THE FIRE KING.

"The blessings of the evil genii, which are curses, were upon him.' Eastern Tale.

This ballad was written at the request of Mr. Lewis, to be inserted in his Tales of Wonder. It is the third in a series of four ballads, on the subject of Elementary Spirits. The story is, however, partly historical; for it is recorded, that, during the struggles of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, a knight templar, called Saint Alban, deserted to the Saracens, and defeated the Christians in many combats, till he was finally routed and slain, in a conflict with King Baldwin, under the walls of Jerusalem.

BOLD knights and fair dames, to my harp give an ear,
Of love, and of war, and of wonder to hear;
And you haply may sigh, in the midst of your glee,
At the tale of Count Albert, and fair Rosalie.

O see you that castle, so strong and so high?
And see you that lady, the tear in her eye?
And see you that palmer from Palestine's land,
The shell on his hat, and the staff in his hand?

"Now, palmer, gray palmer, O tell unto me,
What news bring you home from the Holy Countrie?
And how goes the warfare by Galilee's strand?
And how fare our nobles, the flower of the land?"

"O well goes the warfare by Galilee's wave,
For Gilead, and Nablous, and Ramah we have;
And well fare our nobles by Mount Lebanon,
For the heathen have lost, and the Christians have
won."

A fair chain of gold mid her ringlets there hung: O'er the palmer's gray locks the fair chain has she flung;

"O palmer, gray palmer, this chain be thy fee, For the news thou hast brought from the Holy Countrie.

O saw ye him foremost on Mount Lebanon ?"

"O lady, fair lady, the tree green it grows; O lady, fair lady, the stream pure it flows: Your castle stands strong, and your hopes soar on high;

But lady, fair lady, all blossoms to die.

"The green boughs they wither, the thunderbolt falls,

It leaves of your castle but levin-scorch'd walls; The pure stream runs muddy; the gay hope is gone; Count Albert is prisoner on Mount Lebanon."

And she has ta'en shipping for Palestine's land, To ransom Count Albert from Soldanrie's hand.

Small thought had Count Albert on fair Rosalie,
Small thought on his faith, or his knighthood had he;
A heathenish damsel his light heart had won,
The Soldan's fair daughter of Mount Lebanon.
"O Christian, brave Christian, my love wouldst
thou be,

Three things must thou do ere I hearken to thee;
Our laws and our worship on thee shalt thou take;
And this thou shalt first do for Zulema's sake.
"And, next, in the cavern, where burns evermore
The mystical flame which the Kurdmans adore,
Alone, and in silence, three nights shalt thou wake;
And this thou shalt next do for Zulema's sake.

"And, last, thou shalt aid us with counsel and hand,

To drive the Frank robber from Palestine's land; For my lord and my love then Count Albert I'll take, When all this is accomplish'd for Zulema's sake,"

He has thrown by his helmet and cross-handled sword,

Renouncing his knighthood, denying his Lord; He has ta'en the green caftan, and turban put on, For the love of the maiden of fair Lebanon.

They search'd Albert's body, and, lo! on his breast
Was the sign of the cross, by his father impress'd.

The priests they erase it with care and with pain,
And the recreant return'd to the cavern again;
But, as he descended, a whisper there fell-
It was his good angel, who bade him farewell!

High bristled his hair, his heart flutter'd and beat, And he turn'd him five steps, half resolved to retreat;

need;

gone,

When he thought of the maid of fair Lebanon.

his hounds, he could not refrain from crying, "Gluck zu, Falkenburg!" (Good sport to ye, Falkenburg!) "Dost thou wish me good sport?" answered a hoarse voice; "thou shalt share the game;" and there was thrown at him what seemed to be a huge piece of foul carrion. The daring chasseur lost two of his best horses soon after, and never perfectly recovered the personal effects of this ghostly greeting. This tale, though told with some variation, is universally believed all over Germany.

The French had a similar tradition concerning an aërial hunter, who infested the forest of Fontainebleau. He was sometimes visible; when he appeared as a huntsman, surrounded with dogs, a tall grisly figure. Some account of him may be found in "Sully's Memoirs," who says he was called Le Grande Veneur. At one time he chose to hunt so near the palace, that the attendants, and, if I mistake not, Sully himself, came out into the court, supposing it was the sound of the king returning from the chase. This phantom is elsewhere called Saint Hubert.

