"No Will-o'-the-Wisp mislight thee;
Nor snake or glow-worm bite thee;
But on, on thy way,
Not making a stay,
Since ghost there is none to affright thee.
"Then let not the dark thee cumber;
What though the moon does slumber,
The stars of the night
Will lend thee their light,
Like tapers clear without number.
"Then, Julia, let me woo thee,
Thus, thus to come unto me;
And when I shall meet
Thy silvery feet,
My soul I'll pour into thee."
The song might have been intended in compliment to the fair Julia, for
so I found his partner was called, or it might not; she, however, was
certainly unconscious of any such application, for she never looked
at the singer, but kept her eyes cast upon the floor. Her face was
suffused, it is true, with a beautiful blush, and there was a gentle
heaving of the bosom, but all that was doubtless caused by the exercise
of the dance; indeed, so great was her indifference, that she was
amusing herself with plucking to pieces a choice bouquet of hothouse
flowers, and by the time the song was concluded, the nosegay lay in
ruins on the floor.
The party now broke up for the night with the kind-hearted old custom of
shaking hands. As I passed through the hall, on the way to my chamber,
the dying embers of the Yule-clog still sent forth a dusky glow; and had
it not been the season when "no spirit dares stir abroad," I should have
been half tempted to steal from my room at midnight, and peep whether
the fairies might not be at their revels about the hearth.
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