murmured, "O William! what if my father be in the moor?-For if you who need care so little about me, have come hither, as I suppose, to save my life, you may be sure that my father sat not within doors during the storm." As she spoke it was calm below, but the wind was still alive in the upper air, and cloud, rack, mist, and sleet, were all driving about in the sky. Out shone for a moment the pallid and ghostly moon, through a rent in the gloom, and by that uncertain light, came staggering forward the figure of a man. "Father-Father," cried Hannah-and his gray hairs were already on her cheek. The barking of the dogs and the shouting of the young shepherd had struck his ear, as the sleep of death was stealing over him, and with the last effort of benumbed nature, he had roused himself from that fatal torpor, and prest through the snow-wreath that had separated him from his child. As yet they knew not of the danger each had endured,—but each judged of the other's suffering from their own, and father and daughter regarded one another as creatures rescued, and hardly yet rescued, from death. But a few minutes ago, and the three human beings who loved each other so well, and now feared not to cross the Moor in safety, were, as they thought, on their death-beds. Deliverance now shone upon them all like a gentle fire, dispelling that pleasant but deadly drowsiness; and the old man was soon able to assist William Grieve in leading Hannah along through the snow. Her colour and her warmth returned, and her loverfor so might he well now be calledfelt her heart gently beating against his side. Filled as that heart was with gratitude to God, joy in her deliverance, love to her father, and purest affection for her master's son, never before had the innocent maiden known what was happiness-and never more was she to forget it. The night was now almost calm, and fast returning to its former beauty-when the party saw the first twinkle of the fire through the low window of the Cottage of the Moor. They soon were at the garden gate-and to relieve the heart of the wife and mother within, they talked loudly and cheerfully naming each other familiarly, and VOL. VII. laughing between, like persons who had known neither danger nor distress. No voice answered from withinno footstep came to the door, which stood open as when the father had left it in his fear, and now he thought with affright that his wife, feeble as she was, had been unable to support the loneliness, and had followed him out into the night, never to be brought home alive. As they bore Hannah into the house, this fear gave way to worse, for there upon the hard clay floor lay the mother upon her face, as if murdered by some savage blow. She was in the same deadly swoon into which she had fallen on her husband's departure three hours before. The old man raised her up, and her pulse was still so was her hearther face pale and sunken-and her body cold as ice. "I have recovered a daughter," said the old man, "but I have lost a wife;" and he carried her, with a groan, to the bed,_on which he laid her lifeless body. The sight was too much for Hannah, worn out as she was, and who had hitherto been able to support herself in the delightful expectation of gladdening her mother's heart by her safe arrival.She, too, now swooned away, and, as she was placed on the bed beside her mother, it seemed, indeed, that death, disappointed of his prey on the wild moor, had seized it in the cottage, and by the fireside. The husband knelt down by the bed-side, and held his wife's icy hand in his, while William Grieve, appalled and awe-stricken, hung over his Hannah, and inwardly implored God that the night's wild adventure might not have so ghastly an end. But Hannah's young heart soon began once more to beat-and soon as she came to her recollection, she rose up with a face whiter than ashes and free from all smiles, as if none had ever played there, and joined her father and young master in their efforts to restore her mother to life. It was the mercy of God that had struck her down to the earth, insensible to the shrieking winds, and the fears that would otherwise have killed her. Three hours of that wild storm had passed over her head, and she heard nothing more than if she had been asleep in a breathless night of the summer dew. Not even a dream F had touched her brain, and when she opened her eyes which, as she thought, had been but a moment shut, she had scarcely time to recal to her recollection the image of her husband rushing out into the storm, and of a daughter therein lost, till she beheld that very husband kneeling tenderly by her bed-side, and that very daugh ter smoothing the pillow on which her aching temples reclined. But she knew from the white stedfast countenances before her that there had been tribulation and deliverance, and she looked on the beloved beings ministering by her bed, as more fearfully dear to her from the unimagined danger from which she felt assured they had been rescued by the arm of the Almighty. There is little need to speak of returning recollection, and returning strength. They had all now power to weep, and power to pray. The Bible had been lying in its place ready for worship and the father read aloud that chapter in which is narrated our Saviour's act of miraculous power, by which he saved Peter from the sea. Soon as the solemn thoughts awakened by that act of