To battle, deemed his cause the cause of Heaven.
Unskilled in arms, with useless courage stood,
While gentle Monmouth grieved to shed his blood;
But fierce Dundee, inflamed with deadly hate,
In vengeance for the great Montrose's fate,
Let loose the sword, and to the hero's shade
A barbarous hecatomb of victories paid."
Wilson's Clyde.
When we picture to ourselves the Duke of Monmouth ordering his brave footguards under command of Lord Livingstone, to force the bridge, which was defended by Hackstone of Rathillet, and Claverhouse sitting on his white horse on the hillside near Bothwell, watching the progress of the fray, and ready to rush down with his cavalry and fall on the infatuated Covenanters who were quarreling among themselves on Hamilton haughs, we see a wild and correspondent landscape, rough as the Cameronian insurgents, and rude as their notions. The Bothwell brig of the present day has all the old aspect modernized out of it. Its smiling fields, and woods that speak of long peaceful times, and snug modern homes—oh! how far off are they from the grand old melancholy tone of the old ballad:—
"Now farewell father, and farewell mother,