LILLIE BUFFUM GHACE WYMAN 
 
Book . W75li^ 
 
 Copyright N» L^I3__ 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
INTERLUDES 
 
 AND OTHER VERSES 
 
 Byl^iLLJE BuFFUM Chace Wyman 
 
 Published by ^, B. Clarke Company 
 26-2S Tremont Street, Boston 
 
Copyright, 191 3 
 By Lillie Buffum Chace Wyman 
 
 
 Thomas Todd Company, Printers 
 14 Beacon Street, Boston, Mass. 
 
 ©CI.A347953 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 Introduction . 
 
 Motto, by Jeanie Spring Peet 
 
 Dedication 
 
 Seemed My Soul Existent 
 
 A Dirge . 
 The Irish Chieftain 
 
 Prelude . 
 
 The O'Neil . 
 The Hero . 
 
 Preston S. Brooks, or The Coward 
 
 The Hero 
 
 Oliver Brown's Widow 
 
 Lucifer the Fallen 
 
 Northern Maidens . 
 
 Mary McGuinness . 
 
 From Age to Age 
 
 Ah, Can It Be? I, II 
 
 Ben Butler 
 In Arcady . 
 
 Memory . . 
 
 The Jubilant Wind . 
 
 Man Exultant . 
 
 Unnamed. I, II, III, IV 
 Three Cities 
 
 I, II, III, IV . 
 Purple Asters . 
 
 I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX 
 
 [iii] 
 
 V, VI 
 
 IX 
 
 xi 
 xiii 
 xiv 
 
 XV 
 
 I 
 3 
 4 
 17 
 19 
 23 
 24 
 
 24 
 25 
 26 
 
 27 
 28 
 30 
 
 35 
 37 
 38 
 38 
 39 
 45 
 47 
 51 
 53 
 
Wendell Phillips, The Hermes 
 
 I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X 
 XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV . 
 The Minstrel and Helen 
 
 A Duet . . . . 
 Songs from the Cloister of Age 
 
 There Are Cloisters of Many Kinds 
 
 As It Was in the Beginning 
 
 To J. C. W. I, II, III, IV, V . 
 
 Across the Gulfs of Life 
 
 Lake George 
 
 s. o. c. . 
 
 E. B. C. . 
 
 There Is a Love 
 
 Thomas Davidson 
 
 The Woman and the Girl 
 
 Oh Hush Thee 
 
 Sergius Stepniak. I, II 
 Epigrams . 
 
 Wendell Phillips, John Crawford Wyman, 
 
 William Lloyd Garrison, John Weiss, 
 
 Lucy Stone, John Brown, Julia Ward 
 
 Howe, Ellen Terry 
 
 Orchard Blossoms 
 
 In the Orchard 
 
 Minnie 
 
 After Goethe . 
 
 Sabbatia Cottage 
 
 A July Day 
 
 [Iv] 
 
' — Continued 
 
 
 Appeal . 
 
 135 
 
 The Old Story .... 
 
 135 
 
 Fredrika Bremer Stood . 
 
 136 
 
 Thomas Wentworth Higglnson 
 
 137 
 
 Anna Redfield 
 
 139 
 
 Interludes 
 
 141 
 
 The War Secretary .... 
 
 143 
 
 The Secretary of State . . 
 
 148 
 
 Sic Semper 
 
 156 
 
 Alexander H. Stephens . 
 
 160 
 
 A Man Unknown to History . 
 
 165 
 
 A Man of the Period 
 
 175 
 
 Helen Pitts Douglass 
 
 180 
 
 L'Envoi. I, H 
 
 182 
 
 [v] 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 John Crawford Wyman . . Frontispiece ^ 
 In photogravure 
 
 The Baby .... Facing page 40 ^^ 
 
 Wendell Phillips . . Facing page 65 "^ 
 
 Printed by permission of Francis J. 
 Garrison 
 
 Ann Greene Phillips . . Facing page 77 '/ 
 
 Printed by permission of Francis J. 
 Garrison 
 
 Samuel Oliver Chace . Facing page 108 G 
 From a cameo likeness 
 
 Mignonette . . . Facing page 1 30 ^ 
 
 [vn] 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
MOTTO 
 
 nr^HE Gray Dawn, at Carmel, 
 
 "*- Comes floating from the sea ; 
 She's free from joys and sorrows, 
 
 From light and darkness free. 
 Her sunless hour of being 
 
 Is but a wistful dream ; 
 Oh, pity her, you human phantoms : 
 
 You also only seem. 
 
 Jeanie Spring Peet. 
 
