The Downing legends : Stories in Rhyme :: :: University of Virginia Library

A thrilling tale the daughter told,
Right strange to folk of modern mould,
Though like adventures often came
To gracious maids of Grecian name,
To Andromeda by the shore,
To Proserpine and many more.

She walked at eve a lonely wood,
Reciting hymns in dreamy mood,
And watching rapt the boreal lights
That filled the hollow sky with flights
Of saintly ghosts in bright attire,
Ascending swift on wings of fire;
When all at once the glory died
And shudders through the forest sighed,
And crickets hushed their cheery shout,
And fireflies put their lanterns out,
As though a mighty fiend drew near
Who draped effulgent night in fear.

Then overhead the branches clove,
And through the trembling shadows drove
A sombre form without a form,
No doubt a wraith of night and storm,
Who lifted her on gloomy plumes
Athwart the evening's ghostly brumes
O'er glinting lake and woodland brown

163

And frowning crag and glimmering town,
To leave her captivate with those
Who lately fell by Downing's blows.

Which tale her father never doubted,
Because, although his arm had routed
The wizard hordes and goblin legions
In manifold New England regions,
He knew a fiendish remnant scouted
From point to point as Satan's skinners

[_]

Tory cow-thieves.

To plague the saints and help the sinners.