The superstition seems to have been very general, as appears from the following fine poetical description of this phantom chase, as it was heard in the wilds of Ross-shire.

"Ere since, of old, the haughty thanes of Ross-
So to the simple swain tradition tells-
Were wont with clans, and ready vassals throng'd
To wake the bounding stag, or guilty wolf,
There oft is heard, at midnight, or at noon,
Beginning faint, but rising still more loud,
And nearer, voice of hunters, and of hounds,
And horns hoarse-winded, blowing far and keen:-
Forthwith the hubbub multiplies; the gale
Labours with wilder shrieks and rifer din
Of hot pursuit; the broken cry of deer
Mangled by throttling dogs; the shouts of men,
And hoofs thick beating on the hollow hill.
Sudden the grazing heifer in the vale
Starts at the noise, and both the herdsman's ears
Tingle with inward dread. Aghast he eyes
The mountain's height, and all the ridges round,
Yet not one trace of living wight discerns;
Nor knows, o'eraw'd, and trembling as he stands,
To what or whom he owes his idle fear,
To ghost, to witch, to fairy, or to fiend;
But wonders, and no end of wondering finds."

Scottish Descriptive Poems, pp. 167, 168.

A posthumous miracle of father Lesly, a Scottish Capuchin, related to his being buried on a hill haunted by these unearthly cries of hounds and huntsmen. After his sainted relics had been deposited there, the noise was never heard more. The reader will find this, and other miracles, recorded in the life of father Bonaventura, which is written in the choicest Italian.

THE wildgrave winds his bugle horn,
To horse, to horse! halloo, halloo !
His fiery courser snuffs the morn,
And thronging serfs their lord pursue.

The eager pack, from couples freed,

Dash through the bush, the brier, the brake; While answering hound, and horn, and steed, The mountain echoes startling wake.

The beams of God's own hallow'd day
Had painted yonder spire with gold,
And, calling sinful men to pray,
Loud, long, and deep, the bell had toll'd:

But still the wildgrave onward rides ;
Halloo, halloo! and hark again!
When, spurring from opposing sides,

Two stranger horsemen join the train.

Who was each stranger, left and right,

Well may I guess, but dare not tell; The right hand steed was silver white, The left, the swarthy hue of hell.

The right hand horseman, young and fair,
His smile was like the morn of May;
The left, from eye of tawny glare,
Shot midnight lightning's lurid ray.

He waved his huntsman's cap on high,
Cried, "Welcome, welcome, noble lord!
What sport can earth, or sea, or sky,
To match the princely chase, afford ?"

"Cease thy loud bugle's clanging knell,"
Cried the fair youth, with silver voice;
"And for devotion's choral swell
Exchange the rude unhallow'd noise.

"To-day the ill-omen'd chase forbear, Yon bell yet summons to the fane; To-day the warning spirit hear,

To-morrow thou mayst mourn in vain."

"Away, and sweep the glades along!" The sable hunter hoarse replies; "To muttering monks leave matin song, And bells, and books, and mysteries." The wildgrave spurr'd his ardent steed, And, lanching forward with a bound, "Who, for thy drowsy priest-like rede, Would leave the jovial horn and hound?

"Hence, if our manly sport offend!

With pious fools go chant and pray:
Well hast thou spoke, my dark-brow'd friend
Halloo, halloo! and, hark away!"

The wildgrave spurr'd his courser light,
O'er moss and moor, o'er holt and hill;
And on the left, and on the right,
Each stranger horseman follow'd still.
Up springs, from yonder tangled thorn,

A stag more white than mountain snow:
And louder rung the wildgrave's horn,
"Hark forward, forward! holla, ho!"

A heedless wretch had cross'd the way;
He gasps, the thundering hoofs below:
But, live who can, or die who may,
Still," Forward, forward!" on they go.
See, where yon simple fences meet,

A field with autumn's blessings crown'd;
See, prostrate at the wildgrave's feet,
A husbandman, with toil embrown'd:

"O mercy, mercy, noble lord!

