This way of considering the misfortunes which this battle would bring upon posterity, not only on those who were born immediately after the battle, and lost their fathers in it, but on those also who perished in future battles which took their rise from this quarrel of the two earls, is wonderfully beautiful and conformable to the way of thinking among the ancient poets.
Audiet pugnas vitio parentum.
Rara juventus.
HOR., Od. i. 2, 23.
Posterity, thinn'd by their fathers' crimes, Shall read, with grief, the story of their times.
What can be more sounding and poetical, or resemble more the majestic simplicity of the ancients, than the following stanzas?--The stout Earl of Northumberland A vow to God did make, His pleasure in the Scottish woods Three summer's days to take.
With fifteen hundred bowmen bold, All chosen men of might, Who knew full well, in time of need, To aim their shafts aright.
The hounds ran swiftly through the woods The nimble deer to take, And with their cries the hills and dales An echo shrill did make.
Vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeron, Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaurus equorum:
Et vox assensu memorum ingeminata remugit.
VIRG., Georg. iii. 43.
Cithaeron loudly calls me to my way:
Thy hounds, Taygetus, open, and pursue their prey:
High Epidaurus urges on my speed, Famed for his hills, and for his horses' breed:
From hills and dales the cheerful cries rebound:
For Echo hunts along, and propagates the sound.
DRYDEN.
Lo, yonder doth Earl Douglas come, His men in armour bright;Full twenty hundred Scottish spears, All marching in our sight.
All men of pleasant Tividale, Fast by the river Tweed, &c.
The country of the Scotch warrior, described in these two last verses, has a fine romantic situation, and affords a couple of smooth words for verse. If the reader compares the foregoing six lines of the song with the following Latin verses, he will see how much they are written in the spirit of Virgil:
Adversi campo apparent: hastasque reductis Protendunt longe dextris, et spicula vibrant:-Quique altum Praeneste viri, quique arva Gabinae Junonis, gelidumque Anienem, et roscida rivis Hernica saxa colunt:- qui rosea rura Velini;Qui Tetricae horrentes rupes, montemq ue Severum, Casperiamque colunt, porulosque et flumen Himellae:
Qui Tyberim Fabarimque bibunt.
AEn. xi. 605, vii. 682, 712.
Advancing in a line they couch their spears--- Praeneste sends a chosen band, With those who plough Saturnia's Gabine land:
Besides the succours which cold Anien yields:
The rocks of Hernicus--besides a band That followed from Velinum's dewy land -And mountaineers that from Severus came:
And from the craggy cliffs of Tetrica;
And those where yellow Tiber takes his way, And where Himella's wanton waters play:
Casperia sends her arms, with those that lie By Fabaris, and fruitful Foruli.
DRYDEN.
But to proceed:
Earl Douglas on a milk-white steed, Most like a baron bold, Rode foremost of the company, Whose armour shone like gold.
Turnus, ut antevolans tardum praecesserat agmen, &c.
Vidisti, quo Turnus equo, quibus ibat in armis Aurcus--AEn. ix. 47, 269.
Our English archers bent their bows, Their hearts were good and true;At the first flight of arrows sent, Full threescore Scots they slew.
They closed full fast on ev'ry side, No slackness there was found;And many a gallant gentleman Lay gasping on the ground.
With that there came an arrow keen Out of an English bow, Which struck Earl Douglas to the heart, A deep and deadly blow.
AEneas was wounded after the same manner by an unknown hand in the midst of a parley.
Has inter voces, media inter talia verba, Ecce viro stridens alis allapsa sagitta est, Incertum qua pulsa manu--AEn. xii. 318.
