Ellen Gray or, The dead maiden's curse. A poem, by the late Dr. Archibald Macleod [i.e. W. L. Bowles] |
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| II. | CANTO II. |
 | Ellen Gray |  |
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CANTO II.
At early dawn, gay Hubert pass'd along,—The birds were singing loud their hedge-row song;—
The meadow's pathway, on which fairies threw
Their lightest net-work of the film and dew,
Careless he brush'd: the sun rose as he pass'd,
A line of glory on the scene was cast,—
Where the brook, trembling in the orient light,
Stole by; and now, the small spire rose in sight,
As the mist creeping from the nether plain
Flew off, departing to the northern main.
Now, peeping from the river's farther side,
Ellen's maternal cottage he descried,
And saw a faded garland at the door,
And with'ring branches of the sycamore:
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Slow rising o'er the shades of pine and oak.
Ah! was it fancy? as he pass'd along,
He thought he heard a spirit's feeble song !
Struck by the thrilling sound, he turned his look,—
Upon the ground there lay an open book,—
The page was folded down:—Spirit of grace!
Ah! there are soils, like tear-blots, on the place:
It was a pray'r-book!—and these words he read:
“Let him be desolate, and beg his bread !
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“Be his days few,—his children fatherless,—
“His wife a widow!—let there be no friend
“In his last moments mercy to extend!”
It is a common idea in Cornwall, that when any person is drowned, the voice of his spirit may be heard by those who first pass by.
The passage folded down was the 109th Psalm, commonly called “the imprecating Psalm.” It is now generally understood, that the imprecations were denounced by David's enemies against himself. I extract the most affecting passages:—
“May his days be few.”
“Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.”
“Let there be none to extend mercy.”
“Let their name be blotted out, because he slayed even the broken in heart.”
It was a pray'r-book he before had seen:
Where? when? Once more, wild terror on his mien,
He read the page:—“An outcast let him lie,
“And unlamented and deserted die!
“When he has children, may they pine away
“Before his sight,—to hopeless grief a prey!
“His wife—”
Where? when? Once more, wild terror on his mien,
He read the page:—“An outcast let him lie,
“And unlamented and deserted die!
“When he has children, may they pine away
“Before his sight,—to hopeless grief a prey!
“His wife—”
He trembled—who could read unmov'd?
Ah! 'tis the written name of her he lov'd:—
“The book of Ellen Gray;—when this you see,
“And I am dead and gone—remember me!”
His limbs—they shake—the dew is on his brow:—
“The curse is hers!—oh God! I feel it now!
“I see already—ev'n at my right hand—
“Poor Ellen, thy accusing spirit stand!
“I feel thy deep, last curse!” Then with a cry,
He sunk upon the earth in agony.
Feebly he rose,—when, on the matted hair
Ah! 'tis the written name of her he lov'd:—
“The book of Ellen Gray;—when this you see,
“And I am dead and gone—remember me!”
His limbs—they shake—the dew is on his brow:—
“The curse is hers!—oh God! I feel it now!
“I see already—ev'n at my right hand—
“Poor Ellen, thy accusing spirit stand!
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He sunk upon the earth in agony.
Of a drown'd maid, and on her bosom bare,
The sun shone out; and, 'mid the sedges green,
Poor Ellen's cold and floating corse was seen.
“Merciful God!” with faltering voice he cries,
“Hide me! oh, hide me from the sight! Those eyes—
“They glare on me! oh, hide me with the dead!
“The curse—the deep curse rests upon my head!”
Ellen, farewell! 'twas frenzy fir'd thy breast,—
That prompted horrors not to be express'd:
Whilst ever at thy side the foul fiend stood,
And, laughing, pointed to the oblivious flood.
Hubert, heart-stricken—to despair a prey,
Soon left the village, journeying far away;
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He sought the spirit of St. Cuthbert's well :
He dropp'd a pebble—mark! no bubble bright
Follow'd; and slow he turn'd away his sight.
He look'd again: “Oh, God! those eye-balls glare,
“How terribly! ah, smooth that matted hair,—
“Ellen! dead Ellen! thy cold corse I see
“Rise from the fountain! look not thus at me!
“I cannot bear the sight—that form—that look!
“Oh! shut the book, dear Ellen, shut the book!”
The people of the country consult the spirit of the well for their future destiny, by dropping a pebble into it, striking the ground, and other methods of divination, derived, no doubt, from Pagan antiquity. —Polwhele.
Her lone and grey-hair'd mother wept and pray'd:
Soon to the dust she follow'd; and unknown,
There, they both rest without a name or stone.
