March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale,
Why, my lads, dinna ye march forward in order!
March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale,
All the Blue Bonnets are bound for the Border.
Many a banner spread
Flutters above your head,
Many a crest that is famous in story;
Mount and make ready then,
Sons of the mountain glen,
Fight for the Queen and our old Scottish glory!
Come from the hills where your hirsels[1] are grazing,
Come from the glen of the buck and the roe;
Come to the crag where the beacon is blazing,
Come with the buckler, the lance, and the bow;
Trumpets are sounding,
War-steeds are bounding,
Stand to your arms, and march in good order;
England shall many a day
Tell of the bloody fray
When the Blue Bonnets came over the Border.
Scott
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Cattle
THE GREAT NORTHERN DIVER
The weird, long call, or the shrill, demoniacal laugh coming out of the night tells of the sleepless activity of the loon. The whip-poor-will in the adjacent shrubbery seems companionable, and there is a friendly spirit in the short, shrill tremolo of the night-hawk from the invisible sky. Even the plaint of the screech-owl has a tone of human sympathy. But the dreary cadence of the loon is the voice of the inhospitable night, repelling every thought of human association. It does not entreat, it does not warn; yet there is a fascination in its expressionless strength. Over the black water, under the lowering sky, or through the bright still moonlight, the same unfeeling tone fills the ear of night. And sometimes, when the lingering moon sheds a broad trail of light along the still waters of the lake, the graceful swimmer will glide across and disappear in the darkness, breaking the bright reflection into a multitude of chasing, quivering, trailing threads of silver. Throughout the day, where the cedars come down to meet their shadows in the dark water, he swims ceaselessly about, sitting low, with black, glossy neck gracefully curved and displaying its delicate white markings. Sometimes he stretches himself wearily, flapping his wings, and displaying his white breast and the handsome, showy markings of his sides. Though wary and aloof, and without a trace of animation in his loud, penetrating cries, he shows his kinship by the scrupulous care with which he preens his handsome feathers—even lying on his back in the water to comb out and smooth his glossy, white breast.
A hurried cry from overhead may unexpectedly reveal the presence of a pair of loons in another element, and it is always fascinating to watch their steady, strained, energetic flight above the tops of the pines, generally to curve down to some more attractive expanse in the cedar-girt lake. For the water is the loon's natural element. There is an amusing deliberateness in his graceful, silent dive. He does not make the hurried dip of his smaller cousin, the grebe, but more calmly curves both neck and body, disappearing under the surface in a graceful arch. Settling down and swimming with only head and neck exposed is an evidence of suspicion, and is generally followed by a long dive, with a belated reappearance in some remote part of the lake.