d ruins of secluded pride:
A strange lone land, long past the prime,
Fit land for Mosby or for crime.

The brook in the dell they pass. One peers
Between the leaves: "Ay, there's the place--
There, on the oozy ledge--'twas there
We found the body (Blake's you know);
Such whirlings, gurglings round the face--
Shot drinking! Well, in war all's fair--
So Mosby says. The bough--take care!"

Hard by, a chapel. Flower-pot mould
Danked and decayed the shaded roof;
The porch was punk; the clapboards spanned
With ruffled lichens gray or green;
Red coral-moss was not aloof;
And mid dry leaves green dead-man's-hand
Groped toward that chapel in Mosby-land.

They leave the road and take the wood,
And mark the trace of ridges there--
A wood where once had slept the farm--
A wood where once tobacco grew
Drowsily in the hazy air,
And wrought in all kind things a calm--
Such influence, Mosby! bids disarm.

To ease even yet the place did woo--
To ease which pines unstirring share,
For ease the weary horses sighed:
Halting, and slackening girths, they feed,
Their pipes they light, they loiter there;
Then up, and urging still the Guide,
On, and after Mosby ride.

This Guide in frowzy coat of brown,
And beard of ancient growth and mould,
Bestrode a bony steed and strong,
As suited well with bulk he bore--
A wheezy man with depth of hold
Who jouncing went. A staff he swung--
A wight whom Mosby's wasp had stung.

Burnt out and homeless--hunted long!
That wheeze he caught in autumn-wood
Crouching (a fat man) for his life,
And spied his lean son 'mong the crew
That probed the covert. Ah! black blood
Was his 'gainst even child and wife--
Fast friends to Mosby. Such the strife.

A lad, unhorsed by sliding girths,
Strains hard to readjust his seat
Ere the main body show the gap
'Twixt them and the read-guard; scrub-oaks near
He sidelong eyes, while hands move fleet;
Then mounts and spurs. One drop his cap--
"Let Mosby fine!" nor heeds mishap.

A gable time-stained peeps through trees:
"You mind the fight in the haunted house?
That's it; we clenched them in the room--
An ambuscade of ghosts, we thought,
But proved sly rebels on a house!
Luke lies in the yard." The chimneys loom:
Some muse on Mosby--some on doom.

Less nimbly now through brakes they wind,
And ford wild creeks where men have drowned;
They skirt th