The Poetical Works of Ebenezer Elliott :: :: University of Virginia Library

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,
May wake in me a dream of youth,
But cannot sweep the mist away
From hoar tradition's dateless day;

344

And if no scene can now be found
Which fancy might deem haunted ground
How shall the Muse of bed-rid age
Construct for Eld a hermitage,
Where he may bend dejected o'er
Old dust, whose history no man tells,
And homes of glory now no more?
His old eyes full of doubt, and dim
With grief! his old beard jagg'd and torn,
And hung with weeping icicles!
The only old tree mocking him!
The old rocks laughing him to scorn!
And the old skies (with tears, at morn,
Implored some little grace to show him,)
Looking as if they did not know him!

I.

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;

345

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
Paced the black water's eastern shore,
And on her woful bosom bore
Her child, asleep.
She could not weep;
The “countless laughter” of the lake,
Like mockery on her senses brake.
Because her heart was broken.
She would have spoken
Her deathful thought,
But in her throat
The strangled utterance died.
She knew not that she tried in vain,
With trembling lips, to speak her pain;
Nor knew that, screen'd by willows grey,
Beneath her, in its little bay,
Sat giant Adwick in his boat,
With lifted oars—prepared to pay

346

A visit long delay'd.
In silent pray'r, she pray'd;
Then, looking, wildly looking
On Konig's tower—nor longer brooking
His cruelty and pride—
Sprang over boat and willows
Into the billows.
Close to her breast the child was press'd,
And down she went; but rose, at length,
Relenting, and with desperate strength
Cried, “Save lord Konig's child!” then, drank
The wave, and sank.

II.

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 placed the infant in the boat;
Then, from its stooping side,
Plunged deep beneath the tide;
Rose, dived, and rose, to dive in vain;
Yet lived to see that face again!
Recovering soon his rocking boat,
He sate awhile in painful thought:

347

“Another victim! women run
To Konig's lord, to be undone.
If man may tempt them, Konig can;
Ay, Konig is your woman's man.”
Gently he laid upon his knee
The frighted child, and wept to see
Its helpless loveliness;
Yet felt he not the less
The promptings of an inward snake,
To hate it for its father's sake.
“I'll plague yon false betroth'd of mine;”
(Grimly he spoke, and grimly smiled,)
“I'll take the babe to Etheline;
She loves the sire—why not the child?”

III.

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 believed,)

348

Fear'd was her power, and widely known:
Her spells could rule the thunder-stone,
That floods the heavens with fire;
Her glance strike dead the secret foe
Who but in thought might work her woe.
A bow-shot from the roughen'd wave,
Not ten yards from the copse and grave,
Back'd westward by the boundless wood,
Her moss'd and log-built cabin stood;
And still beneath the copse she went,
And enter'd oft the tenement,
But could not there abide.
She feign'd much wonder—“Why no more
Came Adwick then, as heretofore,
To lonely Waterside?”
(Such was the name her dwelling bore,)
And sometimes blush'd, (but not with shame,)
For neither he nor Konig came.
“Not that she cared for Konig. Why,
Should lowly maiden look so high?
Besides, of love he never spoke;
Though oft he came, 'twas but to joke;
And still he came, to go in haste;
And weeks, since last he came, had pass'd.
Then, why should Adwick knit his brow?
Was Adwick jealous? Jealous! No;
She'd scorn him, if he could be so.”

349

IV.

The stormy west was scowling,
And wolves, far off, were howling.
The starved 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
Foretels a night of moan and groan—
Here to be pass'd by one so lone!
The night is coming.”
What saw she westward of the grove?
What look'd she north to see?
A boat approaching? Did it move?
It moved, it pass'd the wizard's tree;
“He comes!” she said, “'tis he.”

350

V.

In haste, she strew'd her cottage floor
With rushes, to the open door;
Arranged the hearth, roused up the fire;
Swept both her stools, and dress'd them both
In covers of outlandish cloth,
The work of mind-raised 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 loved 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
Renown'd, and to be famous long,
Who many pains and dangers dared,
And sang (where heroes thought in stone,
And men were wise as brave,)
The earliest written song.
Unletter'd, not unwise, was he
Whom now their daughter sate to see;
An outlaw, learn'd in mystic lore,
The worship of his sires of yore.

351

How tardy seem'd his coming! “Hark!
He moors,” she said, “his little bark;”
And while she spoke, he stood before
The seated maiden's open door:
At once, homed sadness left her eye,
Or feign'd a wondrous levity;
As if a flower had long'd to die,
And waked to laughter suddenly.

VI.

“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.”

VII.

Then, Adwick told, in mournful tone,
(While on her lap he laid
The rescued infant, still afraid,)
How, crossing o'er the lake,
He saved 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.”

352

VIII.

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

IX.

“Nay,” he replied, “no rival fear;
For who its mother,
Whether it sister have or brother,
I nothing know; but this foretell,”
(And as he spoke his raised brow fell,)
“That thou wilt love the baby well.”

X.

“Hence with ye both!” she said, and frown'd,
And almost wish'd her lover drown'd.
But then the child
Look'd up and smiled,
Gazing on her with Konig's eyes:
“Oh, leave her here! I'll take the child!”
She cried, betray'd by her surprise;
Then, feasted on its father's eyes
Of deep, deep, darkest blue.

353

XI.

Passion! thou to thyself art true,
And well dost all thou hast to do.
Adwick beheld the sweet surprise
With which she gazed on Konig's eyes
In that poor infant's face.
He did not fail to trace
His rival's image there!
With fiery scowl
He stamp'd it on his soul.
With sullen stare,
He saw her kiss the foundling fair;
And in the blood of deathless pain,
Painted that picture on his brain.

XII.

