196 &|)e Barton's 



His horns, as they touched me softly, felt 

 Like icicles to my flesh. 



" I rushed through the water across the brook, 



And high on the shelving shore 

 I stopped and ventured to turn and look, 

 In hope to see him no more. 



44 He walked in my wake on the top of the flood, 



And followed me up the bank ! 

 A blast from his nostrils froze my blood ! 

 My spirit within me sank ! 



** I hid in the reeds, O mother dear, 



But swift as a whiff of air 

 He followed me there ! he followed me here !- - 

 He follows me everywhere ! 



" Oh, frown at him, frighten him, drive him away ! 



He's coming in at the door ! " 

 And down fell the lad in a swoon, and lay 

 At his mother's feet on the floor. 



The mother looked round her, dazed and dumb, 



She saw but the empty air, 

 Yet knew if the Phantom Ox had come, 



The shadow of Death was there. 



She caught the pallid boy to her breast, 



And pillowed him on his bed ; 

 The white-eyed moon kept watch in the west ; 



The beautiful child lay dead ! * 



* Theodore Tilton, " Swabian Stories." 



