The Countess would weep, and the Yerl would say,
"Alas! for the hour when he went away."
But the womb of old Time is everly full,
And the storm-wind bloweth after a lull.
Hark! a horn has sounded both loud and clear,
And echoed around both far and near;
It is Sir Ronald from Palestine--
Sir Ronald, a suitor of Etheline.
"I have come," said he, "through pain and peril,
To tell unto thee, most noble Yerl:
Woe to the sword of the fierce Soldan,
Who slew our most gallant capitan!
Sir Peregrine, in an unhappy hour,
Fell wounded before High Salem's tower,
And ere he died he commissioned me
To bear to Scotland, and give to thee,
This bit of the genuine haly rood
Dipt in his heart's outpouring blood,
That thou mightst give it to Etheline,
As a relic of dead Sir Peregrine."
IV.
All Eaglestein vale is yellow and sere,
The ancient elms seem withered and bare,
The river asleep in its rushy bed,
The waters are green, and the grass is red,
The roses are dead in the sylvan bowers,
Where oft in the dewy evening hours,
Ere yet the fairies had sought the dell,
And the merle was singing her day-farewell,
The Lady Etheline would recline
And think of her dear Sir Peregrine:
All was cheerless now, forlorn,
As if they missed her at early morn;
At noontide and at evening fall
They sorrowed for her, the spirit of all.
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