Spare the poor's pittance," was his cry, "Earn'd by the sweat these brows have pour'd, In scorching hour of fierce July?"

Earnest the right hand stranger pleads,
The left still cheering to the prey,
Th' impetuous earl no warning heeds,
But furious holds the onward way.

"Away, thou hound so basely born,

Or dread the scourge's echoing blow!" Then loudly rung his bugle horn,

Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!"

So said, so done: a single bound
Clears the poor labourer's humble pale:
Wild follows man, and horse, and hound,
Like dark December's stormy gale.

And man, and horse, and hound, and horn,
Destructive sweep the field along;
While joying o'er the wasted corn,

Fell famine marks the maddening throng.

Again uproused, the timorous prey

Scours moss, and moor, and holt, and hill; Hard run, he feels his strength decay,

And trusts for life his simple skill.

Too dangerous solitude appear'd;

He seeks the shelter of the crowd; Amid the flock's domestic herd

His harmless head he hopes to shroud.

O'er moss, and moor, and holt, and hill, His track the steady bloodhounds trace; O'er moss and moor, unwearied still,

The furious earl pursues the chase.

Full lowly did the herdsman fall;

"O spare, thou noble baron, spare These herds, a widow's little all; These flocks an orphan's fleecy care?"

Earnest the right hand stranger pleads,

The left still cheering to the prey; The earl nor prayer nor pity heeds,

But furious keeps the onward way.

"Unmanner'd dog! to stop my sport Vain were thy cant and beggar whine, Though human spirits, of thy sort,

Were tenants of these carrion kine!"

Again he winds his bugle horn,

"Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!" And through the herd, in ruthless scorn, He cheers his furious hounds to go.

In heaps the throttled victims fall;

Down sinks their mangled herdsman near. The murderous cries the stag appal

Again he starts, new nerved by fear. With blood besmear'd, and white with foam, While big the tears of anguish pour He seeks, amid the forest's gloom, The humble hermit's hallow'd bower.

But man and horse, and horn and hound,
Fast rattling on his traces go;
The sacred chapel rung around

With, "Hark away! and, holla, ho!"

All mild, amid the route profane,

The holy hermit pour'd his prayer; "Forbear with blood God's house to stain; Revere his altar, and forbear!

"The meanest brute has rights to plead, Which wrong'd by cruelty or pride, Draw vengeance on the ruthless head:

Be warn'd at length, and turn aside.”

Still the fair horseman anxious pleads;
The black, wild whooping, points the prey:
Alas! the earl no warning heeds,

But frantic keeps the forward way.

"Holy or not, or right or wrong,

Thy altar, and its rites, I spurn; Not sainted martyr's sacred song,

Not God himself, shall make me turn!"

He spurs his horse, he winds his horn, "Hark forward, forward, holla, ho!" But off, on wirlwind's pinions borne,

The stag, the hut, the hermit, go.

And horse, and man, and horn, and hound,
And clamour of the chase was gone;
For hoofs, and howls, and bugle sound,
A deadly silence reign'd alone.

Wild gazed th' affrighted earl around;
He strove in vain to wake his horn;
In vain to call; for not a sound
Could from his anxious lips be borne.
He listens for his trusty hounds;
No distant baying reach'd his ears:
His courser, rooted to the ground,
The quickening spur unmindful bears.
Still dark and darker frown the shades,
Dark as the darkness of the grave;
And not a sound the still invades,
Save what a distant torren: gave.

High o'er the sinner's humbled head

At length the solemn silence broke; And from a cloud of swarthy red,

The awful voice of, thunder spoke.

"Oppressor of creation fair!

Apostate spirits' harden'd tool! Scorner of God! Scourge of the poor! The measure of thy cup is full. "Be chased forever through the wood; Forever roam th' affrighted wild; And let thy fate instruct the proud,

God's meanest creature is his child."

"Twas hush'd: one flash, of sombre glare, With yellow ting'd the forest brown; Up rose the wildgrave's bristling hair, And horror chill'd each nerve and bone.

