With tall plumes crested and wild hues o’erspread,
Girt him like feverish phantoms; and pale stars
Look’d through the branches as through dungeon bars,
Shedding no hope. He knew, he felt his doom—
Oh! what a tale to shadow with its gloom
That happy hall in England. Idle fear!
Would the winds tell it? Who might dream or hear
The secret of the forests? To the stake
They bound him; and that proud young soldier strove
His father’s spirit in his breast to wake,