Yet cheerful and happy (nor distant the day,)
Poor Mary the maniac hath been;
The traveller remembers, who journeyed this way,
No damsel so lovely, no damsel so gay,
As Mary, the Maid of the Inn.
Her cheerful address filled the guests with delight,
As she welcomed them in with a smile;
Her heart was a stranger to childish affright,
And Mary would walk by the Abbey at night,
When the wind whistled down the dark aisle.
She loved, and young Richard had settled the day,
And she hoped to be happy for life;
But Richard was idle and worthless; and they
Who knew him would pity poor Mary, and say,
That she was too good for his wife.
'Twas in Autumn, and stormy and dark was the night, And fast were the windows and door;
Two guests sat enjoying the fire that burnt bright,
And smoking in silence, with tranquil delight,
They listened to hear the wind roar.
"'Tis pleasant," cried one," seated by the fire-side, "To hear the wind whistle without."
"What a night for the Abbey !" his comrade replied; "Methinks a man's courage would now be well tried, "Who should wander the ruins about.
"I myself, like a school-boy, should tremble to hear
"The hoarse ivy shake over my head;
"And could fancy I saw, half-persuaded by fear,
"Some ugly old abbot's grim spirit appear,
"For this wind might awaken the dead."
"I'll wager a dinner," the other one cried,
"That Mary would venture there now."
"Then wager, and lose," with a sneer he replied,
"I'll warrant she'd fancy a ghost by her side,
"And faint if she saw a white cow."
"Will Mary this charge on her courage allow ?"
His companion exclaimed with a smile ;
"I shall win, for I know she will venture there now, "And earn a new bonnet by bringing a bough
"From the elder that grows in the aisle."
With fearless good humour did Mary comply,
And her way to the Abbey she bent;
The night it was gloomy, the wind it was high ;
And, as hollowly howling it swept through the sky,
She shivered with cold as she went.
O'er the path, so well known, still proceeded the maid,
Where the Abbey rose dim on the sight;
Through the gateway she entered,-she felt not afraid;
Yet the ruins were lonely and wild, and their shade
Seemed to deepen the gloom of the night.
All around her was silent, save when the rude blast
Howled dismally round the old pile ;
Over weed-covered fragments still fearless she passed,
And arrived at the innermost ruin at last,
Where the elder-tree grew in the aisle.
Well pleased did she reach it, and quickly drew near,
And hastily gathered the bough;
When the sound of a voice seemed to rise on her ear,-
She paused, and she listened, all eager to hear,
And her heart panted fearfully now.
The wind blew, the hoarse ivy shook over her head ;-
She listened ;-nought else could she hear.
The wind ceased, her heart sunk in her bosom with dread,
For she heard in the ruins distinctly the tread
Of footsteps approaching her near.
Behind a wide column, half breathless with fear,
She crept to conceal herself there;
That instant the moon o'er a dark cloud shone clear,
And she saw in the moonlight two ruffians appear,
And between them a corpse did they bear.
Then Mary could feel her heart's-blood curdle cold,
Again the rough wind hurried by-
It blew off the hat of the one, and behold!
Even close to the feet of poor Mary it rolled;
She fell-and expected to die.
66 Plague the hat!" he exclaims,-" nay come on, and fast hide "The dead body," his comrade replies.
She beholds them in safety pass on by her side,
She seizes the hat, fear her courage supplied,
And fast through the Abbey she flies.
She ran with wild speed, she rushed in at the door,
She cast her eyes horribly round;
Her limbs could support their faint burden no more,
But, exhausted and breathless, she sunk on the floor,
Unable to utter a sound.
Ere yet her pale lips could the story impart,
For a moment the hat met her view;
Her eyes from that object convulsively start,
For, O God! what cold horror thrilled through her heart
When the name of her Richard she knew!
Where the old Abbey stands on the common hard by,
His gibbet is now to be seen;
Not far from the road it engages the eye,
The traveller beholds it, and thinks, with a sigh,
Of poor Mary, the Maid of the Inn.
