"The flowers gave her their friendship;
Her couch was on the ground.
A happier, gayer maiden,
Was nowhere to be found.
"The air was filled with music
Sung by the babbling brook.
Sweet lullabies with chorus clear
In which the flowers partook.
"This maiden knew not sorrow,
Until an evil day;
When riding lone across the moors,
A hunter lost his way.
"And chancing on this valley,
He met the maiden sweet.
Her beauty overwhelmed him;
He fell love-sick at her feet.
"Despite the fervent warnings
Of her friends the flowers and trees,
She listened to his courting;
And with him roamed the leas.
"The leas, far from the valley,
They rode the livelong night;
Till a heavy mist descending
Hid the roadway from their sight.
"Uprose, then, forms of evil.
From out the mocking gloom;
And seizing horse and hunter scared,
Left the maiden to her doom.
"Travellers now within those regions,
Through the nightly grey fog see
A woman's shade crawl slow along,
To a ghastly melody.
"And those who linger--follow
The phantom pale and wan.
O'er hill and dale, and rill and vale
It slowly leads them on.
"On till they reach the valley,
A valley grim and drear,
Where lurid things with fibrous arms
Their course through darkness steer.
"And on the travellers palsied
In frenzied crowd they pour.
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