University of Virginia Library

DEATH NOT LOVE.

Ada, say 'twas but a dream!
Wandering, lo, with sudden awe,
One, like Love, methought I saw,
Angling in life's fleeting stream;
Straight my question answer brought
What his wily labour sought;
“For a true heart do I throw
Treacherous snare the wave below;
And, a fair false face my bait,
Guileful eye and false sweet breath,
Here my mortal prey await,
Ruthless wait, for I am Death.”

THE HAUNTED HOUSE.

A TOWN SKETCH.

A little back from out the street,
As if in truth it shunned your sight,
Untenanted, it silent stands,
A gloom amid the cheerful light;
The ragged grass-plots in its front
With unchecked weeds are tangled o'er,
And on the green and mossy path
The frog leaps up before the door;
Uncleansed it stands, befouled and dimmed
By summer's dusts, and winter's rains;
The weather-stains of countless years
Thick on its darkening window-panes;
The very knocker on its door
Would waken up a ghastly sound,
And with a strange mysterious awe,
Would startle out the dwellers round;
It looks as if a sound of life
Within its walls had ne'er been heard,
As if no moving human thing
Its prisoned air had ever stirred;
Amid the noisy bustle round,
Its daylight hush, so grim and still,
With something of a nameless dread
Has power the passer-by to fill;
And if you ask why thus it stands,
Unsought by life from year to year,
A scarce-remembered tale of blood,
Of midnight murder foul you hear;
Men tell of grey-haired sleepers waked
To strive and shriek for life in vain,
Of flying forms, and clinging hands,
Of shattered skull, and spattered brain;
So, even in the light of day,
The grim house by, in awe, men walk,
And by the winter fireside shun
To name it in their evening talk;
And years must pass, and man must strive
To call that tale to mind in vain,
Ere hand unclose, or foot shall dare
To tread that haunted house again.