Fair Ellen was long the delight of the young, No damsel could with her compare; Her charms were the theme of the heart and the tongue. And bards without number in extacies sung, The beauties of Ellen the fair.
Yet cold was the maid; and tho' legions advanced, All drill'd by Ovidean art, And languish'd, and ogled, protested and danced, Like shadows they came, and like shadows they glanced From the hard polish'd ice of her heart.
Yet still did the heart of fair Ellen implore A something that could not be found; Like a sailor she seem'd on a desolate shore, With nor house, nor a tree, nor a sound but the roar Of breakers high dashing around.
From object to object still, still would she veer, Though nothing, alas, could she find; Like the moon, without atmosphere, brilliant and clear, Yet doom'd, like the moon, with no being to cheer The bright barren waste of her mind.
But rather than sit like a statue so still When the rain made her mansion a _pound_, Up and down would she go, like the sails of a mill, And pat every stair, like a woodpecker's bill, From the tiles of the roof to the ground.
One morn, as the maid from her casement inclin'd, Pass'd a youth, with a frame in his hand. The casement she clos'd--not the eye of her mind; For, do all she could, no, she could not be blind; Still before her she saw the youth stand.
"Ah, what can he do," said the languishing maid, "Ah, what with that frame can he do?" And she knelt to the Goddess of Secrets and pray'd, When the youth pass'd again, and again he display'd The frame and a picture to view.
"Oh, beautiful picture!" the fair Ellen cried, "I must see thee again or I die." Then under her white chin her bonnet she tied, And after the youth and the picture she hied, When the youth, looking back, met her eye.
"Fair damsel," said he (and he chuckled the while) "This picture I see you admire: Then take it, I pray you, perhaps 'twill beguile Some moments of sorrow; (nay, pardon my smile) Or, at least, keep you home by the fire."
Then Ellen the gift with delight and surprise From the cunning young stripling receiv'd. But she knew not the poison that enter'd her eyes, When sparkling with rapture they gaz'd on her prize-- Thus, alas, are fair maidens deceiv'd!