"Back, old man," cried he, "and dare not, any of you, to lay a sacrilegious finger on her corse, or I will stretch him that advances as lowly as lies my mother's head. When or how it came hither matters not. Here, at the altar, has it been placed, and none shall move it hence. The dead shall witness my nuptials. Fate has ordained it—my fate! o'er which the dead preside. Her ring shall link me to my bride. I knew not, when I snatched it from her death-cold finger, to what end I preserved it. I learn it now. It is here." And he held forth a ring.
"'Tis a fatal boon, that twice-used ring," cried Sybil; "such a ring my mother, on her death-bed, said should be mine. Such a ring she said should wed me——"
"Unto whom?" fiercely demanded Luke.
"Unto Death!" she solemnly rejoined.
Luke's countenance fell. He turned aside, deeply abashed, unable further to brook her gaze; while in accents of such wildly touching pathos as sank into the hearts of each who heard her—hearts, few of them framed of penetrable stuff—the despairing maiden burst into the following strain:
THE TWICE-USED RING
"Beware thy bridal day!"
On her death-bed sighed my mother;
"Beware, beware, I say,
Death shall wed thee, and no other.
Cold the hand shall grasp thee,
Cold the arms shall clasp thee,
Colder lips thy kiss shall smother!
Beware thy bridal kiss!
"Thy wedding ring shall be
From a clay-cold finger taken;
From one that, like to thee,
Was by her love forsaken.
For a twice-used ring
Is a fatal thing;
Her griefs who wore it are partaken—,
Beware that fatal ring!
"The altar and the grave
Many steps are not asunder;
Bright banners o'er thee wave,
Shrouded horror lieth under.
Blithe may sound the bell,
Yet 'twill toll thy knell;
Scathed thy chaplet by the thunder—
Beware that blighted wreath!"
Beware my bridal day!
Dying lips my doom have spoken;
Deep tones call me away;
From the grave is sent a token.
Cold, cold fingers bring
That ill-omen'd ring;
Soon will a second heart be broken;
This is my bridal day.