 Carmel-by-the-Sea, California 
 Christmas Day, 1910 
 
 [xi] 
 
I dedicate this volume to the memory of 
 John Crawford Wyman, concerning whom it 
 was well said, "To those in need, he was charity 
 itself ; and to all he was gentle with the courtesy 
 of a true gentleman." L. B. c. w. 
 
 [ xiii ] 
 
CEEMED my soul existent to love thee, 
 ^ As in Summer's sweet weather 
 Loved it rose that was Yorkist, 
 Rose that in June 
 Did its petals combine, 
 Like flakes drifted down from the moon; 
 
 Now, my soul, far distant below thee. 
 
 In the Summer is nether, 
 Misses rose that was Yorkist, 
 
 Rose, from whence soon 
 Fell the petals divine, 
 Like notes that are lost from a tune ; 
 
 If I lift up my lyre and accord it, 
 Benison to my song, wilt thou award it? 
 
 [xiv] 
 
A DIRGE 
 
 /^LEAR be the minstrelsy, 
 ^^ Him, that would sigh ; 
 Sweet be the phantasy 
 Where doth he lie ! 
 
 Hymnal of poesy 
 
 Like lullaby, 
 Unto his ecstasy 
 
 Fain render I ; 
 
 Doth he remember. 
 There now on high. 
 
 How, In September, 
 
 Maple leaves amber. 
 Up to the sky. 
 
 On the winds clamber? 
 
 [xv] 
 
THE IRISH CHIEFTAIN 
 
PRELUDE 
 
 T SAT, long since, within thy chamber. Love, 
 ■*■ And saw, upon thy whitely changing face, 
 
 A shadow, like a pencil, making trace 
 How passed the Deathly Angel close above; 
 
 I heard his whisper on thy breathing move. 
 As he had caught it from thy lips apace. 
 And filled it with far echoes out of space 
 
 Whose fateful voice he was the Master of; 
 
 And, as I saw and sadly barkened, came 
 
 The story of O'Neil into my mind 
 And laid upon my singing accents claim, 
 
 So forth did ancient faith and sorrow flow 
 
 On rhythms, that my pulses had combined. 
 As, from mine own, I sang of Ireland's woe. 
 
 [3] 
 
THE O'NEIL 
 
 Hiii2;]i, Earl of Tyrone, was the last Irish 
 chieftain to bear the title, "The O'Neil." An 
 able, cultured man, he married clandestinely the 
 sister of Sir Henry Baiz;nal, the Lord IVIarshal, 
 who opposed the match. Tyrone then joined 
 the forces endeavoring to free Ireland, and 
 Bagnal, who commanded an English army, was 
 slain in battle with Tyrone's confederates. For 
 several years Tyrone maintained himself against 
 the English. He treated with Essex at the 
 ford of Lagan in behalf of Ireland, and Essex 
 agreed there to an armistice in order to lay the 
 grievances of the Irish before Elizabeth. The 
 Queen angrily disavowed Essex's Irish policy 
 and sent Mountjoy in his place to Ireland. To 
 him Tyrone was finally forced to surrender, 
 evidently in the hope of gaining more for 
 Ireland by submission than by resistance. He 
 apparently gave his allegiance to England in 
 good faith, but the treatment which the Irish 
 received from James I provoked him into some 
 indignant utterances, which rendered him an 
 object of suspicion to the English government, 
 and he finally fled to the continent, and died 
 blind and broken-hearted in Rome in the year 
 1616. 
 
 [4] 
 
Tyrone 
 /^ LD, blind and helpless, like a fallen stone 
 ^^ Amid these Roman stones I lie. Each 
 
 block 
 Of marble hath a history. And I — 
 I, too, am but a marred and broken rock, 
 Down tumbled by the pitiless great storms 
 Of my tempestuous past — the storms that 
 
 rushed 
 From sea to sea, o'er Erin's prostrate land. 
 Half sunken in the grave am I, as they, 
 In sand, these stony statues of old men; 
 But I — unlike to them — I bear a heart 
 That aches. 
 
 Ursula 
 Come to the open lattice, love, 
 And feel the sun. 
 
 Tyrone 
 It tells me that the year 
 Hath rolled around and brought again the day 
 Commemorating still the one when I 
 Did lay my hope, my life, and Ireland's chance 
 Low down before an English soldier's feet; 
 But Mountjoy smiled in scorn e'en as I knelt. 
 And then I knew my kneeling was in vain. 
 Not such was Essex, when we met that morn 
 
 [5] 
 
Beside the ford. The sun shone bright. My 
 
 heart 
 Went out to Essex as we talked. My faith 
 Was strong in Essex — good and kind was he. 
 How could she let him die, that fickle queen? 
 But Mount] oy jeered that day above my head ! 
 
