Marmion Part 24

line 403. Montserrat, a mountain, with a Benedictine abbey on it, in Catalonia. The inhabitants of the neighbourhood cherish a myth to the effect that the fantastic peaks and gorges of the mountain were formed at the Crucifixion.

lines 404-7. Scott annotates as follows:--

'Sante Rosalie was of Palermo, and born of a very n.o.ble family, and, when very young, abhorred so much the vanities of this world, and avoided the converse of mankind, resolving to dedicate herself wholly to G.o.d Almighty, that she, by divine inspiration, forsook her father's house, and never was more heard of, till her body was found in that cleft of a rock, on that almost inaccessible mountain, where now the chapel is built; and they affirm she was carried up there by the hands of angels; for that place was not formerly so accessible (as now it is) in the days of the Saint; and even now it is a very bad, and steepy, and break-neck way. In this frightful place, this holy woman lived a great many years, feeding only on what she found growing on that barren mountain, and creeping into a narrow and dreadful cleft in a rock, which was always dropping wet, and was her place of retirement, as well as prayer; having worn out even the rock with her knees, in a certain place, which is now open'd on purpose to show it to those who come here. This chapel is very richly adorn'd; and on the spot where the saint's dead body was discover'd, which is just beneath the hole in the rock, which is open'd on purpose, as I said, there is a very fine statue of marble, representing her in a lying posture, railed in all about with fine iron and bra.s.s work; and the altar, on which they say ma.s.s, is built just over it.'--Voyage to Sicily and Malta, by Mr. John Dryden, (son to the poet,) p. 107.

Stanza XXIV. line 408. The national motto is 'St. George for Merrie England.' The records of various central and eastern English towns tell of a very ancient custom of 'carrying the dragon in procession, in great jollity, on Midsummer Eve.' See Brand's 'Popular Antiquities,' i. 321. In reference to the 'Birth of St George' and his deeds, see Percy's 'Reliques.'

line 409. Becket (1119-70), Archbishop of Canterbury. See 'Canterbury Tales' and Aubrey de Vere's 'St. Thomas of Canterbury: a dramatic poem.'

line 410. For Cuthbert, see below, II. xiv. 257. Bede (673-735), a monk of Jarrow on Tyne; called the Venerable Bede; author of an important 'Ecclesiastical History' and an English translation of St.

John's Gospel.

lines 419-20. Lord Jeffrey's sense of humour was not adequate to the appreciation of these two lines, which he specialised for condemnation.

Stanza. XXV. line 421. Gramercy, from Fr. grand merci, sometimes used as an emphatic exclamation, although fundamentally implying the thanks of the speaker.

line 430 still = always. Cp., inter alia, 440 and 452 below. See 'STILL vexed Bermoothes,' Tempest, i. 2. 229, and cp. Hamlet, ii. 2.

42,--

'Thou STILL hast been the father of good news.'

Stanza XXVI. line 452. Scott quotes from Rabelais the pa.s.sage in which the monk suggests to Gargantua that in order to induce sleep they might together try the repet.i.tion of the seven penitential psalms. 'The conceit pleased Gargantua very well; and, beginning the first of these psalms, as soon as they came to Beati quorum they fell asleep, both the one and the other.' Cp. Chaucer's Monk and the character of Accidia in 'Piers the Plowman,' Pa.s.sus V.

line 453. ave, an address to the Virgin Mary, beginning 'Ave Maria'; creed, a profession of faith, beginning with Credo. It has been objected to this line that the creed is not an essential part of the rosary, and that ten aves and one paternoster would have been more accurate. It should, however, be noticed that both Friar John and young Selby know more of other matters than the details of religious devotion.

Stanza XXVII. line 459. 'A PALMER, opposed to a PILGRIM, was one who made it his sole business to visit different holy shrines; travelling incessantly, and subsisting by charity: whereas the Pilgrim retired to his usual home and occupations, when he had paid his devotions at the particular spot which was the object of his pilgrimage. The Palmers seem to have been the Quaestionarii of the ancient Scottish canons 1242 and 1296. There is in the Bannatyne MS.

a burlesque account of two such persons, ent.i.tled, "Simmy and his Brother." Their accoutrements are thus ludicrously described (I discard the ancient spelling):--

"Syne shaped them up, to loup on leas, Two tabards of the tartan; They counted nought what their clouts were When sew'd them on, in certain.

