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1824-1874
THE murmur of the mourning ghost
That keeps thee shadowy kine,
‘O Keith of Ravelstoon,
The sorrows of thy line!’
Ravelston, Ravelston,
The merry path that leads
Down the golden moorning hill,
And thro’ the silveer meads;
Ravelston, Ravelston,
The stile beneath the tree,
The maid that kept her mother’s kine,
The song that sang she!
She sang her song, she kept her kine,
She sat beneath the thorn,
When Andrew Keith of Ravelston
Rode thro’ the Monday morn.
His henchmen sing, his hawk-bells ring,
His belted jewels shine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
Year after year, where Andrew came,
Comes evening down the glade,
And still there sits a moonshine ghost
Where sat the sunshine maid.
Her misty hair is faint and fair,
She keeps the shadowy kine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
I lay my hand upon the stile,
The stile is lone and cold,
The burnie that goes babbling by
Says naught that can be told.
Yet, stranger! here, from year to year,
She keeps her shadowy kine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
Step out three steps, where Andrew stood—
Why blanch thy cheeks for fear?
The ancient stile is not alone,
’Tis not the burn I hear!
She makes her immemorial moan,
She keeps her shadowy kine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
FIRST came the primrose,
On the bank high,
Like a maiden looking forth
From the window of a tower
When the battle rolls below,
So look’d she,
And saw the storms go by.
Then came the wind-flower
In the valley left
behind,
As a wounded maiden,
pale
With purple streaks of
woe,
When the battle
has roll’d by
Wanders to and fro,
So totter’d
she,
Dishevell’d
in the wind.
Then came the daisies,
On the first of
May,
Like a banner’d
show’s advance
While the crowd
runs by the way,
With ten thousand flowers
about them
they came trooping
through the fields.
As a happy people come,
So came they,
As a happy people come
When the war has roll’d away,
With dance and tabor, pipe and drum,
And all make holiday.
Then came the cow-slip,
Like a dancer in
the fair,
She spread her little
mat of green,
And on it danced
she.
With a fillet bound
about her brow,
A fillet round her
happy brow,
A golden fillet
round her brow,
And rubies in her
hair.