It rose not with the reddening flush
Of transient anger's hasty blush,
But pale as marble o'er the tomb,
Whose ghastly whiteness aids its gloom.
--BYRON.
Robert Stevens returned home, his mind filled with strange, wild thoughts. It was a lovely evening in early spring. The moon, round and full, rose from out its watery bed and shed a soft, refulgent glow on this most delightful of all climes. Below was the bay, on which floated many barks, and among them the vessel which had so recently brought him from Boston. The little town lay quiet and peaceful on the hill where his grandfather and Captain John Smith sixty years ago had planted it. Beyond were the dark forests, gloomy and forbidding, as if they concealed many foes of the white men; but those woods were not all dark and forbidding. From them issued the sweet perfumes of wild flowers and the songs of night birds, such as are known in Virginia.
Young Stevens was in no mood to be impressed by the surrounding scenery. He was repeating under his breath:
"Tyranny! tyranny! tyranny!"
Robert loved freedom as dearly as he loved Ester Goffe, and one was as necessary to his existence as the other. Now, on his return to the land of his nativity, he found the ruler, once so mild and popular, grown to a tyrant.
"His office is for life," sighed Robert. "And too much power hath made him mad."