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The Voice Of Ocean
Madison Julius Cawein
A cry went through the darkness; and the moon, Hurrying through storm, gazed with a ghastly face, Then cloaked herself in scud: the merman race Of surges ceased; and then th' Aeolian croon Of the wild siren, Wind, within the shrouds Sunk to a sigh. The ocean in that place Seemed listening; haunted, for a moment's space, By something dread that cried against the clouds. Mystery and night; and with them fog and rain: And then that cry again as if the deep Uttered its loneliness in one dark word: Her horror of herself; her Titan pain; Her monsters; and the dead that she must keep, Has kept, alone, for centuries, unheard.
The Cock And The Pearl.
Jean de La Fontaine
[1] A cock scratch'd up, one day, A pearl of purest ray, Which to a jeweller he bore. 'I think it fine,' he said, 'But yet a crumb of bread To me were worth a great deal more.' So did a dunce inherit A manuscript of merit, Which to a publisher he bore. ''Tis good,' said he, 'I'm told, Yet any coin of gold To me were worth a great deal more.'
Life
Paul Laurence Dunbar
A crust of bread and a corner to sleep in, A minute to smile and an hour to weep in, A pint of joy to a peck of trouble, And never a laugh but the moans come double; And that is life! A crust and a corner that love makes precious, With a smile to warm and the tears to refresh us; And joy seems sweeter when cares come after, And a moan is the finest of foils for laughter; And that is life!
The Countryman Who Sought His Calf
Jean de La Fontaine
A COUNTRYMAN, one day, his calf had lost, And, seeking it, a neighbouring forest crossed; The tallest tree that in the district grew, He climbed to get a more extensive view. Just then a lady with her lover came; The place was pleasing, both to spark and dame; Their mutual wishes, looks and eyes expressed, And on the grass the lady was caressed. At sights of charms, enchanting to the eyes, The gay gallant exclaimed, with fond surprise: - Ye gods, what striking beauties now I see! No objects named; but spoke with anxious glee. The clod, who, on the tree had mounted high, And heard at ease the conversation nigh, Now cried: - Good man! who see with such delight; Pray tell me if my calf be in your sight?
A Man Young And Old:- The Empty Cup
William Butler Yeats
A crazy man that found a cup, When all but dead of thirst, Hardly dared to wet his mouth Imagining, moon-accursed, That another mouthful And his beating heart would burst. October last I found it too But found it dry as bone, And for that reason am I crazed And my sleep is gone.
Three Seasons
Christina Georgina Rossetti
'A cup for hope!' she said, In springtime ere the bloom was old: The crimson wine was poor and cold By her mouth's richer red. 'A cup for love!' how low, How soft the words; and all the while Her blush was rippling with a smile Like summer after snow. 'A cup for memory!' Cold cup that one must drain alone: While autumn winds are up and moan Across the barren sea. Hope, memory, love: Hope for fair morn, and love for day, And memory for the evening grey And solitary dove.
First Sight Of Her And After
Thomas Hardy
A day is drawing to its fall I had not dreamed to see; The first of many to enthrall My spirit, will it be? Or is this eve the end of all Such new delight for me? I journey home: the pattern grows Of moonshades on the way: "Soon the first quarter, I suppose," Sky-glancing travellers say; I realize that it, for those, Has been a common day.
A Curse for Kings
Vachel Lindsay
A curse upon each king who leads his state, No matter what his plea, to this foul game, And may it end his wicked dynasty, And may he die in exile and black shame. If there is vengeance in the Heaven of Heavens, What punishment could Heaven devise for these Who fill the rivers of the world with dead, And turn their murderers loose on all the seas! Put back the clock of time a thousand years, And make our Europe, once the world's proud Queen, A shrieking strumpet, furious fratricide, Eater of entrails, wallowing obscene In pits where millions foam and rave and bark, Mad dogs and idiots, thrice drunk with strife; While Science towers above; - a witch, red-winged: Science we looked to for the light of life. Curse me the men who make and sell iron ships, Who walk the floor in thought, that they may find Each powder prompt, each steel with fearful edge, Each deadliest device against mankind. Curse me the sleek lords with their plumes and spurs, May Heaven give their land to peasant spades, Give them the brand of Cain, for their pride's sake, And felon's stripes for medals and for braids. Curse me the fiddling, twiddling diplomats, Haggling here, plotting and hatching there, Who make the kind world but their game of cards, Till millions die at turning of a hair. What punishment will Heaven devise for these Who win by others' sweat and hardihood, Who make men into stinking vultures' meat, Saying to evil still "Be thou my good"? Ah, he who starts a million souls toward death Should burn in utmost hell a million years! - Mothers of men go on the destined wrack To give them life, with anguish and with tears: - Are all those childbed sorrows sneered away? Yea, fools laugh at the humble christenings, And cradle-joys are mocked of the fat lords: These mothers' sons made dead men for the Kings! All in the name of this or that grim flag, No angel-flags in all the rag-array - Banners the demons love, and all Hell sings And plays wild harps.    Those flags march forth to-day!
The Cobbler And The Financier.
Jean de La Fontaine
A cobbler sang from morn till night; 'Twas sweet and marvellous to hear, His trills and quavers told the ear Of more contentment and delight, Enjoy'd by that laborious wight Than e'er enjoy'd the sages seven, Or any mortals short of heaven. His neighbour, on the other hand, With gold in plenty at command, But little sang, and slumber'd less - A financier of great success. If e'er he dozed, at break of day, The cobbler's song drove sleep away; And much he wish'd that Heaven had made Sleep a commodity of trade, In market sold, like food and drink, So much an hour, so much a wink. At last, our songster did he call To meet him in his princely hall. Said he, 'Now, honest Gregory, What may your yearly earnings be?' 'My yearly earnings! faith, good sir, I never go, at once, so far,' The cheerful cobbler said, And queerly scratch'd his head, - 'I never reckon in that way, But cobble on from day to day, Content with daily bread.' 'Indeed! Well, Gregory, pray, What may your earnings be per day?' 'Why, sometimes more and sometimes less. The worst of all, I must confess, (And but for which our gains would be A pretty sight, indeed, to see,) Is that the days are made so many In which we cannot earn a penny - The sorest ill the poor man feels: They tread upon each other's heels, Those idle days of holy saints! And though the year is shingled o'er, The parson keeps a-finding more!'[1] With smiles provoked by these complaints, Replied the lordly financier, 'I'll give you better cause to sing. These hundred pounds I hand you here Will make you happy as a king. Go, spend them with a frugal heed; They'll long supply your every need.' The cobbler thought the silver more Than he had ever dream'd before, The mines for ages could produce, Or world, with all its people, use. He took it home, and there did hide - And with it laid his joy aside. No more of song, no more of sleep, But cares, suspicions in their stead, And false alarms, by fancy fed. His eyes and ears their vigils keep, And not a cat can tread the floor But seems a thief slipp'd through the door. At last, poor man! Up to the financier he ran, - Then in his morning nap profound: 'O, give me back my songs,' cried he, 'And sleep, that used so sweet to be, And take the money, every pound!'
The Rat And The Oyster
Jean de La Fontaine
[1] A country rat, of little brains, Grown weary of inglorious rest, Left home with all its straws and grains, Resolved to know beyond his nest. When peeping through the nearest fence, 'How big the world is, how immense!' He cried; 'there rise the Alps, and that Is doubtless famous Ararat.' His mountains were the works of moles, Or dirt thrown up in digging holes! Some days of travel brought him where The tide had left the oysters bare. Since here our traveller saw the sea, He thought these shells the ships must be. 'My father was, in truth,' said he, 'A coward, and an ignoramus; He dared not travel: as for me, I've seen the ships and ocean famous; Have cross'd the deserts without drinking, And many dangerous streams unshrinking; Such things I know from having seen and felt them.' And, as he went, in tales he proudly dealt them, Not being of those rats whose knowledge Comes by their teeth on books in college. Among the shut-up shell-fish, one Was gaping widely at the sun; It breathed, and drank the air's perfume, Expanding, like a flower in bloom. Both white and fat, its meat Appear'd a dainty treat. Our rat, when he this shell espied, Thought for his stomach to provide. 'If not mistaken in the matter,' Said he, 'no meat was ever fatter, Or in its flavour half so fine, As that on which to-day I dine.' Thus full of hope, the foolish chap Thrust in his head to taste, And felt the pinching of a trap - The oyster closed in haste. We're first instructed, by this case, That those to whom the world is new Are wonder-struck at every view; And, in the second place, That the marauder finds his match, And he is caught who thinks to catch.
August.
James Whitcomb Riley
A day of torpor in the sullen heat Of Summer's passion: In the sluggish stream The panting cattle lave their lazy feet, With drowsy eyes, and dream. Long since the winds have died, and in the sky There lives no cloud to hint of Nature's grief; The sun glares ever like an evil eye, And withers flower and leaf. Upon the gleaming harvest-field remote The thresher lies deserted, like some old Dismantled galleon that hangs afloat Upon a sea of gold. The yearning cry of some bewildered bird Above an empty nest, and truant boys Along the river's shady margin heard - A harmony of noise - A melody of wrangling voices blent With liquid laughter, and with rippling calls Of piping lips and trilling echoes sent To mimic waterfalls. And through the hazy veil the atmosphere Has draped about the gleaming face of Day, The sifted glances of the sun appear In splinterings of spray. The dusty highway, like a cloud of dawn, Trails o'er the hillside, and the passer-by, A tired ghost in misty shroud, toils on His journey to the sky. And down across the valley's drooping sweep, Withdrawn to farthest limit of the glade, The forest stands in silence, drinking deep Its purple wine of shade. The gossamer floats up on phantom wing; The sailor-vision voyages the skies And carries into chaos everything That freights the weary eyes: Till, throbbing on and on, the pulse of heat Increases - reaches - passes fever's height, And Day sinks into slumber, cool and sweet, Within the arms of Night.
To England at the Outbreak of the Balkan War
Alan Seeger
A cloud has lowered that shall not soon pass o'er. The world takes sides: whether for impious aims With Tyranny whose bloody toll enflames A generous people to heroic war; Whether with Freedom, stretched in her own gore, Whose pleading hands and suppliant distress Still offer hearts that thirst for Righteousness A glorious cause to strike or perish for. England, which side is thine? Thou hast had sons Would shrink not from the choice however grim, Were Justice trampled on and Courage downed; Which will they be - cravens or champions? Oh, if a doubt intrude, remember him Whose death made Missolonghi holy ground.
The Curate And The Corpse.
Jean de La Fontaine
A dead man going slowly, sadly, To occupy his last abode, A curate by him, rather gladly, Did holy service on the road. Within a coach the dead was borne, A robe around him duly worn, Of which I wot he was not proud - That ghostly garment call'd a shroud. In summer's blaze and winter's blast, That robe is changeless - 'tis the last. The curate, with his priestly dress on, Recited all the church's prayers, The psalm, the verse, response, and lesson, In fullest style of such affairs. Sir Corpse, we beg you, do not fear A lack of such things on your bier; They'll give abundance every way, Provided only that you pay. The Reverend John Cabbagepate Watch'd o'er the corpse as if it were A treasure needing guardian care; And all the while, his looks elate, This language seem'd to hold: 'The dead will pay so much in gold, So much in lights of molten wax, So much in other sorts of tax:' With all he hoped to buy a cask of wine, The best which thereabouts produced the vine. A pretty niece, on whom he doted, And eke his chambermaid, should be promoted, By being newly petticoated. The coach upset, and dash'd to pieces, Cut short these thoughts of wine and nieces! There lay poor John with broken head, Beneath the coffin of the dead! His rich, parishioner in lead Drew on the priest the doom Of riding with him to the tomb! The Pot of Milk,[2] and fate Of Curate Cabbagepate, As emblems, do but give The history of most that live.
The Meeting Of The Centuries
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
A curious vision on mine eyes unfurled In the deep night.    I saw, or seemed to see, Two Centuries meet, and sit down vis-a-vis Across the great round table of the world: One with suggested sorrows in his mien, And on his brow the furrowed lines of thought; And one whose glad expectant presence brought A glow and radiance from the realms unseen. Hand clasped with hand, in silence for a space The Centuries sat; the sad old eyes of one (As grave paternal eyes regard a son) Gazing upon that other eager face. And then a voice, as cadenceless and gray As the sea's monody in winter time, Mingled with tones melodious, as the chime Of bird choirs, singing in the dawns of May. THE OLD CENTURY SPEAKS By you, Hope stands.    With me, Experience walks. Like a fair jewel in a faded box, In my tear-rusted heart, sweet Pity lies. For all the dreams that look forth from your eyes, And those bright-hued ambitions, which I know Must fall like leaves and perish, in Time's snow, (Even as my soul's garden stands bereft,) I give you pity! 'tis the one gift left. THE NEW CENTURY Nay, nay, good friend! not pity, but Godspeed, Here in the morning of my life I need. Counsel, and not condolence; smiles, not tears, To guide me through the channels of the years. Oh, I am blinded by the blaze of light That shines upon me from the Infinite. Blurred is my vision by the close approach To unseen shores, whereon the times encroach. THE OLD CENTURY Illusion, all illusion.    List and hear The Godless cannons, booming far and near. Flaunting the flag of Unbelief, with Greed For pilot, lo! the pirate age in speed Bears on to ruin.    War's most hideous crimes Besmirch the record of these modern times. Degenerate is the world I leave to you, - My happiest speech to earth will be - adieu. THE NEW CENTURY You speak as one too weary to be just. I hear the guns - I see the greed and lust. The death throes of a giant evil fill The air with riot and confusion.    Ill Ofttimes makes fallow ground for Good; and Wrong Builds Right's foundation, when it grows too strong. Pregnant with promise is the hour, and grand The trust you leave in my all-willing hand. THE OLD CENTURY As one who throws a flickering taper's ray To light departing feet, my shadowed way You brighten with your faith.    Faith makes the man Alas, that my poor foolish age outran Its early trust in God!    The death of art And progress follows, when the world's hard heart Casts out religion.    'Tis the human brain Men worship now, and heaven, to them, means - gain. THE NEW CENTURY Faith is not dead, tho' priest and creed may pass, For thought has leavened the whole unthinking mass, And man looks now to find the God within. We shall talk more of love, and less of sin, In this new era.    We are drawing near Unatlassed boundaries of a larger sphere. With awe, I wait, till Science leads us on, Into the full effulgence of its dawn.
A Session With Uncle Sidney - IV - And Makes Nursery Rhymes - 5 The Daring Prince
James Whitcomb Riley
A daring prince, of the realm Rangg Dhune, Once went up in a big balloon That caught and stuck on the horns of the moon, And he hung up there till next day noon - When all at once he exclaimed, "Hoot-toot!" And then came down in his parachute.
The Guardian Of The Red Disk.
Emma Lazarus
Spoken by a Citizen of Malta - 1300. A curious title held in high repute, One among many honors, thickly strewn On my lord Bishop's head, his grace of Malta. Nobly he bears them all, - with tact, skill, zeal, Fulfills each special office, vast or slight, Nor slurs the least minutia, - therewithal Wears such a stately aspect of command, Broad-checked, broad-chested, reverend, sanctified, Haloed with white about the tonsure's rim, With dropped lids o'er the piercing Spanish eyes (Lynx-keen, I warrant, to spy out heresy); Tall, massive form, o'ertowering all in presence, Or ere they kneel to kiss the large white hand. His looks sustain his deeds, - the perfect prelate, Whose void chair shall be taken, but not filled. You know not, who are foreign to the isle, Haply, what this Red Disk may be, he guards. 'T is the bright blotch, big as the Royal seal, Branded beneath the beard of every Jew. These vermin so infest the isle, so slide Into all byways, highways that may lead Direct or roundabout to wealth or power, Some plain, plump mark was needed, to protect From the degrading contact Christian folk. The evil had grown monstrous: certain Jews Wore such a haughty air, had so refined, With super-subtile arts, strict, monkish lives, And studious habit, the coarse Hebrew type, One might have elbowed in the public mart Iscariot, - nor suspected one's soul-peril. Christ's blood! it sets my flesh a-creep to think! We may breathe freely now, not fearing taint, Praise be our good Lord Bishop! He keeps count Of every Jew, and prints on cheek or chin The scarlet stamp of separateness, of shame. No beard, blue-black, grizzled or Judas-colored, May hide that damning little wafer-flame. When one appears therewith, the urchins know Good sport's at hand; they fling their stones and mud, Sure of their game. But most the wisdom shows Upon the unbelievers' selves; they learn Their proper rank; crouch, cringe, and hide, - lay by Their insolence of self-esteem; no more Flaunt forth in rich attire, but in dull weeds, Slovenly donned, would slink past unobserved; Bow servile necks and crook obsequious knees, Chin sunk in hollow chest, eyes fixed on earth Or blinking sidewise, but to apprehend Whether or not the hated spot be spied. I warrant my Lord Bishop has full hands, Guarding the Red Disk - lest one rogue escape!
Iago
Walter De La Mare
A dark lean face, a narrow, slanting eye, Whose deeps of blackness one pale taper's beam Haunts with a fitting madness of desire; A heart whose cinder at the breath of passion Glows to a momentary core of heat Almost beyond indifference to endure: So parched Iago frets his life away. His scorn works ever in a brain whose wit This world hath fools too many and gross to seek. Ever to live incredibly alone, Masked, shivering, deadly, with a simple Moor Of idiot gravity, and one pale flower Whose chill would quench in everlasting peace His soul's unmeasured flame - O paradox! Might he but learn the trick! - to wear her heart One fragile hour of heedless innocence, And then, farewell, and the incessant grave. "O fool! O villain!" - 'tis the shuttlecock Wit never leaves at rest. It is his fate To be a needle in a world of hay, Where honour is the flattery of the fool; Sin, a tame bauble; lies, a tiresome jest; Virtue, a silly, whitewashed block of wood For words to fell. Ah! but the secret lacking, The secret of the child, the bird, the night, Faded, flouted, bespattered, in days so far Hate cannot bitter them, nor wrath deny; Else were this Desdemona.... Why! Woman a harlot is, and life a nest Fouled by long ages of forked fools. And God - Iago deals not with a tale so dull: To have made the world! Fie on thee, Artisan!
A Death-Blow Is A Life-Blow To Some
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A death-blow is a life-blow to some Who, till they died, did not alive become; Who, had they lived, had died, but when They died, vitality begun.
The Countryman And The Serpent.
Jean de La Fontaine
[1] A countryman, as Aesop certifies, A charitable man, but not so wise, One day in winter found, Stretch'd on the snowy ground, A chill'd or frozen snake, As torpid as a stake, And, if alive, devoid of sense. He took him up, and bore him home, And, thinking not what recompense For such a charity would come, Before the fire stretch'd him, And back to being fetch'd him. The snake scarce felt the genial heat Before his heart with native malice beat. He raised his head, thrust out his fork'd tongue, Coil'd up, and at his benefactor sprung. 'Ungrateful wretch!' said he, 'is this the way My care and kindness you repay? Now you shall die.' With that his axe he takes, And with two blows three serpents makes. Trunk, head, and tail were separate snakes; And, leaping up with all their might, They vainly sought to reunite. 'Tis good and lovely to be kind; But charity should not be blind; For as to wretchedness ingrate, You cannot raise it from its wretched state.
At The Ford.
Theodore Harding Rand
I. A death-like dew was falling On the herbs and the grassy ground; The stars to their bournes prest forward, Night cloaked the hills around. He thought of a night long past, - Of the ladder that reached to heaven, The Face that shone above it, The pillar, his pillows of even. II. From out of the sleeve of the darkness Was thrust an arm of strength, - Long he wrestled for mastery, But begged for blessing at length. White fear fell on him at dawn, As the Nameless spake with him then; "Prevailer and Prince," called He him, "A power with God and with men." And, alone, the lame wrestler mused: "The Face of God is this place! Ah me - and my life is preserved, Yet God have I seen face to face!" III. Life's darkness is background for God, For unsleeping Love's high command, And the shadowy heap of each life Is revealed at the touch of His hand. And the arm of Love doth wrestle All night by the fords we cross, To shrivel our sinews of self And give His blessing for loss. Night shows the houses of heaven, O pilgrim for life's journey shod! And from out the sleeve of darkness Is thrust the arm of God.
On The Borders Of Cannock Chase.
Jean Ingelow
A cottager leaned whispering by her hives, Telling the bees some news, as they lit down, And entered one by one their waxen town. Larks passioning hung o'er their brooding wives, And all the sunny hills where heather thrives Lay satisfied with peace. A stately crown Of trees enringed the upper headland brown, And reedy pools, wherein the moor-hen dives, Glittered and gleamed. A resting-place for light, They that were bred here love it; but they say, "We shall not have it long; in three years' time A hundred pits will cast out fires by night, Down yon still glen their smoke shall trail its way, And the white ash lie thick in lieu of rime."
The Loafers' Club
Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton)
A club there is established here, whose name they say is Legion From Melbourne to the Billabong, they're known in every region. They do not like the cockatoos, but mostly stick to stations, Where they keep themselves from starving by cadging shepherds' rations. The rules and regulations, they're not difficult of learning, They are to live upon the cash which others have been earning. To never let a chance go by of being in a shout, sir, And if they see a slant to turn your pockets inside out, sir. They'll cadge your baccy, knife, and pipe, and tell a tale of sorrow Of how they cannot get a job, but mean to start to-morrow. But that to-morrow never comes, until they see quite plainly That it's completely up the spout with Messrs. Scrase and Ainley. If, feeling thirsty, you should go to take a little suction, I'll swear they'll not be long before they'll force an introduction. One knew you here, one knew you there, all love you like a brother, And if one plan will not succeed, they'll quickly try another. I knew one poor, unhappy wight, having a little ready, Entered a Smeaton public-house, determined to keep steady. A celebrated loafer there determined upon showing him That he once had the pleasure and the privilege of knowing him. Through hills and dales, by lakes and streams, he close pursued his victim, Until the miserable man confessed that be quite licked him. In vain the quarry tried to turn, pursuit was far too strong, sir, The loafer followed up the scent and earthed him in Geelong, sir. The noble art of lambing down they know in all its beauty, And if they do not squeeze you dry, they'll think they've failed in duty. But, truth to say, they seldom fail to do that duty neatly, And very few escape their hands who're not cleared out completely.
Storm On Lake Asquam
John Greenleaf Whittier
A cloud, like that the old-time Hebrew saw On Carmel prophesying rain, began To lift itself o'er wooded Cardigan, Growing and blackening. Suddenly, a flaw Of chill wind menaced; then a strong blast beat Down the long valley's murmuring pines, and woke The noon-dream of the sleeping lake, and broke Its smooth steel mirror at the mountains' feet. Thunderous and vast, a fire-veined darkness swept Over the rough pine-bearded Asquam range; A wraith of tempest, wonderful and strange, From peak to peak the cloudy giant stepped. One moment, as if challenging the storm, Chocorua's tall, defiant sentinel Looked from his watch-tower; then the shadow fell, And the wild rain-drift blotted out his form. And over all the still unhidden sun, Weaving its light through slant-blown veils of rain, Smiled on the trouble, as hope smiles on pain; And, when the tumult and the strife were done, With one foot on the lake and one on land, Framing within his crescent's tinted streak A far-off picture of the Melvin peak, Spent broken clouds the rainbow's angel spanned.
An Inscription
Ambrose Bierce
A conqueror as provident as brave, He robbed the cradle to supply the grave. His reign laid quantities of human dust: He fell upon the just and the unjust.
The Dog In The Manger
Walter Crane
A Cow sought a mouthful of hay; But a Dog in the manger there lay, And he snapped out "how now?" When most mildly, the Cow Adventured a morsel to pray. Don't Be Selfish
A Starry Night
Paul Laurence Dunbar
A cloud fell down from the heavens, And broke on the mountain's brow; It scattered the dusky fragments All over the vale below. The moon and the stars were anxious To know what its fate might be; So they rushed to the azure op'ning, And all peered down to see.
Surview
Thomas Hardy
"Cogitavi vias meas" A cry from the green-grained sticks of the fire Made me gaze where it seemed to be: 'Twas my own voice talking therefrom to me On how I had walked when my sun was higher - My heart in its arrogancy. "You held not to whatsoever was true," Said my own voice talking to me: "Whatsoever was just you were slack to see; Kept not things lovely and pure in view," Said my own voice talking to me. "You slighted her that endureth all," Said my own voice talking to me; "Vaunteth not, trusteth hopefully; That suffereth long and is kind withal," Said my own voice talking to me. "You taught not that which you set about," Said my own voice talking to me; "That the greatest of things is Charity. . . " - And the sticks burnt low, and the fire went out, And my voice ceased talking to me.
Crabbed.
Edwin C. Ranck
A college professor one day Was fishing in Chesapeake Bay; Said a crab to his mate, "Let's kick off the bait, This business is too old to pay."
Black Bonnet
Henry Lawson
A day of seeming innocence, A glorious sun and sky, And, just above my picket fence, Black Bonnet passing by. In knitted gloves and quaint old dress, Without a spot or smirch, Her worn face lit with peacefulness, Old Granny goes to church. Her hair is richly white, like milk, That long ago was fair, And glossy still the old black silk She keeps for "chapel wear"; Her bonnet, of a bygone style, That long has passed away, She must have kept a weary while Just as it is to-day. The parasol of days gone by, Old days that seemed the best, The hymn and prayer books carried high Against her warm, thin breast; As she had clasped, come smiles come tears, Come hardship, aye, and worse, On market days, through faded years, The slender household purse. Although the road is rough and steep, She takes it with a will, For, since she hushed her first to sleep Her way has been uphill. Instinctively I bare my head (A sinful one, alas!) Whene'er I see, by church bells led, Brave Old Black Bonnet pass. For she has known the cold and heat And dangers of the Track: Has fought bush-fires to save the wheat And little home Out Back. By barren creeks the Bushman loves, By stockyard, hut, and pen, The withered hands in those old gloves Have done the work of men. - - - - - - - - They called it "Service" long ago When Granny yet was young, And in the chapel, sweet and low, As girls her daughters sung. And when in church she bends her head (But not as others do) She sees her loved ones, and her dead And hears their voices too. Fair as the Saxons in her youth, Not forward, and not shy; And strong in healthy life and truth As after years went by: She often laughed with sinners vain, Yet passed from faith to sight, God gave her beauty back again The more her hair grew white. She came out in the Early Days, (Green seas, and blue, and grey), The village fair, and English ways, Seemed worlds and worlds away. She fought the haunting loneliness Where brooding gum trees stood; And won through sickness and distress As Englishwomen could. - - - - - - - - By verdant swath and ivied wall The congregation's seen, White nothings where the shadows fall, Black blots against the green. The dull, suburban people meet And buzz in little groups, While down the white steps to the street A quaint old figure stoops. And then along my picket fence Where staring wallflowers grow, World-wise Old Age, and Common-sense!, Black Bonnet, nodding slow. But not alone; for on each side A little dot attends In snowy frock and sash of pride, And these are Granny's friends. To them her mind is clear and bright, Her old ideas are new; They know her "real talk" is right, Her "fairy talk" is true. And they converse as grown-ups may, When all the news is told; The one so wisely young to-day, The two so wisely old. At home, with dinner waiting there, She smooths her hair and face, And puts her bonnet by with care And dons a cap of lace. The table minds its p's and q's Lest one perchance be hit By some rare dart which is a part Of her old-fashioned wit. - - - - - - - - Her son and son's wife are asleep, She puts her apron on, The quiet house is hers to keep, With all the youngsters gone. There's scarce a sound of dish on dish Or cup slipped into cup, When left alone, as is her wish, Black Bonnet "washes up."
Where
Paul Cameron Brown
A dark, shadow grey moth rests along the grim hue of brick, its spattered orange cream underwings scream a Halloween defiance to the bleariness of stone and city. And before each fold of its wings, there rests beyond all the pale fire and din of a thousand slow eyed empires, feeling the seethe of their existence spent in a fidgeting cauldron where mediocrity camps with her dangerous throne.
Upon Love (2)
Robert Herrick
A crystal vial Cupid brought, Which had a juice in it: Of which who drank, he said, no thought Of Love he should admit. I, greedy of the prize, did drink, And emptied soon the glass; Which burnt me so, that I do think The fire of hell it was. Give me my earthen cups again, The crystal I contemn, Which, though enchased with pearls, contain A deadly draught in them. And thou, O Cupid!    come not to My threshold, since I see, For all I have, or else can do, Thou still wilt cozen me.
The River Duddon - A Series Of Sonnets, 1820. - XVII - A Dark Plume Fetch Me From Yon Blasted Yew
William Wordsworth
A dark plume fetch me from yon blasted yew, Perched on whose top the Danish Raven croaks; Aloft, the imperial Bird of Rome invokes Departed ages, shedding where he flew Loose fragments of wild wailing, that bestrew The clouds and thrill the chambers of the rocks; And into silence hush the timorous flocks, That, calmly couching while the nightly dew Moistened each fleece, beneath the twinkling stars Slept amid that lone Camp on Hardknot's height, Whose Guardians bent the knee to Jove and Mars: Or, near that mystic Round of Druid frame Tardily sinking by its proper weight Deep into patient Earth, from whose smooth breast it came!
Deed.
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A deed knocks first at thought, And then it knocks at will. That is the manufacturing spot, And will at home and well. It then goes out an act, Or is entombed so still That only to the ear of God Its doom is audible.
