 to
ask what was the original of the tradition. The choice between the horn and
sword may, perhaps, include as a moral, that it is fool-hardy to awaken danger
before we have arms in our hands to resist it.
    Although admitting of much poetical ornament, it is clear that this legend
would have formed but an unhappy foundation for a prose story, and must have
degenerated into a mere fairy tale. Dr. John Leyden has beautifully introduced
the tradition in his Scenes of Infancy: -
 
Mysterious Rhymer, doomed by fate's decree,
Still to revisit Eildon's fated tree;
Where oft the swain, at dawn of Hallow-day,
Hears thy fleet barb with wild impatience neigh;
Say who is he, with summons long and high,
Shall bid the charmed sleep of ages fly,
Roll the long sound through Eildon's caverns vast,
While each dark warrior kindles at the blast?
The horn, the falchion grasp with mighty hand,
And peal proud Arthur's march from Fairy-land?
                                                      SCENES OF INFANCY, Part 1.
 
In the same cabinet with the preceding fragment, the following occurred among
other disjecta membra. It seems to be an attempt at a tale of a different
description from the last, but was almost instantly abandoned. The introduction
points out the time of the composition to have been about the end of the
eighteenth century.
 
                             The Lord of Ennerdale.
   In a Fragment of a Letter from John B--, Esq. of that Ilk, to William G--,
                                    F.R.S.E.
 
»Fill a bumper,« said the Knight; »the ladies may spare us a little longer -
Fill a bumper to the Archduke Charles.«
    The company did due honour to the toast of their landlord.
    »The success of the Archduke,« said the muddy Vicar, »will tend to further
our negotiation at Paris; and if -«
    »Pardon the interruption, Doctor,« quoth a thin emaciated figure, with
somewhat of a foreign accent; »but why should you connect those events unless to
hope that the bravery and victories of our allies may supersede the necessity of
a degrading treaty?«
    »We begin to feel, Monsieur l'Abbé,« answered the Vicar, with some asperity,
»that a continental war entered into for the defence of an ally who was
unwilling to defend himself, and for the restoration of a royal family,
nobility, and priesthood, who tamely abandoned their own rights, is a burden too
much even for the resources of this country.«
    »And was the