Syne clampit up St. Peter's keys, Made of an old red gartane; St. James's sh.e.l.ls, on t'other side, shews As pretty as a partane Toe, On Symmye and his brother."'--SCOTT.

With this account of the Palmer, cp. 'Piers the Plowman,' v. 523:--

'He bare a burdoun ybounde . with a brode liste, In a withewyndes wise . ywounden aboute.

A bolle and a bagge . he bare by his syde; An hundredth of ampulles . on his hatt seten, Signes of Synay . and sh.e.l.les of Galice; And many a cruche on his cloke . and keyes of Rome, And the vernicle bifore . for men shulde knowe, And se bi his signes . whom he soughte hadde.'

In connexion with this, Prof. Skeat draws attention to the romance of Sir Isumbras and to Chaucer's Prol. line 13.

line 467. Loretto, in Ancona, Italy, is the site of a sanctuary of the Virgin, ent.i.tled Santa Casa, Holy House, which enjoys the reputation of having been the Virgin's residence in Nazareth, and the scene of the Annunciation, &c.

Stanza XXVIII. line 483. haggard wild is a twofold adj. in the Elizabethan fas.h.i.+on, like 'bitter sweet,' 'childish foolish,' and other familiar examples.

line 490. Science appears to support this theory. See various examples in Sir Erasmus Wilson's little work, 'Healthy Skin.' Many of the cases are within the writer's own knowledge, and all the others are historical or otherwise well authenticated. He mentions Sir T. More the night before his execution; two cases reported by Borellus; three by Daniel Turner; one by Dr. Ca.s.san; and in a note he recalls John Libeny, a would-be a.s.sa.s.sin of the Emperor of Austria, 'whose hair turned snow-white in the forty-eight hours preceding his execution.' See 'Notes and Queries,' 6th S. vols. vi.

to ix., and 7th S. ii. Not only fear but sorrow is said to cause the hair to turn white very suddenly. Byron makes his Prisoner of Chillon say that his white hairs have not come to him

'In a single night, As men's have grown from sudden fears.'

Stanza XXIX. line 506. 'St. Regulus (Scottice, St. Rule), a monk of Patrae, in Achaia, warned by a vision, is said, A. D. 370, to have sailed westward, until he landed at St. Andrews, in Scotland, where he founded a chapel and tower. The latter is still standing; and, though we may doubt the precise date of its foundation, is certainly one of the most ancient edifices in Scotland. A cave, nearly fronting the ruinous castle of the Archbishops of St. Andrews, bears the name of this religion person. It is difficult of access; and the rock in which it is hewed is washed by the German Ocean. It is nearly round, about ten feet in diameter, and the same in height. On one side is a sort of stone altar; on the other an aperture into an inner den, where the miserable ascetic, who inhabited this dwelling, probably slept. At full tide, egress and regress are hardly practicable. As Regulus first colonised the metropolitan see of Scotland, and converted the inhabitants in the vicinity, he has some reason to complain that the ancient name of Killrule (Cella Reguli) should have been superseded, even in favour of the tutelar saint of Scotland. The reason of the change was, that St. Rule is said to have brought to Scotland the relics of Saint Andrew.'--SCOTT.

line 509. 'St. Fillan was a Scottish saint of some reputation.

Although Popery is, with us, matter of abomination, yet the common people still retain some of the superst.i.tions connected with it.

There are in Perths.h.i.+re several wells and springs dedicated to St.

Fillan, which are still places of pilgrimage and offerings, even among the Protestants. They are held powerful in cases of madness; and, in some of very late occurrence, lunatics have been left all night bound to the holy stone, in confidence that the saint would cure and unloose them before morning. [See various notes to the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.]'--SCOTT.

line 513. Cp. Macbeth, v. 3. 40:--

'Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased?'

and Lear, iii. 4. 12:--

'The tempest in my mind Doth from my senses take all feeling else Save what beats there.'

Stanza x.x.x. line 515. With 'midnight draught,' cp. Macbeth's 'drink,' ii. 1. 31, and the 'posset,' ii. 2. 6. See notes to these pa.s.sages in Clarendon Press Macbeth.