 Ursula 
 Forget the day, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 I shall more soon 
 Forget my God. 
 
 Ursula 
 You make me weep, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 O sweetest English rose, O English wife. 
 When hast thou wept at words of mine before ? 
 Yet surely thou hadst cause to weep. 
 
 Ursula 
 
 And cause 
 To love, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 Now tell me, dear, art thou 
 As fair as in the days when I could see? 
 
 [6] 
 
Ursula 
 I think not, since, O'Neil, upon the street 
 The people do not turn and look on me 
 As once they did. 
 
 Tyrone 
 And doth it grieve thy heart? 
 
 Ursula 
 Not much, my lord. 
 
 Tyrone 
 I would it did, my wife. 
 One tiny flaw of vanity in this. 
 The crystal of thy soul, would seem to me 
 To justify — in part — my youthful pride. 
 The rash presumption of my love when I 
 Did deem myself a fitting mate for thee. 
 
 Ursula 
 It gladdens me to hear you jest, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 What, art thou ever glad with me, my girl ? 
 For England was thy country, dearest love. 
 As Ireland mine. And England's sword was 
 turned 
 
 [7] 
 
Against my country's breast. I could not 
 
 choose 
 But try to beat It back. 
 
 Ursula 
 I knew that, dear, 
 In that wild morning hour I married you. 
 
 Tyrone 
 Oh sweetest, maddest hour that ever dawned. 
 
 Ursula 
 From madness sometimes groweth peace, 
 O'Nell. 
 
 Tyrone 
 And blessed patience, like, my wife, to thine; 
 Yet tell me something now, for, ere I die — 
 
 Ursula 
 Nay, do not talk of death. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 Yes, tell me now 
 Before I die, one thing I have not known. 
 Thy brother's name hath ne'er been breathed 
 
 by us 
 Since on my soldiers' spears he fell and died. 
 
 [8] 
 
Ursula 
 I never breathe his name except In prayer. 
 
 Tyrone 
 Hast thou remarked the silence 'twixt us 
 twain? 
 
 Ursula 
 I have the silence felt, O'Nell. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 A mist 
 Has crept between us, slow enfolding us. 
 And was it dark for thee within the mist? 
 
 Ursula 
 Thou stoodst there with me, dear, 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 O sweetest heart, 
 O truest, tenderest heart of woman kind ! 
 Now, look you, wife, these eyes of mine are 
 
 blank. 
 But In my soul are other eyes which yearn. 
 With something deeper than a lover's pain, 
 Within one hidden chamber in your heart 
 To see. 
 
 [9] 
 
Ursula 
 It shall be open to your wish. 
 
 Tyrone 
 Didst thou not love thy knightly brother then, 
 Although he would have crossed thy young 
 desires? \_A Pause^ 
 
 Ursula 
 He was so much my elder, that he bore 
 Me in his arms, when I was but a child, 
 Beside the English streams. I love him still. 
 
 Tyrone 
 Ah me! 
 
 Ursula 
 It is a woman's fate to choose 
 Between her loves. I made my choice, my 
 lord. 
 
 Tyrone 
 A rueful need of choice to thee. Close grew 
 The thorrs on either path and flaming red 
 The blossoms were with blood. 'Tis passing 
 
 strange ; 
 This hour my spirit seems released so far 
 From thine, that I can pity thee, in truth, 
 As if thou wert another — not my wife. 
 
 [lO] 
 
Ursula 
 Draw nearer, then. Thy pity hurts me, Hugh. 
 
 Tyrone 
 I never loved thee more than now, and yet 
 A strong wind bears me forth from thee, and I 
 Look back and see thee in thy patient pain; 
 When thou didst move among both maids and 
 
 men, 
 Amid all matrons and all children, both 
 The lowly and the folk of high degree, 
 As one who never gave unto herself 
 A thought, except to measure her sweet 
 
 strength 
 And match it with another's need, for gift 
 Of service and of consolation full. 
 And joy-bestowing tenderness. O wife. 
 So queenly in humility, that thou 
 Didst quite forget thou wert high born and 
 
 fair — 
 But how the wounded, sick, the poor and old. 
 And little babies loved thee, dear ! 
 
 Ursula 
 
 Their love 
 Enveloped me with gladness — theirs and 
 thine, 
 
 [ii] 
 
And so I must, I think, have given back 
 Some comfort — yes, I truly hope I did; 
 I walked, a blessed woman, by thy side. 
 Rejoicing that the blessing came from thee, 
 Since thou hadst led me where so many loved. 
 