The Story Of Rudra.
Ramakrishna, T.
A deep calm sea; on the blue waters toiled, From morn till eve, the simple fishermen; And, on the beach, there stood a group of huts Before whose gates old men sat mending nets And eyed with secret joy the little boys That gaily gambolled on the sandy beach Regardless of their parents' daily toils. And all the busy women left their homes And their young ones with baskets on their heads Filled with the finny treasures of the deep. A thousand yards to landward rose a town With its broad streets, high roofs, and busy marts. An ancient temple in the centre stood, Where to his servant Nandi once appeared Great Siva, it is said, in human frame. E'en learned saints sang of the holy shrine; And to this sacred spot from far-off lands For adoration countless pilgrims came And men to buy all rarest things that poured Into her busy marts from foreign parts. Here in this ancient port of Nundipore In royal splendour lived a merchant youth, Who scarce had reached his one-and-twentieth year. His aged father had but lately died And left him the sole heir of all his wealth. And Rudra - for that was the brave youth's name - Had heard from infant days full many tales Of how his grandsire and his sire had braved The perils of the deep in search of gold, And in his bosom fondly nurtured hopes To travel likewise on the dang'rous sea. And oft would he to Rati, his fair wife, Exulting tell how wisely he would trade In foreign shores and with rare gems return; How even princes, by those gems allured, To court his friendship come from distant lands, And he dictate his own high terms to them, And thus add glory to his glorious house. And often would she vainly plead in turn Her desolate position and her youth. And her dear lord implore upon her knees For ever to dismiss his cherished thoughts And turn to her and to their lordly wealth Which God had given them, to live in peace. Thus wrangled for some months the timid wife And he whom woman's charms could not subdue Until at last arrived th' appointed day. The little ship was waiting in the port, And Rudra to his youthful wife repaired His purpose to disclose; and as at times Clouds hover over us and darken all The sky for days, and still no rain descends - But suddenly when least expected comes - So she to whom her husband's parting lay In words saw it burst in reality. He said, "Dear Rati! well thou knowest how I fondly wish to trade in distant realms. The time has come for me to part from thee. This morn a little ship was sighted here, And she is riding yonder on the sea. And ere the setting sun sinks down to rest Into the western waves the little bark Now destined to take me will leave the port; And I have therefore one, but one short hour. 'Tis willed by Him above that I should soon Bid farewell to the place where I was born, Where all my thoughts for ever centred lie, - Soon part from all that to my heart is dear, But soon come richer, greater to my home, To spend my days in joy and happiness. Dear wife! allow me therefore to depart." To which the wife - "Dear husband, sad it is To me to think that thou shouldst part from me; But sadder still the thought that thou shouldst go On seas to roam in lands unknown and strange, And canst not tell when to this spot return. There is our lordly mansion here; there is Our wealth, and here I am thy youthful wife. Why go away and risk thy precious life While we enjoy our days like king and queen? Why leave me here to pine away in grief And loneliness? Without my lord it is Half death to me, and I would rather die Than see him part; hence banish from thy mind All thoughts of going and stay here with me." "My wife!" he said, "why cherish idle fears? The holy Brahmin whom thou knowest well, So deeply versed in all the starry lore, Tells me that I am fated to return. It is an evil omen that thou shouldst, Lamenting, hinder me at this last hour And tell me not to go. Send me away With thy good wishes, I will soon return. By Him above that rules man's destinies, By mother earth, by yonder setting sun, The moon that shines up in the starry heav'ns, By all that to his heart is sacred deemed, And lastly by his sire whose picture hangs On the wall there, thy husband Rudra swears That after he returns he'll stay with thee, And nevermore e'en think of leaving thee, And let him therefore go in peace of mind." "If it is true," replied the crying maid, "That Sita followed Rama to the woods, And that she of the Pandus also shared With them their toils - if ever woman's charms Had power to move the adamantine heart Of man, then let thy Rati go with thee To share with thee thy joys and woes as well. If thou shouldst go alone, remember then, Dear lord, the sin rests solely on thy head That a young maiden has been left alone To mourn for ever for her husband on The seas - and all for gold and for a name." "A name thou sayest - never, never would Thy Rudra die unhonoured and unknown And bear the evil name and the reproach For ever with his sons and his sons' sons, That of his old illustrious family He was the only one that feared to go Upon the sea. The sun is going down, And cruel darkness is invading fast On us; and soon the ship will leave the port. Within a year thou shalt see me again. But if 'tis ruled by God that I should not Return, to one thing listen ere I go. To soothe thy spirits in a few short months An infant will be lying on thy lap, And if a daughter she should be, let her Be married to one worthy of our race. But if a son is born tend him with care; When he grows old, let it be said of him That he is his lost father's worthy son." And when the few last awful words were spoke The frighted wife that stood supported by Her lord at once grew pale and motionless. As one that watched with anxious care the growth Of a young tendril slowly fixes it Upon a new and stronger prop, e'en so Brave Rudra extricated himself from Her grasp and gently placed her on the couch; Then gazed on her for a few moments with His hands upon her throbbing temples, kissed Her brow, and straightway vanished from the room. And now the little ship in which he sailed Safe bore the crew along the wat'ry waste, And after twenty days' fast sailing she Encountered on the way a storm, was wrecked, And all save Rudra perished in the waves. The shipwrecked merchant lost all that he had, And wandered through a distant country with No friends, no money but his hands to earn For him his daily bread: the lonely youth Thus dragged for years his miserable life With nothing to make it worth living save The hope, the only hope, to see his wife; Till at the end of twenty years a ship Was sighted that was bound for Nundipore. In it he sailed and safely landed in His native port. It was the midday noon; He saw the selfsame fishing village that Stood years ago upon the sandy beach, And with a joyful heart he hastened to His house which all deserted seemed; inside With falt'ring steps he went, and on the walls Of the big hall were hanging pictures of His sire, of Krishna playing on the flute, Of Rama, Siva, and the other gods Whom in his childhood days his house adored, And seemed as they were drawn but yesterday; A thousand other old familiar scenes In quick succession passed before his eyes, Then quickly passed into a room, where lo! There slept a youth and she for whom for years Life's toils he patient bore. As one born blind Had after years of pray'r the gift of sight Vouchsafed to him by God, his Maker, to Behold the beauties of the universe, His wife, his children, and those dear to him, But straightway feels the precious gift withdrawn; Or as a lonely bird that unawares Has wandered far into the deep blue sea Finds nothing but a wat'ry waste all round, And knows not where to rest its wearied limbs, But at a distance kens at last a ship To which with doubled speed it flies and flies, And there discerns a seaman with his bow Preventing it from sitting on the mast - So Rudra felt. "Is this my wife?" he thought. "Yes, by the mole upon her cheek she is; And beauty, spite of age, still lingers on Her face, and this fair youth, attracted by Her charms, came here. Why hast Thou brought me home, O God! why was I not drowned in the sea? Why did I leave that distant country where These twenty years I toiled for bread and lived? And why was I not spared this ghastly sight? No, Rati! never would thy husband bear To see thee lying with another man. First he will kill you both, then die himself." So saying, from a sheath a blade he drew, When lo! there fell the piece of a palm leaf Whereon were writ - think well before you do. "This is," he said, "my father's dying gift; By the advice here giv'n I will abide," Then woke his wife, and in firm tones thus asked, "Who is this youth that has defiled my bed? Speak ere I strike you both." The wond'ring wife The dagger and the stranger saw and cried - "Kill me alone, but spare my only son." "Thy only son!" he said; "now wake him up, And let us all adore our Maker first, Who saved us from my frenzy, which in one Short moment would have shattered all our bliss."
The Fox With His Tail Cut Off.
Jean de La Fontaine
[1] A cunning old fox, of plundering habits, Great crauncher of fowls, great catcher of rabbits, Whom none of his sort had caught in a nap, Was finally caught in somebody's trap. By luck he escaped, not wholly and hale, For the price of his luck was the loss of his tail. Escaped in this way, to save his disgrace, He thought to get others in similar case. One day that the foxes in council were met, 'Why wear we,' said he, 'this cumbering weight, Which sweeps in the dirt wherever it goes? Pray tell me its use, if any one knows. If the council will take my advice, We shall dock off our tails in a trice.' 'Your advice may be good,' said one on the ground; 'But, ere I reply, pray turn yourself round.' Whereat such a shout from the council was heard, Poor bob-tail, confounded, could say not a word. To urge the reform would have wasted his breath. Long tails were the mode till the day of his death.
The Child And The Mariner
William Henry Davies
A dear old couple my grandparents were, And kind to all dumb things; they saw in Heaven The lamb that Jesus petted when a child; Their faith was never draped by Doubt: to them Death was a rainbow in Eternity, That promised everlasting brightness soon. An old seafaring man was he; a rough Old man, but kind; and hairy, like the nut Full of sweet milk. All day on shore he watched The winds for sailors' wives, and told what ships Enjoyed fair weather, and what ships had storms; He watched the sky, and he could tell for sure What afternoons would follow stormy morns, If quiet nights would end wild afternoons. He leapt away from scandal with a roar, And if a whisper still possessed his mind, He walked about and cursed it for a plague. He took offence at Heaven when beggars passed, And sternly called them back to give them help. In this old captain's house I lived, and things That house contained were in ships' cabins once; Sea-shells and charts and pebbles, model ships; Green weeds, dried fishes stuffed, and coral stalks; Old wooden trunks with handles of spliced rope, With copper saucers full of monies strange, That seemed the savings of dead men, not touched To keep them warm since their real owners died; Strings of red beads, methought were dipped in blood, And swinging lamps, as though the house might move; An ivory lighthouse built on ivory rocks, The bones of fishes and three bottled ships. And many a thing was there which sailors make In idle hours, when on long voyages, Of marvellous patience, to no lovely end. And on those charts I saw the small black dots That were called islands, and I knew they had Turtles and palms, and pirates' buried gold. There came a stranger to my granddad's house, The old man's nephew, a seafarer too; A big, strong able man who could have walked Twm Barlum's hill all clad in iron mail; So strong he could have made one man his club To knock down others, Henry was his name, No other name was uttered by his kin. And here he was, insooth illclad, but oh, Thought I, what secrets of the sea are his! This man knows coral islands in the sea, And dusky girls heartbroken for white men; This sailor knows of wondrous lands afar, More rich than Spain, when the Phoenicians shipped Silver for common ballast, and they saw Horses at silver mangers eating grain; This man has seen the wind blow up a mermaid's hair Which, like a golden serpent, reared and stretched To feel the air away beyond her head. He begged my pennies, which I gave with joy, He will most certainly return some time A self-made king of some new land, and rich. Alas that he, the hero of my dreams, Should be his people's scorn; for they had rose To proud command of ships, whilst he had toiled Before the mast for years, and well content; Him they despised, and only Death could bring A likeness in his face to show like them. For he drank all his pay, nor went to sea As long as ale was easy got on shore. Now, in his last long voyage he had sailed From Plymouth Sound to where sweet odours fan The Cingalese at work, and then back home, But came not near his kin till pay was spent. He was not old, yet seemed so; for his face Looked like the drowned man's in the morgue, when it Has struck the wooden wharves and keels of ships. And all his flesh was pricked with Indian ink, His body marked as rare and delicate As dead men struck by lightning under trees, And pictured with fine twigs and curled ferns; Chains on his neck and anchors on his arms; Rings on his fingers, bracelets on his wrist; And on his breast the Jane of Appledore Was schooner rigged, and in full sail at sea. He could not whisper with his strong hoarse voice, No more than could a horse creep quietly; He laughed to scorn the men that muffled close For fear of wind, till all their neck was hid, Like Indian corn wrapped up in long green leaves; He knew no flowers but seaweeds brown and green, He knew no birds but those that followed ships. Full well he knew the water-world; he heard A grander music there than we on land, When organ shakes a church; swore he would make The sea his home, though it was always roused By such wild storms as never leave Cape Horn; Happy to hear the tempest grunt and squeal Like pigs heard dying in a slaughterhouse. A true-born mariner, and this his hope, His coffin would be what his cradle was, A boat to drown in and be sunk at sea; To drown at sea and lie a dainty corpse Salted and iced in Neptune's larder deep. This man despised small coasters, fishing-smacks; He scorned those sailors who at night and morn Can see the coast, when in their little boats They go a six days' voyage and are back Home with their wives for every Sabbath day. Much did he talk of tankards of old beer, And bottled stuff he drank in other lands, Which was a liquid fire like Hell to gulp, But Paradise to sip. And so he talked; Nor did those people listen with more awe To Lazarus, whom they had seen stone dead, Than did we urchins to that seaman's voice. He many a tale of wonder told: of where, At Argostoli, Cephalonia's sea Ran over the earth's lip in heavy floods; And then again of how the strange Chinese Conversed much as our homely Blackbirds sing. He told us how he sailed in one old ship Near that volcano Martinique, whose power Shook like dry leaves the whole Carribean seas; And made the sun set in a sea of fire Which only half was his; and dust was thick On deck, and stones were pelted at the mast. So, as we walked along, that seaman dropped Into my greedy ears such words that sleep Stood at my pillow half the night perplexed. He told how isles sprang up and sank again, Between short voyages, to his amaze; How they did come and go, and cheated charts; Told how a crew was cursed when one man killed A bird that perched upon a moving barque; And how the sea's sharp needles, firm and strong, Ripped open the bellies of big, iron ships; Of mighty icebergs in the Northern seas, That haunt the far horizon like white ghosts, He told of waves that lift a ship so high That birds could pass from starboard unto port Under her dripping keel. Oh, it was sweet To hear that seaman tell such wondrous tales: How deep the sea in parts, that drowned men Must go a long way to their graves and sink Day after day, and wander with the tides. He spake of his own deeds; of how he sailed One summer's night along the Bosphorus, And he, who knew no music like the wash Of waves against a ship, or wind in shrouds, Heard then the music on that woody shore Of nightingales, and feared to leave the deck, He thought 'twas sailing into Paradise. To hear these stories all we urchins placed Our pennies in that seaman's ready hand; Until one morn he signed for a long cruise, And sailed away, we never saw him more. Could such a man sink in the sea unknown? Nay, he had found a land with something rich, That kept his eyes turned inland for his life. 'A damn bad sailor and a landshark too, No good in port or out', my granddad said.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCCXLVIII. Love And Matrimony.
Unknown
A cow and a calf, An ox and a half, Forty good shillings and three; Is that not enough tocher For a shoe-maker's daughter, A bonny lass with a black e'e?
Sea-Song.
Sophie M. (Almon) Hensley
A dash of spray, A weed-browned way, - My ship's in the bay, In the glad blue bay, - The wind's from the west And the waves have a crest, But my bird's in the nest And my ship's in the bay! At dawn to stand Soft hand to hand, Bare feet on the sand, - On the hard brown sand, - To wait, dew-crowned, For the tarrying sound Of a keel that will ground On the scraping sand. A glad surprise In the wind-swept skies Of my wee one's eyes, - Those wondering eyes. He will come, my sweet, And will haste to meet Those hurrying feet And those sea-blue eyes. I know the day Must weary away, And my ship's in the bay, - In the clear, blue bay, - Ah! there's wind in the west, For the waves have a crest, But my bird's in the nest And my ship's in the bay!
Imitation
Edgar Allan Poe
A dark unfathomed tide Of interminable pride, A mystery, and a dream, Should my early life seem; I say that dream was fraught With a wild and waking thought Of beings that have been, Which my spirit hath not seen, Had I let them pass me by, With a dreaming eye! Let none of earth inherit That vision of my spirit; Those thoughts I would control, As a spell upon his soul: For that bright hope at last And that light time have past, And my worldly rest hath gone With a sigh as it passed on: I care not though it perish With a thought I then did cherish.
Diet
Unknown
A Colonel, who used to assert That naught his digestion could hurt, Was forced to admit That his weak point was hit When they gave him hot shot for dessert.
Weathering
A. R. Ammons
A day without rain is like a day without sunshine
All the Rage.
Hattie Howard
A common wayside flower it grew, Unhandsome and unnoticed too, Except in deprecation That such an herb unreared by toil, Prolific cumberer of the soil, Defied extermination. Its gorgeous blooms were never stirred By honey-bee nor humming-bird In their corollas dipping; But they from clover white and red Delicious nectar drew instead In dainty rounds of sipping. No place its own euphonious name Within the catalogue might claim Of any flora-lover; For, in the scores of passers-by, As yet no true artistic eye Its beauty could discover. The reaper with his sickle keen Aimed at its crest of gold and green With spiteful stroke relentless, And would have rooted from the ground The "Solidago" - blossom-crowned, But gaudy, rank, and scentless. But everything must have its day - And since some fickle devot'e Or myrmidon of Fashion Declares that this obnoxious weed, From wild, uncultivated seed, Shall be the "ruling passion," Effusive schoolgirls dote on it; Whose "frontispieces" infinite That need no decoration Are hid beneath its golden dust, Till many a fine, symmetric bust Is lost to admiration. Smart dudes and ladies' men - the few Who wish they could be ladies too - Display a sprig of yellow Conspicuous in their buttonhole, To captivate a maiden soul Or vex some other fellow. And spinsters of uncertain age Are clamoring now for "all the rage" To give a dash of color To their complexions, which appear To be the hue they hold so dear - Except a trifle duller. That n'glig'e "blue-stocking" friend, Who never cared her time to spend On mysteries of the toilet, Now wears a sumptuous bouquet And shakes your hand a mile away For fear that you will spoil it. Delightful widows, dressed in black, Complain with modest sighs they lack That coveted expression, That sort of Indian Summer air Which "relicts" always ought to wear By general concession; And so lugubrious folds of crape Are crimped and twisted into shape With graceful heads of yellow, That give a winsome toning down To sombre hat and sable gown - In autumn tintings mellow. Alas, we only hate the weed! And think that it must be, indeed, The ladies' last endeavor To match the gentlemen, who flaunt That odious dried tobacco plant At which they puff forever.
Erie Waters
Emily Pauline Johnson
A dash of yellow sand, Wind-scattered and sun-tanned; Some waves that curl and cream along the margin of the strand; And, creeping close to these Long shores that lounge at ease, Old Erie rocks and ripples to a fresh sou'-western breeze. A sky of blue and grey; Some stormy clouds that play At scurrying up with ragged edge, then laughing blow away, Just leaving in their trail Some snatches of a gale; To whistling summer winds we lift a single daring sail. O! wind so sweet and swift, O! danger-freighted gift Bestowed on Erie with her waves that foam and fall and lift, We laugh in your wild face, And break into a race With flying clouds and tossing gulls that weave and interlace.
Epilogue To The Breakfast-Table Series Autocrat-Professor-Poet
Oliver Wendell Holmes
At A Bookstore Anno Domini 1972 A crazy bookcase, placed before A low-price dealer's open door; Therein arrayed in broken rows A ragged crew of rhyme and prose, The homeless vagrants, waifs, and strays Whose low estate this line betrays (Set forth the lesser birds to lime) YOUR CHOICE AMONG THESE BOORS 1 DIME! Ho! dealer; for its motto's sake This scarecrow from the shelf I take; Three starveling volumes bound in one, Its covers warping in the sun. Methinks it hath a musty smell, I like its flavor none too well, But Yorick's brain was far from dull, Though Hamlet pah!'d, and dropped his skull. Why, here comes rain! The sky grows dark, - Was that the roll of thunder? Hark! The shop affords a safe retreat, A chair extends its welcome seat, The tradesman has a civil look (I 've paid, impromptu, for my book), The clouds portend a sudden shower, - I 'll read my purchase for an hour. What have I rescued from the shelf? A Boswell, writing out himself! For though he changes dress and name, The man beneath is still the same, Laughing or sad, by fits and starts, One actor in a dozen parts, And whatsoe'er the mask may be, The voice assures us, This is he. I say not this to cry him down; I find my Shakespeare in his clown, His rogues the selfsame parent own; Nay! Satan talks in Milton's tone! Where'er the ocean inlet strays, The salt sea wave its source betrays; Where'er the queen of summer blows, She tells the zephyr, "I'm the rose!" And his is not the playwright's page; His table does not ape the stage; What matter if the figures seen Are only shadows on a screen, He finds in them his lurking thought, And on their lips the words he sought, Like one who sits before the keys And plays a tune himself to please. And was he noted in his day? Read, flattered, honored? Who shall say? Poor wreck of time the wave has cast To find a peaceful shore at last, Once glorying in thy gilded name And freighted deep with hopes of fame, Thy leaf is moistened with a tear, The first for many a long, long year. For be it more or less of art That veils the lowliest human heart Where passion throbs, where friendship glows, Where pity's tender tribute flows, Where love has lit its fragrant fire, And sorrow quenched its vain desire, For me the altar is divine, Its flame, its ashes, - all are mine! And thou, my brother, as I look And see thee pictured in thy book, Thy years on every page confessed In shadows lengthening from the west, Thy glance that wanders, as it sought Some freshly opening flower of thought, Thy hopeful nature, light and free, I start to find myself in thee! . . . . . . . . . . . Come, vagrant, outcast, wretch forlorn In leather jerkin stained and torn, Whose talk has filled my idle hour And made me half forget the shower, I'll do at least as much for you, Your coat I'll patch, your gilt renew, Read you - perhaps - some other time. Not bad, my bargain! Price one dime!
Prelude - The Wayside Inn - Part Second
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
A cold, uninterrupted rain, That washed each southern window-pane, And made a river of the road; A sea of mist that overflowed The house, the barns, the gilded vane, And drowned the upland and the plain, Through which the oak-trees, broad and high, Like phantom ships went drifting by; And, hidden behind a watery screen, The sun unseen, or only seen As a faint pallor in the sky;-- Thus cold and colorless and gray, The morn of that autumnal day, As if reluctant to begin, Dawned on the silent Sudbury Inn, And all the guests that in it lay. Full late they slept.    They did not hear The challenge of Sir Chanticleer, Who on the empty threshing-floor, Disdainful of the rain outside, Was strutting with a martial stride, As if upon his thigh he wore The famous broadsword of the Squire, And said, "Behold me, and admire!" Only the Poet seemed to hear, In drowse or dream, more near and near Across the border-land of sleep The blowing of a blithesome horn, That laughed the dismal day to scorn; A splash of hoofs and rush of wheels Through sand and mire like stranding keels, As from the road with sudden sweep The Mail drove up the little steep, And stopped beside the tavern door; A moment stopped, and then again With crack of whip and bark of dog Plunged forward through the sea of fog, And all was silent as before,-- All silent save the dripping rain. Then one by one the guests came down, And greeted with a smile the Squire, Who sat before the parlor fire, Reading the paper fresh from town. First the Sicilian, like a bird, Before his form appeared, was heard Whistling and singing down the stair; Then came the Student, with a look As placid as a meadow-brook; The Theologian, still perplexed With thoughts of this world and the next; The Poet then, as one who seems Walking in visions and in dreams; Then the Musician, like a fair Hyperion from whose golden hair The radiance of the morning streams; And last the aromatic Jew Of Alicant, who, as he threw The door wide open, on the air Breathed round about him a perfume Of damask roses in full bloom, Making a garden of the room. The breakfast ended, each pursued The promptings of his various mood; Beside the fire in silence smoked The taciturn, impassive Jew, Lost in a pleasant revery; While, by his gravity provoked, His portrait the Sicilian drew, And wrote beneath it "Edrehi, At the Red Horse in Sudbury." By far the busiest of them all, The Theologian in the hall Was feeding robins in a cage,-- Two corpulent and lazy birds, Vagrants and pilferers at best, If one might trust the hostler's words, Chief instrument of their arrest; Two poets of the Golden Age, Heirs of a boundless heritage Of fields and orchards, east and west, And sunshine of long summer days, Though outlawed now and dispossessed!-- Such was the Theologian's phrase. Meanwhile the Student held discourse With the Musician, on the source Of all the legendary lore Among the nations, scattered wide Like silt and seaweed by the force And fluctuation of the tide; The tale repeated o'er and o'er, With change of place and change of name, Disguised, transformed, and yet the same We've heard a hundred times before. The Poet at the window mused, And saw, as in a dream confused, The countenance of the Sun, discrowned, And haggard with a pale despair, And saw the cloud-rack trail and drift Before it, and the trees uplift Their leafless branches, and the air Filled with the arrows of the rain, And heard amid the mist below, Like voices of distress and pain, That haunt the thoughts of men insane, The fateful cawings of the crow. Then down the road, with mud besprent, And drenched with rain from head to hoof, The rain-drops dripping from his mane And tail as from a pent-house roof, A jaded horse, his head down bent, Passed slowly, limping as he went. The young Sicilian--who had grown Impatient longer to abide A prisoner, greatly mortified To see completely overthrown His plans for angling in the brook, And, leaning o'er the bridge of stone, To watch the speckled trout glide by, And float through the inverted sky, Still round and round the baited hook-- Now paced the room with rapid stride, And, pausing at the Poet's side, Looked forth, and saw the wretched steed, And said: "Alas for human greed, That with cold hand and stony eye Thus turns an old friend out to die, Or beg his food from gate to gate! This brings a tale into my mind, Which, if you are not disinclined To listen, I will now relate." All gave assent; all wished to hear, Not without many a jest and jeer, The story of a spavined steed; And even the Student with the rest Put in his pleasant little jest Out of Malherbe, that Pegasus Is but a horse that with all speed Bears poets to the hospital; While the Sicilian, self-possessed, After a moment's interval Began his simple story thus.
My Bachelor Chum
James Whitcomb Riley
A corpulent man is my bachelor chum, With a neck apoplectic and thick - An abdomen on him as big as a drum, And a fist big enough for the stick; With a walk that for grace is clear out of the case, And a wobble uncertain - as though His little bow-legs had forgotten the pace That in youth used to favor him so. He is forty, at least; and the top of his head Is a bald and a glittering thing; And his nose and his two chubby cheeks are as red As three rival roses in spring; His mouth is a grin with the corners tucked in, And his laugh is so breezy and bright That it ripples his features and dimples his chin With a billowy look of delight. He is fond of declaring he "don't care a straw" - That "the ills of a bachelor's life Are blisses, compared with a mother-in-law And a boarding-school miss for a wife!" So he smokes and he drinks, and he jokes and he winks, And he dines and he wines, all alone, With a thumb ever ready to snap as he thinks Of the comforts he never has known. But up in his den - (Ah, my bachelor chum!) - I have sat with him there in the gloom, When the laugh of his lips died away to become But a phantom of mirth in the room. And to look on him there you would love him, for all His ridiculous ways, and be dumb As the little girl-face that smiles down from the wall On the tears of my bachelor chum.
Brother Bruin.
Christina Georgina Rossetti
A dancing Bear grotesque and funny Earned for his master heaps of money, Gruff yet good-natured, fond of honey, And cheerful if the day was sunny. Past hedge and ditch, past pond and wood He tramped, and on some common stood; There, cottage children circling gaily, He in their midmost footed daily. Pandean pipes and drum and muzzle Were quite enough his brain to puzzle: But like a philosophic bear He let alone extraneous care And danced contented anywhere. Still, year on year, and wear and tear, Age even the gruffest, bluffest bear. A day came when he scarce could prance, And when his master looked askance On dancing Bear who would not dance. To looks succeeded blows; hard blows Battered his ears and poor old nose. From bluff and gruff he waxed curmudgeon; He danced indeed, but danced in dudgeon, Capered in fury fast and faster. Ah, could he once but hug his master And perish in one joint disaster! But deafness, blindness, weakness growing, Not fury's self could keep him going. One dark day when the snow was snowing His cup was brimmed to overflowing: He tottered, toppled on one side, Growled once, and shook his head, and died. The master kicked and struck in vain, The weary drudge had distanced pain And never now would wince again. The master growled; he might have howled Or coaxed, - that slave's last growl was growled. So gnawed by rancor and chagrin One thing remained: he sold the skin. What next the man did is not worth Your notice or my setting forth, But hearken what befell at last. His idle working days gone past, And not one friend and not one penny Stored up (if ever he had any Friends; but his coppers had been many), All doors stood shut against him but The workhouse door, which cannot shut. There he droned on, - a grim old sinner, Toothless, and grumbling for his dinner, Unpitied quite, uncared for much (The rate-payers not favoring such), Hungry and gaunt, with time to spare; Perhaps the hungry, gaunt old Bear Danced back, a haunting memory. Indeed, I hope so, for you see If once the hard old heart relented, The hard old man may have repented.
At Last
James Whitcomb Riley
A dark, tempestuous night; the stars shut in With shrouds of fog; an inky, jet-black blot The firmament; and where the moon has been An hour agone seems like the darkest spot. The weird wind - furious at its demon game - Rattles one's fancy like a window-frame. A care-worn face peers out into the dark, And childish faces - frightened at the gloom - Grow awed and vacant as they turn to mark The father's as he passes through the room: The gate latch clatters, and wee baby Bess Whispers, "The doctor's tummin' now, I dess!" The father turns; a sharp, swift flash of pain Flits o'er his face: "Amanda, child! I said A moment since - I see I must AGAIN - Go take your little sisters off to bed! There, Effie, Rose, and CLARA MUSTN'T CRY!" "I tan't he'p it - I'm fyaid 'at mama'll die!" What are his feelings, when this man alone Sits in the silence, glaring in the grate That sobs and sighs on in an undertone As stoical - immovable as Fate, While muffled voices from the sick one's room Come in like heralds of a dreaded doom? The door-latch jingles: in the doorway stands The doctor, while the draft puffs in a breath - The dead coals leap to life, and clap their hands, The flames flash up.    A face as pale as death Turns slowly - teeth tight clenched, and with a look The doctor, through his specs, reads like a book. "Come, brace up, Major!" - "Let me know the worst!" "W'y you're the biggest fool I ever saw - Here, Major - take a little brandy first - There!    She's a BOY - I mean HE is - hurrah!" "Wake up the other girls - and shout for joy - Eureka is his name - I've found A BOY!"