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Till thou hast said one pray'r, for charity!
But what of Hubert? “Hide me in the mine!”
He cried, “the beams of day insulting shine!
“Earth's very shadows are too gay, too bright,—
“Hide me, for ever, in forgetful night!”
In vain;—that shade, the cause of all his woes,
More sternly terrible in darkness rose!
Nearer he saw, with its white waving hand,
That phantom in appalling stillness stand;
The letters in the book shone through the night,
More blasting! “Hide, oh hide me from the sight!
“Vast ocean, to thy solitudes I bring
“A heart, that not the fragrance of the spring,—
“The green-leaves' music,—or the wood-lark's strain,—
“Shall ever wake to hope or joy again!
“Ocean, be mine,—wild as thy wastes, to roam
“From clime to clime!—Ocean, be thou my home!”
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He went to sea; yet there, amid the roar
Of the wild waters, starting from his sleep,
He gaz'd upon the lone tempestuous deep;
When, slowly rising from the vessel's lee,
A shape appeared, which none besides could see;
And then he shriek'd, like one whom Heav'n forsook,—
“Oh! shut the book, dear Ellen, shut the book!”
In foreign lands, in darkness and in light,
The same dread spectre stood before his sight;
If slumber came, his aching lids to close,
Funereal forms in sad procession rose.
Sometimes he dreamed that ev'ry grief was pass'd,—
Ellen had long been lost—was found at last,—
And now she smil'd as when in early life,—
The morn was come when she should be his wife;
The maids were dress'd in white, and all were gay,
And the bells rang for Ellen's wedding-day!
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Hark! the glad bells have sunk into a toll,—
A slow, deep toll; and lo! a sable train
Of mourners, moving to the village fane.
A coffin now is laid in holy ground,
That, heavily, returns its hollow sound,
When the first earth upon its lid is thrown:
The hollow sound is chang'd into a groan:
And, rising with wan cheek, and dripping hair,
And moving lips, and eyes of ghastly stare,
A figure issues! Ah! it comes more near!
'Tis Ellen! and that book with many a tear
Is wet, which, with her fingers long and cold,
He sees her to the glimmering moon unfold.
Her icy hand is laid upon his heart;
Gasping, he wakes,—and, with a convulsive start,
He gazes round. Moonlight is on the tide—
The passing keel is scarcely heard to glide,—
Ah! there the spectre goes: with frenzied look
He shrieks, “Oh! shut, dear Ellen, shut the book!”
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And hark! far off, the lessening laughter dies.
Years roll'd away,—till now, at evening's close,
Faint, and more faint, th' accusing spirit rose.
Restor'd from toil, and perils of the main,
Now Hubert treads his native land again.
Near the “hoar” mount, by Marazion's shore,
Where, from the west, Atlantic surges roar,
Where once, above the solitary main,
The mighty vision sat, and look'd to Spain ,
He liv'd, a lonely stranger, sad, but mild;
All mark'd the sadness, chiefly when he smil'd;
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So, in a cottage, on his native soil,
He dwelt, remote from crowds, nor told his tale
To human ear: he saw the white clouds sail
O'er the bright bay, when suns of summer shone,
And oft he wander'd, mutt'ring and alone.
He never went to church, where he might hear
The judgment-psalm, so harrowing to his ear:
The Bible on the window-seat was laid,
He wept upon it, and in secret pray'd;
But never join'd the social sabbath bands,
That to St. Paul's pass'd o'er the whit'ning sands.
The apparition of St. Michael, who, from the top of the mount so called, as Milton says, in his Lycidas,
“Looks to Namanco's and Bayonna's hold.”See a masterly note of T. Warton's on the passage, in illustration of its imagery.
Which, from the Mississippi, far away,
O'er the Atlantic, to his native land
He brought;—it fed from its protector's hand,
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That ev'ry passenger would pause to hear.
In the great world there was not one beside
For whom he car'd, since his grey father died.
Weigh'd light upon his frame, though pass'd in tears;
Not thirty-five his age, and in his face
There was of care, more than of time, the trace.
Ellen was half-forgotten; by degrees,
The sights and sounds of life began to please.
The widow'd Ruth in early life had known
Domestic griefs and losses of her own.
She—patient, mild, compassionate, and kind—
Waken'd to human sympathies his mind.
The first that won his notice, was her child,
Who fed his bird, and took his hand, and smil'd.
Ruth and her little boy, to most unknown,
Liv'd in a cottage that adjoin'd his own;
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They read the Bible, on a Sabbath night.
