Page:Scott - Tales of my Landlord - 3rd series - 1819.djvu/239

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A LEGEND OF MONTROSE.
229
CHAPTER V.

Thareby so fearlesse and so fell he grew,
That his owne syre and maister of his guise,
Did often tremble at his horrid view;
And if for dread of hurt would him advise,
The angry beastes not rashly to despise,
Nor too much to provoke; for he would learne
The lyon stoup to him in lowly wise,
(A lesson hard,) and make the libbard sterne
Leave roaring, when in rage he for revenge did earne.

Spenser.


Notwithstanding the proverbial epicurism ot the English,—proverbial, that is to say, in Scotland at the period,—the English visitors made no figure whatever at the entertainment compared with the portentous voracity of Captain Dalgetty, although that gallant soldier had already displayed much steadiness and pertinacity in his attack upon the refreshment set be-