No story tells; whate'er we guess, The past lies deaf and still, But Fate, who rules to blight or bless, Can lead us where she will. Make way! Sir Harry's coach and four, And liveried grooms that ride! They cross the ferry, touch the shore On Winnisimmet's side. They hear the wash on Chelsea Beach,-- The level marsh they pass, Where miles on miles the desert reach Is rough with bitter grass. The shining horses foam and pant, And now the smells begin Of fishy Swampscott, salt Nahant, And leather-scented Lynn. Next, on their left, the slender spires And glittering vanes that crown The home of Salem's frugal sires, The old, witch-haunted town. So onward, o'er the rugged way That runs through rocks and sand, Showered by the tempest-driven spray, From bays on either hand, That shut between their outstretched arms The crews of Marblehead, The lords of ocean's watery farms, Who plough the waves for bread. At last the ancient inn appears, The spreading elm below, Whose flapping sign these fifty years Has seesawed to and fro. How fair the azure fields in sight Before the low-browed inn The tumbling billows fringe with light The crescent shore of Lynn; Nahant thrusts outward through the waves Her arm of yellow sand, And breaks the roaring surge that braves The gauntlet on her hand; With eddying whirl the waters lock Yon treeless mound forlorn, The sharp-winged sea-fowl's breeding-rock, That fronts the Spouting Horn; Then free the white-sailed shallops glide, And wide the ocean smiles, Till, shoreward bent, his streams divide The two bare Misery Isles. The master's silent signal stays The wearied cavalcade; The coachman reins his smoking bays Beneath the elm-tree's shade. A gathering on the village green! The cocked-hats crowd to see, On legs in ancient velveteen, With buckles at the knee. A clustering round the tavern-door Of square-toed village boys, Still wearing, as their grandsires wore, The old-world corduroys! A scampering at the "Fountain" inn,--- A rush of great and small,-- With hurrying servants' mingled din And screaming matron's call. Poor Agnes! with her work half done They caught her unaware; As, humbly, like a praying nun, She knelt upon the stair; Bent o'er the steps, with lowliest mien She knelt, but not to pray,-- Her little hands must keep them clean, And wash their stains away. A foot, an ankle, bare and white, Her girlish shapes betrayed,-- "Ha! Nymphs and Graces!" spoke the Knight; "Look up, my beauteous Maid!" She turned,--a reddening rose in bud, Its calyx half withdrawn,-- Her cheek on fire with damasked blood Of girlhood's glowing dawn! He searched her features through and through, As royal lovers look On lowly maidens, when they woo Without the ring and book. "Come hither, Fair one! Here, my Sweet! Nay, prithee, look not down! Take this to shoe those little feet,"-- He tossed a silver crown.