The cottage look'd upon the circling bay;
Penzance, a streak of light, to southward lay;
Eastward the Lizard's hazy point was seen,
Now vanish'd in “a momentary spleen ;”
Nearer, the lone, romantic rock uprears
Its tower'd brow, which like a crown appears,
And seems the shadow of its state to throw
Along the restless waves that break below.
Who has not sigh'd for the lone fisher's life,
So fraught with terror to an anxious wife?
Night after night, expos'd upon the main;
Returning tir'd with toil, or drench'd in rain;
His gains uncertain as his life,—he knows
No stated hours of labour and repose.
On land, when busy scenes of life retire,
And his wife looks upon the evening fire,
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Haply, is thinking of that social light.
Came down,—the tempest swept the southern main;—
Whether his skiff on some black shore was cast,
Or, whelm'd, he slept beneath the ocean vast,
Was never known;—but, from his native shore,
Thy husband, Ruth, sail'd,—and return'd no more.
Seven years had pass'd,—and after evening pray'r,
To Hubert's cottage Ruth would oft repair,
And with her little son full late would stay,
Listening to tales of regions far away.
The wond'ring boy lov'd of wild scenes to hear;
Of battles of the roving buccaneer;
Of wild-fires lighted in the forest glen,
And songs and dances of the savage men;
Then the pale mother would sit by and weep,
While Hubert told the dangers of the deep.
He spoke of many a peril he had pass'd,—
Of howling night-fiends riding on the blast,—
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Upon some melancholy rock are left,
Who mark, despairing, at the close of day,
Perhaps, some far-off vessel sail away.
He spoke with pity of the land of slaves—
Then, of the phantom-ship that rides the roaring waves .
It comes! it comes! A melancholy light
Gleams from the prow upon the storm of night.
'Tis here! 'tis there! In vain the billows roll;
It steers right on,—but not a living soul
Is there, to guide its voyage thro' the dark,
Or spread the sails of that terrific bark.
He spoke of vast sea-serpents, how they float
For many a rood, or near some hurrying boat
Lift up their tall neck, with a hissing sound ,
And turn their blood-shot eye-balls questing round.
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Who in the sun comb their green, dripping locks,
While, heard at distance, in the parting ray,
Beyond the farthest promontory grey,
Aërial music swells and dies away!
The Doctor evidently seems here to have endeavoured to make the sound an echo to the sense.
“So Ajax strives,” &c.
—Essay on Criticism.
And Ruth that night “beguil'd him of a tear,
“When he did speak of the distressful stroke
“Which his youth suffer'd.” Then, she pitying spoke,
Yet placed religious hope within his view!
And from that night a tenderer feeling grew.
And why not, ere the long night of the dead,
Life's slow descending steep together tread?
Partake its transient light, or gathering gloom,
And journey gently onward to the tomb?
The day was fix'd; no longer he shall roam,
But both shall have one heart, one house, one home:
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Both wait the evening of life's changeful day:
She shall his anguish soothe, when he grows wild,—
And he shall be a father to her child.
Fair rose the dawn—the summer air how bland!
The blue wave scarcely seem'd to touch the land,—
So soft it lay, far off, in morning light,
Whilst here and there a scatter'd sail shone white.
Come, hasten—yonder is the church; away
All cares, for who can mournful be to-day?
The bells are ringing, and the rites are o'er,—
The nuptial train return along the shore,
Cheer'd by new hopes of life: as thus they pass'd,
In sudden blackness rush'd the impetuous blast ;
Deep thunder roll'd, with long portentous sound,
At distance: nearer now, it shakes the ground,
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As the fork'd flash seems darted at his breast.
His beating heart was heard,—bleach'd was his cheek,—
A well-known voice seem'd in the storm to speak;
Aghast he cried, wild phrenzy in his look,
“Oh! shut the book, dear Ellen, shut the book!”
(The arrow in his soul,) he pin'd away,
And silent sunk beneath the ceaseless smart
Of a pierced conscience, and a broken heart.
Go, stranger, and instruct the young and fair;
Bid them of rash and hasty trust beware,
Lest they should find the dream for ever fly—
The dream of hope—and broken-hearted die!
And thou, if ever thou hast prov'd unkind,
Or caus'd one sorrow to a virtuous mind;
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Whose first affections never swerv'd from you;
If thou hast seen with tears her eyelid swell,
When thou hast said—but for a time—farewell!
Leave her not—(oh! for pity and for ruth)—
Leave her not “tearful in her days of youth ;”
For life may long, and not unhappy prove,
But its best blessing is—the heart's first love!
| Ellen Gray | |