Page images
PDF
EPUB

He did not guess-as they paused to hear,

How music's dying tone

Came mournfully to the distant ear,

With a magic all its own

That the archer god, to thrall his soul,

Was lingering in the porch,

Disguised that evening, like my Whole,
With a sooty face and torch.

XVI.

THE Indian lover burst

From his lone cot by night;-
When Love hath lit my First,
In hearts by Passion nurst,

Oh! who shall quench the light?

The Indian left the shore;

He heard the night wind sing,

And curs'd the tardy oar,

And wish'd that he could soar,
Upon my Second's wing.

The blast came cold and damp,

But, all the voyage through,

I lent my lingering lamp
As o'er the marshy swamp

He paddled his canoe.

XVII.

WHEN Ralph by holy hands was tied
For life to blooming Cis,

Sir Thrifty too drove home his bride,
A fashionable Miss,

That day, my First, with jovial sound
Proclaim'd the happy tale,

And drunk was all the country round
With pleasure or with ale.

Oh, why should Hymen ever blight
The roses Cupid wore?—
Or why should it be ever night
Where it was day before?—

Or why should women have a tongue,
Or why should it be curs'd,
In being, like my Second, long,
And louder than my First?

"You blackguard !" cries the rural wench,
My lady screams, "Ah, bête!"
And Lady Thrifty scolds in French,
And Cis in Billingsgate;

'Til both their Lords my Second try,
To end connubial strife-

Sir Thrifty hath the means to die,

And Ralph-to beat his wife!

XVIII.

A TEMPLAR kneel'd at a friar's knee;
He was a comely youth to see,
With curling locks and forehead high,
And flushing cheek, and flashing eye;

And the monk was as jolly and large a man
As ever laid lip to a convent can,

Or called for a contribution;

As ever read, at midnight hour,
Confessional in lady's bower,

Ordain'd for a peasant the penance whip,
Or spoke for a noble's venial slip
A venal absolution.

"Oh, Father! in the dim twilight
I have sinned a grievous sin to-night;
And I feel hot pain e'en now begun
For the fearful murder I have done.

"I rent my victim's coat of green;
I pierced his neck with my dagger keen;
The red stream mantled high;

I grasp'd him, Father, all the while.
With shaking hand, and feverish smile,
And said my jest, and sang my song,
And laugh'd my laughter, loud and long,
Until his glass was dry!

"Though he was rich, and very old,

[ocr errors]

I did not touch a grain of gold,

But the blood I drank from the bubbling vein
Hath left on my lip a purple stain."

'My son my son! for this thou hast done

Though the sands of thy life for aye should run,"
The merry monk did say;

"Though thine eye be bright, and thine heart be light, Hot spirits shall haunt thee all the night,

Blue devils all the day."

The thunders of the Church were ended,
Back on his way the Templar wended;
But the name of him the Templar slew
Was more than the Inquisition knew.

XIX.

Row on, row on!—The First may light

My shallop o'er the wave to-night;
But she will hide in a little while,
The lustre of her silent smile;
For fickle she is, and changeful still,

As a madman's wish, or a woman's will.

Row on, row on!-The Second is high
In my own bright lady's balcony;
And she beside it, pale and mute,
Untold her beads, untouched her lute,
Is wondering why her lover's skiff
So slowly glides to the lonely cliff.

Row on, row on!-When the Whole is fled,
The song will be hushed, and the rapture dead;
And I must go in my grief again

To the toils of day, and the haunts of men
To a future of fear, and a present of care,
And memory's dream of the things that were.

« PreviousContinue »