'O, open the door, some pity to show, <br />Keen blows the northern wind! <br />The glen is white with the drifted snow, <br />And the path is hard to find. <br /> <br />'No outlaw seeks your castle gate, <br />From chasing the King's deer, <br />Though even an outlaw's wretched state <br />Might claim compassion here. <br /> <br />'A weary Palmer, worn and weak, <br />I wander for my sin; <br />O, open, for our Lady's sake! <br />A pilgrim's blessing win! <br /> <br />'I'll give you pardons from the Pope, <br />And reliques from o'er the sea,- <br />Or if for these you will not ope, <br />Yet open for charity. <br /> <br />'The hare is crouching in her form, <br />The hard beside the hind; <br />An aged man, amid the storm, <br />No shelter can I find. <br /> <br />'You hear the Ettrick's sullen roar, <br />Dark, deep, and strong is he, <br />And I must ford the Ettrick o'er, <br />Unless you pity me. <br /> <br />'The iron gate is bolted hard, <br />At which I knock in vain; <br />The owner's heart is closer barr'd, <br />Who hears me thus complain. <br /> <br />'Farewell, farewell! and Mary grant, <br />When old and frail you be, <br />You never may the shelter want, <br />That's now denied to me.' <br /> <br />The Ranger on his couch lay warm, <br />And heard him plead in vain; <br />But oft amid December's storm, <br />He'll hear that voice again: <br /> <br />For lo, when through the vapours dank, <br />Morn shone on Ettrick fair, <br />A corpse amid the alders rank, <br />The Palmer welter'd there.<br /><br />Sir Walter Scott<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-palmer/
