Robin sung,-"Now, while the night-wind loud and chill
Unheeded raves around the door,
Let us the wine-cup drain and fill,
And welcome social joys once more--
The joys that still remain to cheer
The gloomiest month of all the year,
By our own fire side.
"What need we care for frost and snow?
Thus meeting--what have we to fear
From frost and snow, or winds that blow?
Such guests can find no entrance here.
No coldness of the heart or air--
Our little world of twelve feet square,
And our own fire-side.
"I drink this pledge to thee and thine--
I fill this cup to thine and thee--
How long the summer sun might shine,
Nor fill our souls with half the glee
A merry winter's night can bring,
To warm our hearts, while thus we sing
By our own fire-side."
The song, however, produced a contrary effect to that the Ranger had
intended. It pictured a fancied scene--one to which both Walter and the
Buccaneer had long been strangers; and a lengthened and painful pause
succeeded to the brief moment of forced merriment. It was broken by the
Cavalier, who inquired-"How long will it be before you return from this new trip? for remember,
my good friend, that suspense is a----"
"Hell!" interrupted Dalton, in his usual intemperate manner: "but I
cannot help it. It is not wise to pluck unripe fruit--do you understand
me?"
"Perfectly--and I dare say you are right; but tell me, Dalton, how is it
that, till lately, you so completely abandoned this island, and kept to
the Devon and Cornwall coasts? I should have thought this the most
convenient; your storehouse here is so well arranged."
"Ay, ay, sir; but this is over-near London, though it used to be a safe
place enough; but now that Sir Michael Livesey--regicide that he
is!--abides so continually at Little Shurland, what chance is there for
any good to such as I? I tell ye, Cromwell's nose is ever on the scent."
"A great advantage to him, and a disadvantage to his foes," said Robin:
"he has only to put the said nose to the touch-hole of the biggest
cannon, and off it goes; it never costs the army a farthing for matches
when he's with it."
"Pshaw, Robin! but is he indeed so red-nosed? You have often seen him,
Captain."
"Ay, dressed in a plain cloth suit, made by an ill country tailor;
his linen coarse and unclean; his band unfashionable, and often
spotted with blood; his hat without a band; his sword close to his
side; his countenance swollen and reddish; and, as to his nose,
it looked to me more purple than aught else. But, sir, to see
Cromwell, see him in battle--he is a right noble horseman; and
the beast (a black one especially he was once so fond of) seemed
to have been tutored by the evil one: its eye was as vigilant as
its rider's. Cromwell sits his saddle not gracefully, but firmly,
just as if he were part and portion of the animal; then, with a
sword in his right hand, and a pistol in his left---- Sir, it was
unlike any thing I ever saw! He must have managed the horse by the
pressure of his heel; for I never could make out, such was the decision
yet rapidity of hism movements, whether he held reins or not: now here,
now there--firing--preaching--shouting--praying--conquering--yet
everything done in its right place and time, never suffering the
excitement of the moment to bear down one of his resolves. Had
he been born a king----"