A Still-life Sketch

“Still, still I love thee,—love thee, love thee, still.”—La Sonnambula

He stood among the mossy rocks
Beside a Highland waterfall,
And wrung his hands and tore his locks,
And cursed the gaugers one and all.

Behind him was a ruined hut,
Its walls were levell’d with the ground,
And broken rafters black with soot,
And staves of tubs, were scatter’d round.

With streaming eyes adown the glen
He fix’d his gaze—I look’d, and lo!
Along the road a band of men,
With horse and cart, were moving slow.

Upon my life, it made me shiver
To hear him shriek with frantic yell,
“Fare-thee-well,—and if for ever.
Still, for ever fare-thee-well!”

Sholto.