EPILOGUE by WALTER SCOTT

THE sages -- for authority, pray look
Seneca's morals, or the copy-book --
The sages to disparage woman's power,
Say, beauty is a fair, but fading flower; --
I cannot tell -- I've small philosophy --
Yet, if it fades, it does not surely die,
But, like the violet, when decay'd in bloom,
Survives through many a year in rich perfume.
Witness our theme to-night, two ages gone,
A third wanes fast, since Mary fill'd the throne.
Brief was her bloom, with scarce one sunny day,
'Twixt Pinkie's field and fatal Fotheringay:
But when, while Scottish hearts and blood you boast,
Shall sympathy with Mary's woes be lost?
O'er Mary's memory the learned quarrel,
By Mary's grave the poet plants his laurel;
Time's echo, old tradition, makes her name
The constant burden of his falt'ring theme;
In each old hall his grey-hair'd heralds tell
Of Mary's picture, and of Mary's cell,
And show -- my fingers tingle at the thought --
The loads of tapestry which that poor Queen wrought.
In vain did fate bestow a double dower
Of ev'ry ill that waits on rank and pow'r,
Of ev'ry ill on beauty that attends --
False ministers, false lovers, and false friends.
Spite of three wedlocks so completely curst,
They rose in ill from bad to worse, and worst;
In spite of errors -- I dare not say more.
For Duncan Targe lays hand on his claymore --
In spite of all, however humours vary,
There is a talisman in that word Mary,
That unto Scottish bosoms all and some
Is found the genuine @3open sesamum!@1
In history, ballad, poetry, or novel,
It charms alike the castle and the hovel,
Even you -- forgive me -- who, demure and shy,
Gorge not each bait, nor stir at every fly,
Must rise to this, else in her ancient reign
The Rose of Scotland has survived in vain.

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