In spiral clouds, through holly’s green, The meadow-hamlet’s smoke I spy, As hastening, ere the fall of e’en, To Preston’s sacred shades I fly; While playful in my path appears The house-dog pricking up his ears, And rosy boys that struggling seek Who first a parent’s name may speak; And, as expression warms each face, Rush fondly to their sire’s embrace.

Short greetings were as shortly made, When winding by the river’s shade, Where fertile pastures shine, I stood by Baldred’s noisy wheel, Where, serpent-like, the waters steal Bright, through the groves of Tyne. I sought in Preston’s holy fane, But all my search was given in vain To find his sacred shrine; Here wakes no midnight anthem’s swell, No croslet mark remains to tell Where the saint’s relics lie; For time, alas! long since has thrown Oblivion o’er the moulder’d stone, And veil’d it from the eye! The moralist may homeward turn, The futile works of man to mourn; If mean and lowly be his lot, The great alike will be forgot! If earthly glory dims his eyes, Here let him ponder, and be wise!

END OF ST BALDRED.

NOTES TO SAINT BALDRED.

=Introductory Stanzas.=

1.

Stanza i. page 9.

_Here ocean’s waves usurp the rural scene, And the blue waters gird the mountain’s zone, Where spread of yore the verdant blooming plain._

There are some ingenious observations on the sea-coast, in the appendix to the Agricultural Survey of East Lothian, wherein the writer supposes that the ancient fortress of Tantallon, which is now nearly insulated, once stood at a considerable distance from the sea. He imagines that the perpendicular shore on each side of the castle, which consists for the most part of soft earth, and upwards of two hundred feet in height, leads the mind back to the time when this shore ended in a gentle slope, and extended greatly beyond the Bass.

2.

Stanza v. page 11.

_Where breezes creep O’er Fidrey’s sacred isle._

As early as the reign of William, a chapel stood on the isle of Fidrey, near the shore of Elbotle, (now forming part of the parish of Dirleton,) dedicated to St Nicolas. The ruins still remain.

3.

Stanza v. page 11.

_The sea-calf roll’d by, Forsook her briny pool, and lick’d the patriarch dry._

_Bede_ relates of St Cuthbert, that when on a visit to the Abbess of Coldingham, one of the monks having discovered that the saint left the monastery in the night, had the curiosity to trace his steps, when he discovered him on the sea-shore, standing up to the neck in water, where he spent the hours in prayer till the time of the morning devotions. Having retired from the waves, two sea calves came forth from the sea, and, approaching the saint, warmed his feet with their breath, and wiped them dry with their skins, after which, on receiving his benediction, they retired to the deep.

4.

Stanza viii. page 13.

_He also taught To rear the rustic dome, which, formed of stone, Fair architecture to perfection brought._

Fenan, the successor of Aidan at Lindisfarn, built a church in the Scottish fashion, of beams and planks of oak, covered with reeds, which in those times was judged fit for the seat of a bishop.—See _Bede_, book iii. chap. 25. The splendid cathedral of York, which is esteemed the largest and most magnificent in Europe, owes its origin to a church built hastily of wood about the time of this poem, and dedicated to St Peter. These rustic houses of prayer were held in such veneration, that afterwards, as was the case with York Minster, when churches of stone began to be built, they commonly comprehended the old fabric within their walls. From various passages in Bede, it appears that the monks employed their leisure hours in the cultivation of agriculture and of the arts. Easterwin, colleague of the abbot of Weremouth, though a man of noble birth, and who had been the minister of King Egfrid, yet having abandoned secular affairs, he sought not to be distinguished from the other brethren, but would fan, grind, milk cows or sheep, guide the plough, beat out iron, work in the bakehouse, &c., and employ himself in any business relative to the monastery as an example to others.—See _Border Hist. Scot._

5.

Stanza ix. page 13.

_And, fair, her house of prayer was seen to rise, Where the Cistertian sisters loved to dwell, Beneath the mighty shade of Lothian’s Alpine hill._

The ruins of the Cistertian nunnery of North Berwick stand on an eminence south-west from the town, and command a delightful view of the sea, the shores of Fife, the Bass, and an immense conical hill, called North Berwick Law, which rises at least 800 feet above the level of the sea. Of this nunnery there are three views in Grose’s Scottish Antiquities. It was consecrated to the Virgin Mary, and founded by Malcolm, son of Duncan, Earl of Fife, in 1216. Besides the patronage of the church of Kilconchar, granted to this place by the Earls of Carrick, and other advowsons, Dame Isabel Home, daughter to Alexander Home of Polwart, prioress of this nunnery, gave to her kinsman, Alexander Home, in feu, the teind sheaves of Largo church in Fife, in 1532; and Dame Margaret Home, her successor, and daughter to the same family, gave a tack of the parsonage-teinds of Logie, in the diocese of Dunblane, to Sir Patrick Home of Polwart and his heirs, in 1555.—See _Spotswood’s Acct. Religious Houses_. But Sir James Dalrymple states, that the elder Earl Duncan, who died in 1154, was the founder, whose father gave to the monastery the lands of Muthritht in Fife, and other lands, which were confirmed by King William, as also those of Kirkamstown, and of two hospitals. The church had been originally the cell or kirk of a religious person, called Campston.

At the Reformation the revenues of the nunnery were converted by operation of law into a lordship for Sir Alexander Home, a favourite of James VI. At this epoch the nunnery was inhabited by eleven nuns, who had each L.20 a year.—See _Caledonia_, vol. ii. p. 506.

A picturesque ruin stands on a sandy eminence, near the harbour of North Berwick. The adjacent ground seems to have been a burial place, from the number of human bones scattered around.—_Grose_.

At Elbotle and Golyn there were also convents of Cistertians; but what may appear remarkable, these cells belonged not to North Berwick, but to _South_ Berwick.

6.

Stanza xi. page 14.

_Methinks, oft gazing o’er Bodotria’s tide, King Brude and Baldred sat in cavern’d shade._

_Bodotria Æstuarium_, the mouth of the Frith of Forth.

NOTES TO SAINT BALDRED.