 Tyrone 
 We were so close through all those changing 
 
 years 
 I could not look on thee till now. For me 
 Thou didst renounce thy girlish home, thy kin. 
 And all that love wherein thy stainless bud 
 Of life, as in a garden, grew until 
 It ripened to the faultless flower. 
 
 Ursula 
 
 That flower, 
 O'Neil, was thine. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 O hapless English wife 
 Of England's direst foe ! 
 
 Ursula 
 
 Thou art the foe. 
 My Irish lord, of England's darkest crimes, 
 And what thou art, am I. 
 
 [12] 
 
Tyrone 
 
 Ah, God to me 
 Hath given the only perfect thing that grew 
 On England's soil. 
 
 Ursula 
 'Tis sweet to hear your words, 
 O'Neil, but they do praise me more, far more 
 Than I deserve. 
 
 Tyrone 
 My dear, thou art my hope, 
 My only source of faith. 
 
 Ursula 
 
 Oh, no, the church 
 Doth bless thee, love, besides. 
 
 Tyrone 
 
 In all this world, 
 This world where I have fought and failed, 
 
 I rest alone 
 On thee. 
 
 Ursula 
 Nay, let me call the priest, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 It shall be as thou wilt. The priest may come. 
 
 [13] 
 
Ursula 
 It frightens me to see your face, O'Neil. 
 
 Tyrone 
 Fear naught, for here in ancient Rome the 
 
 church 
 Shall shelter thee; and our young son shall 
 
 grow 
 In grace and stature, after I am gone, 
 Though English soldiers burn and plunder 
 
 still 
 In Erin's land. 
 
 Ursula 
 O brave and broken heart ! 
 My husband ! Ah, speak yet again ! O'Neil ! 
 O'Neil ! I think I never yet have told you 
 
 half 
 How much I love — 
 
 Tyrone 
 Here endeth all but love; 
 The long endeavor and the baffled flight — 
 The rising hope — the charging on again — 
 The cheated faith — the dull despair of 
 
 God— 
 The sullen effort in contempt of Fate — 
 The joy of battle and the pain of loss — 
 
 [14] 
 
The disappointment drinking steadily 
 Like thirst, through dragging years, my drop- 
 ping blood; 
 All, all Is ended now save love; — O wife, 
 My Ursula, in heaven I hope to see — 
 Once more — thy face ! 
 
 [Dies] 
 
 [15] 
 
THE HERO 
 
PRESTON S. BROOKS, OR THE 
 COWARD, 
 
 TO 
 
 A CONFIDENTIAL FRIEND 
 
 January, 1857 
 
 nr^HE women kissed me, and their odorous 
 
 -* breath. 
 The pressure of their white, bare arms around 
 My neck, the murmur of their soft applause, 
 The gay, triumphant laughter of the men 
 Who greeted me, when home I went to try 
 My cause before our Southern gentlemen — 
 All bore me on a billowed sea of glory; 
 I did not care that Burlingame had gone 
 To meet me there in Canada; — I laughed 
 Within my sleeve, that I had fooled him so, 
 And sent him on such bootless errand. 
 
 But 
 I've wondered lately how the story'll read 
 In history. Damn the future critics. That 
 Is what I say. No future world of men 
 Can understand our Southern cause. 
 
 Well, yes, 
 I do confess I'm just a trifle sick. 
 At last, of seeing canes and getting gifts 
 
 [19] 
 
Of golden-headed sticks; — and silver coins 
 In number thirty, came from Yankee girls. 
 Blasphem'ous females ! They were girls who 
 
 work 
 In cotton mills beside the sea ; and lost, 
 Of course, is all their maiden bloom and sense 
 Of fitness and religion. 
 
 No, I think 
 'Tis said that he has never breathed a word 
 Of me resentful. Hypocrite, he is, 
 Though Mrs. Child considers him a saint. 
 He must detest me though he is a prig ! 
 
 He lay a fallen column on the floor, 
 
 I stood above — how other could I stand? 
 
 I should have shot him, had he risen up, 
 
 To struggle — yes, I meant to do the job 
 
 That I had undertaken, and to shoot. 
 
 If so I must. But, stunned at once, he fell; 
 
 I saw the beauty of his curling hair. 
 
 E'en while the blood flowed through it, and 
 
 I struck! 
 I wish I had not struck those final blows ; 
 But I was in a rage that seemed divine, 
 A great Olympic madness in my veins; — 
 It moved my arm. I don't repent; Oh, no! 
 
