Madonna  Mary  !     Here  she  lives !

See  how  my  sun  has  wrapped  her  in  I
O  solemn  sun  !     O  maiden  face  !

O  joy  that  never  knoweth  sin  —

How  shall  I  name  thee  ?     How  express

The  thoughts  that  unto  thee  belong  ?
Sometimes  a  sigh  interprets  them,

At  other  times,  perhaps,  a  song  ;


Elizabeth  Stuart  fnelps.  97

More  often  still  it  chanceth  me

They  grow  and  group  into  a  prayer
That  guards  me  down  my  sleepless  hours,

A  sentry  in  the  midnight  air.
But  when  the  morning's  monotone

Begins,  of  sickness  or  of  pain,
They  catch  the  key  and,  striking  it,

They  turn  into  a  song  again."

There  she  wrote  "  Gates  Ajar ; "  but  not  long  after
the  publication  of  that  book  she  found  it  necessary  to
make  some  changes  in  her  mode  of  life  which  would
give  her  hopes  of  firmer  health  and  more  quiet  in
which  to  pursue  her  literary  work.  The  summers  she
spent  at  the  seaside, — East  Gloucester,  after  a  few  trials
of  other  places,  being  her  chosen  resort ;  and  her  win
ter  Study  was  removed  from  her  father's  house  to  the
next  door  neighbor's  where  she  spends  the  working
hours  of  the  day,  "  having  learned,"  she  says,  "  like
the  ministers  who  study  in  their  churches,  or  the
carpenters  who  go  to  their  benches,  the  value  of  a
workshop  out  of  the  house."

This  house  is  one  of  the  oldest  on  Andover  Hill
and  its  history  would  be  a  perfect  .epitome  of  the  pe
culiar  life  of  a  secluded  New  England  literary  town.
It  has  been  occupied  in  turn  by  Professors,  Trustees,
Agents,  Commons,  Stewards.  Farmers,  yet  has  retained
a  character  of  its  own  through  all  the  changes.
98  Poets'   Homes.