Pleasant Prophecies
Robert Fuller Murray
A day of gladness yet will dawn, Though when I cannot say; Perhaps it may be Thursday week, Perhaps some other day,-- When man, freed from the bond of clothes, And needing no more food, Shall never pull his neighbour's nose, But be extremely good. When Love and Nobleness shall live Next door to Truth and Right, While Reverence shall rent a room, Upon the second flight. And wishes shall be horses then, And beggars shall be kings; And all the people shall admire This pleasant state of things. But if it seems a mystery, And you're inclined to doubt it, Just ask your local poet.    He Will tell you all about it.
The Teams
Henry Lawson
A cloud of dust on the long white road, And the teams go creeping on Inch by inch with the weary load; And by the power of the green-hide goad The distant goal is won. With eyes half-shut to the blinding dust, And necks to the yokes bent low, The beasts are pulling as bullocks must; And the shining tires might almost rust While the spokes are turning slow. With face half-hid 'neath a broad-brimmed hat That shades from the heat's white waves, And shouldered whip with its green-hide plait, The driver plods with a gait like that Of his weary, patient slaves. He wipes his brow, for the day is hot, And spits to the left with spite; He shouts at `Bally', and flicks at `Scot', And raises dust from the back of `Spot', And spits to the dusty right. He'll sometimes pause as a thing of form In front of a settler's door, And ask for a drink, and remark `It's warm, Or say `There's signs of a thunder-storm'; But he seldom utters more. But the rains are heavy on roads like these; And, fronting his lonely home, For weeks together the settler sees The teams bogged down to the axletrees, Or ploughing the sodden loam. And then when the roads are at their worst, The bushman's children hear The cruel blows of the whips reversed While bullocks pull as their hearts would burst, And bellow with pain and fear. And thus with little of joy or rest Are the long, long journeys done; And thus, 'tis a cruel war at the best, Is distance fought in the mighty West, And the lonely battles won.
Rhymes And Rhythms - II
William Ernest Henley
A desolate shore, The sinister seduction of the Moon, The menace of the irreclaimable Sea. Flaunting, tawdry and grim, From cloud to cloud along her beat, Leering her battered and inveterate leer, She signals where he prowls in the dark alone, Her horrible old man, Mumbling old oaths and warming His villainous old bones with villainous talk, The secrets of their grisly housekeeping Since they went out upon the pad In the first twilight of self-conscious Time: Growling, obscene and hoarse, Tales of unnumbered Ships, Goodly and strong, Companions of the Advance In some vile alley of the night Waylaid and bludgeoned, Dead. Deep cellared in primeval ooze, Ruined, dishonoured, spoiled, They lie where the lean water-worm Crawls free of their secrets, and their broken sides Bulge with the slime of life.    Thus they abide, Thus fouled and desecrate, The summons of the Trumpet, and the while These Twain, their murderers, Unravined, imperturbable, unsubdued, Hang at the heels of their children, She aloft As in the shining streets, He as in ambush at some fetid stair. The stalwart Ships, The beautiful and bold adventurers! Stationed out yonder in the isle, The tall Policeman, Flashing his bull's-eye, as he peers About him in the ancient vacancy, Tells them this way is safety, this way home.
Morning Song
Sara Teasdale
A diamond of a morning Waked me an hour too soon; Dawn had taken in the stars And left the faint white moon. O white moon, you are lonely, It is the same with me, But we have the world to roam over, Only the lonely are free.
Summer Shower.
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A drop fell on the apple tree, Another on the roof; A half a dozen kissed the eaves, And made the gables laugh. A few went out to help the brook, That went to help the sea. Myself conjectured, Were they pearls, What necklaces could be! The dust replaced in hoisted roads, The birds jocoser sung; The sunshine threw his hat away, The orchards spangles hung. The breezes brought dejected lutes, And bathed them in the glee; The East put out a single flag, And signed the fete away.
Three Women.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
I. A dull little station, a man with the eye Of a dreamer; a bevy of girls moving by; A swift moving train and a hot Summer sun, The curtain goes up, and our play is begun. The drama of passion, of sorrow, of strife, Which always is billed for the theatre Life. It runs on forever, from year unto year, With scarcely a change when new actors appear. It is old as the world is -far older in truth, For the world is a crude little planet of youth. And back in the eras before it was formed, The passions of hearts through the Universe stormed. Maurice Somerville passed the cluster of girls Who twisted their ribbons and fluttered their curls In vain to attract him; his mind it was plain Was wholly intent on the incoming train. That great one eyed monster puffed out its black breath, Shrieked, snorted and hissed, like a thing bent on death, Paused scarcely a moment, and then sped away, And two actors more now enliven our play. A graceful young woman with eyes like the morn, With hair like the tassels which hang from the corn, And a face that might serve as a model for Peace, Moved lightly along, smiled and bowed to Maurice, Then was lost in the circle of friends waiting near. A discord of shrill nasal tones smote the ear, As they greeted their comrade and bore her from sight. (The ear oft is pained while the eye feels delight In the presence of women throughout our fair land: God gave them the graces which win and command, But the devil, who always in mischief rejoices, Slipped into their teachers and ruined their voices.) There had stepped from the train just behind Mabel Lee A man whose deportment bespoke him to be A child of good fortune.    His mien and his air Were those of one all unaccustomed to care. His brow was not vexed with the gold seeker's worry, His manner was free from the national hurry. Repose marked his movements.    Yet gaze in his eye, And you saw that this calm outer man was a lie; And you knew that deep down in the depths of his breast There dwelt the unmerciful imp of unrest. He held out his hand; it was clasped with a will In both the firm palms of Maurice Somerville. "Well, Reese, my old Comrade;" "Ha, Roger, my boy," They cried in a breath, and their eyes gemmed with joy (Which but for their sex had been set in a tear), As they walked arm in arm to the trap waiting near, And drove down the shining shell roadway which wound Through forest and meadow, in search of the Sound. Roger: I smell the salt water -that perfume which starts The blood from hot brains back to world withered hearts; You may talk of the fragrance of flower filled fields, You may sing of the odors the Orient yields, You may tell of the health laden scent of the pine, But give me the subtle salt breath of the brine. Already I feel lost emotions of youth Steal back to my soul in their sweetness and truth; Small wonder the years leave no marks on your face, Time's scythe gathers rust in this idyllic place. You must feel like a child on the Great Mother's breast, With the Sound like a nurse watching over your rest? Maurice: There is beauty and truth in your quaint simile, I love the Sound more than the broad open sea. The ocean seems always stern, masculine, bold, The Sound is a woman, now warm, and now cold. It rises in fury and threatens to smite, Then falls at your feet with a coo of delight; Capricious, seductive, first frowning, then smiling, And always, whatever its mood is, beguiling. Look, now you can see it, bright beautiful blue, And far in the distance there loom into view The banks of Long Island, full thirty miles off; A sign of wet weather to-morrow.    Don't scoff! We people who chum with the waves and the wind Know more than all wise signal bureaus combined. But come, let us talk of yourself -for of me There is little to tell which your eyes may not see. Since we finished at College (eight years, is it not?) I simply have dreamed away life in this spot. With my dogs and my horses, a book and a pen, And a week spent in town as a change now and then. Fatigue for the body, disease for the mind, Are all that the city can give me, I find. Yet once in a while there is wisdom I hold In leaving the things that are dearer than gold, - Loved people and places -if only to learn The exquisite rapture it is to return. But you, I remember, craved motion and change; You hated the usual, worshiped the strange. Adventure and travel I know were your theme: Well, how did the real compare with the dream? You have compassed the earth since we parted at Yale, Has life grown the richer, or only grown stale? Roger: Stale, stale, my dear boy! that's the story in short, I am weary of travel, adventure and sport; At home and abroad, in all climates and lands, I have had what life gives when a full purse commands, I have chased after Pleasure, that phantom faced elf, And lost the best part of my youth and myself. And now, barely thirty, I'm heart sick and blue; Life seems like a farce scarcely worth sitting through. I dread its long stretch of dissatisfied years; Ah! wealth is not always the boon it appears. And poverty lights not such ruinous fires As gratified appetites, tastes and desires. Fate curses, when letting us do as we please - It stunts a man's soul to be cradled in ease. Maurice: You are right in a measure; the devil I hold Is oftener found in full coffers of gold Than in bare, empty larders.    The soul, it is plain, Needs the conflicts of earth, needs the stress and the strain Of misfortune, to bring out its strength in this life - The Soul's calisthenics are sorrow and strife. But, Roger, what folly to stand in youth's prime And talk like a man who could father old Time. You have life all before you; the past, -let it sleep; Its lessons alone are the things you should keep. There is virtue sometimes in our follies and sinnings; Right lives very often have faulty beginnings. Results, and not causes, are what we should measure. You have learned precious truths in your search after pleasure. You have learned that a glow worm is never a star, You have learned that Peace builds not her temples afar. And now, dispossessed of the spirit to roam, You are finely equipped to establish a home. That's the one thing you need to lend savor to life, A home, and the love of a sweet hearted wife, And children to gladden the path to old age. Roger: Alas! from life's book I have torn out that page; I have loved many times and in many a fashion, Which means I know nothing at all of the passion. I have scattered my heart, here and there, bit by bit, 'Til now there is nothing worth while left of it; And, worse than all else, I have ceased to believe In the virtue and truth of the daughters of Eve. There's tragedy for you -when man's early trust In woman, experience hurls to the dust! Maurice: Then you doubt your own mother? Roger: She passed heavenward Before I remember; a saint, I have heard, While she lived; there are scores of good women to-day, Temptation has chanced not to wander their way. The devil has more than his lordship can do, He can't make the rounds, so some women keep true. Maurice: You think then each woman, if tempted, must fall? Roger: Yes, if tempted her way -not one way suits them all - They have tastes in their sins as they have in their clothes, The tempter, of course, has to first study those. One needs to be flattered, another is bought; One yields to caresses, by frowns one is caught. One wants a bold master, another a slave, With one you must jest, with another be grave. But swear you're a sinner whom she has reformed And the average feminine fortress is stormed. In rescuing men from abysses of sin She loses her head -and herself tumbles in. The mind of a woman was shaped for a saint, But deep in her heart lies the devil's own taint. With plans for salvation her busy brain teems, While her heart longs in secret to know how sin seems. And if with this question unanswered she dies, Temptation came not in the right sort of guise. There's my estimate, Reese, of the beautiful sex; I see by your face that my words wound and vex, But remember, my boy, I'm a man of the world. Maurice: Thank God, in the vortex I have not been hurled. If experience breeds such a mental disease, I am glad I have lived with the birds and the bees, And the winds and the waves, and let people alone So far in my life but good women I've known. My mother, my sister, a few valued friends - A teacher, a schoolmate, and there the list ends. But to know one true woman in sunshine and gloom, From the zenith of life to the door of the tomb, To know her, as I knew that mother of mine, Is to know the whole sex and to kneel at the shrine. Roger: Then you think saint and woman synonymous terms? Maurice: Oh, no! we are all, men and women, poor worms Crawling up from the dampness and darkness of clay To bask in the sunlight and warmth of the day. Some climb to a leaf and reflect its bright sheen, Some toil through the grass, and are crushed there unseen. Some sting if you touch them, and some evolve wings; Yet God dwells in each of the poor, groping things. They came from the Source -to the Source they go back; The sinners are those who have missed the true track. We can not judge women or men as a class, Each soul has its own distinct place in the mass. There is no sex in sin; it were folly to swear All women are angels, but worse to declare All are devils as you do.    You're morbid, my boy, In what you thought gold you have found much alloy And now you are doubting there is the true ore. But wait till you study my sweet simple store Of pure sterling treasures; just wait till you've been A few restful weeks, or a season, within The charmed circle of home life; then, Roger, you'll find These malarial mists clearing out of your mind. As a ship cuts the fog and is caught by the breeze, And swept through the sunlight to fair, open seas, So your heart will be caught and swept out to the ocean Of youth and youth's birthright of happy emotion. I'll wager my hat (it was new yesterday) That you'll fall in love, too, in a serious way. Our girls at Bay Bend are bewitching and fair, And Cupid lurks ever in salt Summer air. Roger: I question your gifts as a prophet, and yet, I confess in my travels I never have met A woman whose face so impressed me at sight, As one seen to-day; a mere girl, sweet and bright, Who entered the train quite alone and sat down Surrounded by parcels she'd purchased in town. A trim country lass, but endowed with the beauty Which makes a man think of his conscience and duty. Some women, you know, move us that way -God bless them, While others rouse only a thirst to possess them The face of the girl made me wish to be good, I went out and smoked to escape from the mood. When conscience through half a man's life has been sleeping What folly to wake it to worry and weeping! Maurice: The pessimist role is a modern day fad, But, Roger, you make a poor cynic, my lad. Your heart at the core is as sound as a nut, Though the wheels of your mind have dropped into the rut Of wrong thinking.    You need a strong hand on the lever Of good common sense, and an earnest endeavor To pull yourself out of the slough of despond Back into the highway of peace just beyond. And now, here we are at Peace Castle in truth, And there stands its Chatelaine, sweet Sister Ruth, To welcome you, Roger; you'll find a new type In this old-fashioned girl, who in years scarcely ripe, And as childish in heart as she is in her looks, And without worldly learning or knowledge of books, Yet in housewifely wisdom is wise as a sage. She is quite out of step with the girls of her age, For she has no ambition beyond the home sphere. Ruth, here's Roger Montrose, my comrade of dear College days. The gray eyes of the girl of nineteen Looked into the face oft in fancy she'd seen When her brother had talked of his comrade at Yale. His stature was lower, his cheek was more pale Than her thought had portrayed him; a look in his eye Made her sorry, she knew not for what nor knew why, But she longed to befriend him, as one needing aid While he, gazing down on the face of the maid, Spoke some light words of greeting, the while his mind ran On her "points" good and bad; for the average man When he looks at a woman proceeds first to scan her As if she were horse flesh, and in the same manner Notes all that is pleasing, or otherwise.    So Roger gazed at Ruth Somerville. "Mouth like a bow And eyes full of motherhood; color too warm, And too round in the cheek and too full in the form For the highest ideal of beauty and art. Domestic -that word is the cue to her part She would warm a man's slippers, but never his veins; She would feed well his stomach, but never his brains. And after she looks on her first baby's face, Her husband will hold but a second-class place In her thoughts or emotions, unless he falls ill, When a dozen trained nurses her place can not fill. She is sweet of her kind; and her kind since the birth Of this sin ridden, Circe-cursed planet, the Earth, Has kept it, I own, with its medleys of evil From going straight into the hands of the devil. It is not through its heroes the world lives and thrives, But through its sweet commonplace mothers and wives. We love them, and leave them; deceive, and respect them, We laud loud their virtues and straightway neglect them. They are daisy and buttercup women of earth Who grace common ways with their sweetness and worth. We praise, but we pass them, to reach for some flower That stings when we pluck it, or wilts in an hour. "You are thornless, fair Ruth! you are useful and sweet! But lovers shall pass you to sigh at the feet Of the selfish and idle, for such is man's way; Your lot is to work, and to weep, and to pray. To give much and get little; to toil and to wait For the meager rewards of indifferent fate. Yet so wholesome your heart, you will never complain; You will feast on life's sorrow and drink of its pain, And thank God for the banquet; 'tis women like you Who make the romancing of preachers seem true. The earth is your debtor to such large amounts There must be a heaven to square up accounts, Or else the whole scheme of existence at best Is a demon's poor effort at making a jest." That night as Ruth brushed out her bright hazel hair Her thoughts were of Roger, "His bold laughing air Is a cloak to some sorrow concealed in his breast, His mind is the home of some secret unrest." She sighed; and there woke in her bosom once more The impulse to comfort and help him; to pour Soothing oil from the urn of her heart on his wounds. Where motherhood nature in woman abounds It is thus Cupid comes; unannounced and unbidden, In sweet pity's guise, with his arrows well hidden. But once given welcome and housed as a guest, He hurls the whole quiver full into her breast, While he pulls off his mask and laughs up in her eyes With an impish delight at her start of surprise. So intent is this archer on bagging his game He scruples at nothing which gives him good aim. Ruth's heart was a virgin's, in love menaced danger While she sat by her mirror and pitied the stranger. But just as she blew out her candle and stood Robed for sleep in the moonlight, a change in her mood Quickly banished the dreamer, and brought in its stead The practical housekeeper.    Sentiment fled; And she puzzled her brain to decide which were best, Corn muffins or hot graham gems, for the guest! II. The short-sighted minister preached at Bay Bend His long-winded sermon quite through to the end, Unmindful there sat in the Somerville pew A stranger whose pale handsome countenance drew All eyes from his own reverend self; nor suspected What Ruth and her brother too plainly detected That the stranger was bored. "Though his gaze never stirred From the face of the preacher, his heart has not heard," Ruth said to herself; and her soft mother-eye Was fixed on his face with a look like a sigh In its tremulous depths, as they rose to depart. Then suddenly Roger, alert, seemed to start And his dull, listless glance changed to one of surprise And of pleasure.    Ruth saw that the goal of his eyes Was her friend Mabel Lee in the vestibule; fair As a saint that is pictured with sun tangled hair And orbs like the skies in October.    She smiled, And the saint disappeared in the innocent child With an unconscious dower of beauty and youth She paused in the vestibule waiting for Ruth And seemed not to notice the warm eager gaze Of two men fixed upon her in different ways. One, the look which souls lift to a being above, The other a look of unreasoning love Born of fancy and destined to grow in an hour To a full fledged emotion of mastering power. She spoke, and her voice disappointed the ear; It lacked some deep chords that the heart hoped to hear. It was sweet, but not vibrant; it came from the throat, And one listened in vain for a full chested note. While something at times like a petulant sound Seemed in strange disaccord with the peace so profound Of the eyes and the brow. Though our sight is deceived The ear is an organ that may be believed. The faces of people are trained to conceal, But their unruly voices are prone to reveal What lies deep in their natures; a voice rarely lies, But Mabel Lee's voice told one tale, while her eyes Told another.    Large, liquid, and peaceful as lakes Where the azure dawn rests, ere the loud world awakes, Were the beautiful eyes of the maiden.    "A saint, Without mortal blemish or weak human taint," Said Maurice to himself.    To himself Roger said: "The touch of her soft little hands on my head Would convert me.    What peace for a world weary breast To just sit by her side and be soothed into rest." Daring thoughts for a stranger.    Maurice, who had known Mabel Lee as a child, to himself would not own Such bold longings as those were.    He held her to be Too sacred for even a thought that made free. And the voice in his bosom was silenced and hushed Lest the bloom from her soul by his words should be brushed. There are men to whom love is religion; but woman Is far better pleased with a homage more human. Though she may not be able to love in like fashion, She wants to be wooed with both ardor and passion. Had Mabel Lee read Roger's thoughts of her, bold Though they were, they had flattered and pleased her, I hold. The stranger was duly presented. Roger: Miss Lee, I am sure, has no least recollection of me, But the pleasure is mine to have looked on her face Once before this. Mabel: Indeed?    May I ask where? Roger: The place Was the train, and the time yesterday. Mabel: "Then I came From my shopping excursion in town by the same Fast express which brought you?    Had I known that the friend Of my friends, was so near me en route for Bay Bend, I had waived all conventions and asked him to take One-half of my parcels for sweet pity's sake. Roger: You sadden me sorely.    As long as I live I shall mourn the great pleasure chance chose not to give. Maurice: Take courage, mon ami.    Our fair friend, Miss Lee, Fills her time quite as full of sweet works as the bee; Like the bee, too, she drives out the drones from her hive. You must toil in her cause, in her favor to thrive. Roger: She need but command me.    To wait upon beauty And goodness combined makes a pleasure of duty. Maurice: Who serves Mabel Lee serves all Righteousness too. Pray, then, that she gives you some labor to do. The cure for the pessimist lies in good deeds. Who toils for another forgets his own needs, And mischief and misery never attend On the man who is occupied fully. Ruth: Our friend Has the town on her shoulders.    Whatever may be The cause that is needy, we look to Miss Lee. Have you gold?    She will make you disgorge it ere long; Are you poor?    Well, perchance you can dance -sing a song - Make a speech -tell a story, or plan a charade. Whatever you have, gold or wits, sir, must aid In her numerous charities. Mabel: Riches and brain Are but loans from the Master.    He meant them, 'tis plain, To be used in His service; and people are kind, When once you can set them to thinking.    I find It is lack of perception, not lack of good heart Which makes the world selfish in seeming.    My part Is to call the attention of Plenty to need, And to bid Pleasure pause for a moment and heed The woes and the burdens of Labor. Roger: One plea From the rosy and eloquent lips of Miss Lee Would make Avarice pour out his coffers of gold At her feet, I should fancy; would soften the cold, Selfish heart of the world to compassionate sighs, And bring tears of pity to vain Pleasure's eyes. As the sunset a color on lily leaves throws, The words and the glances of Roger Montrose O'er the listener's cheeks sent a pink tinted wave; While Maurice seemed disturbed, and his sister grew grave. The false chink of flattery's coin smites the ear With an unpleasant ring when the heart is sincere. Yet the man whose mind pockets are filled with this ore, Though empty his brain cells, is never a bore To the opposite sex. While Maurice knew of old Roger's wealth in that coin that does duty for gold In Society dealings, it hurt him to see The cheap metal offered to sweet Mabel Lee. (Yet, perchance, the hurt came, not so much that 'twas offered, As in seeing her take, with a smile, what was proffered.) They had walked, two by two, down the elm shaded street, Which led to a cottage, vine hidden, and sweet With the breath of the roses that covered it, where Mabel paused in the gateway; a picture most fair. "I would ask you to enter," she said, "ere you pass, But in just twenty minutes my Sunday-school class Claims my time and attention; and later I meet A Committee on Plans for the boys of the street. We seek to devise for these pupils in crime Right methods of thought and wise uses of time. Roger: I am but a vagrant, untutored and wild, May I join your street class, and be taught like a child? Mabel: If you come I will carefully study your case. Maurice: I must go along, too, just to keep him in place. Mabel: Then you think him unruly? Maurice: Decidedly so. Roger: I was, but am changed since one-half hour ago. Mabel: The change is too sudden to be of much worth; The deepest convictions are slowest of birth. Conversion, I hold, to be earnest and lasting, Begins with repentance and praying and fasting, And (begging your pardon for such a bold speech), You seem, sir, a stranger to all and to each Of these ways of salvation. Roger: Since yesterday, miss, When, unseen, I first saw you (believe me in this), I have deeply repented my sins of the past. To-night I will pray, and to-morrow will fast - Or, make it next week, when my shore appetite May be somewhat subdued in its ravenous might. Maurice: That's the way of the orthodox sinner!    He waits Until time or indulgence or misery sates All his appetites, then his repentance begins, When his sins cease to please, then he gives up his sins And grows pious.    Now prove you are morally brave By actually giving up something you crave! We have fricasseed chicken and strawberry cake For our dinner to-day. Roger: For dear principle's sake I could easily do what you ask, were it not Most unkind to Miss Ruth, who gave labor and thought To that menu, preparing it quite to my taste. Ruth: But the thought and the dinner will both go to waste, If we linger here longer; and Mabel, I see, Is impatient to go to her duties. Roger: The bee Is reluctant to turn from the lily although The lily may obviously wish he would go And leave her to muse in the sunlight alone. Yet when the rose calls him, his sorrow, I own, Has its recompense.    So from delight to delight I fly with my wings honeyladen. Good night. Oh, love is like the dawnlight That turns the dark to day, And love is like the deep night With secrets hid away. And love is like the moonlight Where tropic Summers glow, And love is like the twilight When dreams begin to grow. Oh, love is like the sunlight That sets the world ablaze. And love is like the moonlight With soft illusive rays. And love is like the starlight That glimmers o'er the skies. And love is like the far light That shines from God's great eyes. III. Maurice Somerville from his turreted den Looked out of the window and laid down his pen. A soft salty wind from the water was blowing, Below in the garden sat Ruth with her sewing. And stretched on the grass at her feet Roger lay With a book in his hand. Through the ripe August day, Piped the Katydids' voices, Jack Frost's tally-ho Commanding Queen Summer to pack up and go. Maurice leaned his head on the casement and sighed, Strong and full in his heart surged love's turbulent tide. And thoughts of the woman he worshiped with longing Took shape and like angels about him came thronging. The world was all Mabel! her exquisite face Seemed etched on the sunlight and gave it its grace; Her eyes made the blue of the heavens, the sun Was her wonderful hair caught and coiled into one Shining mass.    With a reverent, worshipful awe, It was Mabel, fair Mabel, dear Mabel he saw, When he looked up to God. They had been much together Through all the bright stretches of midsummer weather, Ruth, Roger, and Mabel and he.    Scarce a day But the four were united in work or in play. And much of the play to a man or a maid Not in love had seemed labor.    Recital, charade, Garden party, church festival, musical, hop, Were all planned by Miss Lee without respite or stop. The poor were the richer; school, hospital, church, The heathen, the laborer left in the lurch By misfortune, the orphan, the indigent old, Our kind Lady Bountiful aided with gold Which she filched from the pockets of pleasure -God's spoil, And God's blessing will follow such lives when they toil Through an infinite sympathy. Fair Mabel Lee Loved to rule and to lead.    She was eager to be In the eyes of the public.    That modern day craze Possessed her in secret, and this was its phase. An innocent, even commendable, fad Which filled empty larders and cheered up the sad. She loved to do good.    But, alas! in her heart, She loved better still the authoritative part Which she played in her town. 'Neath the saint's aureole Lurked the feminine tyrant who longed to control, And who never would serve; but her sway was so sweet, That her world was contented to bow at her feet. Who toils in the great public vineyard must needs Let other hands keep his own garden from weeds. So busy was Mabel with charity fairs She gave little thought to her home or its cares. Mrs. Lee, like the typical modern day mother, Was maid to her daughter; the father and brother Were slaves at her bidding; an excellent plan To make a tyrannical wife for some man. Yet where was the man who, beholding the grace Of that slight girlish creature, and watching her face With its infantile beauty and sweetness, would dare Think aught but the rarest of virtues dwelt there? Rare virtues she had, but in commonplace ones Which make happy husbands and home loving sons She was utterly lacking.    Ruth Somerville saw In sorrow and silence this blemishing flaw In the friend whom she loved with devotion!    Maurice Saw only the angel with eyes full of peace. The faults of plain women are easily seen. But who cares to peer back of beauty's fair screen For things which are ugly to look on? The lover Is not quite in love when his sharp eyes discover The flaws in his jewel. Maurice from his room Looked dreamily down on the garden of bloom, Where Ruth sat with Roger; he smiled as he thought How quickly the world sated cynic was brought Into harness by Cupid.    The man mad with drink, And the man mad with love, is quite certain to think All other men drunkards or lovers.    In truth Maurice had expected his friend to love Ruth. "She was young, she was fair; with her bright sunny art She could scatter the mists from his world befogged heart. She could give him the one heaven under God's dome, A peaceful, well ordered, and love-guarded home. And he? why of course he would worship her!    When Cupid finds the soft spot in the hearts of such men They are ideal husbands."    Maurice Somerville Felt the whole world was shaping itself to his will. And his heart stirred with joy as, by thought necromancy, He made the near future unfold to his fancy, And saw Ruth the bride of his friend, and the place She left vacant supplied with the beauty and grace Of this woman he longed for, the love of his life, Fair Mabel, his angel, his sweet spirit wife. Maurice to his desk turned again and once more Began to unburden his bosom and pour His heart out on paper -the poet's relief, When drunk with life's rapture or sick with its grief. Song. When shall I tell my lady that I love her? Will it be while the sunshine woos the world, Or when the mystic twilight bends above her, Or when the day's bright banners all are furled? Will wild winds shriek, or will the calm stars glow, When I shall tell her that I love her so, I love her so? I think the sun should shine in all his glory; Again, the twilight seems the fitting time. Yet sweet dark night would understand the story, So old, so new, so tender, so sublime. Wild storms should rage to chord with my desire, Yet faithful stars should shine and never tire, And never tire. Ah, if my lady will consent to listen, All hours, all times, shall hear my story told. In amorous dawns, on nights when pale stars glisten In dim hushed gloamings and in noon hours bold, While thunders crash, and while the winds breathe low, Will I re-tell her that I love her so. I love her so. IV. The October day had been luscious and fair Like a woman of thirty.    A chill in the air As the sun faced the west spoke of frost lurking near. All day the Sound lay without motion, and clear As a mirror, and blue as a blond baby's eyes. A change in the tide brought a change to the skies. The bay stirred and murmured and parted its lips And breathed a long sigh for the lost lovely ships, That had gone with the Summer. Its calm placid breast Was stirred into passionate pain and unrest. Not a sail, not a sail anywhere to be seen! The soft azure eyes of the sea turned to green. A sudden wind rose; like a runaway horse Unchecked and unguided it sped on its course. The waves bared their teeth, and spat spray in the face Of the furious gale as they fled in the chase. The sun hurried into a cloud; and the trees Bowed low and yet lower, as if to appease The wrath of the storm king that threatened them.    Close To the waves at their wildest stood Roger Montrose. The day had oppressed him; and now the unrest Of the wind beaten sea brought relief to his breast, Or at least brought the sense of companionship.    Lashed By his higher emotions, the man's passions dashed On the shore of his mind in a frenzy of pain, Like the waves on the rocks, and a frenzy as vain. Since the day he first looked on her face, Mabel Lee Had seemed to his self sated nature to be, On life's troubled ocean, a beacon of light, To guide him safe out from the rocks and the night. Her calm soothed his passion; her peace gave him poise; She seemed like a silence in life's vulgar noise. He bathed in the light which her purity cast, And felt half absolved from the sins of the past. He longed in her mantle of goodness to hide And forget the whole world.    By the incoming tide He talked with his heart as one talks with a friend Who is dying.    "The summer has come to an end And I wake from my dreaming," he mused.    "Wake to know That my place is not here -I must go -I must go. Who dares laugh at Love shall hear Love laughing last, As forth from his bowstring barbed arrows are cast. I scoffed at the god with a sneer on my lip, And he forces me now from his chalice to sip A bitter sweet potion.    Ah, lightly the part Of a lover I've played many times, but my heart Has been proud in its record of friendship.    And now The mad, eager lover born in me must bow To the strong claims of friendship.    