delightful.”
“Aren’t you glad you’ve come?”
“Yes, aren’t you?”
“Yes. Which way shall we go?”
“Oh, away and away and away, through the forests and fens, through the woods and the wilds, on and on and on.”
“I say,” said Leonard, after a pause, “it would be a good thing to give Don quite a deal of his own way, and if he wants particularly to go along any road, just to let him go.”
“O yes, that will be such fun. I’m so happy, hungry. I feel it coming on now.”
“Well, by-and-bye we’ll dine. Agnes made such a splendid pie; it will last us quite two days.”
At noon they found themselves in a dark pine wood, the bare stems of the trees looking like the pillars supporting the roof of some majestic cavern. Here they stopped and unlimbered, because there was a little stream where Don and the deerhound could drink, besides nice, long, green grass for the donkey.
They had a portion of the pie for dinner, and it was more delicious, they thought, than anything they had ever eaten. So thought Ossian. But of course hunger is sweet sauce.
Then they tied Don to the wheel of the cart, and hand in hand went off to cull wild flowers. They gathered quite a garland, and put this round Don’s neck on their return, then turned him loose again to eat for an hour, while Leonard took a volume from a little book-shelf, and read to Effie a few chapters of a beautiful tale.
But the sun began to decline in the west, so they now put Don to, and off they went once more.
They came to cross roads soon, and as Don evinced a desire to turn to the right, they allowed him to do so.
The sun sank, and set at last, and they hurried on more quickly now, for though they intended to sleep in the caravan, still they wanted to be near a house. But gloaming fell, and the wood grew deeper and darker, so at last Leonard, telling his sister not to be frightened, drew in off the road, so that the caravan was closely hidden among spruce trees.
There was light enough, and no more, to gather grass for Don, who was tied fast to the branch of a tree. Ossian was fastened to the axle so that he might keep guard over all, and Leonard and Effie prepared for bed, determined to get up as soon as it was sunrise.
This being their first night out, and the place being so lonesome and drear, they were afraid to have a light, lest it might attract evil-disposed persons to the caravan, although it was all forest land around them.
They were sitting quietly talking over the events of the day, when suddenly the voices of people chanting a hymn fell on their ears, and made them quake with dread.
“Who can it be?” whispered Effie, clinging to her brother.
“They cannot be bad people,” he said boldly, “singing a hymn; bad people do not sing hymns. I will go and see. I’ll take Ossian with me.”
“And I, too, will go,” cried Effie. So hand in hand, with the faithful dog by their side, and guided by the solemn song that rose on the night air at intervals, they walked slowly onwards through the wood.
All at once, on rounding a spruce thicket, the light of a fire gleamed over their faces and figures. They would have retreated, for they had come to see, not to be seen; but from a group of wild-looking men and women who were gathered round the log fire in this clearing, a little gipsy girl not bigger than Effie sprang up and rushed towards them.
She was bare-footed and bare-legged, and her black eyes sparkled like diamonds in the firelight. Round her head and shoulders she wore a ragged little tartan shawl.
“Walk gently,” she whispered, or rather hissed. “Hush, hush! do not speak. Granny is dying.”
She took Leonard’s half-unwilling hand as she spoke, and led them forward to the light.
There was silence for a little while, for all eyes were turned upon the new-comers.
Gipsies all undoubtedly, and of the very lowest caste, dark, swarthy, ragged, and wild-looking.
Lying with her head in the lap of a tall woman was an aged crone, her face almost as black as a negro’s with age and exposure.
The fire blazed higher, its gleams reaching to the highest pine trees, and lighting up the faces of all around.
It was a strange, a weird scene, almost awful in its impressiveness. Once again the voices rose and swelled on the night air. Even bold Leonard felt his heart beat faster, while Effie’s hand trembled in his.
Book One – Chapter Five
Strange Adventures in Wood and Wild
“How sweet it is when mother fancy rocks
The wayward brain, to saunter through a wood;
An old place full of many a lovely brook,
Tall trees, green arbours, and ground flowers in flocks.”
Scene: Still in the forest around the log fire, but the dying gipsy has raised herself to nearly a sitting position, her dim and hollow eyes are fixed on Leonard, and she beckons him to her side. As if under a strange spell, the boy obeys, leaving Effie kneeling by Ossian, and clasping his great neck in her terror.
“Fear not,” the gipsy gasps, “I knew – your – father. And his father. Kind, kind to me and mine were both.”
She took Leonard’s little white hand in her dark claws, and opened its palm towards the firelight. “Never – never – will old Nell Bayne read another fortune. But look; that line will lead you far ayont the seas. You are born to wander, born to roam over the ocean, by mountain, stream, and plain. Yet list! the water is not made to drown you, nor hemp nor lead to take your life, yet list! again, —
“When dead yon lordly pike shall float,
While loud and hoarse the ravens call,
Then grief and woe shall be thy lot,
Glen Lyle’s house must fall.”
The aged crone dropped the hand she held, and sunk back into the arms of her nurse, while the other gipsies, with scared faces, gathered closer round and knelt beside her.
Neither Leonard nor Effie saw nor heard anything more. They fled away from the firelight out into the darkness of the woods, which they much preferred to the solemn scene they had just witnessed.
They walked in the direction, as they thought, of their caravan, but after a while Ossian, whom Effie held by the collar, stopped short, and then began pulling them in quite another direction. The noble dog knew the road though they did not.
They were soon back now at their house-on-wheels. It was a gloomy night’s experience, but they slept none the less soundly, and when they awoke in the morning Leonard felt as happy as if he were king of Elfinland, and Effie his little queen. The sun was shining in a sky of unusual brightness, and the woods all around were musical with the songs of a thousand joyous birds.
Leonard made a fire of sticks, and boiled his kettle in true gipsy fashion, and after everybody, including Don and Ossian, had enjoyed breakfast, away they went again.
The
