I CHANCED to stray along the barren hills
That stretch from Botany Bay to Sydney Cove
One cloudy morn. Full many a marsh distils
Its bitter waters there, and many a grove
Of blasted shrubbery weeps! The fancy fills
Brimful of thoughts most drear! The sky above
Frowns on the dismal scene! It is a spot
Wasted by Heaven’s dread thunder! Bless it not!*
Thoughtful I walked along o’er hill and plain,
Like Orpheus erewhile through the shades below,
Without his object; till a plaintive strain
Of sweet sounds struck my ear, suppressed and slow!
Methought ‘t was some phantasma of the brain
And onward walked. Again I heard it flow
From the scathed hollow of a leafless tree,
Soft as the South-wind’s treacherous lullaby
Before the storm. I hastened to the spot
And lo! a damsel sick and woe-begone
Chaunting a mournful ditty on her lot
Of misery unmixed! Her’s was a tone
So plaintive that it must perforce have brought
A tear of pity from a heart of stone.
She paused as I appeared and raised her eye;
It seemed as if her life’s last hour were nigh!
Her poor and torn attire bespoke the doom
Of early guilt, whence death might soon deliver!
Her cheek was deadly pale! Beauty’s rich bloom
Had once been on it, but had fled for ever!
Her frame some inward wound seemed to consume
And oft her lip convulsively would quiver!
I asked her of her history, and she gave
This sad recital ere she found a grave:
“My father lived near where the Humber flows
With widening channel to the German sea.
Whether he lives or not God only knows,
But he was ay a fond father to me!
I had three sisters, beauteous as the rose;
And happy as the live-long day were we,
Till one I name not, on a luckless day,
Scaled our bright bower and stole our peace away.
“He was a soldier and a baron’s son,
Most deeply versed in every polished art,
With promise fair and many a vow he won,
Too soon, alas, my unsuspecting heart.
I fell, at length; then were my woes begun
And my whole soul transfixed with sorrow’s dart;
For soon, bereft of home and friends and fame,
The recreant left me to a life of shame!
“With many a bitter cry rending the air,
For many a long day I bewailed my lot!
Till urged at length by hunger and despair
I stole a thing of value and was caught.
For this in exile I am doomed to bear
A convict master’s scorn! But I shall not
Bear longer! See! Life ebbs apace; for I
Have come hither like the swan, to sing and die!”
Her sad tale told, she clasped her hands in prayer
And I could hear her muttering the loved names
Of sisters whom she fancied standing there,
Weeping around her in her fitful dreams!
Then she would gaze wistful around and stare
Full in my face, her eyes burning like flames.
At length a cold sweat gathering on her brow,
She sighed and bade adieu to all below!
I took her death-cold hand in mine and shed
A tear of sorrow o’er her as she lay
A lifeless corse! Fairer she seemed when dead
Than when alive in her last agony.
“Surely,” said I, “the immortal spark has sped,
From this wild waste to heaven its upward way!”
O it was sad and pitiful to see
That scene of death within the hollow tree!
But oft, as fancy paints it now, I think
Of him whose false tongue wrought the maiden’s woe;
Who led her blindfold on to ruin’s brink,
And plunged her headlong in the gulf below,
And left her there (the heartless wretch!) to sink
Without one friend to help or pity! O
Thou God of Heaven, Lord of the Land and Seas,
Sure there is vengeance doomed for crimes like these.
(John Dunmore Lang)
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Based on Topics: Life Poems, Mind Poems, Sadness Poems, Death & Dying Poems, Nature Poems, Faces Poems, Heaven Poems, Fairness Poems, Dreams Poems, Home Poems, Beauty PoemsBased on Keywords: shrubbery, chaunting, bewailed, convulsively, botany, recital, humber, death-cold