I love Mabel Lee; Dared I woo as I would, I could make her love me. The soul of a maid who knows not passion's fire Is moth to the flame of a man's strong desire. With one kiss on her lips I could banish the nun And wake in her virginal bosom the one Mighty love of her life.    If I leave her, I know She will be my friend's wife in a season or so. He loves her, he always has loved her; 'tis he Who ever will do all the loving; and she Will accept it, and still be the saint to the end, And she never will know what she missed; but my friend Has the right to speak first.    God! how can he delay? I marvel at men who are fashioned that way. He has worshiped her since first she put up her tresses, And let down the hem of her school-girlish dresses And now she is full twenty-two; were I he A brood of her children should climb on my knee By this time!    What a sin against love to postpone The day that might make her forever his own. The man who can wait has no blood in his veins. Maurice is a dreamer, he loves with his brains Not with soul and with senses.    And yet his whole life Will be blank if he makes not this woman his wife. She is woof of his dreams, she is warp of his mind; Who tears her away shall leave nothing behind. No, no, I am going: farewell to Bay Bend I am no woman's lover -I am one man's friend. Still-born in the arms of the matron eyed year Lies the beautiful dream that my life buries here. Its tomb was its cradle; it came but to taunt me, It died, but its phantom shall ever more haunt me." He turned from the waves that leaped at him in wrath To find Mabel Lee, like a wraith, in his path. The rose from her cheek had departed in fear; The tip of her eyelash was gemmed with a tear. The rude winds had disarranged mantle and dress, And she clung with both hands to her hat in distress. "I am frightened," she cried, in a tremulous tone; "I dare not proceed any farther alone. As I came by the church yard the wind felled a tree, And invisible hands seemed to hurl it at me; I hurried on, shrieking; the wind, in disgust, Tore the hat from my head, filled my eyes full of dust, And otherwise made me the butt of its sport. Just then I spied you, like a light in the port, And I steered for you.    Please do not laugh at my fright! I am really quite bold in the calm and the light, But when a storm gathers, or darkness prevails, My courage deserts me, my bravery fails, And I want to hide somewhere and cover my ears, And give myself up to weak womanish tears." Her ripple of talk allowed Roger Montrose A few needed moments to calm and compose His excited emotions; to curb and control The turbulent feelings that surged through his soul At the sudden encounter. "I quite understand," He said in a voice that was under command Of his will, "All your fears in a storm of this kind. There is something uncanny and weird in the wind; Intangible, viewless, it speeds on its course, And forests and oceans must yield to its force. What art has constructed with patience and toil, The wind in one second of time can despoil. It carries destruction and death and despair, Yet no man can follow it into its lair And bind it or stay it -this thing without form. Ah! there comes the rain! we are caught in the storm. Put my coat on your shoulders and come with me where Yon rock makes a shelter -I often sit there To watch the great conflicts 'twixt tempest and sea. Let me lie at your feet!    'Tis the last time, Miss Lee, I shall see you, perchance, in this life, who can say? I leave on the morrow at break o' the day." Mabel: Indeed?    Why, how sudden! and may I inquire The reason you leave us without one desire To return? for your words seem a final adieu. Roger: I never expect to return, that is true, Yet my wish is to stay. Mabel: Are you not your own master? Roger: Alas, yes! and therein lies the cause of disaster. Myself bids me go, my calm, reasoning part, The will is the man, not the poor, foolish heart, Which is ever at war with the intellect.    So I silence its clamoring voices and go. Were I less my own master, I then might remain. Mabel: Your words are but riddles, I beg you explain. Roger: No, no, rather bid me keep silent!    To say Why I go were as weak on my part as to stay. Mabel: I think you most cruel!    You know, sir, my sex Loves dearly a secret.    Then why should you vex And torment me in this way by hinting at one? Roger: Let us talk of the weather, I think the storm done. Mabel: Very well!    I will go!    No, you need not come too, And I will not shake hands, I am angry with you. Roger: And you will not shake hands when we part for all time? Mabel: Then read me your riddle! Roger: No, that were a crime Against honor and friendship; girl, girl, have a care - You are goading my poor, tortured heart to despair. His last words were lost in the loud thunder's crash; The sea seemed ablaze with a sulphurous flash. From the rocks just above them an evergreen tree Was torn up by the roots and flung into the sea. The waves with rude arms hurled it back on the shore; The wind gained in fury.    The glare and the roar Of the lightning and tempest paled Mabel Lee's cheek, Her pupils dilated; she sprang with a shriek Of a terrified child lost to all save alarm, And clasped Roger Montrose with both hands by the arm, While her cheek pressed his shoulder.    An agony, sweet And unbearable, thrilled from his head to his feet, His veins were like rivers, with billows of fire: His will lost control; and long fettered desire Slipped its leash.    He caught Mabel Lee to his breast, Drew her face up to his, on her frightened lips pressed Wild caresses of passion that startled and shocked. Like a madman he looked, like a madman he talked, Waiting not for reply, with no pause but a kiss, While his iron arms welded her bosom to his. "Girl, girl, you demanded my secret," he cried; "Well, that bruise on your lips tells the story!    I tried, Good God, how I tried! to be silent and go Without speaking one word, without letting you know That I loved you; yet how could you look in my eyes And not see love was there like the sun in the skies? Ah, those hands on my arm -that dear head lightly pressed On my shoulder!    God, woman, the heart in my breast Was dry powder, your touch was the spark; and the blame Must be yours if both lives are scorched black with the flame. Do you hate me, despise me, for being so weak? No, no! let me kiss you again ere you speak! You are mine for the moment; and mine -mine alone Is the first taste of passion your soft mouth has known. Whoever forestalls me in winning your hand, Between you and him shall this mad moment stand - You shall think of me, though you think only to hate. There -speak to me -speak to me -tell me my fate; On your words, Mabel Lee, hangs my whole future life. I covet you, covet you, sweet, for my wife; I want to stay here at your side.    Since I first Saw your face I have felt an unquenchable thirst To be good -to look deep in your eyes and find God, And to leave in the past the dark paths I have trod In my search after pleasure.    Ah, must I go back Into folly again, to retread the old track Which leads out into nothingness?    Girl, answer me, As souls answer at Judgment." The face of the sea Shone with sudden pink splendor.    The riotous wind Swooned away with exhaustion.    Each dark cloud seemed lined With vermilion.    The tempest was over.    A word Floated up like a feather; the silence was stirred By the soul of a sigh.    The last remnant of gray In the skies turned to gold, as a voice whispered, "Stay." God grinds His poor people to powder All day and all night I can hear, Their cries growing louder and louder. Oh, God, have You deadened Your ear? The chimes in old Trinity steeple Ring in the sweet season of prayer, And still God is grinding His people, He is grinding them down to despair. Mind, body and muscle and marrow, He grinds them again and again. Can He who takes heed of the sparrow Be blind to the tortures of men? V. In a bare little room of a tenement row Of the city, Maurice sat alone.    It was so (In this nearness to life's darkest phases of grief And despair) that his own bitter woe found relief. Joy needs no companion; but sorrow and pain Long to comrade with sorrow.    The flowery chain Flung by Pleasure about her gay votaries breaks With the least strain upon it.    The chain sorrow makes Links heart unto heart.    As a bullock will fly To far fields when an arrow has pierced him, to die, So Maurice had flown over far oceans to find No balm for his wounds, and no peace for his mind. Cosmopolitan, always, is sorrow; at home In all countries and lands, thriving well while we roam In vain efforts to slay it.    Toil only, brings peace To the tempest tossed heart.    What in travel Maurice Failed to find -self-forgetfulness -came with his work For the suffering poor in the slums of New York. He had wandered in strange heathen countries -had been Among barbarous hordes; but the greed and the sin Of his own native land seemed the shame of the hour. In his gold there was balm, in his pen there was power To comfort the needy, to aid and defend The unfortunate.    Close in their midst, as a friend And companion, for more than twelve months he had dwelt. Like a ray of pure light in a cellar was felt This strong, wholesome presence.    His little room bare Of all luxuries, taught the poor souls who flocked there For his counsel and aid, how by mere cleanliness The grim features of want lose some lines of distress. The slips from the plants on his window ledge, given To beauty starved souls, spoke more clearly of heaven And God than did sermons or dry creedy tracts. Maurice was no preacher; and yet his kind acts Of mercy and self-immolation sufficed To wake in dark minds a bright image of Christ - The Christ often heard of, but doubted before. Maurice spoke no word of religion.    Of yore His heart had accepted the creeds of his youth Without pausing to cavil, or question their truth. Faith seemed his inheritance.    But, with the blow Which slew love and killed friendship, faith, too, seemed to go. It is easy to be optimistic in pleasure, But when Pain stands us up by her portal to measure The actual height of our trust and belief, Ah! then is the time when our faith comes to grief. The woes of our fellows, God sends them, 'tis plain; But the devil himself is the cause of our pain. We question the wisdom that rules o'er the world, And our minds into chaos and darkness are hurled. The average scoffer at faith goes about Pouring into the ears of his fellows each doubt Which assails him.    One truth he fails wholly to heed; That a doubt oft repeated may bore like a creed. Maurice kept his thoughts to himself, but his pen Was dipped in the gall of his heart now and then, And his muse was the mouthpiece.    The sin unforgiven I hold by the Cherubim chanting in heaven Is the sin of the poet who dares sing a strain Which adds to the world's awful chorus of pain And repinings.    The souls whom the gods bless at birth With the great gift of song, have been sent to the earth To better and brighten it.    Woe to the heart Which lets its own sorrow embitter its art. Unto him shall more sorrow be given; and life After life filled with sorrow, till, spent with the strife, He shall cease from rebellion, and bow to the rod In submission, and own and acknowledge his God. Maurice, with his unwilling muse in the gloom Of a mood pessimistic, was shut in his room. A whistle, a step on the stairway, a knock, Then over the transom there fluttered a flock Of white letters.    The Muse, with a sigh of content, Left the poet to read them, and hurriedly went Back to pleasanter regions.    Maurice glanced them through: There were brief business epistles from two Daily papers, soliciting work from his pen; A woman begged money for Christ's sake; three men Asked employment; a mother wrote only to say How she blessed him and prayed God to bless him each day For his kindness to her and to hers; and the last Was a letter from Ruth.    The pale ghost of the past Rose out of its poor shallow grave, with the scent And the mold of the clay clinging to it, and leant O'er Maurice as he read, while its breath fanned his cheek. "Forgive me," wrote Ruth; "for at last I must speak Of the two whom you wish to forget.    Well I know How you suffered, still suffer, from fate's sudden blow, Though I am a woman, and women must stay And fight out pain's battles where men run away. But my strength has its limit, my courage its end, The time has now come when I, too, leave Bay Bend. Maurice, let the bitterness housed in your heart For the man you long loved as a comrade, depart, And let pity replace it.    Oh, weep for his sorrow - From your fountain of grief, held in check, let me borrow; I have so overdrawn on the bank of my tears That my anguish is now refused payment.    For years You loved Mabel Lee.    Well, to some hearts love speaks His whole tale of passion in brief little weeks. As Minerva, full grown, from the great brow of Jove Sprang to life, so full blown from our breasts may spring Love. Love hid like a bee in my heart's lily cup; I knew not he was there till his sting woke me up. Maurice, oh Maurice!    Can you fancy the woe Of seeing the prize which you coveted so Misused, or abused, by another?    The wife Of the man whom I worshiped is spoiling the life That was wax in her hands, wax to shape as she chose. You were blind to her faults, so was Roger Montrose. Both saw but the saint; well, let saints keep their places, And not crowd the women in life's hurried races. As saint, Mabel Lee might succeed; but, oh brother, She never was meant for a wife or a mother. Her beautiful home has the desolate air Of a house that is ruled by its servants.    The care - The thought of the woman (that sweet, subtle power Pervading some rooms like the scent of a flower), Which turns house into home -that is lacking.    She goes On her merciful rounds, does our Lady Montrose, Looking after the souls of the heathen, and leaving The poor hungry soul of her lord to its grieving. He craves her companionship; wants her to be At his side, more his own, than the public's.    But she Holds such love is but selfish; and thinks he should make Some sacrifice gladly for charity's sake. Her schools, and her clubs, and her fairs fill her time; He wants her to travel; no, that were a crime To go seeking for pleasure, and leave duty here. God had given her work and her labor lay near. A month of the theater season in town? No, the stage is an evil that needs putting down By good people.    So, scheme as he will, the poor man Has to finally yield every project and plan To this sweet stubborn saint; for the husband, you see, Stands last in Her thoughts.    He has come, after three Patient years, to that knowledge; his wishes, his needs Must always give way to her whims, or her creeds. She knows not the primer of loving; her soul Is engrossed with the poor petty wish to control. And she chafes at restriction.    Love loves to be bound, And its sweetest of freedom in bondage is found. She pulls at her fetters.    One worshiping heart And its faithful devotion play but a small part In her life.    She would rather be lauded and praised By a crowd of inferior followers, raised To the pitiful height of their leader, than be One man's goddess.    There, now, is the true Mabel Lee! Grieve not that you lost her, but grieve for the one Who with me stood last night by the corpse of his son, And with me stood alone.    Ah! how wisely and well Could Mabel descant on Maternity! tell Other women the way to train children to be An honor and pride to their parents!    Yet she, From the first, left her child to the nurses.    She found 'Twas a tax on her nerves to have baby around When it worried and cried.    The nurse knew what to do, And a block down the street lived Mama! 'twixt the two Little Roger would surely be cared for.    She must Keep her strength and be worthy the love and the trust Of the poor, who were yearly increasing, and not Bestow on her own all the care and the thought - That were selfishness, surely. Well, the babe grew apace, But yesterday morning a flush on its face And a look in its eye worried Roger.    The mother Was due at some sort of convention or other In Boston -I think 'twas a grand federation Of clubs formed by women to rescue the Nation From man's awful clutches; and Mabel was made The head delegate of the Bay Bend Brigade. Once drop in a small, selfish nature the seed Of ambition for place, and it grows like a weed. The fair village angel we called Mabel Lee, As Mrs. Montrose, has developed, you see, To a full fledged Reformer.    It quite turned her head To be sent to the city of beans and brown bread As a delegate!    (Delegate! magical word! The heart of the queer modern woman is stirred Far more by its sound than by aught she may hear In the phrases poor Cupid pours into her ear.) Mabel chirped to the baby a dozen good-byes, And laughed at the trouble in Roger's grave eyes, As she leaned o'er the lace ruffled crib of her son And talked baby-talk: "Now be good, 'ittle one, While Mama is away, and don't draw a long breath, Unless 'oo would worry Papa half to death. And don't cough, and, of all things, don't sneeze, 'ittle dear, Or Papa will be thrown into spasms of fear. Now, good-bye, once again, 'ittle man; mother knows There is no other baby like Roger Montrose In the whole world to-day." So she left him.    That night The nurse sent a messenger speeding in fright For the Doctor; a second for Grandmama Lee And Roger despatched still another for me. All in vain! through the gray chilly paths of the dawn The soul of the beautiful baby passed on Into Mother-filled lands. Ah! my God, the despair Of seeing that agonized sufferer there; To stand by his side, yet denied the relief Of sharing, as wife, and as mother, his grief. Enough!    I have borne all I can bear.    The role Of friend to a lover pulls hard on the soul Of a sensitive woman.    The three words in life Which have meaning to me are home, mother and wife - Or, rather, wife, mother and home.    Once I thought Men cared for the women who found home the spot Next to heaven for happiness; women who knew No ambition beyond being loyal and true, And who loved all the tasks of the housewife.    I learn, Instead, that from women of that kind men turn, With a yawn, unto those who are useless; who live For the poor hollow world and for what it can give, And who make home the spot where, when other joys cease, One sleeps late when one wishes. You left me Maurice Left the home I have kept since our dear Mother died, With such sisterly love and such housewifely pride, And you wandered afar, and for what cause, forsooth? Oh! because a vain, self-loving woman, in truth, Had been faithless.    The man whom I worshiped, ignored The love and the comfort my woman's heart stored In its depths for his taking, and sought Mabel Lee. Well, I'm done with the role of the housewife.    I see There is nothing in being domestic.    The part Is unpicturesque, and at war with all art. The senile old Century leers with dim eyes At our sex and demands that we shock or surprise His thin blood into motion.    The home's not the place To bring a pleased smile to his wicked old face. To the mandate I bow; since all strive for that end, I must join the great throng!    I am leaving Bay Bend This day week.    I will see you in town as I pass To the college at C - -, where I enter the class Of medical students -I fancy you will Like to see my name thus -Dr. Ruth Somerville." Maurice dropped the long, closely written epistle, Stared hard at the wall, and gave vent to a whistle. A Doctor! his sweet, little home-loving sister. A Doctor! one might as well prefix a Mister To Ruth Somerville, that most feminine name. And then in the wake of astonishment came Keen pity for all she had suffered.    "Poor Ruth, She writes like an agonized woman, in truth, And like one torn with jealousy.    Ah, I can see," He mused, "how the pure soul of sweet Mabel Lee Revolts at the bondage and shrinks from the ban That lies in the love of that sensual man. He is of the earth, earthy.    He loves but her beauty, He cares not for conscience, or honor or duty. Like a moth she was dazzled and lured by the flame Of a light she thought love, till she learned its true name; When she found it mere passion, it lost all its charms. No wonder she flies from his fettering arms! God pity you, Mabel! poor ill mated wife; But my love, like a planet, shall watch o'er your life, Though all other light from your skies disappear, Like a sun in the darkness my love shall appear. Unselfish and silent, it asks no return, But while the great firmament lasts it shall burn." Muse, muse, awake, and sing thy loneliest strain, Song, song, be sad with sorrow's deepest pain, Heart, heart, bow down and never bound again, My Lady grieves, she grieves. Night, night, draw close thy filmy mourning veil, Moon, moon, conceal thy beauty sweet and pale, Wind, wind, sigh out thy most pathetic wail, My Lady grieves, she grieves. Time, time, speed by, thou art too slow, too slow, Grief, grief, pass on, and take thy cup of woe, Life, life, be kind, ah! do not wound her so, My Lady grieves, she grieves. Sleep, sleep, dare not to touch mine aching eyes, Love, love, watch on, though fate thy wish denies, Heart, heart, sigh on, since she, my Lady, sighs, My Lady grieves, she grieves. The flower breathes low to the bee, "Behold, I am ripe with bloom. Let Love have his way with me, Ere I fall unwed in my tomb." The rooted plant sighs in distress To the winds by the garden walk "Oh, waft me my lover's caress, Or I shrivel and die on my stalk." The whippoorwill utters her love In a passionate "Come, oh come," To the male in the depths of the grove, But the heart of a woman is dumb. The lioness seeks her mate, The she-tiger calls her own - Who made it a woman's fate To sit in the silence alone? VI. Wooed, wedded and widowed ere twenty.    The life Of Zoe Travers is told in that sentence.    A wife For one year, loved and loving; so full of life's joy That death, growing jealous, resolved to destroy The Eden she dwelt in.    Five desolate years She walked robed in weeds, and bathed ever in tears, Through the valley of memory.    Locked in love's tomb Lay youth in its glory and hope in its bloom. At times she was filled with religious devotion, Again crushed to earth with rebellious emotion And unresigned sorrow. Ah, wild was her grief! And the years seemed to bring her no balm of relief. When a heart from its sorrow time cannot estrange, God sends it another to alter and change The current of feeling.    Zoe's mother, her one Tie to earth, became ill.    When the doctors had done All the harm which they dared do with powder and pill, They ordered a trial of Dame Nature's skill. Dear Nature! what grief in her bosom must stir When she sees us turn everywhere save unto her For the health she holds always in keeping; and sees Us at last, when too late, creeping back to her knees, Begging that she at first could have given! 'Twas so Mother Nature's heart grieved o'er the mother of Zoe, Who came but to die on her bosom.    She died Where the mocking bird poured out its passionate tide Of lush music; and all through the dark days of pain That succeeded, and over and through the refrain Of her sorrow, Zoe heard that wild song evermore. It seemed like a blow which pushed open a door In her heart.    Something strange, sweet and terrible stirred In her nature, aroused by the song of that bird. It rang like a voice from the future; a call That came not from the past; yet the past held her all. To the past she had plighted her vows; in the past Lay her one dream of happiness, first, only, last. Alone in the world now, she felt the unrest Of an unanchored boat on the wild billow's breast. Two homes had been shattered; the West held but tombs. She drifted again where the magnolia blooms And the mocking bird sings.    Oh! that song, that wild strain, Whose echoes still haunted her heart and her brain! How she listened to hear it repeated!    It came Through the dawn to her heart, and the sound was like flame. It chased all the shadows of night from her room, And burst the closed bud of the day into bloom. It leaped to the heavens, it sank to the earth It gave life new rapture and love a new birth. It ran through her veins like a fiery stream, And the past and its sorrow -was only a dream. The call of a bird in the spring for its lover Is the voice of all Nature when winter is over. The heart of the woman re-echoed the strain, And its meaning, at last, to her senses was plain. Grief's winter was over, the snows from her heart Were melted; hope's blossoms were ready to start. The spring had returned with its siren delights, And her youth and emotions asserted their rights. Then memory struggled with passion.    The dead Seemed to rise from the grave and accuse her.    She fled From her thoughts as from lepers; returned to old ways, And strove to keep occupied, filling her days With devotional duties.    But when the night came She heard through her slumber that song like a flame, And her dreams were sweet torture.    She sought all too soon To chill the warm sun of her youth's ardent noon With the shadows of premature evening.    Her mind Lacked direction and purpose.    She tried in a blind, Groping fashion to follow an early ideal Of love and of constancy, starving the real Affectional nature God gave her.    She prayed For God's help in unmaking the woman He made, As if He repented the thing He had done. With the soul of a Sappho, she lived like a nun, Hid her thoughts from all women, from men kept apart, And carefully guarded the book of her heart From the world's prying eyes.    Yet men read through the cover, And knew that the story was food for a lover. (The dullest of men seemed possessed of the art To read what the passions inscribe on the heart. Though written in cipher and sealed from the sight, Yet masculine eyes will interpret aright.) Worn out with the unceasing conflict at last, Zoe fled from herself and her sorrowful past, And turned to new scenes for diversion from thought. New York! oh, what magic encircles that spot In the feminine mind of the West!    There, it seems, Waits the realization of beautiful dreams. There the waters of Lethe unceasingly roll, With blessed forgetfulness free to each soul, While the doorways that lead to success open wide, With Fame in the distance to beckon and guide. Mirth lurks in each byway, and Folly herself Wears the look of a semi-respectable elf, And is to be courted and trusted when met, For she teaches one how to be gay and forget, And to start new account books with life. It was so, Since she first heard the name of the city, that Zoe Dreamed of life in New York.    It was thither she turned To smother the heart that with restlessness burned, And to quiet and calm an unsatisfied mind. Her plans were but outlines, crude, vague, undefined, Of distraction and pleasure.    A snug little home, With seclusion and comfort; full freedom to roam Where her fancy and income permitted; new faces, New scenes, new environments, far from the places Where brief joy and long sorrow had dwelt with her; free From the curious eyes that seemed ever to be Bent upon her.    She passed like a ship from the port, Without chart or compass; the plaything and sport Of the billows of Fate. The parks were all gay And busy with costuming duties of May When Zoe reached New York.    The rain and the breeze Had freshened the gowns of the Northern pine trees Till they looked bright as new; all the willows were seen In soft dainty garments of exquisite green. Young buds swelled with life, and reached out to invite And to hold the warm gaze of the wandering light. The turf exhaled fragrance; among the green boughs The unabashed city birds plighted their vows, Or happy young house hunters chirped of the best And most suitable nook to establish a nest. There was love in the sunshine, and love in the air; Youth, hope, home, companionship, spring, everywhere. There was youth, there was spring in her blood; yet she only, In all the great city, seemed loveless and lonely. The trim little flat, facing north on the park, Was not homelike; the rooms seemed too sombre and dark To her eyes, sun-accustomed; the neighbors too near And too noisy.    The medley of sounds hurt her ear. Sudden laughter; the cry of an infant; the splash Of a tenant below in his bath-tub; the crash Of strong hands on a keyboard above, and the light, Merry voice of the lady who lived opposite, The air intertwined in a tangled sound ball, And flung straight at her ear through the court and the hall. Ah, what loneliness dwelt in the rush and the stir Of the great pushing throngs that were nothing to her, And to whom she was nothing!    Her heart, on its quest For distraction, seemed eating itself in her breast. She longed for a comrade, a friend.    In the church Which she frequented no one abetted her search, For the faces of people she met in its aisle Gazed calmly beyond her, without glance or smile. The look in their eyes, when translated, read thus, "We worship God here, what are people to us?" In some masculine eyes she read more, it is true. What she read made her gaze at the floor of her pew. The blithe little blonde who lived over the hall, In the opposite rooms, was the first one to call Or to show friendly feeling.    She seemed sweet and kind, But her infantile face hid a mercantile mind. Her voice had the timbre of metal.    Each word Clinked each word like small change in a purse; and you heard, In the rustling silk of her skirts, just a hint Of new bills freshly printed and right from the mint. There was that in her airs and her chatter which made Zoe question and ponder, and turn half afraid From her proffers of friendship.    When one July day The fair neighbor called for a moment to say, "I am off to Long Branch for the summer, good-bye," Zoe seemed to breathe freer -she scarcely knew why, But she reasoned it out as alone in the gloom Of the soft summer evening she sat in her room. "The woman is happy," she said; "at the least, Her heart is not starving in life's ample feast. She lives while she lives, but I only exist, And Fate laughs in my face for the things I resist." New York in the midsummer seems like the gay Upper servant who rules with the mistress away. She entertains friends from all parts of the earth; Her streets are alive with a fictitious mirth. She flaunts her best clothes with a devil-may-care Sort of look, and her parks wear a riotous air. There is something unwholesome about her at dusk; Her trees, and her gardens, seem scented with musk; And you feel she has locked up the door of the house And, half drunk with the heat, wanders forth to carouse, With virtue, ambition and industry all Packed off (moth-protected) with garments for Fall. Zoe felt out of step with the town.    In the song Which it sang, where each note was a soul of the throng, She seemed the one discord.    Books gave no distraction. She cared not for study, her heart longed for action, For pleasure, excitement.    Wild impulses, new To her mind, came like demons and urged her to do All sorts of mad things.    Mischief breathed through the air. One could do as one liked in New York -who would care - Who would know save the God who had left her alone In his world, unprotected, unloved?    From her own Restless mind and sick heart she attempted once more To escape.    One reads much of gay life at the shore - Narragansett, she fancied, would suit her.    The sea Would at least prove a friend; and, perchance, there might be Some heart, like her own, seeking comradeship there. The days brought no friend.    But the moist, salty air Was a stimulant, giving existence new charms. The sea was a lover who opened his arms Every day to embrace her.    And life in this place Held something of pleasure, and sweetness and grace, Though the eyes of the men were too ardent and bold, And the eyes of the women suspicious and cold, She yet had the sea -the sea, strong and mighty, Both father and mother of fair Aphrodite. VII. Mabel grieved for her child with a sorrow sincere, But she bowed to the will of her Maker.    No tear Came to soften the hard, stony look in the eye Of her husband; she heard no complaint and no sigh From his lips, but he turned with impatience whenever She spoke of religion, or made one endeavor To lead his thoughts up from the newly turned sod Where the little form slept, to its spirit with God. Long hours by that grave, Roger passed, and alone. The woes of her neighbors his wife made her own, But her husband she pointed to Christ; and in grief Prayed for light to be cast on his dark unbelief. She flung herself into good works more and more, And saw not that the look which her husband's face wore Was the look of a man starved for love.    In the mold Of a nun she was fashioned, chaste, passionless, cold. (Such women sin more when they take marriage ties Than the love-maddened creature who lawlessly lies In the arms of the man whom she worships.    The child Not conceived in true love leaves the mother defiled. Though an army of clergymen sanction her vows, God sees "illegitimate" stamped on the brows Of her offspring.    Love only can legalize birth In His eyes -all the rest is but spawn of the earth.) Mabel Lee, as the maid, had been flattered and pleased By the passion of Roger; his wild wooing teased That inquisitive sense, half a fault, half a merit, Which the daughters of Eve, to a woman, inherit. His love fanned her love for herself to a glow; She was stirred by the thought she could stir a man so. That was all.    She had nothing to give in return. One can't light a fire with no fuel to burn; And the love Roger dreamed he could rouse in her soul Was not there to be wakened.    He stood at his goal As the Arctic explorer may finally stand, To see all about him an ice prisoned land, White, beautiful, useless. Some women are chaste, Like the snows which envelop the bleak arid waste Of the desert; once melted, alas! what remains But the poor, unproductive, dry soil of the plains? The flora of Cupid will never be found, However he toil there, to thrive in such ground. Mabel Montrose was held in the highest esteem By her neighbors; I think neighbors everywhere deem Such women to be all that's noble.    They sighed When they spoke of her husband; they told how she tried To convert him, and how they had thought for a season His mind was bent Christ-ward; and then, with no reason, He seemed to drift back to the world, and grew jealous Of Mabel, and thought her too faithful and zealous In duty to others. The death of his child Only hardened his heart against God.    He grew wild, Took to drink; spent a week at a time in the city, Neglecting his saint of a wife -such a pity. It was true.    Our friends keep a sharp eye on our deeds But the fine interlining of causes -who heeds? The long list of heartaches which lead to rash acts Would bring pity, not blame, if the world knew the facts. There are women so terribly free from all evil, They discourage a man, and he goes to the devil. There are people whose virtues result in appalling, And they prove a great aid to his majesty's calling. Roger's wife rendered goodness so dreary and cold, His tendril-like will lost its poor little hold On the new better life he was longing to reach, And slipped back to the dust.    Oh! to love, not to preach. Is a woman's true method of helping mankind. The sinner is won through his heart, not his mind. As the sun loves the seed up to life through the sod, So the patience of love brings a soul to its God. But when love is lacking, the devil is sure To stand in the pathway with some sort of lure. Roger turned to the world for distraction.    The world Smiled a welcome, and then like an octopus curled All its tentacles 'round him, and dragged him away Into deep, troubled waters. One late summer day He awoke with a headache, which will not surprise, When you know that his bedtime had been at sunrise, And that gay Narraganset, the world renowned "Pier," Was the scene.    Through the lace curtained window the clear Yellow rays of the hot August sun touched his bed And proclaimed it was mid-day.    