On the field of Killiecrankie,

When that stubborn fight was done!

And the evening star was shining
On Schehallion's distant head,
When we wiped our bloody broadswords,
And returned to count the dead.
There we found him gashed and gory,

Stretched upon the cumbered plain,

As he told us where to seek him,
In the thickest of the slain.
And a smile was on his visage,
For within his dying ear

Pealed the joyful note of triumph,

And the clansmen's clamorous cheer;

So, amidst the battle's thunder,

Shot, and steel, and scorching flame,

In the glory of his manhood

Passed the spirit of the Græme!

THE JACOBITE ON TOWER HILL

GEORGE WALTER THORNBURY

THE Revolution was hardly accomplished when the men who were friendly to James or were disappointed in William and Mary, began plotting for the restoration of the Stuart line. In 1696, a conspiracy was formed to assassinate the king. The plot was betrayed, however, and the leaders arrested and executed.

He tripp'd up the steps with a bow and a smile,
Offering snuff to the chaplain the while,

A rose at his button-hole that afternoon – 'Twas the tenth of the month, and the month it was June.

Then shrugging his shoulders he look'd at the man With the mask and the axe, and a murmuring ran Through the crowd, who, below, were all pushing to

see

The gaoler kneel down, and receiving his fee.

He look'd at the mob, as they roar'd, with a stare,
And took snuff again with a cynical air.

"I'm happy to give but a moment's delight
To the flower of my country agog for a sight."

Then he look'd at the block, and with scented cravat Dusted room for his neck, gaily doffing his hat,

Kiss'd his hand to a lady, bent low to the crowd, Then smiling, turn'd round to the headsman and bow'd.

"God save King James!" he cried bravely and shrill, And the cry reach'd the houses at foot of the hill, "My friend with the axe, à votre service," he said; And ran his white thumb long the edge of the blade.

When the multitude hiss'd he stood firm as a rock; Then kneeling, laid down his gay head on the block; He kiss'd a white rose, — in a moment 'twas red

With the life of the bravest of any that bled.

THE AGE OF QUEEN ANNE

ALEXANDER POPE

(From "The Rape of the Lock," Canto III)

QUEEN ANNE, who succeeded to the throne on the death of Mary's husband (1702), was a woman of feeble intellect. She had so little will of her own that she never came into conflict with her subjects. The affairs of state were managed for her by certain favorites, of whom Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, was chief.

Close by those meads, for ever crown'd with flowers, Where Thames with pride surveys his rising towers, There stands a structure of majestic frame,

Which from the neighbouring Hampton takes its

name.

Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoom

Of foreign tyrants and of nymphs at home;

Here thou, great ANNA! whom three realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take — and sometimes tea.
Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort,

To taste awhile the pleasures of a court;
In various talk the instructive hours they passed,
Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last;
One speaks the glory of the British Queen,
And one describes a charming Indian screen;
A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes;
At every word a reputation dies.

Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat,
With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that.

AFTER BLENHEIM

ROBERT SOUTHEY

LOUIS XIV., king of France, had given refuge to James II. and, after the death of the exiled king, recognized his son Prince James as heir to the English crown. Louis was the most powerful monarch in Europe, and his championship of the Jacobite cause was a serious menace to the peace of England. Marlborough undertook to oppose the grand monarque in his continental ambitions and so joined the foes of France in the war of the Spanish succession (1704-1713). The allied armies won a great victory at Blenheim on the upper Danube and the prestige of France waned from that day. In the end Louis was obliged to abandon the Stuarts and to acknowledge a Protestant prince, George of Hanover, as successor to Queen Anne.

It was a summer evening,

Old Kaspar's work was done,
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun;

And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.

She saw her brother Peterkin

Roll something large and round
Which he beside the rivulet

In playing there had found;

He came to ask what he had found

That was so large and smooth and round.

Old Kaspar took it from the boy

Who stood expectant by;

And then the old man shook his head

And with a natural sigh

"'Tis some poor fellow's skull," said he,
"Who fell in the great victory.

"I find them in the garden,

For there's many here about; And often when I go to plough

The ploughshare turns them out. For many thousand men," said he, "Were slain in that great victory."

"Now tell us what 'twas all about,"
Young Peterkin he cries;
And little Wilhelmine looks up

With wonder-waiting eyes;

"Now tell us all about the war,

And what they fought each other for."

"It was the English," Kaspar cried,
"Who put the French to rout;
But what they fought each other for
I could not well make out.
But everybody said," quoth he,
"That 'twas a famous victory.

"My father lived at Blenheim then,
Yon little stream hard by;
They burnt his dwelling to the ground,
And he was forced to fly :

So with his wife and child he fled,

Nor had he where to rest his head.

"With fire and sword the country round

Was wasted far and wide,

And many a childing mother then

And new-born baby died: