The Buccaneer - A Tale

After he had been conveyed to another chamber, the physician ordered

restoratives and immediate bleeding;--but time did more than the leech's

art; and the first wish he formed was, that he might once more wend his

way to the Isle of Shepey, and gaze again, and for the last time, upon

the form of her he loved.

Once aroused from his torpor, the means of effecting his escape was the

first thing he considered. He had been removed to one of the lower

rooms, and his apartment could not be termed a prison, though the door

was fastened on the outer side--for the window was not more than ten

feet from the ground, and unbolted; it looked out into the garden, and

the sentinel placed beside that portion of the building had a longer

range than was usually allotted to the palace guard. Robin soon observed

that the lawn beneath was planted with rich clusters of young trees. The

hour for evening prayer had arrived; so that the household would be most

probably engaged, and the garden free from visitors. He looked from the

window; it was one of the loveliest days of summer--a day that at any

other time he would have welcomed with all the enthusiasm of a true

lover of nature; so warm the air, so sweet the flowers, so silently

flitted the small insects, as if dreading to disturb the repose of the

sunbeams that slept on the green turf. Nothing could be more unlike the

vicinity of a court; the very sentry seemed to tread it as hallowed

ground--his step was scarcely heard along the soft grass.

Robin did not attempt to assume any disguise.

"I shall walk boldly when I get out of the garden," he thought, "and if

I am taken before Cromwell, I will say why I desire liberty; I only wish

to see her once more, and then farewell to all! the red cross against my

name, in Oliver's dark book, may be dyed still redder--in my heart's

blood!"

Although his arm was stiff from the bleeding he had undergone but an

hour before, he watched till the soldier's back was turned, and dropped

from the window. He had scarcely time to conceal himself beneath a row

of evergreens when the sentinel turned on his path. Robin crept on, from

tuft to tuft--now under the shadow of a tree--now under that of a

turret, until he found himself close to a high wall which flanked the

side next the river; and then he became sorely perplexed as to the

method of his further escape. To the right was a gate which, from its

position, he judged led into one of the outer courts, and,

notwithstanding his first resolve of braving his way, habit and

consideration induced him to prefer the track least frequented or

attended with risk. At the extremity of the wall, where it turned at a

right angle to afford an opening for a gateway, grew an immense

yew-tree, solitary and alone, like some dark and malignant giant,

stretching out its arms to battle with centuries and storms; softened by

no shadow, cheered by no sunbeam, enlivened by no shower, no herb or

flower flourished beneath its ban, but there it towered, like the

spirit of evil in a smiling world. The wall, too, was overgrown with

ivy--the broad ivy, whose spreading leaves hide every little stem that

clasps the bosom of the hard stone, and, with most cunning wisdom,

extracts sustenance from all it touches. Robin's keen eye scanned well

every nook and corner, and he then mounted the tree, conceiving he

might, with little difficulty, descend on the other side, as he

perceived that the branches bent over the wall. He had hardly reached

midway, when a voice, whose tones he well remembered, fell upon his ear,

and for a moment called back his thoughts from their sad and distant

wanderings. He paused: the sound was not from the garden, nor the roof.

After much scrutiny, he discovered a small aperture of about a foot

square, that was originally a window, but latterly had been choked by

the matted ivy which overspread its bars. The voice was as of one who

has tasted the weariness of life, and would fain put away the cup that

was all bitterness. It sung, but the song was more a murmur than a lay,

sorrowful as the winter's wind that roams through the long and

clustering grass in some old churchyard, telling,-"Of blighted hopes and prospects shaded,

Of buried hopes remember'd well,

Of ardor quench'd, and honour faded."