The Ingoldsby Legends :: :: University of Virginia Library

There's a voice in the air,
There's a step on the stair,
The old man starts in his cane-backed chair;
At the first faint sound
He gazes around,
And holds up his dip of sixteen to the pound.
Then half arose
From beside his toes
His little pug-dog with his little pug nose,
But, ere he can vent one inquisitive sniff,
That little pug-dog stands stark and stiff,
For low, yet clear,
Now fall on the ear,
—Where once pronounced for ever they dwell,—
The unholy words of the Dead Man's spell!

“Open lock
To the Dead Man's knock!
Fly bolt, and bar, and band!
Nor move, nor swerve
Joint, muscle, or nerve,
At the spell of the Dead Man's hand!
Sleep all who sleep!—Wake all who wake!—
But be as the Dead for the Dead Man's sake!!”

Now lock, nor bolt, nor bar avails,
Nor stout oak panel thick-studded with nails.
Heavy and harsh the hinges creak,
Though they had been oil'd in the course of the week;
The door opens wide as wide may be,
And there they stand,
That murderous band,
Led by the light of the Glorious Hand,
By one! by two! by three!

They have pass'd through the porch, they have pass'd through the hall,
Where the Porter sat snoring against the wall;
The very snore froze
In his very snub nose,
You'd have verily deem'd he had snored his last
When the Glorious Hand by the side of him past!
E'en the little wee mouse, as it ran o'er the mat
At the top of its speed to escape from the cat,
Though half dead with affright,
Paus'd in its flight;
And the cat, that was chasing that little wee thing,
Lay crouch'd as a Statute in act to spring!

And now they are there,
On the head of the stair,
And the long crooked whittle is gleaming and bare!
—I really don't think any money would bribe
Me the horrible scene that ensued to describe,
Or the wild, wild glare
Of that old man's eye,
His dumb despair
And deep agony.

The kid from the pen, and the lamb from the fold,
Unmoved may the blade of the butcher behold;
They dream not—ah, happier they !—that the knife,
Though uplifted, can menace their innocent life:
It falls; the frail thread of their being is riven,
They dread not, suspect not the blow till 'tis given.
But, oh! what a thing 'tis to see and to know
That the bare knife is raised in the hand of the foe,
Without hope to repel or to ward off the blow !—
Enough! let's pass over as fast as we can
The fate of that grey, that unhappy old man!

But fancy poor Hugh,
Aghast at the view,
Powerless alike to speak or to do!
In vain doth he try
To open the eye
That is shut, or close that which is clapt to the chink,
Though he'd give all the world to be able to wink!
No !—for all that this world can give or refuse,
I would not be now in that little boy's shoes,
Or indeed any garment at all that is Hugh's!
'Tis lucky for him that the chink in the wall
He has peep'd through so long, is so narrow and small!

Wailing voices, sounds of woe
Such as follow departing friends,
That fatal night round Tappington go,
Its long-drawn roofs and its gable-ends:
Ethereal Spirits, gentle and good,
Aye weep and lament o'er a deed of blood.