Then up and spoke the Cameron,

And gave him his hand again:
"There shall never a man in Scotland

Set faith in me in vain;
And whatever man you have slaughtered,

Of whatever name or line,
By my sword and yonder mountain,

I make your quarrel mine. (1)
I bid you in to my fireside,

I share with you house and hall;
It stands upon my honour

To see you safe from all."
It fell in the time of midnight,

When the fox barked in the den
And the plaids were over the faces

In all the houses of men,
That as the living Cameron

Lay sleepless on his bed,
Out of the night and the other world,

Came in to him the dead.
"My blood is on the heather,

My bones are on the hill;
There is joy in the home of ravens

That the young shall eat their fill.
My blood is poured in the dust,

My soul is spilled in the air;
And the man that has undone me

Sleeps in my brother's care."
"I'm wae for your death, my brother,

But if all of my house were dead,
I couldnae withdraw the plighted hand,

Nor break the word once said."
"O, what shall I say to our father,

In the place to which I fare?
O, what shall I say to our mother,

Who greets to see me there?
And to all the kindly Camerons

That have lived and died long-syne -
Is this the word you send them,

Fause-hearted brother mine?"
"It's neither fear nor duty,

It's neither quick nor dead
Shall gar me withdraw the plighted hand,

Or break the word once said."
Thrice in the time of midnight,

When the fox barked in the den,
And the plaids were over the faces

In all the houses of men,
Thrice as the living Cameron

Lay sleepless on his bed,
Out of the night and the other world

Came in to him the dead,
And cried to him for vengeance

On the man that laid him low;
And thrice the living Cameron

Told the dead Cameron, no.
"Thrice have you seen me, brother,

But now shall see me no more,
Till you meet your angry fathers

Upon the farther shore.
Thrice have I spoken, and now,

Before the cock be heard,
I take my leave for ever

With the naming of a word.
It shall sing in your sleeping ears,

It shall hum in your waking head,
The name - Ticonderoga,

And the warning of the dead."
Now when the night was over

And the time of people's fears,
The Cameron walked abroad,

And the word was in his ears.
"Many a name I know,

But never a name like this;
O, where shall I find a skilly man

Shall tell me what it is?"
With many a man he counselled

Of high and low degree,
With the herdsmen on the mountains

And the fishers of the sea.
And he came and went unweary,

And read the books of yore,
And the runes that were written of old

On stones upon the moor.
And many a name he was told,

But never the name of his fears -
Never, in east or west,

The name that rang in his ears:
Names of men and of clans;

Names for the grass and the tree,
For the smallest tarn in the mountains,

The smallest reef in the sea:
Names for the high and low,

The names of the craig and the flat;
But in all the land of Scotland,

Never a name like that.
II. THE SEEKING OF THE NAME

AND now there was speech in the south,
And a man of the south that was wise,

A periwig'd lord of London, (2)
Called on the clans to rise.

And the riders rode, and the summons
Came to the western shore,

To the land of the sea and the heather,
To Appin and Mamore.

It called on all to gather
From every scrog and scaur,

That loved their fathers' tartan
And the ancient game of war.

And down the watery valley
And up the windy hill,

Once more, as in the olden,
The pipes were sounding shrill;

Again in highland sunshine
The naked steel was bright;

And the lads, once more in tartan
Went forth again to fight.

"O, why should I dwell here
With a weird upon my life,

When the clansmen shout for battle
And the war-swords clash in strife?

I cannae joy at feast,
I cannae sleep in bed,

For the wonder of the word
And the warning of the dead.

It sings in my sleeping ears,
It hums in my waking head,

The name - Ticonderoga,
The utterance of the dead.

Then up, and with the fighting men
To march away from here,

Till the cry of the great war-pipe
Shall drown it in my ear!"

Where flew King George's ensign
The plaided soldiers went:

They drew the sword in Germany,
In Flanders pitched the tent.

The bells of foreign cities
Rang far across the plain:

They passed the happy Rhine,
They drank the rapid Main.

Through Asiatic jungles
The Tartans filed their way,

And the neighing of the war-pipes
Struck terror in Cathay. (3)

"Many a name have I heard," he thought,
"In all the tongues of men,

Full many a name both here and there.
Full many both now and then.

When I was at home in my father's house
In the land of the naked knee,

Between the eagles that fly in the lift
And the herrings that swim in the sea,

And now that I am a captain-man
With a braw cockade in my hat -

Many a name have I heard," he thought,
"But never a name like that."

III. THE PLACE OF THE NAME
THERE fell a war in a woody place,

Lay far across the sea,
A war of the march in the mirk midnight

And the shot from behind the tree,
The shaven head and the painted face,

The silent foot in the wood,
In a land of a strange, outlandish tongue

That was hard to be understood.
It fell about the gloaming

The general stood with his staff,
He stood and he looked east and west

With little mind to laugh.
"Far have I been and much have I seen,

And kent both gain and loss,
But here we have woods on every hand

And a kittle water to cross.
Far have I been and much have I seen,

But never the beat of this;
And there's one must go down to that waterside

To see how deep it is."
It fell in the dusk of the night

When unco things betide,
The skilly captain, the Cameron,

Went down to that waterside.
Canny and soft the captain went;

And a man of the woody land,
With the shaven head and the painted face,

Went down at his right hand.
It fell in the quiet night,

There was never a sound to ken;
But all of the woods to the right and the left

Lay filled with the painted men.
"Far have I been and much have I seen,

Both as a man and boy,
But never have I set forth a foot

On so perilous an employ."
It fell in the dusk of the night

When unco things betide,
That he was aware of a captain-man

Drew near to the waterside.
He was aware of his coming

Down in the gloaming alone;
And he looked in the face of the man

• whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
• withdraw [wið´drɔ:] v.收回；撤销；撤退 (初中英语单词)
• spoken [´spəukən] speak的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
• sleeping [´sli:piŋ] n.&a.睡着(的) (初中英语单词)
• western [´westən] a.西的；西方的 (初中英语单词)
• terror [´terə] n.恐怖；惊骇 (初中英语单词)
• highland [´hailənd] n.山地，高地 (高中英语单词)
• perilous [´periləs] a.危险的；冒险的 (高中英语单词)
• thrice [θrais] ad.三倍地；三次 (英语四级单词)
• warning [´wɔ:niŋ] n.警告；前兆 a.预告的 (英语四级单词)
• utterance [´ʌtərəns] n.发音；言辞；所说的话 (英语四级单词)
• asiatic [,eiʃi´ætik ,eizi´ætik] a.亚洲(人)的 n.亚洲人 (英语四级单词)
• sleepless [´sli:pləs] a.失眠的；寂静的 (英语六级单词)
• undone [,ʌn´dʌn] a.未完成的，没有做的 (英语六级单词)
• watery [´wɔ:təri] a.水的；像水的 (英语六级单词)