And there was one those haunts who loved, Of Boswell Kemp's despair, the son: Their Ellen's sports to share. Twelve years beneath the vicar's roof Had seemed the vicar's son. He had his father's raven hair, His father's dark and piercing eyes, To run, to wrestle, or to leap, To climb the forest's topmost tree; And soon he felt his father's blood On, through his veins, more strongly flow: Desires intense had he to roam, Like birds which seek a foreign home, The school became a weary place: The vicar's kindness was a pain : "Be mine, my father's life," he cried, "And who can tell what I may be?" In fancy forward far he ran, He was a youth, he was a man, He was the Gipsy King. He fled and wandered through the land; And worked or starved as chance befell: He saw the various lives of men, And often in the beggar's den It was his lot to dwell. His was an undirected mind He ever undetermined stood: But want and travel sharpen wit; And by degrees he grew in knowledge; He soon the master was of arts Taught in the wide world's college. He 'camped with gipsies in the wolds; Early a father he became But left his children in the land: Although by nature taught, he shunned Not that he ever paused to look Intently on a summer flower.- The presence and the power: He would be free-like the wild steed From year to year, from strength to strength- His energies of soul untamed, Alike in mind and person framed To suffer or subdue. It is the spirit of the times That breathes the soul into the man ; And now the crew with whom he went Were 'camped beside the river Grete ; And he, unknown unto that crew, June 1836.-VOL. XVI.-NO. LXII. M Sought he direct the vicar's door? Thither he went not-through the grounds Back looking through his heart he saw The vicar's face to shun. He went to where beneath the shade There fell, but with no fall profound, An ever-murmuring sound. That no fallen spirit from the skies, For there stood Ellen Brooke. But soon another mood assuming, He smiled-but met no answering smile- Your playmate, Harry Lee?" Then of his life he told the story, Far ranging past the bounds of truth; She chid him for his wandering life, She bade him thence retire. He went but duly when the moon Looked down on that delightful place, He left the camp, the gipsies all, And to the walks and waterfall His steps did he retrace. And still she chid him for his coming; Alone she read, alone she thought, And now she loathes the light of day, And more than ever loves the night: And many an anxious glance she turns, To where her father's taper burns, As though she feared its light. For very wondrous is the tale The gipsy tells of his free life; He thinks not there is in the deed What for past goodness should he care? And that he loves her well. Awake, awake! good Vicar Brooke! That theme may be a glorious theme: The presence bright, the steady light, Thy wife, thy morning star, has set: A day of stealth, a day of tears, A day of watching and of dread, Was that on which the bands were tied, When Ellen Brooke, a thoughtful bride, Was to the woodlands led. And when she reached the gipsies' camp,Fain would I here conclude the story,Such scenes uncouth distressed her sight; The death of love's created light, The dimming of its glory. The radiant arch, the heavenly bow, With which she had the life invested, And tribe with whom she link'd her lot, She reached, whereon it rested. She saw what love should never see; What truth and honour grieved behold; And thence was her's a troubled mind; She fled-in utter woe she fled : And but one living wish had she: She reached it-stood beneath the shade, She stood, and there unto her heart A sense of all the past was given; And to her anguished soul it seemed Ages of sorrow had she dreamed Since she forsook that heaven. She felt her pulse more strongly beat, Her blood rush on, then cease to flow, And the world vanished from her sight, And down she sank amid the night, As falls a wreath of snow. There lay she in the moonlight calm, Like some fair statue overthrown; Could she have wept, she had not died. Send back no thoughts into her youth: Out in the sun and shade. Behold her not in after years, Attended by her own fair light, Like morning walking through the skies, She would dispel the night. For vain it were to cherish grief By dwelling on a mournful theme; The dews are dried, the leaves are shed, The fragrance and the bloom are dead, And all is but a dream. |