GOD prosper long our noble king, To drive the deere with hound and horne, The child may rue* that is unborne, The stout Erle of Northumberland His pleasure in the Scottish woods The cheefest harts in Chevy-Chace To kill and beare away. These tydings to Erle Douglas came, In Scottland where he lay : Who sent Erle Percy present word, He wold prevent his sport. The English Erle, not fearing that, Did to the woods resort With fifteen hundred bow-men bold; The gallant greyhounds swiftly ran, Ere daylight did appeare; And long before high noone they had The bow-men mustered on the hills, Theire backsides all, with speciall care, *The way of considering the misfortune which this battle would bring upon posterity ... is wonderfully beautiful and conformable to the way of thinking among the ancient poets.-ADDISON. The hounds ran swiftly through the woods, The nimble deere to take,* That with their cryes the hills and dales An eccho shrill did make. Lord Percy to the quarry went, To view the slaughter'd deere ; But if I thought he wold not come, With that, a brave younge gentleman Loe, yonder doth Erle Douglas come, All men of pleasant Tivydale, Fast by the river Tweede : That ever did on horsebacke come, I durst encounter man for man, Until the blood, like drops of rain, Yeeld thee, Lord Percy, Douglas sayd; Thy ransome I will freely give, And this report of thee, Thou art the most couragious knight, That ever I did see. Noe, Douglas, quoth Erle Percy then, I will not yeelde to any Scott, With that, there came an arrow keene Who never spake more words than these, Lord Percy sees my fall. Then leaving liffe, Erle Percy tooke O Christ! my verry hart doth bleed A knight amongst the Scots there was, Sir Hugh Mountgomery was he call'd, * Addison praises this line as wonderfully beautiful and pathetic. And past the English archers all, With such a vehement force and might The staff ran through the other side He had a bow bent in his hand, This fight did last from breake of day, For when they rung the evening-bell,* With stout Erle Percy, there was slaine Sir Robert Ratcliff, and Sir John, And with Sir George and stout Sir James, For Witherington needs must I wayle, *Sc. the Curfew bell, usually rung at 8 o'clock, to which the modernizer apparently alludes, instead of the "Evensong bell," a bell for vespers of the original author, before the Reformation. ti.e. "I, as one in deep concern, must lament." The construction here has generally been misunderstood. The old MS. reads "wofull dumpes." For when his leggs were smitten off, He fought upon his stumpes. And with Erle Douglas, there was slaine Sir Hugh Mountgomerye, Sir Charles Murray, that from the feeld One foote wold never flee. Sir Charles Murray, of Ratcliff, too, And the Lord Maxwell in like case Of fifteen hundred Englishmen, Next day did many widowes come, Their husbands to bewayle; They washt their wounds in brinish teares, But all wold not prevayle. Theyr bodyes, bathed in purple gore, They bare with them away: They kist them dead a thousand times, Ere they were cladd in clay.* *"What can be more natural or more moving than the circumstances in which the author describes the behaviour of those women who had lost their husbands on the fatal day?"— ADDISON. The newes was brought to Eddenborrow, Where Scottlands king did raigne, That brave Erle Douglas suddenlye Was with an arrow slaine: O heavy newes, King James did say, I have not any captaine more Like tydings to King Henry came, That Percy of Northumberland Now God be with him, said our king, I trust I have, within my realme, Yett shall not Scotts nor Scotland say, For brave Erle Percyes sake. This vow full well the king perform'd With lords of great renowne: And of the rest, of small account, Did many thousands dye : God save our king, and bless this land II. DEATH'S FINAL CONQUEST. THESE fine moral stanzas were originally intended for a solemn funeral song, in a play of James Shirley's, entitled The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses, no date, 8vo. Shirley flourished as a dramatic writer early in the reign of Charles I.; but he outlived the Restoration. His death happened October 29, 1666, æt. 72. This little poem was written long after many of those that follow, but is inserted here as a kind of dirge to the foregoing piece. It is said to have been a favourite song with King Charles II. THE glories of our birth and state Are shadows, not substantial things; There is no armour against fate: Death lays his icy hands on kings: Scepter and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made Some men with swords may reap the field, Early or late They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, See where the victor victim bleeds: Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust. III. THE RISING IN THE NORTH. THE subject of this ballad is the great northern insurrection in the 12th year of Elizabeth, 1569; which proved so fatal to Thomas Percy, the Seventh Earl of Northumberland. A secret negotiation had been entered into to bring about the marriage of Mary Queen of Scots and the Duke of Norfolk; Mary was at that time a prisoner in England. The report reaching the ears of Queen Elizabeth, made her furiously angry; the Duke of Norfolk was committed to the Tower, and the northern earls were commanded to appear at court. The Earl of Northumberland was making up his mind to obey, when on the night of 14th Nov. there was an alarm that a party of his enemies had come to seize him. He rose from his bed in haste and withdrew to the Earl of Westmoreland, at Brancepeth, where the country round fell into excitement and begged the Earls to take up arms. They accordingly set up their standards, but met with but little success; and the Earl of Sussex with Lord Hunsdon, followed by Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick, and a large army, caused the insurgents to retreat towards the borders; there dismissing their followers, the leaders escaped to Scotland. The Earl of Sussex and Sir George Bowes caused vast numbers of the army to be put to death. Sixty-three constables were hanged, and Sir George Bowes boasted that for sixty miles in length and forty in breadth between Newcastle and Wetherby there was hardly a village or town where some of the inhabitants had not been executed. |