But, if ’twere pity, if twere pain,
His voice was thick and low,
And “’Tis no news,” he said “to hear
You loved John Ashton so!
“I knew you, and I came to see—
But since he’s dead, with you
I’ll go at once to seek the corpse;
And haply find it, too!”
Full simple was the lassie’s heart,
For all her angry tears:
She would have fear’d her lover’s death;
She had no other fears:
She laid her reaping-hook aside,
And stoop’d beneath the boughs,
And follow’d with undoubting foot
Among the hazel knowes.
A shaggy fell was just beyond;
The village lights were far;
And all was dusk, and all was still,
Beneath the evening star:
Her mother was a mile away:
No ear on earth to know
What sounds might scare the hooting owl
Or hush the beck below.—
That night a stranger horseman rode
Full fiercely down the glen:
And he may ride, or he may rest,
Or he may come again,
But never more shall Ducie reap
The harvests of the vale:
Her maiden sleep is sound and deep
At foot of Harwood Dale.
