THE BROOM-BUSH 129 



Again, is there a Jacobite (and in sentiment all men 

 of heart are Jacobites) who has not sympathized, 

 without excess of pity, with the hunted prince who 

 slept beneath a bush o' broom wrapped in a plaid, 

 which, to be sure, was a spare though romantic 

 covering ? The ' landscape glow ' of Thomson would 

 be incomplete without the broom. His bull in the 

 broom was a splendid inset for Spring : 



Scarce seen he wades among the yellow broom, 

 40 While o'er his brawny back the rambling sprays 

 Luxuriant shoot. 



Both Burns and Tannahill also felt the charm of the 

 broom in the furniture of a Scottish landscape : dear 

 to the greater Robert was 



the lone glen of green bracken 

 Wi' the burn stealing under the long yellow broom ; 



and the later and lesser found the fairy graces of 

 Craigielea wood enhanced by the broom, the briar, 

 and the birken bush that bloomed on the skirts of it. 

 so More recently Scott adorned the Trossachs Glen with 

 the broom, though it was but to serve by the tough- 

 ness of its roots as a ladder for FitzJames in his 

 ascent to the poetry of Loch Katrine. It is needless 

 to multiply proof of the value of broom in poetry ; 

 yet, at leaving the subject, one is reminded of Matthew 

 Arnold's fine touch (which gilds refined gold yet with 

 effect !) in the famous Hymn to Apollo : 



What forms are these coming 



So white through the gloom ? 

 GO What garments outglistening 



The gold-flower'd broom ? 



And there is also Wordsworth's strong, fresh, dramatic 



