The Pilgrim crouches terrified As stooping hood, and glassy face, Gloating, evil, side by side, Terror and hate brood o'er the place; He flings his withered hands on high With a bitter, breaking cry:-- "Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, Ye three wild fiends! If I lay me down in slumber, Then I lay me down in wrath; If I stir not in dark dreaming, Then I wither in my path; If I hear sweet voices singing, 'Tis a demon's lullaby: And, in 'hideous storm and terror,' Wake but to die." And even as he spake, on high Arrows of sunlight pierced the sky. Bright streamed the rain. O'er burning snow From hill to hill a wondrous bow Of colour and fire trembled in air, Painting its heavenly beauty there. Wild flapped each fiend a batlike hood Against that 'frighting light, and stood Beating the windless rain, and then Rose heavy and slow with cowering head, Circled in company again, And into darkness fled. Marvellous sweet it was to hear The waters gushing loud and clear; Marvellous happy it was to be Alone, and yet not solitary; Oh, out of terror and dark to come In sight of home! THE GAGE "Lady Jane, O Lady Jane! Your hound hath broken bounds again, And chased my timorous deer, O; If him I see, That hour he'll dee; My brakes shall be his bier, O." "Hoots! lord, speak not so proud to me! My hound, I trow, is fleet and free, He's welcome to your deer, O; Shoot, shoot you may, He'll gang his way, Your threats we nothing fear, O." He's fetched him in, he's laid him low, Drips his lifeblood red and slow, Darkens his dreary eye, O; "Here is your beast, And now at least My herds in peace shall lie, O." "'In peace!' my lord, O mark me well! For what my jolly hound befell You shall sup twenty-fold, O! For every tooth Of his, in sooth, A stag in pawn, I hold, O. "Huntsman and horn, huntsman and horn, Shall scour your heaths and coverts lorn, Braying 'em shrill and clear, O; But lone and still Shall lift each hill, Each valley wan and sere, O. "Ride up you may, ride down you may, Lonely or trooped, by night or day, My hound shall haunt you ever: Bird, beast, and game Shall dread the same, The wild fish of your river." Her cheek burns angry as the rose, Her eye with wrath and pity flows: He gazes fierce and round, O-- "Dear Lord!" he says, "What loveliness To waste upon a hound, O. "I'd give my stags, my hills and dales, My stormcocks and my nightingales To have undone this deed, O; For deep beneath My heart is death Which for her love doth bleed, O." He wanders up, he wanders down, On foot, a-horse, by night and noon: His lands are bleak and drear, O; Forsook his dales Of nightingales, Forsook his moors of deer, O, Forsook his heart, ah me! of mirth; There's nothing gladsome left on earth; All thoughts and dreams seem vain, O, Save where remote The moonbeams gloat, And sleeps the lovely Jane, O.