When clear falls the moonlight,
When spring-tides are low;
When sweet airs come seaward
From heaths starr'd with broom,
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanch'd sands a gloom;
Up the still, glistening beaches,
Up the creeks we will hie,
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.
We will gaze, from the sand-hills,
At the white, sleeping town;
At the church on the hill-side—
And then come back down.
Singing: "There dwells a lov'd one,
But cruel is she!
She left lonely forever
The kings of the sea."
Matthew Arnold.
The Banks o' Doon.
"The Banks o' Doon," by Robert Burns (1759-96). Bonnie Doon is in the southwestern part of Scotland. Robert Burns's old home is close to it. The house has low walls, a thatched roof, and only two rooms. Alloway Kirk and the two bridges so famous in Robert Burns's verse are near by. This is an enchanted land, and the Scotch people for miles around Ayr speak of the poet with sincere affection. Burns, more than any other poet, has thrown the enchantment of poetry over his own locality.
Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon,
How can ye blume sae fair!
How can ye chant, ye little birds,
And I sae fu' o' care.
