Page:Fugitive Poetry 1600-1878.djvu/275

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THE CAPTIVE QUEEN.
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And sweetly there, with her flowing hair,
In her childhood's beautiful grace,
Fair as a flower in its opening hour
Shone the star of the Stuart race.

But the joyous laugh in its cenotaph
Slumbers still with the wassail's mirth,
And lady bright and true-hearted knight
Have long passed away from the earth.

The flag that waved when the loud wind raved
On thy turrets is seen no more;
The lights are fled, the bright fire is dead,
All is changed since the days of yore.

The Captive Queen.
Behind the Ochils' verdant range
Had sunk the orb of day,
And from the east the full-orbed moon
Held on her silent way:
And lowly cot, and lordly pile,
Were lit up with her radiant smile.

Loch Leven, at that midnight hour,
Lay calm beneath her beams;
While o'er the plain was faintly heard
The music of the streams:
The moon's pale orb and Mars' red crest
Were mirrored in her tranquil breast.

As chieftain from his place of power
Commands the vassal crowd,
So o'er Loch Leven's smooth expanse,
There frowned the fortress proud,
Where Mary pined a captive lone,
With peace and hope and honour gone.

From out its halls no festive lights
Gleamed o'er the waters clear;
No sounds of mirth and revelry
Fell on the listening ear;
No royal standard, broad and fair,
Waved in the silent midnight air.

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