 [20] 
 
But wish I had gone daring Northern wrath, 
 And met that Burllngame and fought it out 
 With him, though dead I lay, in consequence, 
 This hour beside the bawling cataract. 
 I think 'twere comfort now, to be — just dead. 
 But I am young and strong, and I shall live 
 Yet twoscore years, at least, to play a part 
 In shaping governmental form for this, 
 Our Union, or its Southern half. 
 
 'Tis said 
 Today, that Sumner'll live. Do you suppose 
 He'll dare to come to Washington again? 
 I don't believe he will. I think that I 
 Have done so much. I've silenced him, and 
 
 all 
 His fellow Abolition Yankees. 
 
 Ugh, 
 I have the queerest feeling in my throat; 
 I'll talk with you another time, but now 
 I'll go and try to sleep. 
 
 \_Later^ 
 
 I think that ne'er 
 Again I'll sleep — alive — upon this earth! 
 It hurts ! I am too young to suffer so ! 
 
 [21] 
 
Loose, loose the collar ! There's a vision 
 
 haunteth me ; 
 I see Charles Sumner standing by a grave, 
 I see the name upon the stone. It's mine ! 
 Ah, God have mercy, it is mine ! I hear — 
 Keep hearing Sumner say, "Poor fellow!" 
 
 That! 
 It maddens me. I wish that Sumner would 
 Be silent by my grave. I hate his voice ; 
 I've heard it in my dreams and when awake ; 
 I could not go beyond the hearing it ! 
 I choke ! Good-by. Let Sumner live or die, 
 Or suffer through the years to come, and howl 
 Unto the world; — if, only, never more 
 I hear his voice, I am content. 
 
 Go call 
 
 My mother now, that she may see me die. 
 And whisper "Darling" in my ear, and stop 
 The noise of Sumner's groaning there. 
 
 [22] 
 
THE HERO 
 
 A MAN unlettered, but the Sages 
 -^ ^ Knew him, on the Concord plain. 
 As looked they from the hermitages 
 Gray and stained by Nature's rain; 
 
 A man uncultured, but the Lady 
 Knew him, nor beheld in vain, 
 
 Who bore him solace from the shady 
 Lawns beside the tidal main; 
 
 A man of mystery, but the People 
 Knew he did not life disdain 
 Who for others laid it down. 
 
 So soldiers marching past the steeple 
 Cheering, sought the Battle Plain, 
 
 Cheering, singing, ''Old John Brown." 
 
 [23] 
 
OLIVER BROWN'S WIDOW 
 
 C AD little Martha sat and sewed, 
 
 ^ She did not tremble — only once she 
 
 cried — 
 Her baby born and dead, two teardrops 
 
 flowed, 
 Then Martha did the thing she could — 
 
 she died. 
 
 LUCIFER THE FALLEN 
 
 TN all ages and all climes 
 -*- Destiny repeateth crimes; 
 Fallen Lucifer again 
 Roamed the awful battle plain, 
 Where the slavers' rebel blade 
 Nation building work essayed 
 O'er that quivering "corner stone" 
 That was made of flesh and bone, 
 Made of ravished human soul. 
 From itself which slavers stole; 
 Fallen Lucifer was fain. 
 Seeking still his end to gain 
 On the beast conceived plan. 
 That to clod, degradeth Man. 
 
 [24] 
 
NORTHERN MAIDENS 
 
 npHROUGH the fading decades five 
 
 ■'- Have the spinsters stayed alive, 
 Since the Fortress Sumter fell 
 Under Charleston's rebel shell. 
 Decades five the black-robed Priest, 
 Walking South and West and East, 
 Never hath a bridegroom found 
 Lay not stiffened under ground. 
 
 Sat the spinsters fair and young. 
 
 Each with silent lips and tongue ; 
 
 Sat the spinsters gray and old, 
 
 And they never mortal told 
 
 That they always heard a wail, 
 
 Sounding on the midnight gale. 
 
 Crying, "Love, I still would come 
 
 But my limbs are cold and numb. 
 
 So I send to you my ghost 
 
 From the grave strewn Southern coast." 
 
 [25] 
 
MARY McGUINNESS 
 
 Che was just an Irish lass 
 
 With old Erin's honest eyes, 
 But the rank Virginian grass 
 
 Groweth where her husband lies. 
 
 Hither over rolling sea 
 
 Came she, doomed to break her heart 
 When the Bull Run musketry 
 
 Did its mad rebelling part. 
 
 Alien offering, to atone 
 
 For our country's deadly sin, 
 
 Laid she on the altar stone, 
 Just a widow's weed to win. 
 
 Fain I would her veil of crape 
 With a shamrock garland bind. 
 
