Page:The Lady of the Lake - Scott (1810).djvu/337

 period, was shortly after decapitated by that very man and instrument.

Lord Lovat is said, by the author of the Letters from Scotland, to have affirmed, that a number of swords that hung up in the hall of the mansion-house, leaped of themselves out of the scabbard at the instant he was born. This story passed current among his clan, but, like that of the story I have just quoted, proved an unfortunate omen.—Letters from Scotland, Vol. II. p. 214.

The connoisseurs in pipe-music affect to discover, in a well-composed pibroch, the imitative sounds of march, conflict, flight, pursuit, and all the "current of a heady fight." To this opinion, Dr Beattie has given his suffrage in the following elegant passage:—"A pibroch is a species of tune peculiar, I think, to the Highlands and western isles of Scotland. It is performed on a bagpipe, and differs totally from all other music. Its rythm is so irregular, and its notes, especially in the quick movement, so mixed and huddled together, that a stranger finds it impossible to reconcile his ear to it, so as to perceive its modulation. Some of these pibrochs, being intended to represent a battle, begin with a grave motion, resembling a march; then gradually quicken into the onset; run off with noisy confusion, and turbulent rapidity, to imitate the conflict