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omens and superstitions, and perhaps will scarce be understood by those whose limited imagination cannot conceive how strongly these operate upon the human mind during a certain progress of society. A line of Virgil, turned up casually, was received in the seventeenth century, and in the court of England,1 as an intimation of future events; and no wonder that a maiden of the distant and wild isles of Zetland should have considered as an injunction from Heaven, verses which happened to convey a sense analogous to her present situation.
1 The celebrated Sortes Virgilianae were resorted to by Charles I. and his courtiers, as a mode of prying into futurity.
“I will be silent,” she muttered, — ” I will seal my lips —
‘The body to its place, and the soul to Heaven’s grace,
And the rest in God’s own time.’“
“Who speaks there?” said Claud Halcro, in some alarm; for he had not, in his travels in foreign parts, been able by any means to rid himself of his native superstitions. In the condition to which fear and horror had reduced her, Minna was at first unable to reply; and Halcro, fixing his eyes upon the female white figure, which he saw indistinctly (for she stood in the shadow of the house, and the morning was thick and misty), began to conjure her in an ancient rhyme which occurred to him as suited for the occasion, and which had in its gibberish a wild and unearthly sound, which may be lost in the ensuing translation: —
“Saint Magnus control thee, that martyr of treason;
Saint Ronan rebuke thee, with rhyme and with reason;
By the mass of Saint Martin, the might of Saint Mary,
Be thou gone, or thy weird shall be worse if thou tarry!
If of good, go hence and hallow thee, —
If of ill, let the earth swallow thee, —
If thou’rt of air, let the grey mist fold thee. —
If of earth, let the swart mine hold thee, —
If a Pixie, seek thy ring, —
If a Nixie, seek thy spring; —
If on middle earth thou’st been Slave of sorrow, shame, and sin,
Hast eat the bread of toil and strife,
And riree’d the lot which men call life,
Begone to thy stone! for thy coffin is scant of thee,
The worm, thy playfellow, wails for the want of thee; —
Hence, houseless ghost! let the earth hide thee,
Till Michael shall blow the blast, see that there thou bide thee! —
Phantom, fly hence! take the Cross for a token,
Hence pass till Hallowmass! — my spell is broken.”
“It is I, Halcro,” muttered Minna, in a tone so thin and low, that it might have passed for the faint reply of the conjured phantom.
“You! — you! “ said Halcro, his tone of alarm changing to one of extreme surprise; “ by this moonlight, which is waning, and so it is! — Who could have thought to find you, my most lovely Night, wandering abroad in your own element! — But you saw them, I reckon, as well as I? — bold enough in you to follow them, though.”
“Saw whom? — follow whom? “ said Minna, hoping to gain some information on the subject of her fears and anxiety.
“The corpse-lights which danced at the haven,” replied Halcro; “ they bode no good, I promise you — you wot well what the old rhyme says —
‘Where corpse-light
Dances bright.
Be it day or night,
Be it light or dark,
There shall corpse lie stiff and stark.’
I went half as far as the haven to look after them, but they had vanished. I think I saw a boat put off, however, — some one bound for the Haaf, I suppose. — I would we had good news of this fishing — there was Norna left us in anger, — and then these corpse-lights! — Well, God help the while 1 I am an old man, and can but wish that all were well over. — But how now, my pretty Minna? tears in your eyes! — And now that I see you in the fair moonlight, barefooted, too, by Saint Magnus! — were there no stockings of Zetland wool soft enough for these pretty feet and ankles, that glance so white in the moonbeam? — What, silent! — angry, perhaps,” he added, in a more serious tone, “at my nonsense? For shame, silly maiden! — Remember I am old enough to be your father, and have always loved you as my child.”
“I am not angry,” said Minna, constraining herself to speak — ”but-heard you nothing? — saw you nothing? — They must have passed you.”
“They? “ said Claud Halcro; “what mean you by they? — is it the corpse-lights? — No, they did not pass by me, but I think they have passed by you, and blighted you with their influence, for you are as pale as a spectre. — Come, come, Minna,” he added, opening a side-door of the dwelling, “these moonlight walks are fitter for old poets than for young maidens — And so lightly clad as you are! Maiden, you should take care how you give yourself to the breezes of a Zetland night, for they bring more sleet than odours upon their wings. — But, maiden, go in; for, as glorious John says — or, as he does not say — for I cannot remember how his verse chimes — but, as I say myself, in a pretty poem, written when my muse was in her teens, —
‘Menseful maiden ne’er should rise,
Till the first beam tinge the skies;
Silk-fringed eyelids still should close,
Till the sun has kiss’d the rose;
Maiden’s foot we should not view,
Mark’d with tiny print on dew,
Till the opening flowerets spread
Carpet meet for beauty’s tread — ’
Stay, what comes next? — let me see.”
When the spirit of recitation seized on Claud Halcro, he forgot time and place, and might have kept his companion in the cold air for half-an-hour, giving poetical reasons why she ought to have been in bed. But she interrupted him by the question, earnestly pronounced, yet in a voice which was scarcely articulate, holding Halcro, at the same time, with a trembling and convulsive grasp, as if to support herself from falling, — ”Saw you no one in the boat which put to sea but now?”
“Nonsense,” replied Halcro; “how could I see any one, when light and distance only enabled me to know that it was a boat, and not a grampus?”
“But there must have been some one in the boat? “ repeated Minna, scarce conscious of what she said.
“Certainly,” answered the poet; “ boats seldom work to windward of their own accord. — But come, this is all folly; and so, as the Queen says, in an old play, which was revived for the stage by rare Will D’Avenant, ‘ To bed — to bed — to bed!”‘
They separated, and Minna’s limbs conveyed her with difficulty, through several devious passages, to her own chamber, where she stretched herself cautiously beside her still sleeping sister, with a mind harassed with the most agonising apprehensions. That she had heard Cleveland, she was positive — the tenor of the songs left her no doubt on that subject, If not equally certain that she had heard young Mertoun’s voice in hot quarrel with her lover, the impression to that effect was strong on her mind. The groan, with which the struggle seemed to terminate — the fearful indication from which it seemed that the conqueror had borne off the lifeless body of his victim — all tended to prove that some fatal event had concluded the contest. And which of the unhappy men had fallen? — which had met a bloody death? — which had achieved a fatai and a bloody victory? — These were questions to which the still small voice of interior conviction answered, that her lover Cleveland, from character, temper, and habits, was most likely to have been the survivor of the fray. She received