Then, if I can get into this Little Gentleman's room under any fair pretext, I shall, no doubt, satisfy myself in five minutes that he is just like other people, and that there is no particular mystery about him.
The night after my visit to the young man John, I made all these and many more reflections.It was about two o'clock in the morning,--bright starlight,--so light that I could make out the time on my alarm-clock,--when I woke up trembling and very moist.It was the heavy dragging sound, as I had often heard it before that waked me.
Presently a window was softly closed.I had just begun to get over the agitation with which we always awake from nightmare dreams, when I heard the sound which seemed to me as of a woman's voice,--the clearest, purest soprano which one could well conceive of.It was not loud, and I could not distinguish a word, if it was a woman's voice; but there were recurring phrases of sound and snatches of rhythm that reached me, which suggested the idea of complaint, and sometimes, I thought, of passionate grief and despair.It died away at last,--and then I heard the opening of a door, followed by a low, monotonous sound, as of one talking,--and then the closing of a door,--and presently the light on the opposite wall disappeared and all was still for the night.
By George! this gets interesting,--I said, as I got out of bed for a change of night-clothes.
I had this in my pocket the other day, but thought I would n't read it at our celebration.So I read it to the boarders instead, and print it to finish off this record with.
ROBINSON OF LEYDEN.
He sleeps not here; in hope and prayer His wandering flock had gone before, But he, the shepherd, might not share Their sorrows on the wintry shore.
Before the Speedwell's anchor swung, Ere yet the Mayflower's sail was spread, While round his feet the Pilgrims clung, The pastor spake, and thus he said:--"Men, brethren, sisters, children dear!
God calls you hence from over sea;
Ye may not build by Haerlem Meer, Nor yet along the Zuyder-Zee.
"Ye go to bear the saving word To tribes unnamed and shores untrod:
Heed well the lessons ye have heard >From those old teachers taught of God.
"Yet think not unto them was lent All light for all the coming days, And Heaven's eternal wisdom spent In making straight the ancient ways.
"The living fountain overflows For every flock, for every lamb, Nor heeds, though angry creeds oppose With Luther's dike or Calvin's dam."He spake; with lingering, long embrace, With tears of love and partings fond, They floated down the creeping Maas, Along the isle of Ysselmond.
They passed the frowning towers of Briel, The "Hook of Holland's" shelf of sand, And grated soon with lifting keel The sullen shores of Fatherland.
No home for these! --too well they knew The mitred king behind the throne;The sails were set, the pennons flew, And westward ho! for worlds unknown.
--And these were they who gave us birth, The Pilgrims of the sunset wave, Who won for us this virgin earth, And freedom with the soil they gave.
The pastor slumbers by the Rhine,--
In alien earth the exiles lie,--
Their nameless graves our holiest shrine, His words our noblest battle-cry!
Still cry them, and the world shall hear, Ye dwellers by the storm-swept sea!
Ye have not built by Haerlem Meer, Nor on the land-locked Zuyder-Zee!