 Fain our banner round her drape, 
 Lit with stars and level lined. 
 
 [26] 
 
FROM AGE TO AGE 
 
 FROM age to age, the form tyrannic 
 And method suffer Ariel's mystic change, 
 Sea-dipped in Time's vast cavern where 
 the strange 
 Deep tides are more than Oceanic, 
 
 But changes not the germ organic 
 
 Of master impulse that would life arrange 
 To crush the weaker, drive it till it cringe 
 
 Before or king or proud mechanic ! 
 
 Beware my Country, lest despotic graft 
 
 Grow alien — yet deep bedded on our tree, 
 An Upas foliage — not of Liberty, 
 
 Till faith shall sicken, and our Nation daft, 
 Reel, as the poet sang, both back and East, 
 Where Man is tyrant or a minion Beast. 
 
 [27] 
 
AH, CAN IT BE? 
 I 
 
 A H, can It be of this vast Universe 
 ^ ^ The primal secret, — that e'en Eden's 
 
 curse. 
 And cause thereof, man's error that provoked, 
 Were both, of Ignorance, (creative cloaked), 
 
 Which tried to do a task too difficult. 
 The fell and unexpected sad result? 
 So sits today a God, in yonder bourne. 
 Who doth His helplessness remorseful mourn? 
 
 Then pity us. Thou God, and take our pity. 
 
 If came the dooming Sorrow on us so, 
 Wail Thou in Solo to our Chorus ditty, 
 
 Wail, wail the pain above, and that below. 
 The anguish born to die in Earthly City 
 And pass to meteors where the comets glow. 
 
 [28] 
 
II 
 
 There Calvin by Servetus rideth grim, 
 
 And with a torch he lights the sunset sky; 
 *'Nay, light it not," the God doth strangely 
 cry; 
 
 "I meant no sin," saith Calvin unto Him. 
 
 "Mine was," pleads Torquemada, "conscience 
 whim;" 
 "And mine mistake," Las Casas breatheth 
 
 sigh ; 
 "Ours dogma was," vow they who did 
 deny 
 The spirit's right to own its body's limb. 
 
 "When God," cry all, "created gulfs of pain, 
 And sentient creatures down its caverns thrust ; 
 We thought the base of gulf was pavement 
 just." 
 
 "Nay, nay," the God declares, "'tis quicksand 
 
 vain; 
 Creation is a car; — with Me hold fast 
 The reins, and help Me drive the quicksands 
 
 past." 
 
 [29] 
 
BEN BUTLER 
 
 '' I ^HE dusky regiment rushed, storming up 
 -■- Newmarket Hill, as Butler gave com- 
 mand, 
 And though the rebel guns their bullets hurled 
 To meet them, firm they clutched their bay- 
 onets. 
 Up climbing, while Ben Butler, watching, 
 
 stood 
 Upon a summit near, Intent to see 
 If negro soldiers could, as much he hoped. 
 Endure such scathing fire, and forward go, 
 And mount the hill unto the belching guns. 
 And smite the slaver hands from off those 
 
 guns. 
 Or would they crouch or run In paltry awe 
 Of white men. So Ben Butler watched; for 
 
 then 
 The nation reeled, both North and South, 
 
 with pride 
 That scorned the negro, doubting were he 
 
 man, 
 Like other men to do and dare ; nor yet. 
 In open battle, had his nerve been tried. 
 There, on Virginian soil, where he had been 
 A chattel sold. 
 
 [30] 
 
Up, up the negroes marched, 
 As sure they were no longer contraband — 
 Grim warfare's unresisting spoil — mere 
 
 things — 
 The shuttlecocks, thrown back and forth 
 
 ^ again, 
 'Twixt armies and the auction block; 
 Now they were men, who sought the rebel 
 
 horde. 
 To test each soldier there in single strife, 
 And strike him dead for right to rear a child, 
 And own a wife, and lay a hearthstone smooth 
 Beneath a sheltering roof. Black men, at last, 
 Were they, to strike their rebel masters dead, 
 And dare the threatened gallows tree. 
 
 On, up 
 They strode, a phalanx armed and strangely 
 
 grim. 
 Avengers of a fearful wrong and woe, 
 Distorted Images of Judgment Day. 
 
 But silence brooded all the fortress o'er, 
 
 When vaulted into It the remnant left 
 
 Of that dark troop, and high their banner 
 
 held 
 Like torch, above the ramparts and the 
 
 sward ; 
 
 [31] 
 
For, just a moment, ere they, shrieking, cam.e, 
 The rebels saw their eyeballs gleaming fierce 
 From out of faces dark, and fled in fright, 
 Too madly frantic for escape to be 
 Ashamed to run from minions. 
 