Stanza x.x.xI. line 534. 'In Catholic countries, in order to reconcile the pleasures of the great with the observances of religion, it was common, when a party was bent for the chase, to celebrate ma.s.s, abridged and maimed of its rites, called a hunting-ma.s.s, the brevity of which was designed to correspond with the impatience of the audience.'--Note to 'The Abbot,' new edition.

line 538. Stirrup-cup, or stirrup-gla.s.s, is a parting-gla.s.s of liquor given to a guest when on horseback and ready to go.

INTRODUCTION TO CANTO SECOND.

The Rev. John Marriott, A. M., to whom this introductory poem is dedicated, was tutor to George Henry, Lord Scott, son of Charles, Earl of Dalkeith, afterwards fourth Duke of Buccleuch and sixth of Queensberry. Lord Scott died early, in 1808. Marriott, while still at Oxford, proved himself a capable poet, and Scott shewed his appreciation of him by including two of his ballads at the close of the 'Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.' The concluding lines of this Introduction refer to Marriott's ballads.

line 2. 'Ettrick Forest, now a range of mountainous sheep-walks, was anciently reserved for the pleasure of the royal chase. Since it was disparked, the wood has been, by degrees, almost totally destroyed, although, wherever protected from the sheep, copses soon arise without any planting. When the King hunted there, he often summoned the array of the country to meet and a.s.sist his sport. Thus, in 1528, James V "made proclamation to all lords, barons, gentlemen, landward-men, and freeholders, that they should compear at Edinburgh, with a month's victuals, to pa.s.s with the King where he pleased, to danton the thieves of Tiviotdale, Annandale, Liddisdale, and other parts of that country; and also warned all gentlemen that had good dogs to bring them, that he might hunt in the said country as he pleased: The whilk the Earl of Argyle, the Earl of Huntley, the Earl of Athole, and so all the rest of the gentlemen of the Highland, did, and brought their hounds with them in like manner, to hunt with the King, as he pleased.

'"The second day of June the King past out of Edinburgh to the hunting, with many of the n.o.bles and gentlemen of Scotland with him, to the number of twelve thousand men; and then past to Meggitland, and hounded and hawked all the country and bounds; that is to say, Crammat, Pappert-law, St. Mary-laws, Carlavirick, Chapel, Ewindoores, and Langhope. I heard say, he slew, in these bounds, eighteen score of harts." -PITSCOTTIE'S History of Scotland, folio edition, p. 143.

'These huntings had, of course, a military character, and attendance upon them was part of the duty of a va.s.sal. The act for abolis.h.i.+ng ward or military tenures in Scotland, enumerates the services of hunting, hosting, watching and warding, as those which were in future to be illegal.'--SCOTT.

lines 5-11. Cp. Wordsworth's 'Thorn':--

'There is a Thorn--it looks so old, In truth, you'd find it hard to say How it could ever have been young, It looks so old and grey.'

There is a special suggestion of antiquity in the wrinkled, lichen- covered thorn of a wintry landscape, and thus it is a fitting object to stir and sustain the poet's tendency to note 'chance and change'

and to lament the loss of the days that are no more. The exceeding appropriateness of this in a narrative poem dealing with departed habits and customs must be quite apparent. The thorn grows to a very great age, and many an unpretentious Scottish homestead receives a pathetic grace and dignity from the presence of its ancestral thorn- tree.

line 15. The rowan is the mountain ash. One of the most tender and haunting of Scottish songs is Lady Nairne's 'Oh, Rowan tree!'--

'How fair wert thou in summer time, wi' a' thy cl.u.s.ters white, How rich and gay thy autumn dress, wi' berries red and bright.'

line 27. There are some notable allusions in the poets to the moonlight baying of dogs and wolves. Cp. Julius Caesar, iv. 3. 27:--

'I had rather be a dog and bay the moon.'

See also s.h.i.+eld's great English song, 'The Wolf':--

'While the wolf, in nightly prowl, Bays the moon with hideous howl!'

One of the best lines in English verse on the wolf--both skilfully onomatopoeic and suggestively picturesque--is Campbell's, line 66 of 'Pleasures of Hope':--