By worn-out fields they cantered on—­
  Drear fields amid the woodlands wide;
By cross-roads of some olden time,
In which grew groves; by gate-stones down—­
  Grassed ruins of secluded pride: 
    A strange lone land, long past the prime,
    Fit land for Mosby or for crime.

The brook in the dell they pass.  One peers
  Between the leaves:  “Ay, there’s the place—­
There, on the oozy ledge—­’twas there
We found the body (Blake’s you know);
  Such whirlings, gurglings round the face—­
    Shot drinking!  Well, in war all’s fair—­
    So Mosby says.  The bough—­take care!”

Hard by, a chapel.  Flower-pot mould
  Danked and decayed the shaded roof;
The porch was punk; the clapboards spanned
With ruffled lichens gray or green;
  Red coral-moss was not aloof;
    And mid dry leaves green dead-man’s-hand
    Groped toward that chapel in Mosby-land.

They leave the road and take the wood,
  And mark the trace of ridges there—­
A wood where once had slept the farm—­
A wood where once tobacco grew
  Drowsily in the hazy air,
    And wrought in all kind things a calm—­
    Such influence, Mosby! bids disarm.

To ease even yet the place did woo—­
  To ease which pines unstirring share,
For ease the weary horses sighed: 
Halting, and slackening girths, they feed,
  Their pipes they light, they loiter there;
    Then up, and urging still the Guide,
    On, and after Mosby ride.

This Guide in frowzy coat of brown,
  And beard of ancient growth and mould,
Bestrode a bony steed and strong,
As suited well with bulk he bore—­
  A wheezy man with depth of hold
    Who jouncing went.  A staff he swung—­
    A wight whom Mosby’s wasp had stung.

Burnt out and homeless—­hunted long! 
  That wheeze he caught in autumn-wood
Crouching (a fat man) for his life,
And spied his lean son ’mong the crew
  That probed the covert.  Ah! black blood
    Was his ’gainst even child and wife—­
    Fast friends to Mosby.  Such the strife.

A lad, unhorsed by sliding girths,
  Strains hard to readjust his seat
Ere the main body show the gap
’Twixt them and the read-guard; scrub-oaks near
  He sidelong eyes, while hands move fleet;
    Then mounts and spurs.  One drop his cap—­
    “Let Mosby fine!” nor heeds mishap.

A gable time-stained peeps through trees: 
  “You mind the fight in the haunted house? 
That’s it; we clenched them in the room—­
An ambuscade of ghosts, we thought,
  But proved sly rebels on a house! 
    Luke lies in the yard.”  The chimneys loom: 
    Some muse on Mosby—­some on doom.

Less nimbly now through brakes they wind,
  And ford wild creeks where men have drowned;
They skirt the pool, a void the fen,
And so till night, when down they lie,
  They steeds still saddled, in wooded ground: 
    Rein in hand they slumber then,
    Dreaming of Mosby’s cedarn den.