e ride.
But now I see you've both served in the Lancers,
Though on my word you look much more like dancers."

To which John answer'd, "Oh, the filthy fellow,
I gave him letters to you, which he said
He would deliver, were you ill or well. Oh!
How I should like to knock him on the head,
And would, but that would show I was quite mellow--
Besides, I see the coward has just fled,
Has ta'en to horse, and got across the ford--
Hang him, that I should with him be so bored!"

But Jeannie said, "John, thou shall do no murder."
To which he answer'd, "I will not do so;"
Then bounded off as though he had not heard her,
And reached a fording-place, but not so low
As where Groze cross'd, and who had now got further
Than John would have thought possible, although
He'd a good-horse, and nearly half an hour
In start--but now the clouds began to lower.

Now Fitzadree's good charger was all mettle,
And soon won to the middle of the stream--
But then the sky grew black as a tea kettle;
It rained, too, quite as fast as ever steam
Rose. But the thing which did at last unsettle
The balance of John's steed, was what you'll deem
A being that was nearly supernatural--
But here the waves John's clothes began to spatter all.

A form rose up from out the waves' abyss--
A monstrous little man with a black hide,
Scarce four feet high, yet he was not remiss,
But dash'd the waves about--and then he cried,
With a demoniac laugh, or rather hiss,
"Die, mortal, die!" and John sank down and died,
The which, when Jeannie saw, she only sigh'd,
"I come, my John, I come, to be thy bride."

The figure was the Kelpie--that she knew,
And madly she rush'd on towards the shore;
The Kelpie roar'd, "Come, mortal, come thou too."
Ere he'd done speaking, Jeannie was no more;
She'd dash'd into the waves, and left no clue,
More than a steamer leaves just left the Nore,
By which you might discover where she lay,
And drag her upwards to the realms of day.

But what befel the cause of all these woes?
That's what I never heard, so cannot tell;
But this I know, that this same Richard Groze
Return'd no more to bonnie Scotland. Well,
I only hope he may in bed repose,
And that he may at last escape from hell.
And this I know, that if you do not smother
This poem, when I choose I'll write another.