7.

Then, Adwick told, in mournful tone,
(While on her lap he laid
The rescu'd infant, still afraid,)
How, crossing o'er the lake,
He sav'd from death the little one;
" And well, " said he, " I knew,
If aught on earth were true,
That thou would'st love it — for my sake. "

8.

" A pretty tale, no doubt, I hear;
But why, " she said, with look austere,
" Must I my rival's bantling rear? "

9.

" Nay, " he replied, " no rival fear;
For who its mother,

" What! come at last? " she said, and laugh'd,
Each word a seeming-spiteful shaft;
" Be seated, for I ne'er again
Expected here my truant swain. "

In haste, she strew'd her cottage floor
With rushes, to the open door;
Arrang'd the hearth, rous'd up the fire;
Swept both her stools, and dress'd them both
In covers of outlandish cloth,
The work of mind-rais'd men and times;
Brought by her grandsire's father's sire,
(A merchant, known in many climes,)
From Greece, his mother's grave.
And that lone maid remember'd well
Traditions (which she lov'd to tell,)
Of old Judea's sacred sod,
The altar of the living God;
Of lands where written speech was known;
And of her ancestor, the bard

The stormy west was scowling,
And wolves, far off, were howling.
The starv'd she-fox, from Ravensly,
Yelp'd o'er oak-waving Denaby.
Deep in the wath of Addersmarsh,
The bittern strain'd her trumpet harsh.
The mast-fed boar had crunch'd his fill.
Beneath the blast, increasing still,
The ash-twigs snapp'd, aloft in air:
Their fall disturb'd the drowsy bear,
And every falling leaf the hare.
" The coming night is glooming, "
She said; " the night is coming;
The direness of the bittern's booming

Beside the grave, where evermore,
Unknell'd, uncoffin'd, not unwept,
Her widow'd mother slept,
Beneath the copse of willows hoar,
With dwarf ash mix'd, and crab, and sloe,
And brambles for the gadding vine;
Close to the deep lake's western shore,
In restless mood, walk'd to and fro
The orphan Etheline.
Lone daughter of a wizard sire,
(So, by her policy deceived,
Men eagerly believ'd,)
Fear'd was her power, and widely known:
Her spells could rule the thunder-stone,
That floods the heavens with fire;

She sank — the baby floated,
As if its life was boated.
Swift Adwick soon the struggler caught,
And almost touch'd the mother's hair,
The sinking face of her despair.
He plac'd the infant in the boat;
Then, from its stooping side,
Plung'd deep beneath the tide;
Rose, dived, and rose, to dive in vain;
Yet liv'd to see that face again!
Recovering soon his rocking boat,
He sate awhile in painful thought:
" Another victim! women run
To Konig's lord, to be undone.
If man may tempt them, Konig can;

The west wind, gusting boldly,
From Cadeby's falls sent far
The roar of Don and Dar,
Flooding with watery howl and groan,
Their wild abyss of riven stone.
After a day of rain,
The setting sun shone coldly,
Like one who smiles in pain,
O'er woods that seem'd to floor the sky
With ocean-like profundity;
And on the lake's dark grey and blue
The oaken towers of Konig threw
A red and shatter'd glare.
'Twas then, that, in despair,
A woman young and fair

BOOK I.

Dear Ellen Rendall! seers have said
That of his realm of giant oak,
O'er valley, plain, and mountain spread
Ere echo mock'd the woodman's stroke,
Barbarian man the temple made,
Where first Religion kneel'd and pray'd;
The green cathedral of the soul
Whose god was in the thunder's roll.
'Twas finely thought, and sagely, too;
The beautiful is ever true.
But I the temple dread would paint
Where primal fraud was terror's saint.
Thou Ellen, thy young grace and truth,

Lo, here comes farmer Nimrod, on his grey!
Eager his victim's well-earn'd hate to brave,
And proud to be a tyrant and a slave,
He damns his feeders twenty times a day:
" What right to think of his concerns have they? "
Well can he bear the trader's land-made cares:
" Happy the poor, " quoth he; " for thrive who may,
A comfortable Workhouse still is theirs. "
Yet swaps he not his happiness for ours!
But in the page that lauds his right to wrong,
Reads weekly, That Trade's gains to him belong;
For what the country grows, the town devours!

We are not lonely, Kinderscout! I stand
Here, with thy sire, and gaze, with Him and thee,
On desolation. This is Liberty!
I want no wing, to lift me from the land,
But look, soul-fetter'd, on the wild and grand.
Oh, that the dungeon'd of the earth were free
As these fix'd rocks, whose summits bare command
Yon cloud to stay, and weep for Man, with me!
Is this, then, solitude? To feel our hearts
Lifted above the world, yet not above
The sympathies of brotherhood and love?
To grieve for him who from the right departs?