He rose, and his head Seemed as large and as light as an air filled balloon While his limbs were like lead. In the glare of the noon, The follies of night show their makeup, and seem Like hideous monsters evoked by some dream. The sea called to Roger: "Come, lie on my breast And forget the dull world.    My unrest shall give rest To your turbulent feelings; the dregs of the wine On your lips shall be lost in the salt touch of mine. Come away, come away.    Ah! the jubilant mirth Of the sea is not known by the stupid old earth." The beach swarmed with bathers -to be more exact, Swarmed with people in costumes of bathers.    In fact, Many beautiful women bathed but in the light Of men's eyes; and their costumes were made for the sight, Not the sea.    From the sea's lusty outreaching arms They escaped with shrill shrieks, while the men viewed their charms And made mental notes of them.    Yet, at this hour, The waves, too, were swelling sea meadows, a-flower With faces of swimmers.    All dressed for his bath, Roger paused in confusion, because in his path Surged a crowd of the curious; all eyes were bent On the form of a woman who leisurely went From her bathing house down to the beach.    "There she goes," Roger heard a dame cry, as she stepped on his toes With her whole ample weight.    "What, the one with red hair? Why, she isn't as pretty as Maude, I declare." A man passing by with his comrade, cried: "Ned, Look! there is La Travers, the one with the red Braid of hair to her knees.    She's a mystery here, And at present the topic of talk at the Pier." Roger followed their glances in time to behold For a second a head crowned with braids of bright gold, And a form like a Venus, all costumed in white. Then she plunged through a billow and vanished from sight. It was half an hour afterward, possibly more, As Roger swam farther and farther from shore, With new life in his limbs and new force in his brain, That he heard, just behind him, a sharp cry of pain. Ten strokes in the rear on the crest of a wave Shone a woman's white face.    "Keep your courage; be brave; I am coming," he shouted.    "Turn over and float." His strong shoulder plunged like the prow of a boat Through the billows.    Six overhand strokes brought him close To the woman, who lay like a wilted white rose On the waves.    "Now, be careful," he cried; "lay your hand Well up on my shoulder; my arms, understand, Must be free; do not touch them --please follow my wishes, Unless you are anxious to fatten the fishes." The woman obeyed him.    "You need not fear me," She replied, "I am wholly at home in the sea. I knew all the arts of the swimmer, I thought, But confess I was frightened when suddenly caught With a cramp in my knee at this distance from shore." With slow even breast strokes the strong swimmer bore His fair burden landward.    She lay on the billows As lightly as if she were resting on pillows Of down.    She relinquished herself to the sea And the man, and was saved; though God knows both can be False and fickle enough; yet resistance or strife, On occasions like this, means the forfeit of life. The throng of the bathers had scattered before Roger carried his burden safe into the shore And saw her emerge from the water, a place Where most women lose every vestige of grace Or of charm.    But this mermaid seemed fairer than when She had challenged the glances of women and men As she went to her bath.    Now her clinging silk suit Revealed every line, from the throat to the foot, Of her beautiful form.    Her arms, in their splendor, Gleamed white like wet marble.    The round waist was slender, And yet not too small.    From the twin perfect crests And the virginlike grace of her beautiful breasts To the exquisite limbs and the curve of her thigh, And the arch of her proud little instep, the eye Drank in beauty.    Her face was not beautiful; yet The gaze lingered on it, for Eros had set His seal on her features.    The mouth full and weak, The blue shadow drooping from eyelid to cheek Like a stain of crushed grapes, and the pale, ardent skin, All spoke of volcanic emotions within. By her tip tilted nose and low brow, it was plain To read how her impulses ruled o'er her brain. She had given the chief role of life to her heart, And her intellect played but a small minor part. Her eyes were the color the sunlight reveals When it pierces the soft, furry coat of young seals. The thickly fringed lids seemed unwilling to rise, But drooped, half concealing them; wonderful eyes, Full of secrets and bodings of sorrow.    As coarse And as thick as the mane of a finely groomed horse Was her bright mass of hair.    The sea, with rough hands, Had made free with the braids, and unloosened the strands Till they hung in great clusters of curls to her knees. Her voice, when she spoke, held the breadth and the breeze Of the West in its tones; and the use of the R Made the listener certain her home had been far From New England.    Long after she vanished from view The eye and the ear seemed to sense her anew. There was that in her voice and her presence which hung In the air like a strain of a song which is sung By a singer, and then sings itself the whole day, And will hot be silenced. As birds flock away From meadow to tree branch, now there and now here, So, from beach to Casino, each day at the Pier Flock the gay pleasure seekers.    The balconies glow With beauty and color.    The belle and the beau Promenade in the sunlight, or sit tete-a-tete, While the chaperons gossip together.    Bands play, Glasses clink; and 'neath sheltering lace parasols There are plans made for meeting at drives or at balls. Roger gat at a table alone, with his glass Of mint julep before him, and watched the crowd pass. There were all sorts of people from all sorts of places. He thought he liked best the fair Baltimore faces. The South was the land of fair women, he mused, Because they were indolent.    Women who used Mind or body too freely.    Changed curves into angles, For beauty forever with intellect wrangles. The trend of the fair sex to-day must alarm Every lover of feminine beauty and charm. As he mused Roger watched with a keen interest For a sight of his Undine.    "All coiffured and drest, With her wonderful body concealed, and her hair Knotted up, well, I doubt if she seem even fair," He soliloquized.    "Ah!" the word burst from his lips, For he saw her approaching.    She walked from the hips With an undulous motion.    As graceful and free From all effort as waves swinging in from the sea Were her movements.    Her full molded figure seemed slight In its close fitting gown of black cloth; and the white Of her cheek seemed still whiter by contrast.    Her clothes Were tasteful and quiet; yet Roger Montrose Knew in some subtle manner he could not express ('Tis an instinct men have in the matters of dress) That they never were made in New York.    By her hat One can oft read a woman's whole character.    That Which our fair Undine wore was a thing of rich lace, Flowers and ribbons like others one saw in the place. Yet the width of the brim, or the twist of its bows, Or the way it was worn made it different from those. As it drooped o'er the eyes full of mystery there, It seemed, all at once, both a menace and dare; A menace to women, a dare to the men. She bowed as she passed Roger's table; and then Took a chair opposite, spread her shade of red silk, Called a waiter and ordered a cup of hot milk, Which she leisurely sipped.    She seemed unaware Of the curious eyes she attracted.    Her air Was of one quite at home, and entirely at ease With herself, the sole person she studied to please. She had been for three weeks at the Pier, and alone, Without maid or escort, and nothing was known Of her there, save the name which the register bore, "Mrs. Travers, New York."    Men were mad to learn more But the women were distant.    One can't, at such places, Accept as credentials good figures or faces. There was an unnameable something about Mrs. Travers which filled other women with doubt And all men with interest.    Roger, blas', Disillusioned with life as he was, felt the sway Of her strong personality, there as she sat Looking out 'neath the rim of her coquettish hat With dark eyes on the sea.    Few people had power To draw his gray thoughts from himself for an hour As this woman had done; she was food for his mind, And he sought by his inner perceptions to find in what class she belonged.    "An adventuress?    No, Though I fancy three-fourths of the women think so And one-half of the men; but that role leaves a trace, An expression, I fail to detect in her face. Her past is not shadowed; my judgment would say That her sins lie before her, and not far away. She's a puzzle, I think, to herself; and grim Fate Will aid her in solving the riddle too late. Her soul dreams of happiness; but in her eyes The sensuous foe to all happiness lies. As the rain is drawn up by some moods of the sun, Some natures draw trouble from life; her's is one." She rose and passed by him again, and her gown Brushed his knee.    A light tremor went shivering down His whole body.    She left on the air as she went A subtle suggestion of perfume; the scent Which steals out of some fans, or old laces, and seems Full of soft fragrant fancies and languorous dreams. She haunted the mind, though she passed from the sight. When Roger Montrose sought his pillow that night, 'Twas to dream of La Travers.    He thought she became A burning red rose, with each leaf like a flame. He stooped down and plucked it, and woke with a start, As it turned to an adder and struck at his heart. The dream left its impress, as certain dreams should, For, as warnings of evil, precursors of good, They are sent to our souls o'er a mystical line, Night messages, couched in a cipher divine. Roger knew much of life, much of women, and knew Even more of himself and his weaknesses.    Few Of us mortals look inward; our gaze is turned out To watch what the rest of the world is about, While the rest of the world watches us. Roger's reason And logic were clear.    But his will played him treason. If you looked at his hand, you would see it.    Hands speak More than faces.    His thumb (the first phalanx) was weak, Undeveloped; the second, firm jointed and long, Which showed that the reasoning powers were strong, But the will, from disuse, had grown feeble. That morning He looked on his dream in the light of a warning And made sudden plans for departure.    "To go Is to fly from some folly," he said, "for I know What salt air and dry wine, and the soft siren eyes Of a woman, can do under midsummer skies With a man who is wretched as I am.    Unrest Is a tramp, who goes picking the locks on one's breast That a whole gang of vices may enter.    A thirst For strong drink and chance games, those twin comrades accursed, Are already admitted.    Oh Mabel, my wife, Reach, reach out your arms, draw me into the life That alone is worth living.    I need you to-day, Have pity, and love me, oh love me, I pray. I will turn once again from the bad world to you. Though false to myself, to my vows I am true." When a soul strives to pull itself up out of sin The devil tries harder to push it back in. And the man who attempts to retrace the wrong track Needs his God and his will to stand close at his back. Through what are called accidents, Roger was late At the train.    Are not accidents servants of Fate? The first coach was filled; he passed on to the second. That, too, seemed complete, but a gentleman beckoned And said, "There's a seat, sir; the third from the last On your left."    Roger thanked him and leisurely passed Down the aisle, with his coat on his arm, to the place Indicated.    The seat held a lady, whose face Was turned to the window.    "Pray pardon me, miss" (For he judged by her back she was youthful), "is this Seat engaged?"    As he spoke, the face turned in surprise, And Roger looked into the long, languid eyes Of La Travers.    She smiled, moved her wraps from the seat, And he sat down beside her.    The same subtle, sweet Breath of perfume exhaled from her presence, and made The place seem a boudoir.    The deep winey shade 'Neath her eyes had grown larger, as if she had wept Or a late, lonely vigil with memory kept. A man who has rescued a woman from danger Or death, does not seem to her wholly a stranger When next she encounters him; yet both essayed To be formal and proper; and each of them made The effort a failure.    The jar of a train At times holds a mesmeric spell for the brain And a tense excitation for nerves; and the shriek Of the engine compels one to lean near to speak Or to list to his neighbor.    Formality flies With the smoke of the train and floats off to the skies. Roger led his companion to talk; and the theme Which he chose, was herself, her life story.    The dream Of the previous night was forgotten.    The charm Of the woman outweighed superstitious alarm. When the sunlight began to play peek-a-boo Through the tunnels, which told them the journey was through, Roger looked at his time-piece; the train for Bay Bend Left in just twenty minutes; but what a rude end To the day's pleasant comradeship -rushing away With a hurried good-bye!    He decided to stay Over night in the city.    He was not expected At home.    Mrs. Travers was quite unprotected, And almost a stranger in Gotham.    He ought To see her safe into her doorway, he thought. At the doorway she gave him her hand, with a smile; "I have known you," she said, "such a brief little while, Yet you seem like a friend of long standing; I say Good-bye with reluctance." "Perhaps, then, I may Call and see you to-morrow?" the words seemed to fall Of themselves from his lips; words he longed to recall When once uttered, for deep in his conscience he knew That the one word for him to speak now, was adieu. The lady's soft, cushion-like hand rested still In his own, and the contact was pleasant.    A thrill From the finger tips quickened his pulses. "You may Call to-morrow at four." The soft hand slipped away And left his palm lonely. "The call must be brief," He said to himself, with a sense of relief, As he ran down the steps, "for at five my train goes." Yet the five o'clock train bore no Roger Montrose From New York.    Mrs. Travers had asked him to dine. A tete-a-tete dinner with beauty and wine, To stir the man's senses and deaden his brain. (The devil keeps always good chefs in his train.) It was ten when he rose for departure.    The room Seemed a garden of midsummer fragrance and bloom. The lights with their soft rosy coverings made A glow like late sunsets, in some tropic glade. The world seemed afar, with its dullness and duty, And life was a rapture of love and of beauty. God knows how it happened; they never knew how. He turned with a formal conventional bow, And some well chosen words of politeness, to go. Her mouth was a rose Love had dropped in the snow Of her face.    It smiled up to him, luscious and sweet. In the tip of each finger he felt his heart beat, Like five hearts all in one, as her hand touched his own. She murmured "good-night," in a tremulous tone. White, intense, through the soft golden mist which the wine Had cast over his vision, he saw her face shine. Her low lidded eyes held a lion-like glow. You have seen sudden storms lash the ocean?    You know How the cyclone, unheralded, rises in wrath, And leaves devastation and death in its path? So swift, sudden passion may rise in its power, And ruin and blight a whole life in an hour. Two unanchored souls in its maelstrom were whirled, Drawn down by love's undertow, lost to the world. The dark, solemn billows of night shut them in. Like corpses afloat on the ocean of sin They must seem to their true, better selves, when again The tide drifts them back to the notice of men. Forget me, dear; forget and cease to love me, I am not worth one memory, kind or true, Let silent, pale Oblivion spread above me Her winding sheet, for I am dead to you. Forget, forget. Sin has resumed its interrupted story; I am enslaved, who dreamed of being free. Say for my soul, in life's dark purgatory, One little prayer, then cease to think of me. Forget, forget. I ask you not to pity or to pardon; I ask you to forget me.    Tear my name From out your heart; the wound will heal and harden. Death does not dig so deep a grave as shame. Forget, forget. VIII. Roger's Letter to Mabel. Farewell!    I shall never again seek your side; I will stay with my sins and leave you with your pride. Let the swift flame of scorn dry the tears of regret, Shut me out of your life, lock the door and forget. I shall pass from your skies as a vagabond star Passes out of the great solar system afar Into blackness and gloom; while the heavens smile on, Scarce knowing the poor erring creature is gone. Say a prayer for the soul sunk in sinning; I die To you, and to all who have known me.    Good-bye. Mabel's Letter to Maurice. I break through the silence of years, my old friend, To beg for a favor; oh, grant it!    I send Roger's letter in confidence to you, and ask, In the name of our sweet early friendship, a task, Which, however painful, I pray you perform. Poor Roger! his bark is adrift in the storm. He has veered from the course; with no compass of faith To point to the harbor, he goes to his death. You are giving your talents and time, I am told, To aiding the poor; let this victim of gold Be included.    His life has not learned self-control, And luxury stunted the growth of his soul. In blindness of spirit he took the wrong track, But he sees his great error and longs to come back. Oh, help me to reach him and save him, Maurice. My heart yearns to show him the infinite peace Found but in God's love.    Let us pity, forgive And help him, dear friend, to seek Christ and to live In the light of His mercy.    I know you will do What I ask, you were ever so loyal and true. Maurice to Mabel. Though bitter the task (why, your heart must well know), Your wish shall be ever my pleasure.    I go On the search for the prodigal.    Not for his sake, But because you have asked me, I willingly make This effort to find him.    Sometimes, I contend, It is kinder to let a soul speed to the end Of its swift downward course than to check it to-day, But to see it to-morrow pursue the same way. The man who could wantonly stray from your side Into folly and sin has abandoned all pride. There is little to hope from him.    Yet, since his name Is the name you now bear, I will save him from shame, God permitting.    To serve and obey you is still Held an honor, Madame, by Maurice Somerville. Maurice to Mabel Ten Days Later. The search for your husband is finished.    Oh, pray Tear all love and all hope from your heart ere I say What I must say.    The man has insulted your trust; He has dragged the most sacred of ties in the dust, And ruined the fame of a woman who wore, Until now, a good name.    He has gone.    Close the door Of your heart in his face if he seeks to come back. The sleuth hounds of justice were put on his track, And his life since he left you lies bare to my gaze. He sailed yesterday on the "Paris."    For days Preceding the journey he lived as the guest Of one Mrs. Zoe Travers, who comes from the West! A widow, young, fair, well-connected.    I hear He followed her back to New York from the Pier, And now he has taken the woman abroad. My letter sounds brutal and harsh.    Would to God I might soften the facts in some measure; but no, In matters like this the one thing is to know The whole truth, and at once.    Though the pain be intense It pulls less on the soul than the pangs of suspense. Like a surgeon of fate, with my pen for a knife, I cut out false hopes which endanger your life. Let the law, like a nurse, cleanse the wound -there is shame And disgrace for you now in the man's very name. Though justice is blindfolded, yet she can hear When the chink of gold dollars sounds close in her ear. One needs but to give her this musical hint To save you the sight of your sorrows in print. Closed doors, private hearing; a sentence or two In the journals; then dignified freedom for you. When love, truth and loyalty vanish, the tie Which binds man to woman is only a lie. Undo it! remember at all times I stand As a friend to rely on -a serf to command. *    *    *    *    * Some women there are who would willingly barter A queen's diadem for the crown of a martyr. They want to be pitied, not envied.    To know That the world feels compassion makes joy of their woe; And the keenest delight in their misery lies, If only their friends will look on with wet eyes. In fact, 'tis the prevalent weakness, I find, Of the sex.    As a mass, women seem disinclined To be thought of as happy; they like you to feel That their bright smiling faces are masks which conceal A dead hope in their hearts.    The strange fancy clings To the mind of the world that the rarest of things - Contentment -is commonplace; and, that to shine As something superior, one must repine, Or seem to be hiding an ache in the breast. Yet the commonest thing in the world is unrest, If you want to be really unique, go along And act as if Fate had not done you a wrong, And declare you have had your deserts in this life. The part of the patient, neglected young wife Contained its attractions for Mabel Montrose. She was one of the women who live but to pose In the eyes of their friends; and she so loved her art That she really believed she was living the part. The suffering martyr who makes no complaint Was a role more important, by far, than the saint Or reformer.    As first leading lady in grief, Her pride in herself found a certain relief. The ardent and love-selfish husband had not Been so dear to her heart, or so close to her thought, As this weak, reckless sinner, who woke in her soul Its dominant wish -to reform and control. (How often, alas, the reformers of earth, If they studied their purpose, would find it had birth In this thirst to control; in the poor human passion The minds and the manners of others to fashion! We sigh o'er the heathen, we weep o'er his woes, While forcing him into our creeds and our clothes. If he adds our diseases and vices as well, Still, at least we have guided him into our hell And away from his own heathen hades.    The pleasure Derived from that thought but reformers can measure.) The thing Mabel Montrose loved best on this earth Was a sinner, and Roger but doubled his worth In her eyes when he wrote her that letter.    And still When the last message came from Maurice Somerville And the bald, ugly facts, unsuspected, unguessed, Lay before her, the woman awoke in her breast, And the patient reformer gave way to the wife, Who was torn with resentment and jealousy's strife. Ah, jealousy! vain is the effort to prove Your right in the world as the offspring of love; For oftener far, you are spawned by a heart Where Cupid has never implanted a dart. Love knows you, indeed, for you serve in his train, But crowned like a monarch you royally reign Over souls wherein love is a stranger. No thought Came to Mabel Montrose that her own life was not Free from blame.    (How few women, indeed, think of this When they grieve o'er the ruin of marital bliss!) She was shocked and indignant.    Pain gave her a new Role to play without study; she missed in her cue And played badly at first, was resentful and cried Against Fate for the blow it had dealt to her pride (Though she called it her love), and declared her life blighted. It is one thing, of course, for a wife to be slighted For the average folly the world calls a sin, Such as races, clubs, games; when a woman steps in The matter assumes a new color, and Mabel, Who dearly loved sinners, at first seemed unable To pardon, or ask God to pardon, the crime Of her husband; an angry disgust for a time Drove all charity out of her heart.    For a thief, For a forger, a murderer, even, her grief Had been mingled with pity and pardon; the one Thing she could not forgive was the thing he had done. It was wicked, indecent, and so unrefined. To the lure of the senses her nature was blind, And her mantle of charity never had been Wide enough to quite cover that one vulgar sin. In the letter she sent to Maurice, though she said Little more than her thanks for his kindness, he read All her tense nervous feelings between its few lines. Though we study our words, the keen reader divines What we thought while we penned them; thought odors reveal What words not infrequently seek to conceal. Maurice read the grief, the resentment, the shame Which Mabel's heart held; to his own bosom came Stealing back, masked demurely as friendly regard, The hope of a lover -that hope long debarred. His letters grew frequent; their tone, dignified, Unselfish, and manly, appealed to her pride. Sweet sympathy mingled with praise in each line (As a gentle narcotic is stirred into wine), Soothed pain, stimulated self love, and restored her The pleasure of knowing the man still adored her. Understand, Mabel Montrose was not a coquette, She lacked all the arts of the temptress; and yet She was young, she was feminine; love to her mind Was extreme admiration; it pleased her to find She was still, to Maurice, an ideal.    A woman Must be quite unselfish, almost superhuman, And full of strong sympathy, who, in her soul, Feels no wrench when she knows she has lost all control O'er the heart of a man who once loved her. Months passed, And Mabel accepted her burden at last And went back to her world and its duties.    Her eyes, Seemed to say when she looked at you, "please sympathize, On the slight graceful form or the beautiful face. Twas a sorrow of mind, not a sorrow of heart, And the two play a wholly dissimilar part In the life of a woman. Maurice Somerville Kept his place as good friend through sheer force of his will But his heart was in tumult; he longed for the time When, free once again from the legalized crime Of her ties, she might listen to all he would say. There was anguish, and doubt, and suspense in delay, Yet Mabel spoke never of freedom.    At length He wrote her, "My will has exhausted its strength. Read the song I enclose; though my lips must be mute, The muse may at least improvise to her lute." Song. There was a bird as blithe as free, (Summer and sun and song) She sang by the shores of a laughing sea, And oh, but the world seemed fair to me, And the days were sweet and long. There was a hunter, a hunter bold, (Autumn and storm and sea) And he prisoned the bird in a cage of gold, And oh, but the world grew dark and cold, And the days were sad to me. The hunter has gone; ah, what cares he? (Winter and wind and rain) And the caged bird pines for the air and the sea, And I long for the right to set her free To sing in the sun again. The hunter has gone with a sneer at fate, (Spring and the sea and the sun) Let the bird fly free to find her mate, Ere the year of love grow sere and late. Sweet ladye, my song is done. Mabel's Letter to Maurice. To the song of your muse I have listened.    Oh, cease To think of me but as a friend, dear Maurice. Once a wife, a wife alway.    I vowed from my heart, "For better, for worse, until death do us part." No mention was made in the service that day Of breaking my fetters if joy flew away. "For better, for worse," a vow lightly spoken, When Fate brings the "worse," how lightly 'tis broken! The "worse," in my case, is the worst fate can give. Tho' I shrank from the blow, I must bear it and live, Not for self, but for duty; nor strive to evade Fulfilling the promise I willingly made. While Roger has sinned, and his sinning would be, In the eyes of the law, proof to render me free, It was God heard my vows and the Church sealed the bond. Until one of us passes to death's dim beyond, Though seas and though sins may divide us for life, We are bound to each other as husband and wife. In God's Court of Justice divorce is a word Which falls without import or meaning when heard; And the women who cast off old fetters that way, To give place to the new, on the great Judgment Day Must find, in the last summing up, that they stand Side by side, in God's eyes, with the Magdalene band. Dear Maurice, be my brother, my counselor, friend. We are lonely without you and Ruth, at Bay Bend. Come sometimes and brighten our lives; put away The thoughts which are making you restless to-day And give me your strong noble friendship; indeed 'Tis a friend that I crave, not a lover I need. Maurice to Mabel. You write like a woman, and one, it is plain, Whose sentiment hangs like a cloud o'er her brain. You gaze through a sort of traditional mist, And behold a mirage of God's laws which exist But in fancy.    God made but one law -it is love. A law for the earth, and the kingdoms above, A law for the woman, a law for the man, The base and the spire of His intricate plan Of existence.    All evils the world ever saw Had birth in man's breaking away from this law. God cancels a marriage when love flies away. "Till death do us part" should be altered to say, "Till disgust or indifference part us."    I know You never loved Roger, my heart tells me so. He won you, I claim, through a mesmeric spell; You dreamed of an Eden, and wakened in hell. You pitied his weakness, you struggled to save him, He paid with a crime the devotion you gave him. And the blackest of insults relentlessly hurled At your poor patient heart in the gaze of the world. In God's mighty ledger the stroke of a pen Has been drawn through your record of marriage.    Though men Call you wedded I hold you are widowed.    Why cling To the poor, empty, meaningless form of a thing - To the letter, devoid of all spirit?    God never Intended a woman to hopelessly sever Herself from all possible joy, or to make True faithfulness suffer for faithlessness' sake. When I think of your wrongs, when I think of my woes, That black word divorce like a bright planet glows In the skies of the future.    Oh, Mabel, be fair To yourself and to me.    For the years of despair I have suffered you owe me some recompense, surely. The heart that has worshipped so long and so purely Ought not to be slighted for mere sentiment. We must live as our century bids us.    Its bent Is away from the worn ruts of thought.    Where of old The life of a woman was run in the mold Of man's wishes and passions, to-day she is free; Free to think and to act; free to do and to be What she pleases.    The poor, pining victim of fate And man's cruelty, long ago went out of date. In the mansion of Life there were some things askew, Which the strong hand of Progress has righted.    The new, Better plan puts old notions of sex on the shelf. Who is true to a knave, is untrue to herself. Oh, be true to yourself, and have pity on one Who has long dwelt in shadow and pines for the sun. Love, starving on memories, begs for one taste Of sweet hope, ere the remnant of youth goes to waste. Mabel to Maurice. You write like a man who sees self as his goal. You speak of your woes -yet my travail of soul Seems mere sentiment to you.    Maurice, pause and think Of the black, bitter potion life gave me to drink When I dreamed of love's nectar.    Too fresh is the taste Of its gall on my lip for my heart in such haste To reach out for the cup that is proffered anew. A certain respect to my sorrows is due. I am weary of love as men know it.    The calm Of a sweet, tranquil friendship would act like a balm On the wounds of my heart; that platonic regard, Which we read of in books, or hear sung by the bard, But so seldom can find when we want it.    I thought, For a time, you had conquered mere self, and had brought Such a friendship to comfort and rest me.    But no, That dream, like full many another, must go. The love that is based on attraction of sex Is a love that has brought me but sorrow.    Why vex My poor soul with the same thing again?    If you love With a higher emotion, you know how to prove And sustain the assertion by conduct.    Maurice, Love must rise above passion, to infinite peace And serenity, ere it is love, to my mind. For the women of earth, in the ranks of mankind There are too many lovers and not enough friends. 'Tis the friend who protects, 'tis the lover who rends. He who can be a friend while he would be a lover Is the rarest and greatest of souls to discover. Have I found, dear Maurice, such a treasure in you? If not, I must say with this letter -adieu. As he finished the letter there seemed but one phrase To the heart of the reader.    It shone on his gaze Bright with promise and hope.    "Too fresh is the taste Of its gall on my lip for my heart in such haste To reach out for the cup that is offered anew." "In such haste."    Ah, how hope into certainty grew As he read and re-read that one sentence.    "Let fate Take the whole thing in charge, I can wait -I can wait. I have lived through the night; though the dawn may be gray And belated, it heralds the coming of day." So he talked with himself, and grew happy at last. The five hopeless years of his sorrow were cast Like a nightmare behind him.    He walked once again With a joy in his personal life, among men. There seemed to be always a smile on his lip, For he felt like a man on the deck of a ship Who has sailed through strange seas with a mutinous crew, And now in the distance sights land just in view. The house at Bay Bend was re-opened.    Once more, Where the waves of the Sound wash the New England shore, Walked Maurice; and beside him, young hope, with the tip Of his fair rosy fingers pressed hard on his lip, Urging silence.    If Mabel Montrose saw the boy With the pursed prudent mouth and the eyes full of joy She said nothing.    Grave, dignified (Ah, but so fair!), There was naught in her modest and womanly air To feed or encourage such hope.    Yet love grew Like an air plant, with only the night and the dew To sustain it; while Mabel rejoiced in the friend, Who, in spite of himself, had come back to Bay Bend, Yielding all to her wishes.    Such people, alone, Who gracefully gave up their plans for her own, Were congenial to Mabel.    Though looking the sweet, Fragile creature, with feminine virtues replete, Her nature was stubborn.    Beneath that fair brow Lurked an obstinate purpose to make others bow To herself in small matters.    She fully believed She was right, always right; and her friends were deceived, As a rule, into thinking the same; for her eyes Held a look of such innocent grief and surprise When her will was opposed, that one felt her misused, And retired from the field of dispute, self-accused. The days, like glad children, went hurrying out From the schoolhouse of time; months pursued the same route More sedately; a year, then two years, passed away, Yet hope, unimpaired, in the lover's heart lay, As a gem in the bed of a river might lie, Unharmed and unmoved while its waters ran by. His toil for the poor still continued, but not With that fervor of zeal which a dominant thought Lends to labor.    Fair love gilded dreams filled his mind, While the corners were left for his suffering kind. He was sorry for sorrow; but love made him glad, And nothing in life now seemed hopeless or sad. His tete-a-tete visits with Mabel were rare; She ordered her life with such prudence and care Lest her white name be soiled by the gossips.    And yet, Though his heart, like a steed checked too closely, would fret Sometimes at these creed-imposed fetters, he felt Keen delight in her nearness; in knowing she dwelt Within view of his high turret window.    Each day Which gave him a glimpse of her, love laid away As a poem in life's precious folio.    