ewhere, but constantly, and in somewhat of the
spirit ascribed to him in the poem.

"For the more imaginative part of the version I must refer back to
one of those unaccountable visions which come upon us like
frightful monsters thrown up by storms from the great black deeps
of slumber. A lifeless body, in love and relationship the nearest
and dearest, was imposed upon my back, with an overwhelming sense
of obligation--not of filial piety merely, but some awful
responsibility, equally vague and intense, and involving, as it
seemed, inexpiable sin, horrors unutterable, torments
intolerable--to bury my dead, like Abraham, out of my sight. In
vain I attempted, again and again, to obey the mysterious
mandate--by some dreadful process the burthen was replaced with a
more stupendous weight of injunction, and an apalling conviction of
the impossibility of its fulfilment. My mental anguish was
indescribable;--the mighty agonies of souls tortured on the
supernatural racks of sleep are not to be penned--and if in
sketching those that belong to blood-guiltiness I have been at all
successful, I owe it mainly to the uninvoked inspiration of that
terrible dream."

The introduction of Admiral Burney's name makes it likely that Hood
may have owed his first interest in the story to Charles Lamb. The
circumstance that the book over which the gentle boy was poring when
questioned by the usher was called the _Death of Abel_, is by no
means forced or unnatural. Salomon Gessner's prose poem, _Der Tod
Abels_, published in 1758, attained an astonishing popularity
throughout Europe, and appeared in an English version somewhere
about the time of the discovery of Aram's crime.]

I.

'Twas in the prime of summer time,
An evening calm and cool,
And four-and-twenty happy boys
Came bounding out of school:
There were some that ran and some that leapt,
Like troutlets in a pool.

II.

Away they sped with gamesome minds,
And souls untouch'd by sin;
To a level mead they came, and there
They drave the wickets in:
Pleasantly shone the setting sun
Over the town of Lynn.

III.

Like sportive deer they coursed about,
And shouted as they ran,--
Turning to mirth all things of earth,
As only boyhood can;
But the Usher sat remote from all,
A melancholy man!

IV.

His hat was off, his vest apart,
To catch heaven's blessed breeze;
For a bu