Page:Precaution; a novel by Cooper, James Fenimore.djvu/387

Rh

has been already mentioned, that the health of Lady Pendennyss suffered a severe shock, in giving birth to a daughter. Change of scene was prescribed as a remedy for her disorder, and Denbigh and his wife were on their return from a fruitless excursion amongst the northern lakes, in pursuit of amusement and relief for the latter, when they were compelled to seek shelter from the fury of a sudden gust in the first building that offered. It was a farm-house of the better sort; and the attendants, carriages, and appearance of their guests, caused no little confusion to its simple inmates. A fire was lighted in the best parlor, and every effort was made by the inhabitants to contribute to the comforts of the travellers.

The countess and her husband were sitting in that kind of listless melancholy which had been too much the companion of their later hours, when in the interval of the storm, a male voice in an adjoining room commenced singing the following ballad, the notes being low, monotonous, but unusually sweet, and the enunciation so distinct, as to render every syllable intelligible:—

Oh! I have lived in endless pain, And I have lived, alas! in vain, For none regard my woe; No father's care conveyed the truth, No mother's fondness blessed my youth, Ah! joys too great to know?

And Marian's love, and Marian's pride. Have crushed the heart that would have died To save my Marian's tears: A brother's hand has struck the blow. Oh! may that brother never know Such madly sorrowing years!