Night Held her face like a picture, dream-framed for his sight. So he fed on the crumbs from love's table, the while Fate sat looking on with a cynical smile. IX. SONGS FROM THE TURRET. I. In the day my thoughts are tender When I muse on my ladye fair. There is never one to offend her, For each is pure as a prayer. They float like spirits above her, About her and always near; And they scarce dare sigh that they love her, Because she would blush to hear. But in dreams my thoughts grow bolder; And close to my lips of fire, I reach out my arms and enfold her, My ladye, my heart's desire. And she who, in earthly places, Seems cold as the stars above, Unmasks in those fair dream spaces And gives me love for love. Oh day, with your thoughts of duty Cross over the sunset streams, And give me the night of beauty And love in the Land of Dreams. For there in the mystic, shady, Fair isle of the Slumber Sea, I read the heart of my ladye That here she hides from me. II. Some day, some beauteous day, Joy will come back again. Sorrow must fly away. Hope, on her harp will play The old inspiring strain Some day, some beauteous day. Through the long hours I say, "The night must fade and wane, Sorrow must fly away." The morn's bewildering ray Shall pierce the night of rain, Some day, some beauteous day. Autumn shall bloom like May, Delight shall spring from pain; Sorrow must fly away. Though on my life, grief's gray Bleak shadow long hath lain, Some day, some beauteous day, Sorrow must fly away. III. When love is lost, the day sets toward the night. Albeit the morning sun may still be bright, And not one cloud ship sails across the sky. Yet from the places where it used to lie, Gone is the lustrous glory of the light. No splendor rests on any mountain height, No scene spreads fair, and beauteous, to the sight. All, all seems dull and dreary to the eye, When love is lost. Love lends to life its grandeur and its might, Love goes, and leaves behind it gloom and blight. Like ghosts of time the pallid hours drag by, And grief's one happy thought is that we die. Ah! what can recompense us for its flight, When love is lost. IV. Life is a ponderous lesson book, and Fate The teacher.    When I came to love's fair leaf My teacher turned the page and bade me wait. "Learn first," she said, "love's grief"; And o'er and o'er through many a long to-morrow She kept me conning that sad page of sorrow. Cruel the task; and yet it was not vain. Now the great book of life I know by heart. In that one lesson of love's loss and pain Fate doth the whole impart. For, by the depths of woe, the mind can measure The beauteous unsealed summits of love's pleasure. Now, with the book of life upon her knee, Fate sits! the unread page of love's delight By her firm hand is half concealed from me, And half revealed to sight. Ah Fate! be kind! so well I learned love's sorrow, Give me its full delight to learn to-morrow. V. If I were a rain drop, and you were a leaf, I would burst from the cloud above you And lie on your breast in a rapture of rest, And love you, love you, love you. If I were a brown bee, and you were a rose, I would fly to you, love, nor miss you; I would sip and sip from your nectared lip, And kiss you, kiss you, kiss you. If I were a doe, dear, and you were a brook, Ah, what would I do then, think you? I would kneel by your bank, in the grasses dank, And drink you, drink you, drink you. VI. Time owes me such a heavy debt, How can he ever make things right? For suns that with no promise set To help me greet the morning light, For dreams that no fruition met, For joys that passed from bud to blight, Time owes me such a heavy debt; How can he ever make things right? For passions balked, with strain and fret Of hopes delayed, or perished quite, For kisses that I did not get On many a love impelling night, Time owes me such a heavy debt; How can he ever make things right? VII. As the king bird feeds on the heart of the bee, So would I feed on the sweets of thee. As the south wind kisses the leaf at will, From the leaf of thy lips I would drink my fill. As the sun pries into the heart of a rose, I would pry in thy heart, and its thoughts disclose. As a dewdrop mirrors the loving sky, I would see myself in thy tear wet eye. As the deep night shelters the day in its arms, I would hide thee, dear, from the world's alarms. VIII. Now do I know how Paradise doth seem, Now do I know the deep red depths of hell. Swift from those fair supernal heights I fell To burning flames of hades, in a dream. Methought my ladye rested by a stream Which rippled through the verdure of a dell. She lay like Eve; dear God, I dare not tell Of her perfections; of the glow and gleam Of tinted flesh, and undulating hair, Of sudden thigh, and sweetly rounded breast. Then, like a cloud, he came, from God knows where, And on her eyes and mouth mad kisses pressed. I fell, and fell, through leagues of scorching space, And always saw his lips upon her face. IX. Love is the source of all supreme delight, Love is the bitter fountain of despair; Who follows Love shall stand upon the height, Yet through the darkest depths, Love, too, leads there. Courage needs he who would with bold Love fare, Let him set forth with all his strength bedight; Yet in his heart this song to banish care - "Love is the source of all supreme delight." And he must sing this song both day and night, Though he be led down shadowy pathways where Black waters moan, through valleys struck with blight, "Love is the bitter fountain of despair." Let him be brave, and bravely let him dare Whate'er betide, and feel no coward fright. Who shares the worst, the best deserves to share; Who follows Love shall stand upon the height. Ah! sweet is peace to those who faced the fight, And bright the crown those faithful ones shall wear, Who whispered, when the shadows veiled their sight, "Yet through the darkest depths, Love, too, leads there." To hearts that best know Love, his dark is fair, His sorrow gladness, and his wrong is right. All joys lie waiting on his winding stair; All ways, ail paths of Love lead to the light. Love is the source. X. My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, Wherein I gaze with silent yearning; Deep in their depths my future dwells. My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, But not one sign my fate foretells, While my poor heart with love is burning. My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, Wherein I gaze with silent yearning. XI. Three things my ladye seemeth like to me - She seems like moonlight on a waveless sea. And like the delicate fragrance, which exhales, When Day's warm garments brush the dewy vales. And when my heart grows weary of earth's sound, She seems like silence -restful and profound. XII. The moon flower, grown from a slip so slender, Has burst in a star bloom, full and white. The air is filled with a perfume tender, The breath that blows from that garden height. Yet moments lag that should take their flight On wings, like the wings of a homing dove, And the world goes wrong where it should go right, For this is a night that is lost to love. Again, like a queen, who would rashly spend her Dower of wealth in a single night, The proud moon seems, on her track of splendor, Enriching the world with her silver light. She flings on the crest of each billow a bright Pure gem, from the casket of jewels above. But I sigh as I gaze on the glorious sight, "This is a night that is lost to love." Oh, I would that the moon might never wend her Way through the skies in royal might, Till the haughty heart of my lady surrender And the faithful love of a life requite. For the moon was made for a lover's delight; And grayer than gloom must its luster prove To the soul that sighs under sorrow's blight, "This is a night that is lost to love." L'Envoi. Fate, have pity upon my plight, And the heart of my lady to mercy move. For the saddest words that youth can write Are, "This is a night that is lost to love." XIII. As the waves of the outgoing sea Leave the rocks and the drift wood bare, When your thoughts are for others than me, My heart is the strand of despair - Beloved, Where bleak suns glare, And Joy, like a desolate mourner, gropes In the wrecks of broken hopes. As the incoming waves of the sea, The rocks and the sandbar hide, When your thoughts flow back to me, My heart leaps up on the tide - Beloved, Where my glad hopes ride With joy at the wheel, and the sun above In a glorious sky of love. XIV. There was a bard all in the olden time, When bards were men to whom the world gave ear, And song an art the great gods deemed sublime, Who sought to make his willful lady hear By weaving strange new melodies of rhyme, Which voiced his love, his sorrow, and his fear. Sweetheart, my soul is heavy now with fear, Lest thou shalt frown upon me for all time. Ah! would that I had skill to weave a rhyme Worthy to win the favor of thine ear. Tho' all the world were deaf, if thou didst hear And smile, my song would seem to me sublime. But ah! too vast, too awful and sublime, Is my great passion, born of grief and fear, To clothe in verse.    Why, if the world could hear And understand my love, then for all time, So long as there was sound or listening ear, All space would ring and echo with my rhyme. Such passion seems belittled by a rhyme - It needs the voice of nature.    The sublime, Loud thunder crash, that hurts the startled ear, And stirs the heart with awe, akin to fear, The weird, wild winds of equinoctial time; These voices tell my love, wouldst thou but hear. And listening at the flood tides, thou might'st hear The love I bear thee surging through the rhyme Of breaking billows, many a moon full time. Why, I have heard thee call the sea sublime, When every wave but voiced the anguished fear Of my man's heart to thy unconscious ear. Vain, then, the hope that thou wilt lend thine ear To any song of mine, or deign to hear My lays of longing or my strains of fear. Vain is the hope to weave for thee a rhyme, Or sweet or sad, or subtle or sublime, Which wins thy gracious favor for all time. Oh, cruel time! my lady will not hear, Though in her ear love sings a song sublime, And my sad rhyme ends, like my love, in fear. Bright like the comforting blaze on the hearth, Sweet like the blooms on the young apple tree, Fragrant with promise of fruit yet to be Are the home-keeping maidens of earth. Better and greater than talent is worth, And where is the glory of brush or of pen Like the glory of mothers and molders of men - The home-keeping women of earth? Crowned since the great solar system had birth, They reign unsurpassed in their beautiful sphere. They are queens who can look in God's face without fear - The home-keeping women of earth. X. A man whose mere name was submerged in the sea Of letters which followed it, B. A., M. D., And Minerva knows what else, held forth at Bellevue On what he believed some discovery new In medical Science (though, mayhap, a truth That was old in Confucius' earliest youth), And a bevy of bright women students sat near, Absorbing his wisdom with eye and with ear. Close by, lay the corpse of a man, half in view. Dear shades of our dead and gone grandmamas! you Whose modesty hung out red flags on each cheek, Danger signals -if some luckless boor chanced to speak The words "leg" or "liver" before you, I think Your gray ashes, even, would deepen to pink Should your ghost happen into a clinic or college Where your granddaughters congregate seeking for knowledge. Forced to listen to what they are eager to hear, No doubt you would fancy the world out of gear, And deem modesty dead, with last century belles. Honored ghosts, you, would err! for true modesty dwells In the same breast with knowledge, and takes no offense. Truth never harmed anything yet but pretense. There are fashions in modesty; what in your time Had been deemed little less than an absolute crime In matters of dress, or behavior, to-day Is the custom.    And however daring you may Deem our manners and modes, yet, were facts fully known, Our morals compare very well with your own. The women composing the class at Bellevue Were young -under thirty; some pleasing to view, Some plain.    Roman features prevailed, with brown hair, But one was so feminine, soft eyed and fair That she seemed out of place in a clinic, as though A rose in a vegetable garden should grow. While her face was intelligent, none would avow That cold intellect dwelt on that fair oval brow, Or looked out of the depths of those golden gray eyes, The color of smoke against clear, sunny skies. 'Twas a warm woman face, made for fireside nooks, Not a face to be bent over medical books. There was nothing aggressive in features or form; She was meant for still harbors, and not for the storm And the strife of rude waters.    The swell of her breast Suggested love's sweet downy cushion of rest For the cheeks of fair children.    Her plump little hands, Seemed fashioned for sewing small gussets and bands And fussing with laces and ribbons, instead Of cutting cold flesh and dissecting the dead. And yet, as a student she ranked with the first. But conscience, in labor once chosen, not thirst For such knowledge, had spurred her to action.    This day She seemed inattentive, her air was distrait, As if thought had slipped free of the bridle and rein And galloped away over memory's plain. It was true; it was strange, too, but there in the class, While the learned man was talking, her mind seemed to pass Out, away from the clinic, away from the town, To a New England midsummer garden close down By the salt water's edge; and she felt the wind blowing Among her loose locks as she leaned o'er her sewing, While the voice of a man stirred her heart into song. She was called from her dream by the clang of the gong Which foretells an arrival at Bellevue.    The class Was dismissed for the day.    In the hall, forced to pass By the stretcher (low brougham of misery), she Whom we know was Ruth Somerville, looked down to see The white, haggard face of the man whom her mind Had strayed off in a waking day vision to find But a moment before. The wild, passionate cry Which arose in her heart, was held back, nor passed by The white sentinels set on her lip.    The serene, Lofty look which deep feeling controlled gives the mien Marked her air as she turned to the surgeon and said: "This man lying here, either dying or dead, Was a classmate, at Yale, of my brother's; my friend Is his wife.    Let me stay by his side to the end, If the end has not come." It was Roger Montrose, Grown old with his sins and grown gaunt with his woes, Lying low in his manhood before her. His eyes Opened slowly; a wondering look of surprise Met the soft orbs above him.    "Ruth -Ruth Somerville," He said feebly.    "Tell Mabel" -then sighed, and was still. But it was not the stillness of death.    There was life In that turbulent heart yet; that heart torn with strife, Scarred with passion, and wracked by the pangs of remorse. "Death's swift leaden messenger missed in its course By the breadth of a hair," said the surgeon.    "The ball Lies in there by the shoulder.    His chances are small For a new start on earth.    While a sober man might Hope to conquer grim Death in this hand-to-hand fight, Here old Alcohol stands as Death's second, fierce, cruel, And stronger than Life's one aid, skill, in the duel. You tell me the wife of this man is your friend? He was shot by a woman, who then made an end Of her own life.    I hope it was not - -" "Oh, no -no, Not his wife," Ruth replied, "for he left her to go With this other, his victim -poor creature -they say She was good till she met him.    Ah! what a black way For love's rose scented path to lead down to, and end. God pity her, pity her."    "Her, not your friend? Not his wife?" There was gentle reproof in the tone Of the staid old physician.    Ruth's eyes met his own In brave, silent warfare; the blue and the gray Again faced each other in battle array. Ruth: I pity the woman who suffered.    His wife Goes her way well contented.    Love was in her life But an incident; while to this other, dear God, It was all; on what sharp, burning ploughshares she trod, Down what chasms she leaped, how she tossed the whole world, Like a dead rose, behind her, to lie and be whirled In the maelstrom of love for one moment.    Ah, brief Is the rapture such souls find, and long is their grief, Black their sin, blurred their record, and scarlet their shame. And yet when I think of them, sorrow, not blame, Stirs my being.    Blind passion is only the weed Of fair, beautiful love.    Both are sprung from one seed; One grows wild, one is trained and directed.    Condemn The hand that neglected -but ah! pity them. Surgeon: You speak with much feeling.    But now, if the friends Of this man are to see him before his life ends I recommend action on your part.    His stay On this planet, I fear, will be finished to-day. A man who neglects and abuses his wife, Who gives her at best but the dregs of his life, In the hey day of health, when he's drained his last cup Has a fashion of wanting to settle things up. Craves forgiveness, and hopes with a few final tears To wash out the sins and the insults of years. Call your friend; bid her hasten, lest lips that are dumb, Having wasted life's feast, shall refuse her death's crumb. Ruth: There are souls to whom crumbs are sufficient, at least They seem not to value love's opulent feast. They neglect, they ignore, they abuse, or destroy What to some poor starved life had been earth's rarest joy. 'Tis a curious fact that love's banqueting table Full often is spread for the guest the least able To do the feast justice.    The gods take delight In offering crusts to the starved appetite And rich fruits, to the sated or sickly. The eyes Of the surgeon were fixed on Ruth's face with a wise Knowing look in their depths, and he said to himself, "There's a mystery here which young Cupid, sly elf, Could account for.    I judge by her voice and her face That the wife of this man holds no very warm place In Miss Somerville's heart, though she names her as friend. Ah, full many a drama has come to an end 'Neath the walls of Bellevue, and the curtain will fall On one actor to-night; though the audience call, He will make no response, once he passes from view, For Death is the prompter who gives him the cue." The wisest minds err.    When a clergyman tries To tell a man where he will go when he dies, Or when a physician makes bold to aver Just the length of a life here, both usually err. So it is not surprising that Roger, at dawn, Sat propped up by pillows, still haggard and wan, But seemingly stronger, and eager to tell His story to Ruth ere the death shadows fell. "If I go before Mabel can reach me," he sighed, "Tell her this: that my heart was all hers when I died, Was all hers while I lived.    Ah!    I see how you start, But that other -God pity her -not with my heart, But my sensual senses I loved her.    The fire Of her glance blinded men to all things save desire. It called to the beast chained within us.    Her lips Held the nectar that makes a man mad when he sips. Her touch was delirium.    In the fierce joys Of her kisses there lurked the fell curse which destroys All such rapture -satiety.    When passion dies, And the mind finds no pleasure, the spirit no ties To replace it, disgust digs its grave.    Ay! disgust Is ever the sexton who buries dead lust. When two people wander from virtue's straight track, One always grows weary and longs to go back. Well, I wearied.    God knows how I struggled to hide The truth from the poor, erring soul at my side. And God knows how I hated my life when I first Found that passion's mad potion had palled on my thirst. Once false to my virtues, now false to my sin, I seemed less to myself than I ever had been. We parted.    This bullet hole here in my breast Proceeds with the story and tells you the rest. She smiled, I remember, in saying adieu: Then two swift, sharp reports -and I woke in Bellevue With one ball in my breast. Ruth: And the other in hers. No more with wild sorrow that sad bosom stirs. She is dead, sir, the woman you led to her ruin. Roger: The woman led me.    Ah! not all the undoing In these matters lies at man's door.    In the mind Of full many a so-called chaste woman we find Unchaste longings.    The world heaps on man its abuse When he woos without wedding; yet women seduce And betray us; they lure us and lead us to shame; As they share in the sin, let them share in the blame. Ruth: Hush! the woman is dead. Roger: And I dying.    But truth Is not changed by the death of two people!    Oh, Ruth, Be just ere you judge me! the death of my child Half unbalanced my reason; weak, wretched and wild With drink and with sorrows, the devil's own chance Flung me down by the side of a woman whose glance Was an opiate, lulling the conscience.    I fell, With the woman who tempted me, down to dark hell. In the honey of sin hides the sting of the bee. The honey soon sated -the sting stayed with me. Like a damned soul I looked from my Hades, above To the world I had left, and I craved the pure love That but late had seemed cold, unresponsive.    Her eyes, Mabel's eyes, shone in dreams from the far distant skies Of the lost world of goodness and virtue.    Like one Who is burning with thirst 'neath a hot desert sun, I longed for her kiss, cool, reluctant, but pure. Ah! man's love for good women alone can endure, For virtue is God, the Eternal.    The rest Is but chaos.    The worst must give way to the best. Tell Mabel -Ruth, Ruth, she is here, oh thank God. She stood, like a violet sprung from the sod, By his bedside; pale, beautiful, dewy with tears. The spectre of death bridged the chasm of years: He sighed on her bosom.    "Forgive, oh forgive!" She kissed his pale forehead and answered him: "Live, Live, my husband! oh plead with the angels to stay Until God, too, has pardoned your sins.    Let us pray." Ruth slipped from the room all unnoticed.    She seemed Like a sleeper who wakens and knows he has dreamed And is dazed with reality.    On, as if led By some presence unseen, to the inn of the dead She passed swiftly; the pale silent guest whom she sought Lay alone on her narrow and unadorned cot. No hand had placed blossoms about her; no tear Of love or of sorrow had hallowed that bier. The desperate smile life had left on her face Death retained; but he touched, too, her brow with a grace And a radiance, subtle, mysterious.    Under The half drooping lids lay a look of strange wonder, As if on the sight of those sorrowing eyes The unexplored country had dawned with surprise. The pure, living woman leaned over the dead, Lovely sinner, and kissed her.    "God rest you," she said. "Poor suffering soul, you were forged in that Source Where the lightnings are fashioned.    Love guided, your force Would have been like a current of life giving joys, And not like the death dealing bolt which destroys. Oh, shame to the parents who dared give you birth, To live and to love and to suffer on earth, With the serious lessons of life unexplained, And your passionate nature untaught and untrained. You would not lie here in your youth and your beauty If your mother had known what was motherhood's duty. The age calls to woman, "Go, broaden your lives," While for lack of good mothers the Potter's Field thrives. But you, poor unfortunate, you shall not lie In that dust heap of death; while the summers roll by You shall sleep where green hillsides are kissed by the wave, And the soft hand of pity shall care for your grave. XI. Ruth's Letter to Maurice, Six Months Later. The springtime is here in our old home again, Which again you have left.    Oh, most worthy of men, Why grieve for unworthiness?    Why waste your life For a woman who never was meant for a wife? Mabel Lee has no love in her nature.    Your heart Would have starved in her keeping.    She plays her new part, As the faithful, forgiving, sweet spouse, with content. I think she is secretly glad Roger went Astray for a season.    She stands up still higher On her pedestal, now, for Bay Bend to admire. She is pleased with herself.    As for Roger, he trots Like a lamb in her wake, with the blemishing spots Of his sins washed away by the Church.    Oh I seem To myself, in these days, like one waked from a dream To blessed reality.    Off in the Bay I saw a fair snowy sailed ship yesterday. The masts shone like gold, and the furrowed waves laughed, To be beat into foam by the beautiful craft. But close in the harbor I saw the ship lying; What seemed like the wings of a sea gull when flying, Were weather stained sheets; there were no masts of gold, And the craft was uncleanly, unseaworthy, old. Well, the man whom I loved, and loved vainly, and whom I fancied had shadowed my whole life with gloom, Has been shown to my sight like that ship in the Bay, And all my illusions have vanished away. The man is by nature weak, selfish, unstable. I think if some woman more loving than Mabel, More tender, more tactful, less painfully good, Had directed his home-life, perchance Roger would Have evolved his best self, that pure atom of God, Which lies deep in each heart like a seed in the sod. 'Tis the world's over-virtuous women, ofttimes, Who drive men of weak will into sexual crimes. I pity him.    (God knows I pity, each, all Of the poor striving souls who grope blindly and fall By the wayside of life.)    But the love which unbidden Crept into my heart, and was guarded and hidden For years, that has vanished.    It passed like a breath, In the gray Autumn morning when Roger faced death, As he thought, and uncovered his heart to my sight. Like a corpse, resurrected and brought to the light, Which crumbles to ashes, the love of my youth Crumbled off into nothingness.    Ah, it is truth; Love can die!    You may hold it is not the true thing, Not the genuine passion, which dies or takes wing; But the soil of the heart, like the soil of the earth, May, at varying times of the seasons, give birth To bluebells, and roses, and bright goldenrod. Each one is a gift from the garden of God, Though it dies when its season is over.    Why cling To the withered dead stalk of the blossoms of spring Through a lifetime, Maurice?    It is stubbornness only, Not constancy, which makes full many lives lonely. They want their own way, and, like cross children, fling Back the gifts which, in place of the lost flowers of spring, Fate offers them.    Life holds in store for you yet Better things, dear Maurice, than a dead violet, As it holds better things than dead daisies for me. To Roger Montrose, let us leave Mabel Lee, With our blessing.    They seem to be happy; or she Seems content with herself and her province; while he Has the look of one who, overfed with emotion, Tries a diet of spiritual health-food, devotion. He is broken in strength, and his face has the hue Of a man to whom passion has bidden adieu. He has time now to worship his God and his wife. She seems better pleased with the dregs of his life Than she was with the bead of it. Well, let them make What they will of their future.    Maurice, for my sake And your own, put them out of your thoughts.    All too brief And too broad is this life to be ruined by grief Over one human atom.    Like mellowing rain, Which enriches the soil of the soul and the brain, Should the sorrow of youth be; and not like the breath Of the cyclone, which carries destruction and death. Come, Maurice, let philosophy lift you above The gloom and despair of unfortunate love. Sometimes, if we look a woe straight in the face, It loses its terrors and seems commonplace; While sorrow will follow and find if we roam. Come, help me to turn the old house into home. We have youth, health, and competence.    Why should we go Out into God's world with long faces of woe? Let our pleasures have speech, let our sorrows be dumb, Let us laugh at despair and contentment will come. Let us teach earth's repiners to look through glad eyes, For the world needs the happy far more than the wise. I am one of the women whose talent and taste Lie in home-making.    All else I do seems mere waste Of time and intention; but no woman can Make a house seem a home without aid of a man. He is sinew and bone, she is spirit and life. Until the veiled future shall bring you a wife, Me a mate (and both wait for us somewhere, dear brother), Let us bury old corpses and live for each other. You will write, and your great heart athrob through your pen Shall strengthen earth's weak ones with courage again. Where your epigrams fail, I will offer a pill, And doctor their bodies with "new woman" skill. (Once a wife, I will drop from my name the M. D. I hold it the truth that no woman can be An excellent wife and an excellent mother, And leave enough purpose and time for another Profession outside.    And our sex was not made To jostle with men in the great marts of trade. The wage-earning women, who talk of their sphere, Have thrown the domestic machine out of gear. They point to their fast swelling ranks overjoyed; Forgetting the army of men unemployed. The banner of Feminine "Rights," when unfurled, Means a flag of distress to the rest of the world. And poor Cupid, depressed by such follies and crimes, Sits weeping, alone, in the Land of Hard Times. The world needs wise mothers, the world needs good wives, The world needs good homes, and yet woman strives To be everything else but domestic.    God's plan Was for woman to rule the whole world, through a man. There is nothing a woman of sweetness and tact Can not do without personal effort or act. She needs but infuse lover, husband or son With her own subtle spirit, and lo! it is done. Though the man is unconscious, full oft, of the cause, And fancies himself the sole maker of laws. Well, let him.    The cannon, no doubt, is the prouder For not knowing its noise is produced by the powder. Yet this is the law: Who can love, can command.) But I wander too far from the subject in hand, Which is, your home coming.    Make haste, dear; I find More need every day of your counseling mind. I work well in harness, but poorly alone. Until that bright day when Fate brings us our own, Let us labor together.    I see many ways, Many tasks, for the use of our talents and days. Your wisdom shall better the workingmen's lives, While I will look after their daughters and wives, And teach them to cook without waste; for, indeed, It is knowledge like this which the poor people need, Not the stuff taught in schools.    You shall help them to think, While I show them what they can eat and can drink With least cost, and most pleasure and benefit.    Please Write me and say you will come, dear Maurice. Home, sister, and duty are all waiting here; Who keeps close to duty finds pleasure dwells near. XII. Maurice's Letter to Ruth: No, no.    I have gambled with destiny twice, And have staked my whole hopes on a home; but the dice Thrown by Fate made me loser.    Henceforward, I know My lot must be homeless.    The gods will it so. I fought, I rebelled; I was bitter.    I strove To outwit the great Cosmic Forces, above, Or beyond, or about us, who guide and control The course of all things from the moat to the soul. The river may envy the peace of the pond, But law drives it out to the ocean beyond. If it roars down abysses, or laughs through the land, It follows the way which the Forces have planned. So man is directed.    His only the choice To help or to hinder -to weep or rejoice. But vain is refusal -and vain discontent, For at last he must walk in the way that was meant. My way leads through shadow, alone to the end I must work out my karma, and follow its trend. I must fulfill the purpose, whatever it be, And look not for peace till I merge in God's sea. Though bankrupt in joy, still my life has its gain; I have climbed the last round in the ladder of pain. There is nothing to dread.    I have drained sorrow's cup And can laugh as I fling it at Fate bottom up. I have missed what I sought; yet I missed not the whole. The best part of love is in loving.    My soul Is enriched by its prodigal gifts.    Still, to give And to ask no return, is my lot while I live. Such love may be blindness, but where are love's eyes? Such love may be folly, love seldom is wise. Such love may be madness, was love ever sane? Such love must be sorrow, for all love is pain. Love goes where it must go, and in its own season. Love cannot be banished by will or by reason. Love gave back your freedom, it keeps me its slave. I shall walk in its fetters, unloved, to my grave. So be it.    What right has the ant, in the dust, To cry that the world is all wrong, and unjust, Because the swift foot of a messenger trod Down the home, and the hopes, that were built in the sod? What is man but an ant, in this universe scheme? Though dear his ambition, and precious his dream, God's messengers speed all unseen on their way, And the plans of a lifetime go down in a day. No matter.    The aim of the Infinite mind, Which lies back of it all, must be great, must be kind. Can the ant or the man, though ingenious and wise, Swing the tides of the sea -set a star in the skies? Can man fling a million of worlds into space, To whirl on their orbits with system and grace? Can he color a sunset, or create a seed, Or fashion one leaf of the commonest weed? Can man summon daylight, or bid the night fall? Then how dare he question the Force which does all? Where so much is flawless, where so much is grand, All, all must be right, could our souls understand. Ah, man, the poor egotist!    Think with what pride He boasts his small knowledge of star and of tide. But when fortune fails him, or when a hope dies, The Maker of stars and of seas he denies! I questioned, I doubted.    But that is all past; I have learned the true secret of living at last. It is, to accept what Fate sends, and to know That the one thing God wishes of man -is to grow. Growth, growth out of self, back to him -the First Cause: Therein lies the purpose, the law of all laws. Tears, grief, disappointment, well, what are all these To the Builder of stars and the Maker of seas? Does the star long to shine, when He tells it to set, As the heart would remember when told to forget? Does the sea moan for flood tide, when bid to be low, As a soul cries for pleasure when given life's woe? In the Antarctic regions a volcano glows, While low at its base lie the up-reaching snows. With patient persistence they steadily climb, And the flame will be quenched in the passage of time. My heart is the crater, my will is the snow, Which yet may extinguish its volcanic glow. When self is once conquered, the end comes to pain, And that is the goal which I seek to attain. I seek it in work, heaven planned, heaven sent; In the kingdom of toil waits the crown of content. Work, work! ah, how high and divine was its birth, When God, the first laborer, fashioned the earth. The world cries for workers; not toilers for pelf, But souls who have sought to eliminate self. Can the lame lead the race?    Can the blind guide the blind? We must better ourselves ere we better our kind. There are wrongs to be righted; and first of them all, Is to lift up the leaners from Charity's thrall. Sweet, wisdomless Charity, sowing the seed Which it seeks to uproot, of dependence and need. For vain is the effort to give man content By clothing his body, by paying his rent. The garment re-tatters, the rent day recurs; Who seeks to serve God by such charity errs. Give light to the spirit, give strength to the mind, And the body soon cares for itself, you will find. First, faith in God's wisdom, then purpose and will, And, like mist before sunlight, shall vanish each ill. To the far realm of Wisdom there lies a short way. To find it we need but the password -Obey. Obey like the acorn that falls to the sod, To rise, through the heart of the oak tree, to God. Though slow be the rising, and distant the goal, Serenity waits at the end for each soul. I seek it.    Not backward, but onward I go, And since sorrow means growth, I will welcome my woe. In the ladder of lives we are given to climb, Each life counts for only a second of time. The one thing to do in the brief little space, Is to make the world glad that we ran in the race. No soul should be sad whom the Maker deemed worth The great gift of song as its dower at birth. While I pass on my way, an invisible throng Breathes low in my ear the new note of a song. So I am not alone; for by night and by day These mystical messengers people my way. They bid me to hearken, they bid me be dumb And to wait for the true inspiration to come. THE END.