She knew not what a change had come
O'er Adwick's mind and heart;
A cloud of grief and ire,
Thence never to depart;
A sorrow worse than dungeon-gloom,
Or blackness of the coffin'd tomb;
The tortured sleep, that ever wakes;
A memory made of knotted snakes;

354

With fire, for blood, in every vein,
And cold, that burns like fire.
The outlaw's heart was turn'd to stone;
His all was gone.

XIII.

But ere he thence departed,
She raised her head, and started
His stricken form to see,
Stiff in its agony.
How like a pallid monument,
The work of skill omnipotent,
With cheeks of rock, and tresses rent,
And forest-brows, o'er paleness bent,
He stood, in silence pale!
Or redden'd, like the crimson glow
Of stormy morn o'er Stumperlow;
Or Kinder, when, far seen, he stands,
With lightnings flashing from his hands,
Unheard, through rain and hail!
And pity wrote, in sorrow's book,
The story of his parting look.
Silent, he sought his restless boat,
And vanish'd, like a dreadful thought:
Oh, hope destroy'd is man's undoing!
Heav'n, save his mind from total ruin!
Flinging from rapid oars the light,
He tilted through the glooming night,

355

And reach'd the cave (his living grave,
And homeless home,) which ne'er again
Shall know a joy unmix'd with pain,
Though still around its door uncouth,
The woodbine of the sunny south,
Brought by the sires of Etheline
From regions of the cluster'd vine,
Shall hang its fragrant-finger'd flowers,
To lure the bee from forest-bowers;
And, rock-throned near, one vastest elm
(Knot-wristed monarch of a realm
All forest, cloud, and wave,)
Spread o'er its lawn his sky of shade,
Where ship-brought foeman never stray'd.
Unseen, lord Konig, hidden nigh,
Beheld him pass. “Wolves have their caves,”
The chieftain said, “and there are graves
For men whose kindred thrive;
But here's a cave that is a grave,
Where lives the dead alive.”
With restless foot, and seeking eye,
Impatiently, impatiently
He waited near the shore
For one whom he
Again shall see,
But to his heart clasp never more.
“The clouds,” he said, “are gone to bed;
How their dark chamber overhead

356

Rocks! Will she come to-night?
The wakeful hare hath roused the bear;
The wild pig grunts, the pack'd wolf hunts;
She will not come to-night.”

XIV.

He said, and vanish'd—not unheard,
As near huge Adwick's cave he pass'd,
And took his homeward way!
How like the climber of the blast,
The noiseless-wing'd, night-haunting bird,
That, hunger-stung, and balk'd of prey,
Flaps, in vext flight, the forest grey!

XV.

“That was not the roused bear's tread,”
Frenzied Adwick, listening, said;
“Nor the pack'd wolf's crowding rush;
Nor my dreaming runlet's gush;
Nor my night-dirge, in the bush;
Nor my cloud-song overheard.
Worse than wolf oft watcheth here;
Worse than wolf inhabits near.”

357

XVI.

No limner was there, at his side,
To paint his lip of grief and pride,
The strife, where mind with madness strove;
The war of misery and love;
And check the pencill'd hand in fear,
Starting, these wilder words to hear.

XVII.

“If I bid blind darkness sing
Hymns of brightness;
If I wield the thunder's wing,
Plumed with brightness;
Shall my mercy fail to smite
Evil will?
Shall my justice fail to kill
Evil might?”

XVIII.

Mad, yet conscious of his madness,
Long he paused—then spoke in sadness:
“Ere the eyes of midnight beam'd;
Ere red morning's banner stream'd;

358

Ere the sun began his race,
Silence, and the grave of death,
Were my throne and dwelling-place;
Yet I draw an outlaw's breath!
Can I make the desert's tree
Beautiful, and all for me?
Or, to soothe another's woes,
Out of nothing bring the rose?
Yet—all shunn'd, and homed with pain,—
Vainly love, and wildly fear,
Vainly heave unceasing sighs,
And from beauteous woman's eyes
Vainly bid a pitying tear
Drop, to cool my burning brain!”

XIX.

Then, weeping, started he,
And spake aloud to vacancy:
“Here again, thou King of Pain?
Me, thy God, dost thou defy?
Mocking still, thou strong in ill,
Sneerest thou, Mine Enemy?
Nought art thou, if not my slave.
Yet thou biggen'st, like the grave
To the sentenced felon's fears,
When the ghastly verge he nears!

359

Slave and Rebel! dost thou frown?
Dost thou threaten? Thou dost well:
I will dash thine altars down,
Shake thee from thy horrid throne,
Stamp thee back to hell.
But what beauteous form and face
Fold'st thou in thy vast embrace?
Let me look upon the face
Folded in thy dread embrace:
Oh, those locks—those lips of snow,
Eyes of death, and cheeks of woe,
Freeze me into stone!”

XX.

But, soon, his grief was lost in ire,
That purpled his worn cheek.
Clench'd were his hands, his lips compress'd,
A life of wrongs groan'd in his breast,
Eager, in deeds, to speak;
Like conflagration, smouldering long
Ere flames the strength that mocks the strong,
When up the red Niagara raves,
And rafters swim on fiery waves,
And night glares red o'er burning graves,
And streets of roofs expire.

I am informed by a person learned in such matters, that the valley of Conisbro' near Doncaster was once a lake of considerable extent.

See a book called “A Monopolygraph, by Samuel Gower of Holmfirth,” full of noble poetry and sound criticism. I refer particularly to his translation of the Prometheus Bound. The line copied by me will be found in the following passage:

Prometheus, (solus,)
Oh, thou divine and boundless atmosphere!
And you, ye swift-wing'd winds of heav'n, and thou,
Oh, countless laughter of the salt sea waves!