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  Canto Sixth  
   Sir Walter Scott    
  Sir Walter Scott was a Scottish novelist and poet. The following is a rather strident defence of patriotic feeling against a denatured individualism. It is part of the Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805). [The word "pelf" means money or riches.]
 

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
"This is my own, my native land!"
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned,
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no Minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentrated all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung.

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