'Prince, prelate, potentate, and peer,
Whose names I now shall call,
Scottish, or foreigner, give ear!
Subjects of him who sent me here,
At his tribunal to appear, 740
I summon one and all:
I cite you by each deadly sin,
That e'er hath soil'd your hearts within;
I cite you by each brutal lust,
That e'er defiled your earthly dust,-- 745
By wrath, by pride, by fear,
By each o'er-mastering passion's tone,
By the dark grave, and dying groan!
When forty days are pass'd and gone,
I cite you at your Monarch's throne, 750
To answer and appear.'--
Then thundered forth a roll of names:--
The first was thine, unhappy James!
Then all thy nobles came;
Crawford, Glencairn, Montrose, Argyle, 755
Ross, Bothwell, Forbes, Lennox, Lyle,-
Why should I tell their separate style?
Each chief of birth and fame,
Of Lowland, Highland, Border, Isle,
Fore-doom'd to Flodden's carnage pile, 760
Was cited there by name;
And Marmion, Lord of Fontenaye,
Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbaye;
De Wilton, erst of Aberley,
The self-same thundering voice did say.-- 765
But then another spoke:
'Thy fatal summons I deny,
And thine infernal Lord defy,
Appealing me to Him on high,
Who burst the sinner's yoke.' 770
At that dread accent, with a scream,
Parted the pageant like a dream,
The summoner was gone.
Prone on her face the Abbess fell,
And fast, and fast, her beads did tell; 775
Her nuns came, startled by the yell,
And found her there alone.
She mark'd not, at the scene aghast,
What time, or how, the Palmer pass'd.