Cold pour'd the sweat in freezing rill;

A rising wind began to sing; And louder, louder, louder still,

Brought storm and tempest on its wing. Earth heard the call! Her entrails rend; From yawning rifts, with many a yell, Mix'd with sulphureous flames, ascend The misbegotten dogs of hell.

What ghastly huntsman next arose,
Well may I guess, but dare not tell;
His eye like midnight lightning glows,
His steed the swarthy hue of hell.

The wildgrave flies o'er bush and thorn,
With many a shriek of helpless wo;
Behind him hound, and horse, and horn,
And, "Hark away, and holla, ho!"

With wild despair's reverted eye,

Close, close behind, he marks the throng, With bloody fangs, and eager cry,

In frantic fear he scours along.

Still, still shall last the dreadful chase,
Till time itself shall have an end:
By day they scour earth's cavern'd space,
At midnight's witching hour ascend.
This is the horn, and hound, and horse,

That oft the lated peasant hears;
Appall'd he signs the frequent cross,
When the wild din invades his ears.

The wakeful priest oft drops a tear
For human pride, for human wo,
When at his midnight mass, he hears
Th' infernal cry of "Holla, ho!"

THE BATTLE OF SEMPACH.

THESE Verses are a literal translation of an ancient Swiss ballad upon the battle of Sempach, fougat 9th July, 1386, being the victory by which the Swiss cantons established their independence. The author is Albert Tehudi, denominated the Souter, from his profession of a shoemaker. He was a citizen of Lucerne, esteemed highly among his countrymen, both for his powers as a Meistersinger, or minstrel, and his courage as a soldier; so that he might share the praise conferred by Collins on Eschylus, that

-Not alone he nursed the poet's flame,

But reach'd from Virtue's hand the patriot steel. The circumstance of their being written by a poet returning from a well-fought field he describes, and in which his country's fortune was secured, may confer on Tehudi's verses an interest which they are not entitled to claim from their poetical merit. But ballad poetry, the more literally it is translated, the more it loses its simplicity, without acquiring either grace or strength; and therefore some of the faults of the verses must be imputed to the translator's feeling it a duty to

keep as closely as possible to his original. The various puns, rude attempts at pleasantry, and disproportioned episodes, must be set down to Tehudi's account, or to the taste of his age.

The military antiquary will derive some amusement from the minute particulars which the martial poet has recorded. The mode in which the Austrian men-at-arms received the charge of the Swiss was by forming a phalanx, which they defended with their long lances. The gallant Winkelried, who sacrificed his own life by rushing among the spears, clasping in his arms as many as he could grasp, and thus opening a gap in these iron battalions, is celebrated in Swiss history. When fairly mingled together, the unwieldy length of their weapons, and cumbrous weight of their defensive armour, rendered the Austrian men-at-arms a very unequal match for the light-armed mountaineers. The victories obtained by the Swiss over the German chivalry, hitherto deemed as formidable on foot as on horseback, led to important changes in the art of war. The poet describes the Austrian knights and squires as cutting the peaks from their boots ere they could act upon foot, in allusion to an inconvenient piece of foppery, often mentioned in the middle ages. Leopold III., Archduke of Austria, called "The handsome man-atarms," was slain in the battle of Sempach, with the flower of his chivalry.

'TWAS when among our linden trees
The bees had housed in swarms,
(And gray-hair'd peasants say that these
Betoken foreign arms,)

Then look'd we down to Willisow,
The land was all in flame;
We knew the Archduke Leopold
With all his army came.

The Austrian nobles made their vow,
So hot their hearts and bold,
"On Switzer carles we'll trample now,
And slay both young and old."

With clarion loud, and banner proud,
From Zurich on the lake,
In martial pomp and fair array,

Their onward march they make.

"Now list ye, lowland nobles all

Ye seek the mountain strand, Nor wot ye what shall be your lot In such a dangerous land.

"I rede ye, shrive you of your sins
Before you further go;

A skirmish in Helvetian hills
May send your souls to wo."

"But where now shall we find a priest,
Our shrift that he may hear?"
"The Switzer priest* has ta’en the field,
He deals a penance drear.

* All the Swiss clergy who were able to bear arms fought in this patriotic war.