VI
And what was next? The girl disappeared.
As Alice feared, no fate interfered.
A posse collected, hunted and peered,
Raced through the night till their eyes were bleared,
And looked for Imogene, cried and cheered
When a clew was found, or a doubt was cleared.
A posse with pitch-forks, scythes and axes,
Shot-guns, pistols, knives and rifles,
Hunts for Imogene, never relaxes,
Runs over meadows for luring trifles:
The wave of grain or a weed that tosses;
And curse and say what a terrible loss is
Come to Spring Lake: a wife's enticed,
And then this fairest maid is abducted.
Why are the innocent sacrificed?
We are a people well conducted.
What is the curse, or is it the war?
Why is it every one here is housing
Fiddlers, idlers, fancy dancers.
At Milem Alkire's why carousing;
Everything that the good abhor
In lovers and romancers?
The world is mad, the village is mad,
Even the cattle bellow and run.
Old maid, young maid, man and lad
Have eaten of something half insane;
Such antics never before were done
And never it seems may be again
Under the shining sun.
And now comes villainy out of the fun.
Come with the torch, come with the halter,
Gather the posse, stay nor falter,
Catch the scoundrel who spoiled our peace
And hang him up in the maple tree's
Highest branch. For what is the law
If it can't slip the noose and draw
This minstrel man to a thing of awe?