"Take heed! for Widow Mysie's game is plain," The gossips cried, but warned me all in vain: Kisses? Ay, faith, they followed score on score After the first I stole behind the door, From which she drank it back with kisses At that he shrugged his shoulders with a grin: Then blushed and glowed and breathed it "I guessed as much the tale has gone the back again, Till, maddened with the ecstasy divine, I clasped her close and craved her to be mine, eye, And while my veins grew bright, my heart heart went wild, round. Ye might have stayed till I was underground. But mind," he added, blinking yellow eye, "I'll handle my own guineas till I die. Frankly I own you might have chosen worse, Fell like a sunbeam on my heart, and smiled, Since you have little siller in your purse The inn is thriving, if report be true, And Widow Mysie has enough for two." The deed thus done, I hied me home, you say, gear Are small, and will be small for many a year, · speak Then running off she mixed, with tender glee, | Then Mysie softened, saddened, and would A glass of comfort, sat her on my knee. "Come, Tam!" she cried; "who cares a fig for wealth? Ay, let him keep it all, and here's his health!" And added, shining brightly on my breast, "Ah, Tam, the siller's worthless love is best." Oh, Widow Mysie, wert thou first sincere When tender accents trembled on mine ear, Like bees that o'er a flower will float and fleet, Of father's sickness with a dewy cheek; Lightly, And musing stood, one little hand of snow And ere they light make murmurs honey- When we were sitting in the ingle-light, The leech's watch went "tick" at Bungo When to that chamber she had won her way, Farm; My father sickened, and his features cold Retained the hue, without the gleam, of gold. The old man's cheek grew brighter every day; She smoothed the pillows underneath his head, She brought sweet music roundabout his bed, She made the very mustard-blisters glow She turned her face, its sunshine fell on him! Better and better every day grew he, Clasping her little hands, "Oh, Tam," she cried, "But for my help, your father would have died; Bliss! to have saved your filial heart that sorrow! But for my help, why, he may die to-morrow. Go, Tom!-this weak warm heart I cannot trust To utter more-be generous! be just! Ah, I shall ever love you-as a mother!" Sir, so it was. Stunned, thunder-stricken, wild, I raved, while father trembled, Mysie smiled; O'er all the country-side the scandal rang, "Mysie!" I cried, with flushing face, too And, ere I knew, the bells began to clang; late And shutting eyes and stopping ears, as red Stung by the poisonous things whose names I As ricks on fire, I blushing turned and fled. Twelve years have passed since I escaped the hate, Which in so many household fires flit free, The salamanders Doubt and Jealousy'Mysie!" and then, in accents fierce and bold, Demanded why her looks had grown so cold. She trembled, flushed, a tear was in her eye, She dropt her gaze and heaved a balmy sigh, Then spoke with tender pauses low and sad: Had I a heart? I frankly owned I had. Could I without a conscience-qualm behold My white-haired father, weak, untended, old, Who had so very short a time to live, Reft of the peace a woman's hands can IF mean or costly dresses through this globe give? Decide the rank in which men are enrolled, "Mysie!" I shrieked, with heart that seemed Why, then, we'll clothe the wolf in satin robe, to rend. With glaring eyes and every hair on end. The alligator in fine silk enfold! T A BRAVE CAGOT. A FRENCH HISTORICAL NARRATIVE. HE existence of an outcast race of men, under the name of Cagots, during several ages in France, has not failed to attract the attention of the curious. To this day, however, obscurity and doubt rest upon their history. It is an error to confound them, as has often been done, with the cretins they had neither the goitre nor the idiocy which distinguished those unfortunates. The only marks by which they were distinguishable from the population of the south were dead bluish eyes, considerable discoloration of the skin and hair of a pale red tinge. Misery and forced isolation, producing their natural effects in the shape indicating physical debility, rendered these peculiar characteristics more striking. The proscription of the Cagots, resulting neither from faults of conformation, habitual ill health nor impiety-for the Cagots were always esteemed good Catholics-was not merely a popular prejudice: it was sanctioned by the laws of the land. Banished to the foot of the Pyrenees, in the same humid valleys where to this day dwell the hideous family of the cretins, pent up in miserable hovels called cagotteries, the Cagots were legally set apart from the rest of mankind. Only at night were they permitted to leave their homes, and for their sole subsistence they had to depend on the produce of the common attached to the cagotterie. Trade of every kind was interdicted to them. They were neither allowed to devote themselves to any lucrative avocation nor to mingle their blood with that of a society which spurned them from its bosom as objects of horror. For some time they were even permitted to be sold publicly as slaves. A legislative enactment positively forbade their speaking to any person not belonging to their tribe; and if, by special favor, they were permitted to attend the church of the district, they were compelled to enter it through a distinct portal, granted to them out of pity out of pity by the clergy and studiously avoided by all the other worshippers. Traces of these Cagot entrances and the well-trodden narrow paths leading to them are still visible in many of the churches of the South of France. The local usages of Béarn, Gascony and Guienne forced them, moreover, to cut wood gratuitously, to carry about with them no other weapon than an axe, and to wear an infamous costume: a red jacket on which was stamped, on a square piece of white cloth, the figure of a goose's leg, proclaimed from afar the approach of the Cagot. The origin of this singular race of outcasts, notwithstanding the researches of several eminent savans, still remains enveloped in mystery. Various theories, more or less plausible, have been set forth to account for the persecution to which they were subjected. |