RECOLLECTIONS OF MELROSE ABBEY.
(For the Mirror.)
"I do love these ancient ruins;
We never tread upon them, but we set
Our foot upon some reverend history."
This fine ruin has a double interest attached to it, for, independent of that which is created by the antiquity and splendour of the edifice, the visiter should bear in mind that it is the Kennaquhair of the northern magician; and here the scenes so finely depicted in the Monastery are vividly brought to our recollection; it gives a "local habitation and a name" to some of the most interesting creations of Sir Walter Scott's genius. The abbey is situated in a valley, surrounded by the Eildon hills. Some ruins of the abbey mill, with the dam belonging to "Hob Miller," the father of the "lovely Mysinda," are still to be seen; and the ford across the Tweed, where the worthy Sacristan was played so scurvy a trick by the White Lady, is also pointed out. Some miles off, on a wild and romantic spot on the course of the river, Elwin, or Allan, is Fairy Dean, or Nameless Dean, which is at once identified to be that place above the tower and vale of Glendearg, which was the favourite haunt of the White Lady, and the spot where Sir Piercie Shafton's stoccatas, embroccatas, and passados first failed him, when opposed to the less polished and rustic skill of Halbert Glendinning, assisted by the machinations of the queen of the elfin tribe. On this place are found a number of small stones, of a singular shape and appearance, resembling guns, cradles with children in them, bonnets, &c., several of which I obtained in a tour to Scotland. They are called elf-stones by the neighbouring peasantry.
Many parts of the abbey are still in a state of tolerable preservation; the marks of cannon-shot and fire are visible on the walls in some places, the abbey having been bombarded by Oliver Cromwell, with his usual zeal against every thing that adorned the country. Many Roman medals of Vespasian, Adrian, &c. have been found about it. I hardly know a more interesting place to visit than Melrose and its neighbourhood; while the abbey affords a fine moral lesson on the instability and perishableness of even the most magnificent works raised by human skill and industry.
"Here naked stand the melancholy walls,
Lash'd by the wint'ry tempests, cold and bleak,
That whistle mournful through the empty aisles,
And piece-meal crumble down the towers to dust,"
When viewed by moonlight, the solemnity and grandeur of the effect is charming. An enthusiastic friend of mine, on paying the abbey a visit a year or two ago, had it lighted up with tapers. I subjoin a few passages from a letter I received at the time from him;—"Yesterday, being Valentine's day, in the evening I went to vespers, and had six tapers burning at the high altar in the abbey; also several in each of the (eight) confessionals, holy water, fonts, shrines, and altars.—The church-yard, the abbey, were silent as the grave; you might have heard a pin drop; there was not a breath of air stirring, so the tapers burnt, beautifully." This must have strongly reminded the spectator of the introduction to the Monastery, and the visit of the worthy benedictine, accompanied by Captain Clutterbuck, for the purpose of taking up his patron's heart. My friend adds, "not a taper has been burnt in St. Mary's of Melrose since the days of Knox.—On Monday I went to the tower of Glendearg; at the fountain, where Sir Piercie Shafton and Halbert Glendinning fought, I got, with the help of my guide, some curious stones, said to be the work of the White Lady." The scenery is picturesque in the highest degree. "Yesterday I went to Old Melrose. The windings of the Tweed there are beautiful; but the tolling the abbey bell recalls me from my wanderings."
The impression made on Sir Walter Scott by the ruins may be inferred from the following lines:—
"If thou would'st view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild but to flout the ruins grey.
When the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruin'd central tower,
When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem framed of ebon and ivory;
When silver edges the imagery,
And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave,
And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave;
Then go—but go alone the while—
Then view St. David's ruin'd pile;
And home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!"
One of your correspondents (with whom I had once a disputation on the weighty subject of ghosts) sent you a version of the subjoined epitaph, with a trifling alteration in the spelling, (which is copied from a very ancient tomb-stone in Melrose Abbey,) with these remarks, (see MIRROR, vol. 4, p. 392):—"The following beautiful lines were written by a cow-boy [!] in Sussex on a wall, with a piece of red chalk, [mark the precision.] They have only been inserted in a Sussex paper, and may be quite unknown to many London readers," &c. &c. &c. This is a regular hoax.