Miss Edith lifts the latch with care, And now she must brave the chill night air. She has violet eyes and ruby lips, A dancing shape—and away she skips; She hies to the haunt of a hermit weird, With flaming eyes and a forky beard, A shocking wizard—who, gossips say, Has dwelt in his cavern a year to-day.
“O, ancient man! I am filled with fear, My lover has left me full a year. ‘I swear to return in a year,’ said he, ‘Or question the man of mystery. Your eyes are blue, and your lips are red; I swear, my love, to come back,’ he said. O, fearsome man! I pray of you, Can he prove so false whom I think so true?”
“O, daughter fair! I am sad to say That young men now and then betray: Thy lover, I wis, has thy trust betray’d, For he presently woos a witching maid: Her eyes are blue, and, I tell thee this, She has tempting lips that he fain would kiss; But courage, my child, thou mayst yet discover A clue to the heart of this worthless lover.”
He mutter’d, when thus he the maid had cheer’d, A strange sound that was drown’d in the forky beard; Then all around loud thunders broke, And the cave was wrapp’d in fire and smoke, And that fearsome man has disappear’d With his flaming eyes and his forky beard; And Edith weeps in rapture sweet To find her lover at her feet!
A GLIMPSE OF GRETNA GREEN, IN THE DISTANCE
“My Kate, at the Waterloo column, To-morrow, precisely at eight; Remember, thy promise was solemn, And—thine till to-morrow, my Kate!”
That evening seem’d strangely to linger, The licence and luggage were packt, And Time, with a long and short finger, Approvingly mark’d me exact.
Arrived, woman’s constancy blessing, No end of nice people I see, Some hither, some thitherwards pressing, But none of them waiting for me.
Time passes, my watch how I con it, I see her—she’s coming—no, stuff! Instead of Kate’s smart little bonnet, It is aunt and her wonderful muff!
(Yes! Fortune deserves to be chidden, It is a coincidence queer, Whenever one wants to be hidden, One’s relatives always appear.)
Near nine! how the passers despise me, They smile at my anguish, I think; And even the sentinel eyes me, And tips that policeman the wink.
Ah! Kate made me promises solemn, At eight she had vow’d to be mine; While waiting for one at this column, I find I’ve been waiting for nine.