of Indolence, Canto 7.]
1 [“ Such a strange and romantic dream as may be naturally
expected to flow from the extraordinary events of the past day.
It might, perhaps, be quoted as one of Mr Scott’s most success¬
ful efforts in descriptive poetry. Some few lines of it are indeed
nnrivalled for delicacy ard melancholy tenderness.”—Critical
Review.]