 So they took 
 The fort, those negroes, sudden proved as 
 men. 
 
 But far below the captured walls, the way 
 Was strewn with bodies gashed and corpses 
 
 stiff. 
 In none of which had dwelt a spirit craven. 
 
 Then Butler, mounted on his war horse, rode 
 That fearful path, and reverent turned his 
 
 steps 
 Amid the wounded and the dead, and saw 
 How blood as red as Saxon vintage flowed 
 From gaping, blackened flesh; whereat his 
 
 soul. 
 Like to a giant, rose in righteous wrath, 
 And swore he to his God a righteous oath : 
 "I will befriend and cherish all my life 
 The race to which these men belong." 
 
 [32] 
 
Black, black, 
 The ghosts around him smiled to hear that 
 
 oath, 
 Exultant smiled, before they skyward sped, 
 A cloud of blackened witnesses, to find 
 Beyond the sun a country and a home. 
 
 Long years had passed when Butler wrote, 
 
 "That vow 
 I have, forever faithful, kept." 
 
 Then down. 
 Through azure, sounded trumpets golden- 
 toned. 
 And on the blast a voice came breathing, 
 
 "Hark, 
 Thou, first of all our Generals to proclaim 
 Decree that wives of negro fugitives 
 Should succor have, — thou, first to find us 
 
 way 
 To freedom, Harken now to us and look, 
 Thy soldiers offer unto thee, this hour, 
 A great salute." 
 
 [33] 
 
IN ARCADY 
 
MEMORY 
 
 npHERE is a tufted bloom 
 
 ^ Too pallid to illume 
 The fields in Spring, 
 When mating warblers sing; 
 
 That bloom is brownish pale, 
 Its stem is soft and frail. 
 It is not fair ; 
 You would not for it care ; 
 
 And yet that flower 
 
 Hath over memory power, 
 
 And brings a tear 
 
 Her drooping eyelids near. 
 
 When warblers sing 
 
 And wake her up in Spring. 
 
 [37] 
 
THE JUBILANT WIND 
 
 A/TAN'S spirit assaulteth the skies — 
 ■^^■^ But what is his triumph to me, 
 Fierce rushing whence Tempests arise 
 The soul of the Organ to be? 
 
 Man conquers his brother in fields — 
 But what is his glory to mine 
 
 Who master the cadence which yields 
 The music of breathing divine? 
 
 MAN EXULTANT 
 
 THE lightning obeyeth my hand — 
 The sunlight hath pencil of Titian 
 forgot 
 
 And painteth as I command, 
 
 The wind is my piper, and knoweth It 
 not. 
 
 [38] 
 
'T^IS odd, how near that little god, 
 ■^ Sweet Cupid, comes to doing 
 
 Himself the wooing; 
 As though, in way that maidens know, 
 
 He thought a laddie couldn't, 
 
 Or wisely wouldn't ; 
 And so, he toots and shoots. 
 Then low, salutes, and scoots. 
 
 II 
 
 TET Clara wear the gem marine, which 
 
 -■*-' gloweth green. 
 
 With pearled translucent sheen 
 
 Not quite as that in moonstone seen ; 
 
 The spirit she of cascade foam, a lady gnome, 
 Who doth like Undine roam 
 Beneath an alien vapor dome; 
 
 And bears she ever on where'er she goes 
 A wave-born captured swan. 
 While sings she all alone, and carries rose 
 White carved of coral stone. 
 
 [39] 
 
Ill 
 
 C TILL my fancy sees him go, 
 *^ A figure lithe, swinging scythe, 
 
 Irish Pompey mowing meadows swampy; 
 But in faith, I do not know 
 
 Another thing I can sing 
 Of old Pompey, save that long ago. 
 He became a phantom fay, Erin's elf astray 
 Where pond lilies sway 
 
 When the mill bells ring 
 Near the Blackstone's flow — 
 Weird old Pompey, tall and blithe 
 
 In the meadows swampy. 
 
 IV 
 
 'HT^WAS queer, so many babies are there 
 
 -■- born down here. 
 That I should have the sweetest one did ever 
 
 cry. 
 Or bawl, and tumble flat when trying not to 
 
 crawl. 
 Or suck its little thumb and look like sleepy 
 
 Puck, 
 But so, it happened that I had it, as you know. 
 
 [40] 
 
\ . 
 
/^NCE there was a little fairy, 
 ^^ And her petticoat was blue, 
 Made of gossamers were airy, 
 
 So 'twas warm and rather lovely too ! 
 