The Dolls
William Butler Yeats
A Doll in the doll-maker's house Looks at the cradle and balls: 'That is an insult to us.' But the oldest of all the dolls Who had seen, being kept for show, Generations of his sort, Out-screams the whole shelf: 'Although There's not a man can report Evil of this place, The man and the woman bring Hither to our disgrace, A noisy and filthy thing.' Hearing him groan and stretch The doll-maker's wife is aware Her husband has heard the wretch, And crouched by the arm of his chair, She murmurs into his ear, Head upon shoulder leant: 'My dear, my dear, oh dear, It was an accident.'
The Donkey And His Panniers. A Fable.
Thomas Moore
--"fessus jam sudat asellus, "parce illi; vestrum delicium est asinus." VERGIL. Copa. A donkey whose talent for burdens was wondrous, So much that you'd swear he rejoiced in a load, One day had to jog under panniers so ponderous, That--down the poor Donkey fell smack on the road! His owners and drivers stood round in amaze What! Neddy, the patient, the prosperous Neddy, So easy to drive thro' the dirtiest ways For every description of job-work so ready! One driver (whom Ned might have "hailed" as a "brother")[1] Had just been proclaiming his Donkey's renown For vigor, for spirit, for one thing or other-- When, lo! mid his praises the Donkey came down! But how to upraise him?--one shouts, t'other whistles, While Jenky, the Conjuror, wisest of all, Declared that an "over-production of thistles[2]-- (Here Ned gave a stare)--was the cause of his fall." Another wise Solomon cries as he passes-- "There, let him alone and the fit will soon cease; "The beast has been fighting with other jack-asses, "And this is his mode of 'transition to peace.'" Some lookt at his hoofs, and with learned grimaces Pronounced that too long without shoes he had gone-- "Let the blacksmith provide him a sound metal basis," (The wise-acres said), "and he's sure to jog on." Meanwhile, the poor Neddy in torture and fear Lay under his panniers, scarce able to groan; And--what was still dolefuller--lending an ear To advisers whose ears were a match for his own. At length a plain rustic whose wit went so far As to see others' folly, roared out, as he past-- "Quick--off with the panniers, all dolts as ye are, "Or your prosperous Neddy will soon kick his last!" October, 1826.
Joy.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
A Dragon-Fly with beauteous wing Is hov'ring o'er a silv'ry spring; I watch its motions with delight, Now dark its colours seem, now bright; Chameleon-like appear, now blue, Now red, and now of greenish hue. Would it would come still nearer me, That I its tints might better see It hovers, flutters, resting ne'er! But hush! it settles on the mead. I have it safe now, I declare! And when its form I closely view, 'Tis of a sad and dingy blue Such, Joy-Dissector, is thy case indeed
The Pack-Saddle
Jean de La Fontaine
A FAMOUS painter, jealous of his wife; Whose charms he valued more than fame or life, When going on a journey used his art, To paint an ASS upon a certain part, (Umbilical, 'tis said) and like a seal: Impressive token, nothing thence to steal. A BROTHER brush, enamoured of the dame; Now took advantage, and declared his flame: The Ass effaced, but God knows how 'twas done; Another soon howe'er he had begun, And finished well, upon the very spot; In painting, few more praises ever got; But want of recollection made him place A saddle, where before he none could trace. THE husband, when returned, desired to look At what he drew, when leave he lately took. Yes, see my dear, the wily wife replied, The Ass is witness, faithful I abide. Zounds! said the painter, when he got a sight, - What! - you'd persuade me ev'ry thing is right? I wish the witness you display so well, And him who saddled it, were both in Hell.
Ballad
John Clare
A faithless shepherd courted me, He stole away my liberty. When my poor heart was strange to men, He came and smiled and stole it then. When my apron would hang low, Me he sought through frost and snow. When it puckered up with shame, And I sought him, he never came. When summer brought no fears to fright, He came to guard me every night. When winter nights did darkly prove, None came to guard me or to love. I wish, I wish, but all in vain, I wish I was a maid again. A maid again I cannot be, O when will green grass cover me?
Last Lines
Anne Bronte
Jan 7th A dreadful darkness closes in On my bewildered mind; O let me suffer and not sin, Be tortured yet resigned. Through all this world of whelming mist Still let me look to Thee, And give me courage to resist The Tempter till he flee. Weary I am, O give me strength And leave me not to faint; Say Thou wilt comfort me at length And pity my complaint. I've begged to serve Thee heart and soul, To sacrifice to Thee No niggard portion, but the whole Of my identity. I hoped amid the brave and strong My portioned task might lie, To toil amid the labouring throng With purpose pure and high. But Thou hast fixed another part, And Thou hast fixed it well; I said so with my breaking heart When first the anguish fell. For Thou hast taken my delight And hope of life away, And bid me watch the painful night And wait the weary day. The hope and the delight were Thine; I bless Thee for their loan; I gave Thee while I deemed them mine Too little thanks, I own. Shall I with joy Thy blessings share And not endure their loss? Or hope the martyr's crown to wear And cast away the cross? These weary hours will not be lost, These days of passive misery, These nights of darkness anguish tost If I can fix my heart on Thee. Weak and weary though I lie, Crushed with sorrow, worn with pain, Still I may lift to Heaven mine eyes And strive and labour not in vain, That inward strife against the sins That ever wait on suffering; To watch and strike where first begins Each ill that would corruption bring, That secret labour to sustain With humble patience every blow, To gather fortitude from pain And hope and holiness from woe. Thus let me serve Thee from my heart Whatever be my written fate, Whether thus early to depart Or yet awhile to wait. If Thou shouldst bring me back to life More humbled I should be; More wise, more strengthened for the strife, More apt to lean on Thee. Should Death be standing at the gate Thus should I keep my vow; But, Lord, whate'er my future fate So let me serve Thee now. Finished. Jan. 28, 1849.
Nursery Rhyme. CCXCIV. Games.
Unknown
[The game of water-skimming is of high antiquity, being mentioned by Julius Pollux, and also by Eustathius, in his commentary upon Homer. Brand quotes a curious passage from Minucius Felix; but all antiquaries seem to have overlooked the very curious notice in Higgins' adaptation of Junius's 'Nomenclator,' 8vo, London, 1585, p. 299, where it is called "a duck and a drake, and a halfe-penie cake." Thus it is probable that lines like the following were employed in this game as early as 1585; and it may be that the last line has recently furnished a hint to Mathews in his amusing song in 'Patter v. Clatter.'] A duck and a drake, A nice barley-cake, With a penny to pay the old baker; A hop and a scotch, Is another notch, Slitherum, slatherum, take her.
The Dream-Follower
Thomas Hardy
A dream of mine flew over the mead To the halls where my old Love reigns; And it drew me on to follow its lead: And I stood at her window-panes; And I saw but a thing of flesh and bone Speeding on to its cleft in the clay; And my dream was scared, and expired on a moan, And I whitely hastened away.
Like And Like.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
A FAIR bell-flower Sprang tip from the ground; And early its fragrance It shed all around; A bee came thither And sipp'd from its bell; That they for each other Were made, we see well.
Chopin.
Emma Lazarus
I. A    dream of interlinking hands, of feet Tireless to spin the unseen, fairy woof, Of the entangling waltz.    Bright eyebeams meet, Gay laughter echoes from the vaulted roof. Warm perfumes rise; the soft unflickering glow Of branching lights sets off the changeful charms Of glancing gems, rich stuffs, dazzling snow Of necks unkerchieft, and bare, clinging arms. Hark to the music!    How beneath the strain Of reckless revelry, vibrates and sobs One fundamental chord of constant pain, The pulse-beat of the poet's heart that throbs. So yearns, though all the dancing waves rejoice, The troubled sea's disconsolate, deep voice. II. Who shall proclaim the golden fable false Of Orpheus' miracles?    This subtle strain Above our prose-world's sordid loss and gain Lightly uplifts us.    With the rhythmic waltz, The lyric prelude, the nocturnal song Of love and languor, varied visions rise, That melt and blend to our enchanted eyes. The Polish poet who sleeps silenced long, The seraph-souled musician, breathes again Eternal eloquence, immortal pain. Revived the exalted face we know so well, The illuminated eyes, the fragile frame, Slowly consuming with its inward flame, We stir not, speak not, lest we break the spell. III. A voice was needed, sweet and true and fine As the sad spirit of the evening breeze, Throbbing with human passion, yet divine As the wild bird's untutored melodies. A voice for him 'neath twilight heavens dim, Who mourneth for his dead, while round him fall The wan and noiseless leaves.    A voice for him Who sees the first green sprout, who hears the call Of the first robin on the first spring day. A voice for all whom Fate hath set apart, Who, still misprized, must perish by the way, Longing with love, for that they lack the art Of their own soul's expression.    For all these Sing the unspoken hope, the vague, sad reveries. IV. Then Nature shaped a poet's heart - a lyre From out whose chords the lightest breeze that blows Drew trembling music, wakening sweet desire. How shall she cherish him?    Behold! she throws This precious, fragile treasure in the whirl Of seething passions; he is scourged and stung, Must dive in storm-vext seas, if but one pearl Of art or beauty therefrom may be wrung. No pure-browed pensive nymph his Muse shall be, An amazon of thought with sovereign eyes, Whose kiss was poison, man-brained, worldly-wise, Inspired that elfin, delicate harmony. Rich gain for us!    But with him is it well? The poet who must sound earth, heaven, and hell!
The Dog And Cat.
Jean de La Fontaine
A dog and cat, messmates for life, Were often falling into strife, Which came to scratching, growls, and snaps, And spitting in the face, perhaps. A neighbour dog once chanced to call Just at the outset of their brawl, And, thinking Tray was cross and cruel, To snarl so sharp at Mrs. Mew-well, Growl'd rather roughly in his ear. 'And who are you to interfere?' Exclaim'd the cat, while in his face she flew; And, as was wise, he suddenly withdrew. It seems, in spite of all his snarling, And hers, that Tray was still her darling.
Smack In School, The
William Pitt Palmer
A district school, not far away, Mid Berkshire's hills, one winter's day, Was humming with its wonted noise Of threescore mingled girls and boys; Some few upon their tasks intent, But more on furtive mischief bent. The while the master's downward look Was fastened on a copy-book; When suddenly, behind his back, Rose sharp and clear a rousing smack! As 'twere a battery of bliss Let off in one tremendous kiss! "What's that?" the startled master cries; "That, thir," a little imp replies, "Wath William Willith, if you pleathe, I thaw him kith Thuthanna Peathe!" With frown to make a statue thrill, The master thundered, "Hither, Will!" Like wretch o'ertaken in his track, With stolen chattels on his back, Will hung his head in fear and shame, And to the awful presence came, A great, green, bashful simpleton, The butt of all good-natured fun. With smile suppressed, and birch upraised, The thunderer faltered, "I'm amazed That you, my biggest pupil, should Be guilty of an act so rude! Before the whole set school to boot, What evil genius put you to't?" "'Twas she herself, sir," sobbed the lad, "I did not mean to be so bad; But when Susannah shook her curls, And whispered, I was 'fraid of girls And dursn't kiss a baby's doll, I couldn't stand it, sir, at all, But up and kissed her on the spot! I know, boo, hoo, I ought to not, But, somehow, from her looks, boo, hoo, I thought she kind o' wished me to!"
May Day
Sara Teasdale
A delicate fabric of bird song Floats in the air, The smell of wet wild earth Is everywhere. Red small leaves of the maple Are clenched like a hand, Like girls at their first communion The pear trees stand. Oh I must pass nothing by Without loving it much, The raindrop try with my lips, The grass with my touch; For how can I be sure I shall see again The world on the first of May Shining after the rain?
Nirvana
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
A drop of water risen from the ocean Forgot its cause, and spake with deep emotion Unto a passing breeze.    'How desolate And all forlorn is my unhappy fate. I know not whence I came, or where I go. Scorched by the sun, or chilled by winds that blow, I dwell in space a little time, then pass Out into the night and nothingness - alas!' 'Nay,' quoth the breeze, 'my friend, that cannot be. Thou dost reflect the Universe to me. Look at thine own true self, and there behold A world of light, all scintillant with gold.' Just there the drop sank back into the wave From whence it came.    Nay, that was not its GRAVE! It lived, it moved, it was a joyous part Of that strong palpitating ocean heart; Its little dream of loneliness was done; It woke to find, Self, and Cause, were one. So shalt thou wake, sad mortal, when thy course Has run its karmic round, and reached the Source, And even now thou dost reflect the whole Of God's great glory in thy shining soul.
Sunday
George MacDonald
DECEMBER 28, 1879. A dim, vague shrinking haunts my soul, My spirit bodeth ill-- As some far-off restraining bank Had burst, and waters, many a rank, Were marching on my hill; As if I had no fire within For thoughts to sit about; As if I had no flax to spin, No lamp to lure the good things in And keep the bad things out. The wind, south-west, raves in the pines That guard my cottage round; The sea-waves fall in stormy lines Below the sandy cliffs and chines, And swell the roaring sound. The misty air, the bellowing wind Not often trouble me; The storm that's outside of the mind Doth oftener wake my heart to find More peace and liberty. Why is not such my fate to-night? Chance is not lord of things! Man were indeed a hapless wight Things, thoughts occurring as they might-- Chaotic wallowings! The man of moods might merely say As by the fire he sat, "I am low spirited to-day; I must do something, work or play, Lest care should kill the cat!" Not such my saw: I was not meant To be the sport of things! The mood has meaning and intent, And my dull heart is humbly bent To have the truth it brings. This sense of needed shelter round, This frequent mental start Show what a poor life mine were found, To what a dead self I were bound, How feeble were my heart, If I who think did stand alone Centre to what I thought, A brain within a box of bone, A king on a deserted throne, A something that was nought! A being without power to be, Or any power to cease; Whom objects but compelled to see, Whose trouble was a windblown sea, A windless sea his peace! This very sadness makes me think How readily I might Be driven to reason's farthest brink, Then over it, and sudden sink In ghastly waves of night. It makes me know when I am glad 'Tis thy strength makes me strong; But for thy bliss I should be sad, But for thy reason should be mad, But for thy right be wrong. Around me spreads no empty waste, No lordless host of things; My restlessness but seeks thy rest; My little good doth seek thy best, My needs thy ministerings. 'Tis this, this only makes me safe-- I am, immediate, Of one that lives; I am no waif That haggard waters toss and chafe, But of a royal fate, The born-child of a Power that lives Because it will and can, A Love whose slightest motion gives, A Freedom that forever strives To liberate his Man. I live not on the circling air, Live not by daily food; I live not even by thinkings fair, I hold my very being there Where God is pondering good. Because God lives I live; because He thinks, I also think; I am dependent on no laws But on himself, and without pause; Between us hangs no link. The man that lives he knows not how May well fear any mouse! I should be trembling this same now If I did think, my Father, thou Wast nowhere in the house! O Father, lift me on thine arm, And hold me close to thee; Lift me into thy breathing warm, Then cast me, and I fear no harm, Into creation's sea!
Nursery Rhyme. LXIX. Tales.
Unknown
A dog and a cock, A journey once took, They travell'd along till 'twas late; The dog he made free In the hollow of a tree, And the cock on the boughs of it sate. The cock nothing knowing, In the morn fell a crowing, Upon which comes a fox to the tree; Says he, I declare, Your voice is above, All the creatures I ever did see. Oh! would you come down I the fav'rite might own, Said the cock, there's a porter below; If you will go in, I promise I'll come down. So he went - and was worried for it too.
Scent Of Irises
D. H. Lawrence (David Herbert Richards)
A Faint, sickening scent of irises Persists all morning. Here in a jar on the table A fine proud spike of purple irises Rising above the class-room litter, makes me unable To see the class's lifted and bended faces Save in a broken pattern, amid purple and gold and sable. I can smell the gorgeous bog-end, in its breathless Dazzle of may-blobs, when the marigold glare overcast you With fire on your cheeks and your brow and your chin as you dipped Your face in the marigold bunch, to touch and contrast you, Your own dark mouth with the bridal faint lady-smocks, Dissolved on the golden sorcery you should not outlast. You amid the bog-end's yellow incantation, You sitting in the cowslips of the meadow above, Me, your shadow on the bog-flame, flowery may-blobs, Me full length in the cowslips, muttering you love; You, your soul like a lady-smock, lost, evanescent, You with your face all rich, like the sheen of a dove. You are always asking, do I remember, remember The butter-cup bog-end where the flowers rose up And kindled you over deep with a cast of gold? You ask again, do the healing days close up The open darkness which then drew us in, The dark which then drank up our brimming cup. You upon the dry, dead beech-leaves, in the fire of night Burnt like a sacrifice; you invisible; Only the fire of darkness, and the scent of you! - And yes, thank God, it still is possible The healing days shall close the darkness up Wherein we fainted like a smoke or dew. Like vapour, dew, or poison. Now, thank God, The fire of night is gone, and your face is ash Indistinguishable on the grey, chill day; The night has burnt us out, at last the good Dark fire burns on untroubled, without clash Of you upon the dead leaves saying me Yea.
Days Of Vanity.
Christina Georgina Rossetti
A dream that waketh, Bubble that breaketh, Song whose burden sigheth, A passing breath, Smoke that vanisheth, - Such is life that dieth. A flower that fadeth, Fruit the tree sheddeth, Trackless bird that flieth, Summer time brief, Falling of the leaf, - Such is life that dieth. A scent exhaling, Snow waters failing, Morning dew that drieth, A windy blast, Lengthening shadows cast, - Such is life that dieth. A scanty measure, Rust-eaten treasure, Spending that nought buyeth, Moth on the wing, Toil unprofiting, - Such is life that dieth. Morrow by morrow Sorrow breeds sorrow, For this my song sigheth; From day to night We lapse out of sight, - Such is life that dieth.
Pleasure
Unknown
A dinner, coffee and cigars, Of friends, a half a score. Each favorite vintage in its turn, - What man could wish for more?
My Queen.
Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
A fair sweet blossom is born for you, A beautiful rose, my queen! And never was flower so fair as this, Oh, never so fair, I ween! A banner is hung in the western sky Of colors that flash ere they fade and die; And the rippling waves where the waters run Are stained with the gold of the summer sun; The world is so fair for you, my queen, The world is so fair and true; And the rose that blossoms to-day, my own, Is the love that I have for you. The grasses that spring at your feet, my queen, Could whisper all day in your ear; But I stand dumb at your side, my own, Stilled by my love's own fear. Oh, what would you know of my love's sweet will The heart speaks most when the lips are still; And the love that is filling my soul to-day Is the beautiful blossom you throw away. But I worship you still, my queen, my queen, I worship you still, I ween; For the loveliest blossom on earth I know Is my beautiful love, my queen!
In White
Robert Lee Frost
A dented spider like a snow drop white On a white Heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of lifeless satin cloth Saw ever curious eye so strange a sight? Portent in little, assorted death and blight Like the ingredients of a witches' broth? - The beady spider, the flower like a froth, And the moth carried like a paper kite. What had that flower to do with being white, The blue prunella every child's delight. What brought the kindred spider to that height? (Make we no thesis of the miller's plight.) What but design of darkness and of night? Design, design! Do I use the word aright?
A Desolate Shore
William Ernest Henley
A desolate shore, The sinister seduction of the Moon, The menace of the irreclaimable Sea. Flaunting, tawdry and grim, From cloud to cloud along her beat, Leering her battered and inveterate leer, She signals where he prowls in the dark alone, Her horrible old man, Mumbling old oaths and warming His villainous old bones with villainous talk - The secrets of their grisly housekeeping Since they went out upon the pad In the first twilight of self-conscious Time: Growling, hideous and hoarse, Tales of unnumbered Ships, Goodly and strong, Companions of the Advance, In some vile alley of the night Waylaid and bludgeoned - Dead. Deep cellared in primeval ooze, Ruined, dishonoured, spoiled, They lie where the lean water-worm Crawls free of their secrets, and their broken sides Bulge with the slime of life.    Thus they abide, Thus fouled and desecrate, The summons of the Trumpet, and the while These Twain, their murderers, Unravined, imperturbable, unsubdued, Hang at the heels of their children - She aloft As in the shining streets, He as in ambush at some accomplice door. The stalwart Ships, The beautiful and bold adventurers! Stationed out yonder in the isle, The tall Policeman, Flashing his bull's-eye, as he peers About him in the ancient vacancy, Tells them this way is safety - this way home.
A Portrait.
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A face devoid of love or grace, A hateful, hard, successful face, A face with which a stone Would feel as thoroughly at ease As were they old acquaintances, -- First time together thrown.
The Grey Wolf
Walter De La Mare
'A fagot, a fagot, go fetch for the fire, son!' 'O, Mother, the wolf looks in at the door!' 'Cry Shoo! now, cry Shoo! thou fierce grey wolf fly, now; Haste thee away, he will fright thee no more.' 'I ran, O, I ran, but the grey wolf ran faster, O, Mother, I cry in the air at thy door, Cry Shoo! now, cry Shoo! but his fangs were so cruel, Thy son (save his hatchet) thou'lt never see more.'
The Fause Lover
George Wharton Edwards
A fair maid sat in her bower door, Wringing her lily hands; And by it came a sprightly youth, Fast tripping o'er the strands. "Where gang ye, young John," she says, "Sae early in the day? It gars me think, by your fast trip, Your journey's far away." He turn'd about wi' surly look, And said, "What's that to thee? I'm ga'en to see a lovely maid, Mair fairer far than ye." "Now hae ye play'd me this, fause love, In simmer, 'mid the flowers? I shall repay ye back again, In winter, 'mid the showers." "But again, dear love, and again, dear love, Will ye not turn again? For as ye look to ither women, I shall do to other men." "Make your choice o' whom you please, For I my choice will have; I've chosen a maid more fair than thee, I never will deceive." But she's kilt up her claithing fine, And after him gaed she; But aye he said, "Ye'll turn again, Nae farder gae wi' me." "But again, dear love, and again, dear love, Will ye never love me again? Alas! for loving you sae well, And you na me again." The firstan' town that they came till, He bought her brooch and ring; But aye he bade her turn again, And gang nae farder wi' him. "But again, dear love, and again, dear love," etc. The nextan' town that they came till, He bought her muff and gloves; But aye he bade her turn again, And choose some other loves. "But again, dear love, and again, dear love," etc. The nextan' town that they came till, His heart it grew mair fain; And he was deep in love wi' her. As she was ower again. The nextan' town that they came till, He bought her wedding gown; And made her lady o' ha's and bowers, In sweet Berwick town.
Life.
Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
A dewy flower, bathed in crimson light, May touch the soul--a pure and beauteous sight; A golden river flashing 'neath the sun, May reach the spot where life's dark waters run; Yet, when the sun is gone, the splendor dies, With drooping head the tender flower lies. And such is life; a golden mist of light, A tangled web that glitters in the sun; When shadows come, the glory takes its flight, The treads are dark and worn, and life is done. Oh! tears, that chill us like the dews of eve, Why come unbid--why should we ever grieve? Why is it, though life hath its leaves of gold, The book each day some sorrow must unfold! What human heart with truth can dare to say No grief is mine--this is a perfect day? Oh! poet, take your harp of gold and sing, And all the earth with heavenly music fill! You may do this, yet song can never bring One sunbeam back, let song be what it will. Oh! painter, you can catch the glowing light That tints the skies before the coming night; With throbbing heart and upward lifted eyes, You paint the splendor of the purple skies; Yet tell me, does your genius hold the key To life's strange secrets and its mystery? Oh! life is sad, yet sunshine, too, is there; We cannot tell what spell the years may weave-- Perchance a song that dies upon the air-- Perhaps a shadow that the sun doth leave.
