Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/152

148 the fairest creations of the sculptor, over the rude chairs and tables, and every moment giving a glance at the mariner, like one who took delight in pleasing him, and seemed to work for his sake. And he was pleased. I saw him smile, and no one had ever seen him smile before; he passed his hand over the long clustering tresses of the maiden, caused her to sit down beside him, and looked on her face, which, outgrowing the child, had not yet grown into woman, with a look of affection, and reverence, and joy.

I was pondering on what I witnessed, and imagining an interview with the unhappy mariner and his beautiful child, for such his companion was, when I observed the latter take out a small musical instrument from a chest. She touched its well ordered strings with a light and a ready hand, and played several of the simple and plaintive airs so common among the peasantry of the Scottish and English coasts. After a pause she resumed her music, and, to an air singularly wild and melancholy, sang the following ballad, which relates, no doubt, to the story of her father's and mother's misfortunes; but the minstrel has observed a mystery in his narrative which excites suspicion rather than gratifies curiosity:—

O mariner, O mariner,

When will our gallant men

Make our cliffs and woodlands ring

With their homeward hail agen?

Full fifteen paced the stately deck,

And fifteen stood below,

And maidens waved them from the shore,

With hands more white than snow;

All underneath them flashed the wave,

The sun laughed out aboon,

Will they come bounding homeward

By the waning of yon moon?

O maid, the moon shines lovely down,

The stars all brightly burn,

And they may shine till doomsday comes

Ere your true love return;

O'er his white forehead roll the waves,

The wind sighs lowne and low,

And the cry the sea-fowl uttereth

Is one of wail and woe;