Our hame we left wi' hopefu' heart and mony a warm fareweel,
And gowd and gear we gain'd awa; but oh, the freen's sae leal!
Where are they? where my childhood's hearth—those hearts sae kind and free,—
When a' is unco groun save the auld aik-tree?
JAMES DODDS.
A man of elegant and varied accomplishments, and one of the most eloquent public-speakers of the age, James Dodds was born in 1815, in the county of Roxburgh. He was at first intended by some influential friends for the Church, and proceeded through part of the College curriculum, but some changes occurring, he ultimately devoted himself to the study of law. Probably his ambition was for the Bar; but overruling circumstances led him, about twelve years ago, to enter on the profession of parliamentary solicitor in London, in which he has met with much success.
From his youth a devoted student, he has, amidst the exigencies of business, sedulously kept up his literary pursuits. He has produced no independent work, but has largely contributed, both in prose and verse, to the periodicals. Among these contributions, a series of poems, chiefly ballads on incidents connected with the times of the Covenant, which appeared in several of the Edinburgh magazines, about thirteen years since, attracted much attention. One of these lays we have transferred to the present work. Mr Dodds has lately prepared a series of lectures on the fifty years' struggle of the Covenanters, which will probably be presented to the public. He has evinced a deep interest in the cause of raising a national monument to Sir William Wallace, and has, under the auspices of the Central Committee, addressed public meetings on the subject in many of the principal towns.
TRIAL AND DEATH OF ROBERT BAILLIE OF JERVIESWOODE.
'Twas when December's dark'ning scowl the face of heaven o'ercast,
And vile men high in place were more unpitying than the blast,
Before their grim tribunal's front, firm and undaunted stood
That patriot chief of high renown, the noble Jervieswoode.
The hand of death is on him press'd—the seal of death is there!
Oh, the savage of the wilderness those weak old limbs would spare!
Frail, frail his step, and bent his frame, and ye may plainly trace
The shadow of death's wing upon his pale and sunken face.
These twenty long and dreary months in the dungeon he hath lain,
Long days of sickness, weary nights of languishing and pain;
For whom no gale hath breathed its balm, no sun hath bless'd the year,
No friendly hand to smooth his couch, nor friendly voice to cheer;
His lady in their lonely hall doth mournful vigils keep,
And where he sat and where he walk'd his children watch and weep.
Yet o'er his weakness and decay an ancient grandeur falls,
Like the majesty that lingers round some mould'ring palace walls;
The light of calm and noble thoughts is bright within his eye,
And, purged of earthly taint, his soul prepares to mount on high.
Nor is he left alone—a sister faithful to him clung
With woman's heart, with home-born love, with angel look and tongue;
There in that Golgotha she sits, so tender, so benign—
Fair as the moon's sweet glimpses through the cloudy tempest shine.