10. THE SIEGE OF CORINTH.
ALP felt his soul become more light
Beneath the freshness of the night.
Cool was the silent sky, though calm,
And bathed his brow with airy balm :
Behind, the camp-before him lay,
In many a winding creek and bay
Lepanto's gulf; and, on the brow
Of Delphi's hill, unshaken snow,
High and eternal, such as shone
Through thousand summers brightly gone,
Along the gulf, the mount, the clime;
It will not melt, like man, to time:
Tyrant and slave are swept away,
Less formed to wear before the ray;
But that white veil, the lightest, frailest,
Which on the mighty mount thou hailest,
While tower and tree are torn and rent,
Shines o'er its craggy battlement;
In form a peak, in height a cloud,
In texture like a hovering shroud,
Thus high by parting Freedom spread,
As from her fond abode she fled,
And lingered on the spot, where long
Her prophet-spirit spake in song
Oh, still her step at moments falters
O'er withered fields, and ruined altars,
And fain would wake, in souls too broken,
By pointing to each glorious token.
But vain her voice, till better days
Dawn in those yet remembered rays
Which shone upon the Persian flying,
And saw the Spartan smile in dying.
Not mindless of these mighty times
Was Alp, despite his flight and crimes;
And through this night, as on he wandered,
And o'er the past and present pondered,
And thought upon the glorious dead
Who there in better cause had bled,
He felt how faint and feebly dim
The fame that could accrue to him,
Who cheered the band, and waved the sword,
A traitor in a turbaned horde;
And led them to the lawless siege,
Whose best success were sacrilege.
Not so had those his fancy numbered,
The chiefs whose dust around him slumbered,
Their phalanx marshalled on the plain,
Whose bulwarks were not then in vain.
They fell devoted, but undying;
The very gale their names seemed sighing:
The waters murmured of their name;
The woods were peopled with their fame;
The silent pillar, lone and gray,
Claimed kindred with their sacred clay;
Their spirits wrapt the dusky mountain,
Their memory sparkled o'er the fountain;
The meanest rill, the mightiest river
Rolled mingling with their fame for ever.
Despite of every yoke she bears,
That land is glory's still and theirs
'Tis still a watch-word to the earth:
When man would do a deed of worth
He points to Greece, and turns to tread,
So sanctioned, on the tyrant's head:
He looks to her, and rushes on
Where life is lost, or freedom won.
HARK! hear ye the sounds that the winds on their pinions
Exultingly roll from the shore to the sea,
With a voice that resounds through her boundless dominions? "Tis COLUMBIA calls on her sons to be free!
Behold on yon summits where Heaven has throned her,
How she starts from her proud inaccessible seat;
With Nature's impregnable ramparts around her,
And the cataract's thunder and foam at her feet!
In the breeze of her mountains her loose locks are shaken,
While the soul-stirring notes of her warrior-song
From the rock to the valley re-echo, "Awaken,
Awaken, ye hearts that have slumbered too long!"
Yes, Despots! too long did your tyranny hold us,
In a vassalage vile, ere its weakness was known;
Till we learned that the links of the chain that controlled us
Were forged by the fears of its captives alone.
That spell is destroyed, and no longer availing,
Despised as detested-pause well ere ye dare
To cope with a people whose spirits and feeling
Are roused by remembrance and steeled by despair.
Go tame the wild torrent, or stem with a straw
The proud surges that sweep o'er the strand that confines them ;
But presume not again to give Freemen a law,
Nor think with the chains they have broken to bind them.
To hearts that the spirit of Liberty flushes,
Resistance is idle,—and numbers a dream ;
They burst from control, as the mountain-stream rushes
From its fetters of ice, in the warmth of the beam.
WIDE over the tremulous sea,
The moon spread her mantle of light,
And the gale, gently dying away,
Breathed soft on the bosom of night.
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