When Arnold Mountjoy bade the Prews farewell,
It jarr’d the elder-ears, as doth the knell
Of some departed child—lov’d, but too well.
Alas! he’s gone: the door is clos’d, and fate
Had made the Prews the most disconsolate
Of creatures. Yes, that morn, that wretched morn,
The lady cried; the squire, he felt forlorn;
And poor Miss Prew, she doubly sad as they,
Could not refrain from weeping bitterly.
As Arnold cross’d the park, he ’spied the smoke
Uprising through the branches of the oak,—
A noble tree, whose sturdy limbs had kept
The little cottage shelter’d on the left,—
Which spread its foliage o’er the gable end,
And frown’d, or would, on whom who dared t’offend
That little sacred dwelling-place of Jane.
And, furtherward, he turn’d and saw the lane
Which led from thence and thither to the cot;
In front of which a small triangle spot,
(Where April “golden-cups,”[175] and daisies vie
To lure the trav’ler, or the tourist’s eye,)
Was fenc’d with stones, crust from Earth’s surface wrung;
The fence was broad, and taper’d to make strong:
Three unwrought beams were set within the close,
With cords out-stretch’d, to dry the linen clothes:
There, he beheld—whom he admir’d the most,
Going ’round the inclosure; then from post to post,
She skipp’d along, and seem’d attentively
Engaged in ranging out the drapery.
Now, stopping at a roadside shingle-gate,
He invented an excuse t’interrogate
An husbandman, in the immediate field,—
The nature of the soil, and of its yield;
The owner of the land; and whose the mill,
From whence the water-course which turn’d its wheel.
Receiving in reply the man’s best wit,
Until he saw his pretty angel flit;
Then, unperceiv’d, he kiss’d his hand, and thrust
It forth towards the cot, pray’ng heaven’s gust
Might waft it o’er; and with it went a sigh,—
His last adieu! and turn’d away his eye.
[175] A pretty yellow flower, which generally abounds in Meadlands.