Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/219

Rh unperceived, and lay down at her feet, as a footstool on which she must tread before she could enter the shallop. This was unheeded of many, or of all; for the blessings showered by all ranks on the departing pair, the bustle of the mariners preparing to sail with the tide, which now filled Preston Bay, the sounding of bugle and pipe, and the unremitting rivalry in song and ballad between the mariners in the barges of the bridegroom and bride, successively filled every mind save mine, overclouded then, and as it has ever since been, before some coming calamity. Ballad and song passed over my memory without leaving a verse behind; one song alone, sung by a mariner of Allanbay, and which has long been popular on the coast, interested me much, more I confess from the dark and mysterious manner in which it figured or shadowed forth our catastrophe than from its poetical merit, the last verse alone approaching to the true tone of the lyric.

Upon the bonnie mountain side,

Upon the leafy trees,

Upon the rich and golden fields,

Upon the deep green seas,

The wind comes breathing freshly forth—

Ho! pluck up from the sand

Our anchor, and go shooting as

A winged shaft from the land!

The sheep love Skiddaw's lonesome top,

The shepherd loves his hill,

The throstle loves the budding bush,

Sweet woman loves her will;

The lark loves heaven for visiting,

But green earth for her home;

And I love the good ship, singing

Through the billows in their foam.

"My son," a grey-haired peasant said,

"Leap on the grassy land,

And deeper than five fathom sink

Thine anchor in the sand,

And meek and humble make thy heart,

For ere yon bright'ning moon

Lifts her wondrous lamp above the wave

Amid night's lonely noon,

There shall be shriekings heard at sea,

Lamentings heard ashore—

My son, go pluck thy mainsail down,

And tempt the heav'n no more.