mercy so similar to that which had rescued themselves from death had subsided, and they had all risen up from prayer, they gather ed themselves in gratitude round the little table which had stood so many hours spread-and exhausted nature was strengthened and restored by a frugal and simple meal partaken of in silent thankfulness. The whole story of the night was then calmly recited -and when the mother heard how the stripling had followed her sweet Hannah into the storm, and borne her in his arms through a hundred drifted heaps and then looked upon her in her pride, so young, so innocent, and so beautiful, she knew, that were the child indeed to become an orphan, there was one, who, if there was either trust in nature, or truth in religion, would guard and cherish her all the days of her life. It was not nine o'clock when the storm came down from Glen Scrae upon the Black-moss, and now in a pause of silence the clock struck twelve. Within these three hours William and Hannah had led a life of trouble and of joy, that had enlarged and kindled their hearts within them and they felt that henceforth they were to live wholly for each other's sakes. His love was the proud and exulting love of a deliverer who, under Providence, had saved from the frost and the snow the innocence and the beauty of which his young passionate heart had been so desperately enamoured-and he now thought of his own Hannah Lee ever more moving about in his father's house, not as a servant, but as a daughter-and when some few happy years had gone by, his own most beautiful and most loving wife. The innocent maiden still called him her young master-but was not ashamed of the holy affection which she now knew that she had long felt for the fearless youth on whose bosom she had thought herself dying in that cold and miserable moor. Her heart leapt within her when she heard her parents bless him by his name and when he took her hand into his before them, and vowed before that Power who had that night saved them from the snow, that Hannah Lee should ere long be his wedded wife-she wept and sobbed as if her heart would break in a fit of strange and insupportable happiness. The young shepherd rose to bid them farewell-" my father will think I am lost," said he, with a grave smile, "and my Hannah's mother knows what it is to fear for a child." So nothing was said to detain him, and the family went with him to the door. The skies smiled as serenely as if a storm had never swept before the stars-the moon was sinking from her meridian, but in cloudless splendour-and the hollow of the hills was hushed as that of heaven. Danger there was none over the placid nightscene-the happy youth soon crost the Black-Moss, now perfectly still-and, perhaps, just as he was passing, with a shudder of gratitude, the very spot where his sweet Hannah Lee had so nearly perished, she was lying down to sleep in her innocence, or dreaming of one now dearer to her than all on earth but her parents. EREMUS. MOODS OF THE MIND. No I. Despondency-A Reverie. "TWAS on the evening of an August day, To blast this lower world. I leaned my side I thought of life, and love, and earthly bliss, Our fathers,-where are they? The moss is green I thought of men, who looked upon my face, All evening on my knees, and pressed my hand, I thought of sunless regions, where the day Of ancient castles mouldering to the dust- Where coffined warriors rest, amid the night The unsheltered cattle lowed upon the plain ;- Dim was the aspect of the sullen sky; The night scowled gloomier down:-I could not throw From off my heart the weary weight of woe, But loathed the world, and coveted to die; Beholding only in the earth and air Omens of desolation and despair." No II. The Woodland Glen. 1. THE sun is sinking behind the mountain, And the ceaseless gush of the twilight fountain By the spirit, that far from the homes of men, 2. When the heart is sullen, and sad, and lonely, When pleasure, and friendship, and love forsaking, Oh! fly to the lone, the sequestered spot, 3. The hazel, the willow, and birch tree weeping, Descending from slaty rocks, and steeping The flap of the night bird skimming by, 4. The sound of the gentle rills, that tinkle The aspect of the stars that twinkle, The waves of the spirit, till all is smooth. 5. If sorrow the blossom of manhood wither, If the world to thee is estranged, come hither And learn, that far from the snares of men, No III. The Isle of Despair. A Vision. COLD blew the noisy winds unceasingly of frozen masses, with o'erwhelming force, In icy greenness, rolling with its waves. Sure to the voice of man these barren rocks What moving creature stirs on yonder height, The thoughts of gall and bitterness; to feel For death that mocks him still. His hollow eye, And as the she-wolf, when the hunter's hand To utter it unto the winds of heaven, Voiceless he stood. The famished bear came by, Grinding his teeth in famine; in the path Prostrate he threw himself, and hoped for death And, with remorseless and unnatural rage, And crunch their young bones, with unfeeling maw! The clouds grew dark-the shadows hovered roundThey hovered round, and compassed him about, As with a garment; and I heard a cry, Ear-piercing-horrible-a desolate cryThe circling hills re-echoed it; around They caught the tone, till faint and far away Lowly it died; and, listening there I heard, Alone, the weltering of the dreary sea. |