A Fantasy
James Whitcomb Riley
A fantasy that came to me As wild and wantonly designed As ever any dream might be Unraveled from a madman's mind, - A tangle-work of tissue, wrought By cunning of the spider-brain, And woven, in an hour of pain, To trap the giddy flies of thought. I stood beneath a summer moon All swollen to uncanny girth, And hanging, like the sun at noon, Above the center of the earth; But with a sad and sallow light, As it had sickened of the night And fallen in a pallid swoon. Around me I could hear the rush Of sullen winds, and feel the whir Of unseen wings apast me brush Like phantoms round a sepulcher; And, like a carpeting of plush,0 A lawn unrolled beneath my feet, Bespangled o'er with flowers as sweet To look upon as those that nod Within the garden-fields of God, But odorless as those that blow In ashes in the shades below. And on my hearing fell a storm Of gusty music, sadder yet Than every whimper of regret That sobbing utterance could form, And patched with scraps of sound that seemed Torn out of tunes that demons dreamed, And pitched to such a piercing key, It stabbed the ear with agony; And when at last it lulled and died, I stood aghast and terrified. I shuddered and I shut my eyes, And still could see, and feel aware Some mystic presence waited there; And staring, with a dazed surprise, I saw a creature so divine That never subtle thought of mine May reproduce to inner sight So fair a vision of delight. A syllable of dew that drips From out a lily's laughing lips Could not be sweeter than the word I listened to, yet never heard. - For, oh, the woman hiding there Within the shadows of her hair, Spake to me in an undertone So delicate, my soul alone But understood it as a moan Of some weak melody of wind A heavenward breeze had left behind. A tracery of trees, grotesque Against the sky, behind her seen, Like shapeless shapes of arabesque Wrought in an Oriental screen; And tall, austere and statuesque She loomed before it - e'en as though The spirit-hand of Angelo Had chiseled her to life complete, With chips of moonshine round her feet. And I grew jealous of the dusk, To see it softly touch her face, As lover-like, with fond embrace, It folded round her like a husk: But when the glitter of her hand, Like wasted glory, beckoned me, My eyes grew blurred and dull and dim - My vision failed - I could not see - I could not stir - I could but stand, Till, quivering in every limb, I flung me prone, as though to swim The tide of grass whose waves of green Went rolling ocean-wide between My helpless shipwrecked heart and her Who claimed me for a worshiper. And writhing thus in my despair, I heard a weird, unearthly sound, That seemed to lift me from the ground And hold me floating in the air. I looked, and lo!    I saw her bow Above a harp within her hands; A crown of blossoms bound her brow, And on her harp were twisted strands Of silken starlight, rippling o'er With music never heard before By mortal ears; and, at the strain, I felt my Spirit snap its chain And break away, - and I could see It as it turned and fled from me To greet its mistress, where she smiled To see the phantom dancing wild And wizard-like before the spell Her mystic fingers knew so well.
A Face
Paul Cameron Brown
A face in the mist, with rain around, clings to bare leaves frowning. A face through the mist, convulsed, plays stationary, perching from twigs. A face, not knowing it, trust it is good.
The Animals Sending Tribute To Alexander.
Jean de La Fontaine
[1] A fable flourished with antiquity Whose meaning I could never clearly see. Kind reader, draw the moral if you're able: I give you here the naked fable. Fame having bruited that a great commander, A son of Jove, a certain Alexander, Resolved to leave nought free on this our ball, Had to his footstool gravely summon'd all Men, quadrupeds, and nullipeds, together With all the bird-republics, every feather, - The goddess of the hundred mouths, I say, Thus having spread dismay, By widely publishing abroad This mandate of the demigod, The animals, and all that do obey Their appetite alone, mistrusted now That to another sceptre they must bow. Far in the desert met their various races, All gathering from their hiding-places. Discuss'd was many a notion. At last, it was resolved, on motion, To pacify the conquering banner, By sending homage in, and tribute. With both the homage and its manner They charged the monkey, as a glib brute; And, lest the chap should too much chatter, In black on white they wrote the matter. Nought but the tribute served to fash, As that must needs be paid in cash. A prince, who chanced a mine to own, At last, obliged them with a loan. The mule and ass, to bear the treasure, Their service tender'd, full of pleasure; And then the caravan was none the worse, Assisted by the camel and the horse. Forthwith proceeded all the four Behind the new ambassador, And saw, erelong, within a narrow place, Monseigneur Lion's quite unwelcome face. 'Well met, and all in time,' said he; 'Myself your fellow traveller will be. I wend my tribute by itself to bear; And though 'tis light, I well might spare The unaccustom'd load. Take each a quarter, if you please, And I will guard you on the road; More free and at my ease - In better plight, you understand, To fight with any robber band.' A lion to refuse, the fact is, Is not a very usual practice: So in he comes, for better and for worse; Whatever he demands is done, And, spite of Jove's heroic son, He fattens freely from the public purse. While wending on their way, They found a spot one day, With waters hemm'd, of crystal sheen; Its carpet, flower-besprinkled green; Where pastured at their ease Both flocks of sheep and dainty heifers, And play'd the cooling breeze - The native land of all the zephyrs. No sooner is the lion there Than of some sickness he complains. Says he, 'You on your mission fare. A fever, with its thirst and pains, Dries up my blood, and bakes my brains; And I must search some herb, Its fatal power to curb. For you, there is no time to waste; Pay me my money, and make haste.' The treasures were unbound, And placed upon the ground. Then, with a look which testified His royal joy, the lion cried, 'My coins, good heavens, have multiplied! And see the young ones of the gold As big already as the old! The increase belongs to me, no doubt;' And eagerly he took it out! 'Twas little staid beneath the lid; The wonder was that any did. Confounded were the monkey and his suite. And, dumb with fear, betook them to their way, And bore complaint to Jove's great son, they say - Complaint without a reason meet; For what could he? Though a celestial scion, He could but fight, as lion versus lion. When corsairs battle, Turk with Turk, They're not about their proper work.
A Dull Uncertain Brain,
Ralph Waldo Emerson
A dull uncertain brain, But gifted yet to know That God has cherubim who go Singing an immortal strain, Immortal here below. I know the mighty bards, I listen when they sing, And now I know The secret store Which these explore When they with torch of genius pierce The tenfold clouds that cover The riches of the universe From God's adoring lover. And if to me it is not given To fetch one ingot thence Of the unfading gold of Heaven His merchants may dispense, Yet well I know the royal mine, And know the sparkle of its ore, Know Heaven's truth from lies that shine-- Explored they teach us to explore.
A Dull Eyed Rattlesnake That Lay
Joaquin Miller
A dull eyed rattlesnake that lay All loathsome, yellow-skinned, and slept, Coil'd tight as pine-knot, in the sun With flat head through the center run, Struck blindly back.
Contrast.
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A door just opened on a street -- I, lost, was passing by -- An instant's width of warmth disclosed, And wealth, and company. The door as sudden shut, and I, I, lost, was passing by, -- Lost doubly, but by contrast most, Enlightening misery.
On the Downs
Algernon Charles Swinburne
A faint sea without wind or sun; A sky like flameless vapour dun; A valley like an unsealed grave That no man cares to weep upon, Bare, without boon to crave, Or flower to save. And on the lip's edge of the down, Here where the bent-grass burns to brown In the dry sea-wind, and the heath Crawls to the cliff-side and looks down, I watch, and hear beneath The low tide breathe. Along the long lines of the cliff, Down the flat sea-line without skiff Or sail or back-blown fume for mark, Through wind-worn heads of heath and stiff Stems blossomless and stark With dry sprays dark, I send mine eyes out as for news Of comfort that all these refuse, Tidings of light or living air From windward where the low clouds muse And the sea blind and bare Seems full of care. So is it now as it was then, And as men have been such are men. There as I stood I seem to stand, Here sitting chambered, and again Feel spread on either hand Sky, sea, and land. As a queen taken and stripped and bound Sat earth, discoloured and discrowned; As a king's palace empty and dead The sky was, without light or sound; And on the summer's head Were ashes shed. Scarce wind enough was on the sea, Scarce hope enough there moved in me, To sow with live blown flowers of white The green plain's sad serenity, Or with stray thoughts of light Touch my soul's sight. By footless ways and sterile went My thought unsatisfied, and bent With blank unspeculative eyes On the untracked sands of discontent Where, watched of helpless skies, Life hopeless lies. East and west went my soul to find Light, and the world was bare and blind And the soil herbless where she trod And saw men laughing scourge mankind, Unsmitten by the rod Of any God. Out of time's blind old eyes were shed Tears that were mortal, and left dead The heart and spirit of the years, And on mans fallen and helmless head Time's disanointing tears Fell cold as fears. Hope flowering had but strength to bear The fruitless fruitage of despair; Grief trod the grapes of joy for wine, Whereof love drinking unaware Died as one undivine And made no sign. And soul and body dwelt apart; And weary wisdom without heart Stared on the dead round heaven and sighed, 'Is death too hollow as thou art, Or as man's living pride?' And saying so died. And my soul heard the songs and groans That are about and under thrones, And felt through all time's murmur thrill Fate's old imperious semitones That made of good and ill One same tune still. Then 'Where is God? and where is aid? Or what good end of these?' she said; 'Is there no God or end at all, Nor reason with unreason weighed, Nor force to disenthral Weak feet that fall? 'No light to lighten and no rod To chasten men? Is there no God?' So girt with anguish, iron-zoned, Went my soul weeping as she trod Between the men enthroned And men that groaned. O fool, that for brute cries of wrong Heard not the grey glad mother's song Ring response from the hills and waves, But heard harsh noises all day long Of spirits that were slaves And dwelt in graves. The wise word of the secret earth Who knows what life and death are worth, And how no help and no control Can speed or stay things come to birth, Nor all worlds' wheels that roll Crush one born soul. With all her tongues of life and death, With all her bloom and blood and breath, From all years dead and all things done, In the ear of man the mother saith, 'There is no God, O son, If thou be none.' So my soul sick with watching heard That day the wonder of that word, And as one springs out of a dream Sprang, and the stagnant wells were stirred Whence flows through gloom and gleam Thought's soundless stream. Out of pale cliff and sunburnt health, Out of the low sea curled beneath In the land's bending arm embayed, Out of all lives that thought hears breathe Life within life inlaid, Was answer made. A multitudinous monotone Of dust and flower and seed and stone, In the deep sea-rock's mid-sea sloth, In the live water's trembling zone, In all men love and loathe, One God at growth. One forceful nature uncreate That feeds itself with death and fate, Evil and good, and change and time, That within all men lies at wait Till the hour shall bid them climb And live sublime. For all things come by fate to flower At their unconquerable hour, And time brings truth, and truth makes free, And freedom fills time's veins with power, As, brooding on that sea, My thought filled me. And the sun smote the clouds and slew, And from the sun the sea's breath blew, And white waves laughed and turned and fled The long green heaving sea-field through, And on them overhead The sky burnt red Like a furled flag that wind sets free, On the swift summer-coloured sea Shook out the red lines of the light, The live sun's standard, blown to lee Across the live sea's white And green delight. And with divine triumphant awe My spirit moved within me saw, With burning passion of stretched eyes, Clear as the light's own firstborn law, In windless wastes of skies Time's deep dawn rise.
Memorials Of A Tour In Scotland, 1803 X. Rob Roy's Grave
William Wordsworth
A Famous man is Robin Hood, The English ballad-singer's joy! And Scotland has a thief as good, An outlaw of as daring mood; She has her brave ROB ROY! Then clear the weeds from off his Grave, And let us chant a passing stave, In honour of that Hero brave! Heaven gave Rob Roy a dauntless heart And wondrous length and strength of arm: Nor craved he more to quell his foes, Or keep his friends from harm. Yet was Rob Roy as wise as brave; Forgive me if the phrase be strong; A Poet worthy of Rob Roy Must scorn a timid song. Say, then, that he was 'wise' as brave; As wise in thought as bold in deed: For in the principles of things 'He' sought his moral creed. Said generous Rob, "What need of books? Burn all the statutes and their shelves: They stir us up against our kind; And worse, against ourselves. "We have a passion, make a law, Too false to guide us or control! And for the law itself we fight In bitterness of soul. "And, puzzled, blinded thus, we lose Distinctions that are plain and few: These find I graven on my heart: 'That' tells me what to do. "The creatures see of flood and field, And those that travel on the wind! With them no strife can last; they live In peace, and peace of mind. "For why? because the good old rule Sufficeth them, the simple plan, That they should take, who have the power, And they should keep who can. "A lesson that is quickly learned, A signal this which all can see! Thus nothing here provokes the strong To wanton cruelty. "All freakishness of mind is checked; He tamed, who foolishly aspires; While to the measure of his might Each fashions his desires. "All kinds, and creatures, stand and fall By strength of prowess or of wit: 'Tis God's appointment who must sway, And who is to submit. "Since, then, the rule of right is plain, And longest life is but a day; To have my ends, maintain my rights, I'll take the shortest way." And thus among these rocks he lived, Through summer heat and winter snow: The Eagle, he was lord above, And Rob was lord below. So was it 'would', at least, have been But through untowardness of fate; For Polity was then too strong He came an age too late; Or shall we say an age too soon? For, were the bold Man living 'now', How might he flourish in his pride, With buds on every bough! Then rents and factors, rights of chase, Sheriffs, and lairds and their domains, Would all have seemed but paltry things, Not worth a moment's pains. Rob Roy had never lingered here, To these few meagre Vales confined; But thought how wide the world, the times How fairly to his mind! And to his Sword he would have said, Do Thou my sovereign will enact From land to land through half the earth! Judge thou of law and fact! "'Tis fit that we should do our part, Becoming, that mankind should learn That we are not to be surpassed In fatherly concern. "Of old things all are over old, Of good things none are good enough: We'll show that we can help to frame A world of other stuff. "I, too, will have my kings that take From me the sign of life and death: Kingdoms shall shift about, like clouds, Obedient to my breath." And, if the word had been fulfilled, As 'might' have been, then, thought of joy! France would have had her present Boast, And we our own Rob Roy! Oh! say not so; compare them not; I would not wrong thee, Champion brave! Would wrong thee nowhere; least of all Here standing by thy grave. For Thou, although with some wild thoughts, Wild Chieftain of a savage Clan! Hadst this to boast of; thou didst love The 'liberty' of man. And, had it been thy lot to live With us who now behold the light, Thou would'st have nobly stirred thyself, And battled for the Right. For thou wert still the poor man's stay, The poor man's heart, the poor man's hand; And all the oppressed, who wanted strength, Had thine at their command. Bear witness many a pensive sigh Of thoughtful Herdsman when he strays Alone upon Loch Veol's heights, And by Loch Lomond's braes! And, far and near, through vale and hill, Are faces that attest the same; The proud heart flashing through the eyes, At sound of ROB ROY'S name.
Life's Changes.
Mary Ann H. T. Bigelow
A fair young girl was to the altar led By him she loved, the chosen of her heart; And words of solemn import there were said, And mutual vows were pledged till death should part. But life was young, and death a great way off, At least it seemed so then, on that bright morn; And they no doubt, expected years of bliss, And in their path the rose without a thorn. Cherished from infancy with tenderest care, A precious only daughter was the bride; And when that young protector's arm she took, She for the first time left her parents' side. With all a woman's tender, trustful heart, She gave herself away to him she loved; Why should she not, was he not all her own, A choice by friends and parents too approved? How rapidly with him the days now fly, With him the partner of her future life; Happy and joyous as a child she'd been, Happy as daughter, happier still as wife. But ere eight months in quick succession passed, One to each human heart a dreaded foe, Entered her house, and by a single stroke, Blasted her hopes, and laid her idol low. Three months of bitter anguish was endured, But hope again revived, and she was blest, When pressing to her heart a darling child, Whose little head she pillowed on her breast. Not long is she permitted to enjoy, This sweetest bud of promise to her given; Short as an angel's visit was its stay, When God, who gave it, took it up to heaven. Ah, what a contrast one short year presents! Replete with happiness - replete with woe; In that brief space, a maiden called, and wife, Widow and mother written - childless too. Surely my friend, I need not say to thee, Look not to earth for what it can't bestow; 'Tis at the best a frail and brittle reed, Which trusting for support, will pierce thee through. Then let us look above this fleeting earth, To heaven and heavenly joys direct our eyes; No lasting happiness this world affords - "He builds too low who builds below the skies." Weston, Dec. 1, 1852.
Winter
Alfred Lichtenstein
A dog shrieks in misery from a bridge To heaven... which stands like old gray stone Upon far-off houses.    And, like a rope Made of tar, a dead river lies on the snow. Three trees, black frozen flames, make threats At the end of the earth.    They pierce With sharp knives the rough air, In which a scrap of bird hangs all alone. A few street lights wade towards the city, Extinguished candles for a corpse.    And a smear Of people shrinks together and is soon Drowned in the wretched white swamp.
The Impossible Thing
Jean de La Fontaine
A DEMON, blacker in his skin than heart, So great a charm was prompted to impart; To one in love, that he the lady gained, And full possession in the end obtained: The bargain was, the lover should enjoy The belle he wished, and who had proved so coy. Said Satan, soon I'll make her lend an ear, In ev'ry thing more complaisant appear; But then, instead of what thou might'st expect, To be obedient and let me direct, The devil, having thus obliged a friend, He'll thy commands obey, thou may'st depend, The very moment; and within the hour Thy humble servant, who has got such pow'r, Will ask for others, which at once thou'lt find; Make no delay, for if thou art so blind, Thou comprehend'st, thy body and thy soul The lovely fair no longer shall control, But Satan then upon them both shall seize, And with them do-whatever he may please: 'Gainst this the spark had not a word to say; 'Twas pleasing to command, though not obey. HE sallied forth the beauteous belle to seek, And found her as he wished: - complying-meek; Indulged in blisses, and most happy proved, Save that the devil always round him moved. Whatever rose within the whirl of thought He now commanded: - quickly it was brought; And when he ordered palaces to rise, Or raging tempests to pervade the skies, The devil instantly obeyed his will, And what he asked was done with wondrous skill. LARGE sums his purse received; - the devil went just where commanded, and to Rome was sent, From whence his highness store of pardons got; No journey long, though distant was the spot, But ev'ry thing with magick ease arose, And all was soon accomplished that he chose. So oft the spark was asked for orders new, Which he was bound to give the fiend at view, That soon his head most thoroughly was drained, And to the fair our lover much complained, Declared the truth, and ev'ry thing detailed, How he was lost, if in commands he failed. IS'T this, said she, that makes thee so forlorn? Mere nothing!-quickly I'll remove the thorn; When Satan comes, present his highness this, Which I have here, and say: - You will not miss To make it flat, and not its curl retain On which she gave him, what with little pain She drew from covert of the Cyprian grove, The fairy labyrinth where pleasures rove, Which formerly a duke so precious thought; To raise a knightly order thence he sought, Illustrious institution, noble plan, More filled with gods and demi-gods than man. THE lover to the crafty devil said: - 'Tis crooked this, you see, and I am led To wish it otherwise; go, make it straight; A perfect line: no turn, nor twist, nor plait. Away to work, be quick, fly, hasten, run; The demon fancied it could soon be done; No time he lost, but set it in the press, And tried to manage it with great success; The massy hammer, kept beneath the deep, Made no impression: he as well might sleep; Howe'er he beat: whatever charm he used: - 'Twas still the same; obedience it refused. His time and labour constantly were lost; Vain proved each effort: mystick skill was crossed; The wind, or rain, or fog, or frost, or snow, Had no effect: still circular 'twould go. The more he tried, the ringlet less inclined To drop the curvature so closely twined. How's this? said Satan, never have I seen Such stubborn stuff wherever I have been; The shades below no demon can produce, That could divine what here would prove of use: 'Twould puzzle hell to break the curling spring, And make a line direct of such a thing. ONE morn the devil to the other went: Said he, to give thee up I'll be content; If solely thou wilt openly declare What 'tis I hold, for truly I despair; I'm victus I confess, and can't succeed: No doubt the thing's impossible decreed. FRIEND Satan, said the lover, you are wrong; Despondency should not to you belong, At least so soon: - what you desire to know Is not the only one that's found to grow; Still many more companions it has got, And others could be taken from the spot.
Nursery Rhyme. CX. Scholastic.
Unknown
A diller, a dollar, A ten o'clock scholar, What makes you come so soon? You used to come at ten o'clock, But now you come at noon.
Dublin Men (The Rocky Road To Dublin)
James Stephens
A Dublin man will frown when he Hears a tale of villainy; But when a kindness you relate, He swings and whistles on the gate.
Nocturne
Madison Julius Cawein
A disc of violet blue, Rimmed with a thorn of fire, The new moon hangs in a sky of dew; And under the vines, where the sunset's hue Is blent with blossoms, first one, then two, Begins the cricket's choir. Bright blurs of golden white, And points of silvery glimmer, The first stars wink in the web of night; And through the flowers the moths take flight, In the honeysuckle-colored light, Where the shadowy shrubs grow dimmer. Soft through the dim and dying eve, Sweet through the dusk and dew, Come, while the hours their witchcraft weave, Dim in the House of the Soul's-Sweet-Leave, Here in the pale and perfumed eve, Here where I wait for you. A great, dark, radiant rose, Dripping with starry glower, Is the night, whose bosom overflows With the balsam musk of the breeze that blows Into the heart, as each one knows, Of every nodding flower. A voice that sighs and sighs, Then whispers like a spirit, Is the wind that kisses the drowsy eyes Of the primrose open, and, rocking, lies In the lily's cradle, and soft unties The rosebud's crimson near it. Sweet through the deep and dreaming night, Soft through the dark and dew, Come, where the moments their magic write, Deep in the Book of the Heart's-Delight, Here in the hushed and haunted night, Here where I wait for you.
Pigeon Toes
Henry Lawson
A dusty clearing in the scrubs Of barren, western lands, Where, out of sight, or sign of hope The wretched school-house stands; A roof that glares at glaring days, A bare, unshaded wall, A fence that guards no blade of green, A dust-storm over all. The books and slates are packed away, The maps are rolled and tied, And for an hour I breathe, and lay My ghastly mask aside; I linger here to save my head From voices shrill and thin, That rasp for ever in the shed, The 'home' I'm boarding in. The heat and dirt and wretchedness With which their lives began, Bush mother nagging day and night, And sullen, brooding man; The minds that harp on single strings, And never bright by chance, The rasping voice of paltry things, The hopeless ignorance. I had ideals when I came here, A noble purpose had, But all that they can understand Is 'axe to grind' or 'mad.' I brood at times till comes a fear That sets my brain awhirl, I fight a strong man's battle here, And I am but a girl. I hated paltriness and deemed A breach of faith a crime; I listen now to scandal's voice In sewing-lesson time. There is a thought that haunts me so, And gathers strength each day, Shall I as narrow-minded grow, As mean of soul as they? The feuds that rise from paltry spite, Or from no cause at all; The brooding, dark, suspicious minds, I suffer for it all. They do not dream the 'Teacher' knows, What brutal thoughts are said; The children call me 'Pigeon Toes,' 'Green Eyes' and 'Carrot Head.' On phantom seas of endless change My thoughts to madness roam, The only thing that keeps me here, The thoughts of those at home, The hearts that love and cling to me, That I love best on earth, My mother left in poverty, My brother blind from birth. On burning West Australian fields In that great dreadful land, Where all day long the heat waves flow O'er the seas of glowing sand. My elder brother toils and breaks That great true heart of his To rescue us from poverty, To rescue me from this. And one is with him where he goes, My brother's mate and mine; He never called me Pigeon Toes, He said my eyes were 'fine'; And his face comes before me now, And hope and courage rise, The lines of life, the troubled brow, Firm mouth and kind grey eyes. I preach content and gentleness, And mock example give; They little think the Teacher hates And loathes the life they live. I told the infants fairy tales But half an hour since, They little dream how Pigeon Toes Prays for a fairy Prince. I have one prayer (and God forgive A selfish prayer and wild); I kneel down by the infants' stool (For I am but a child), And pray as I've prayed times untold That Heaven will set a sign, To guide my brother to the gold, For mother's sake and mine. A dust cloud on the lonely road, And I am here alone; I lock the door till it be past, For I have nervous grown. God spare me disappointment's blow. He stops beside the gate; A voice, thrill-feeling that I know. My brother! No! His mate! His eyes, a proud, triumphant smile, His arms outstretched, and 'Come, 'For Jack and I have made our pile, 'And I'm here to take you home'!
A Dew Sufficed Itself
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
A dew sufficed itself And satisfied a leaf, And felt, 'how vast a destiny! How trivial is life!' The sun went out to work, The day went out to play, But not again that dew was seen By physiognomy. Whether by day abducted, Or emptied by the sun Into the sea, in passing, Eternally unknown.
The Dove And The Ant.
Jean de La Fontaine
A dove came to a brook to drink, When, leaning o'er its crumbling brink, An ant fell in, and vainly tried, In this, to her, an ocean tide, To reach the land; whereat the dove, With every living thing in love, Was prompt a spire of grass to throw her, By which the ant regain'd the shore. A barefoot scamp, both mean and sly, Soon after chanced this dove to spy; And, being arm'd with bow and arrow, The hungry codger doubted not The bird of Venus, in his pot, Would make a soup before the morrow. Just as his deadly bow he drew, Our ant just bit his heel. Roused by the villain's squeal, The dove took timely hint, and flew Far from the rascal's coop; - And with her flew his soup.
The False Knight's Tragedy
John Clare
A false knight wooed a maiden poor, And his high halls left he To stoop in at her cottage door, When night left none to see. And, well-a-day, it is a tale For pity too severe-- A tale would melt the sternest eye, And wake the deafest ear. He stole her heart, he stole her love, 'T was all the wealth she had; Her truth and fame likewise stole he, *    *    *    * And they rode on, and they rode on; Far on this pair did ride, Till the maiden's heart with fear and love Beat quick against her side. And on they rode till rocks grew high. "Sir Knight, what have we here?" "Unsaddle, maid, for here we stop:" And death's tongue smote her ear. Some ruffian rude she took him now, And wished she'd barred the door, Nor was it one that she could read Of having heard before. "Thou art not my true love," she said, "But some rude robber loon; He'd take me from the saddle bow, Nor leave me to get down." "I ne'er was your true love," said he, "For I'm more bold than true; Though I'm the knight that came at dark To kiss and toy with you." "I know you're not my love," said she, "That came at night and wooed; Although ye try and mock his speech His way was ne'er so rude. He ne'er said word but called me dear, And dear he is to me: Ye spake as ye ne'er knew the word, Rude ruffian as ye be. Ye never was my knight, I trow, Ye pay me no regard, But he would take my arm in his If we but went a yard." "No matter whose true love I am; I'm more than true to you, For I'll ne'er wed a shepherd wench,-- Although I came to woo." And on to the rock's top they walked, Till they stood o'er the salt sea's brim. "And there," said he, "'s your bridal bed, Where you may sink or swim." A moonbeam shone upon his face, The maid sunk at his feet, For 't was her own false love she saw, That once so fond did greet. "And did ye promise love for this? Is the grave my priest to be? And did ye bring this silken dress To wed me with the sea?" "O never mind your dress," quoth he, 'T is well to dress for sea: Mermaids will love to see you fine; Your bridesmaids they will be." "O let me cast this gown away, It's brought no good to me, And if my mother greets my clay Too wretched will she be. For she, for my sad sake, would keep This guilty bridal dress, To break and tell her bursting heart She had a daughter less." So off she threw her bridal gown, Likewise her gold clasped shoon: His looks frowned hard as any stone, Hers pale turned as the moon. "O false, false knight you've wrapped me warm Ere I was cold before, And now you strip me unto death, Although I'm out of door. O dash away those thistles rude, That crowd about the shore; They'll wound my tender feet, that ne'er Went barefoot thus before. O dash those stinging nettles down, And cut away the brier, For deep they wound those lily arms Which you did once admire." And he nor briers nor thistles cut, Although she grieved full sore, And he nor shed one single tear, Nor kiss took evermore. She shrieked--and sank, and is at rest, All in the deep, deep sea; And home in base and scornful pride, With haunted heart, rode he. Now o'er that rock there hangs a tree, And chains do creak thereon; And in those chains his memory hangs, Though all beside is gone.
To Mary Field French
Eugene Field
A dying mother gave to you Her child a many years ago; How in your gracious love he grew, You know, dear, patient heart, you know. The mother's child you fostered then Salutes you now and bids you take These little children of his pen And love them for the author's sake. To you I dedicate this book, And, as you read it line by line, Upon its faults as kindly look As you have always looked on mine. Tardy the offering is and weak;-- Yet were I happy if I knew These children had the power to speak My love and gratitude to you.
The Rock-Tomb Of Bradore
John Greenleaf Whittier
A drear and desolate shore! Where no tree unfolds its leaves, And never the spring wind weaves Green grass for the hunter's tread; A land forsaken and dead, Where the ghostly icebergs go And come with the ebb and flow Of the waters of Bradore! A wanderer, from a land By summer breezes fanned, Looked round him, awed, subdued, By the dreadful solitude, Hearing alone the cry Of sea-birds clanging by, The crash and grind of the floe, Wail of wind and wash of tide. "O wretched land!" he cried, "Land of all lands the worst, God forsaken and curst! Thy gates of rock should show The words the Tuscan seer Read in the Realm of Woe Hope entereth not here!" Lo! at his feet there stood A block of smooth larch wood, Waif of some wandering wave, Beside a rock-closed cave By Nature fashioned for a grave; Safe from the ravening bear And fierce fowl of the air, Wherein to rest was laid A twenty summers' maid, Whose blood had equal share Of the lands of vine and snow, Half French, half Eskimo. In letters uneffaced, Upon the block were traced The grief and hope of man, And thus the legend ran "We loved her! Words cannot tell how well! We loved her! God loved her! And called her home to peace and rest. We love her." The stranger paused and read. "O winter land!" he said, "Thy right to be I own; God leaves thee not alone. And if thy fierce winds blow Over drear wastes of rock and snow, And at thy iron gates The ghostly iceberg waits, Thy homes and hearts are dear. Thy sorrow o'er thy sacred dust Is sanctified by hope and trust; God's love and man's are here. And love where'er it goes Makes its own atmosphere; Its flowers of Paradise Take root in the eternal ice, And bloom through Polar snows!