While stretched at length upon the floor,
Again I fought each combat o'er.
Pebbles and shells, in order laid,
The mimic ranks of war displayed;
And onward still the Scottish Lion bore,
And still the scattered Southron fled before."
Scott eyed the distant height of Sandy Knowe with an earnest gaze as we
rode along, and said he had often thought of buying the place,
repairing the old tower, and making it his residence. He has in some
measure, however, paid off his early debt of gratitude, in clothing it
with poetic and romantic associations, by his tale of "The Eve of St.
John." It is to be hoped that those who actually possess so interesting
a monument of Scott's early days, will preserve it from further
dilapidation.
Not far from Sandy Knowe, Scott pointed out another old border hold,
standing on the summit of a hill, which had been a kind of enchanted
castle to him in his boyhood. It was the tower of Bemerside, the
baronial residence of the Haigs, or De Hagas, one of the oldest
families of the border. "There had seemed to him," he said, "almost a
wizard spell hanging over it, in consequence of a prophecy of Thomas
the Rhymer, in which, in his young days, he most potently believed:"
"Betide, betide, whate'er betide,
Haig shall be Haig of Bemerside.
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