A LEGEND OF BLACK GANG CHYNE.
The dwellers in Wight they once did wail,
When they lived in dread of the giant of Chale.
The giant of Chale was mighty and big;
And he loved man's flesh better than pig.
He chose those that were tall and heavy,
And stew'd the fat ones in their own gravy.
The children he tied with bonds of wire,
And broiled them alive on a charcoal fire.
He dyed his hands with man's blood red;
He laughed and shook his sides, and said,
"I care not for saint in his lonely cell—
I care not for book, and I care not for bell—
I care not for heaven, I care not for hell—
I live upon man's flesh, and fat me well."
The saint was praying on his knee
For those that are dead, and those that be;
And as he raised his voice in prayer,
He heard the curses fly through the air.
The holy man was struck with dread,
And every hair stood up on his head.
For he knew the time was a fated hour,
When the spirits of earth and sea have power,
And that which is holy quakes and quails,
For the time of the spirit of sin prevails.
The fiendish laughter thrilled through his bones;
And he answered the sound of mirth with groans.
He hailed the voice as it came on the wind,
"What is thy title, what is thy kind?
Who is it scoffs at saint and cell?
Who cares not for book, and cares not for bell?
Who cares not for heaven, and cares not for hell?
But lives upon man's flesh and fats him well?"
The burly giant rose from his lair
When he heard the questions ring through the air.
Then he poured a goblet filled with blood,
And he dipped his hands in the gory flood;
He made a sign with his bloody hand,
And drew the figure in the sand.
"I'll make his spirit quake and quail
That questioneth the ogre of Chale.
I dare him to meet me at midnight dread,
When the horned moon is over our head;
For then the lower spirits and upper,
And those of the earth, I've asked to supper;
Then the imps that ride on the desolate wind
Shall chant him in thunder my title and kind."
There was heard, when the blood of the sign had dried,
A whizzing sound on every side;
It sang in the Culver's goblin cave—
It sang at the Needles and over the wave—
It sang on Hecla's frozen strand—
It sang on the desert's burning sand—
It sang the mountains and clouds aboon—
And the whizzing sound went up to the moon.
The sound went down to the ocean's deep,
And the kelpies were roused from their evening sleep.
And though the night was clear and still,
The wind seemed to whistle round Katherine's hill;
But the sound came not in the chapel fair,
Because the sign of the cross was there.
The bloody sign was a sign of might
To every being that shuns the light;
Whether made by sprite or child of clay,
The bloody signal they must obey.
The holy man was struck with fear
When the words of the giant rang in his ear;
For the giant was mighty in wizard power,
And Hallowe'en was a dreadful hour.
But the fearfullest time was the midnight dread,
When the horned moon is over one's head.
The saint had been dared to come that night,
Or acknowledge his fear of the giant sprite.
He took him a staff of the mountain ash,
His pilgrim scrip and calabash;
Nor spirit did he hold in scorn
Distilled from the barley-corn,
(For he had grown infirm and old,)
To keep himself from catching cold.
At midnight he left his lonely cell
To seek the giant's flowery dell.
In a lovely vale, all down by the sea,
Was the cave of the giant's cruelty.
The valley side was blooming fair,
For every flower blossomed there:
The violet and primrose gay,
And cowslip tall, adorned the way;
Nodded to him the blue harebell,
And smiled the yellow daffodil;
The heath its little eye did twinkle,
And stared the humble periwinkle,
Snapdragon opened its yellow mouth,
Sunflower turned his face from the south—
The blown rose smiled in matron pride
At the little rosebuds round by her side,
Besprinkled with dewdrops all around,
Like a diamond necklace down to the ground;
The foxglove showed its sunburnt face,
And bent and bowed with vulgar grace,
Fluttered a leaf to the moonbeam wan,
Just as a lady flutters her fan;
And every daisy on the hill,
With its yellow face and clean white frill,
Seemed each to giggle and shake its head
As though, if it could, it would have said,
'Twas a comical time and a comical place
To look the giant of Chale in the face.
But though the bank was blooming fair
The robin redbreast dwelt not there;
For the robin was a friend of man,
And would not eat from an ogre's hand.
Though all things seemed to laugh and jeer,
They could not put the saint in fear;
For he had dared both death and chains,
And a noble spirit ran in his veins.
Sudden there crashed a clap of thunder,
Which filled the saint with awe and wonder;
And just before his footpath way
A cavern yawned in the mountain clay.
The cavern it was not paved with stones,
But strewed around with dead men's bones.
On a throne of skulls the giant sat,
And his lamps were fed with dead men's fat.
The sea was studded with goblin sails,
And snakes and adders danced on their tails.
The bats fly high, the bats fly low;
The owlets hoot, and the ravens crow;
The dragons they rattle their scaly wings;
The scorpions show their poison stings.
For the spirits appeared in every shape—
One took the form of a long-legged ape,
And one was like a large black cat;
And one like a boar, and one like a rat;
One grinned in the form of a dusky bear,
Another was like a spotted hare;
Another was like a bloated toad,
That spat his venom on the road.
They laughed, and they grinned, and they jeered to see
The saint come to join their revelry.
The owlet he hooted his laugh in the air,
And in laughter growled the dusky bear.
'Twas a horrible thing to hear and see
These beasts, how they mimicked humanity.
On a table, in lieu of a loaf of bread,
Was a bodiless but living head;
Its sightless eyeballs it rolled about,
And its bloodless tongue it lolled out.
The giant has called for his favourite dish
Of reptiles alive, and loathsome fish.
The soup it was brought in earthenware pails—
The mermen who carried them hopped on their tails;
The leeches crept in and the leeches crept out,
The blind worms and lizzards wriggled about.
As the demons raised their cups on high,
There arose a shout, a yell, a cry—
"Here's a curse on the living, a curse on the dead!
But here's a health to the head—the head.
Old man, there's afire of charcoal and peat:
Do you wish to be roasted? or will you eat?
Here's a boiling lake—you stand on the brink—
Do you wish to be stewed down? or will you drink?"
The saint he was filled with such dismay,
He could not speak, and he could not pray.
The carrion vulture was over his head,
And under his feet were the bones of the dead;
And human skeletons round were lain,
And one of them turned, as it were, in pain.
But when the sign of the cross he made,
His courage came ; he spoke, and said—
"I bless the living, I bless the dead;
A curse upon thee! and I curse the head.
I curse the hill, and I curse the strand—
I curse the ground whereon I stand.
Nor flowers nor fruit this earth shall bear;
But all shall be dark, and waste, and bare!
Nor shall the ground give footing dry
To beasts that walk, or birds that fly;
But a poisonous stream shall run to the sea,
Bitter to taste, and bloody to see;
And the earth it shall crumble and crumble away,
And crumble on till the judgment day."
He spoke, and a mist came over his eye—
He saw not the land, and he saw not the sky.
But when the mist had rolled away,
The earth looked black, and the rocks looked gray;
At his feet there flowed a blood-stained rill,
And bleak and lonely stood the hill.