 Lived she in a mushroom dwelling, 
 
 With a rabbit chaperon, 
 But her spirit felt rebelling 
 
 When that rabbit ate her mush alone ; 
 
 Therefore ran she on the roadway, 
 
 Holding up her petticoat. 
 While a guiding squirrel showed way 
 
 To the land where women vote ; 
 
 But the sunshine made her dizzy 
 And she tumbled down to sleep. 
 
 Where was Master Merlin busy 
 
 Weaving nets the dragon flies to keep ; 
 
 Then the gray old Wizard Merlin 
 Touched her forehead with his hand, 
 
 Smoothing back the tresses curling 
 Golden, under bluest ribbon band: 
 
 [41] 
 
Long she lay beneath a hickory, 
 And, when up that fairy woke. 
 
 She had turned to blossom chicory — 
 And she was so blue she never spoke. 
 
 Never made the smallest murmur, 
 Only when the breezes blew 
 
 Grasped her stalk with twiglets firmer, 
 While she bluer blue, in silence, grew. 
 
 [42] 
 
VI 
 
 T THINK it is a doom outrageous 
 -^ That we must sleep away 
 One third of every rarely precious 
 And love-inspiring day; 
 
 Though Shakespeare rhapsodize of slumber 
 
 In his enchanting rhyme, 
 I wish he might awake have written 
 
 Through all his breathing time. 
 
 I'm willing both to eat and labor, 
 
 Keep shop or house or sheep, 
 But execrate the law of nature 
 
 Condemning me to sleep ; 
 
 When I'm awake I'm really living, 
 
 I talk or sob or laugh, 
 But sleeping is an occupation 
 
 Fit only for a calf. 
 
 [43] 
 
THREE CITIES 
 
THERE are some stories rise like kingly 
 ghosts, 
 And say, "What! did you think us dead 
 
 and gone? 
 Tho' shroud on shroud be round about us 
 drawn 
 We walk, grim sentinels at outer posts, 
 
 "And cannot merge our action with the hosts. 
 Who hail the glowing Paradisal dawn. 
 Until to beings still this planet on 
 
 Be told the awe of life that made us ghosts, 
 
 "The secret awe of God, of love, of sin, 
 Whate'er it was that pierced through all the 
 
 thin 
 Earth-woven fabrics of our mortal life, 
 
 "And sent us silent forth unto the Shore 
 That stretches desert-like and wide before 
 The Gate that shelters harmony from strife." 
 
 [47] 
 
II 
 
 /^ H, empty, save of phantoms, is the street 
 ^^ In cities three, where wraiths with gob- 
 lins meet, 
 Nor tell each other how the Angels greet, 
 While Silence rushes like the wind-blown 
 sleet ; 
 
 Through cities three, there passes empty road; 
 It empty were, though thither legions strode. 
 And silent were, though blare of trumpets 
 
 flowed; 
 And fallen on this earth is mine abode ! 
 
 It lieth ruined by the Beacon hill. 
 Nor build it architects of Paris will. 
 And by the Bay that house is roofless still 
 Above the graves which all its courtyards fill. 
 
 Ah, is there City with pearled fortresses 
 Where Angels can defy Eumenides ? 
 
 [48] 
 
Ill 
 
 IITILLED Providence, that crowns the 
 
 -*^ tidal Bay, 
 
 Thou City of the mingled rivers three 
 That bear the toilers' harvest to the sea, 
 
 Still wild and sweet thy palace bells convey 
 The message of the dead and gone to me. 
 The dead who filled thy halls with mirth 
 and glee ; 
 
 There is no amber bloom of asphodel 
 
 Upon thy banks, 
 That yieldeth such perfume as tale I tell 
 
 Upon thy banks, 
 While ocean's mournful boom is sounding 
 knell 
 
 Upon thy banks. 
 
 [49] 
 
IV 
 
 /^ PARIS, City thou of mad unrest, 
 ^^ I never have unto the world confessed 
 How many sacred secrets mine lie pressed 
 And hidden close beneath thy marble breast ; 
 
 My echo song hath never breathed refrain 
 Of one sad moan beside the river Seine, 
 A moan that sobbeth forth the mortal pain 
 That since Creation solace seeks in vain; 
 
 Oh Paris, still I hear a laughter low 
 
 In one bright spot where lamps of evening 
 
 glow; — 
 Yet round a fading joy doth laughter flow; 
 
 Where mimes of Danton and of Robespierre 
 
 grope, 
 And mock parading of our modern hope, 
 Upon thy pavement cast I heliotrope. 
 
 [50] 
 
PURPLE ASTERS 
 
I 
 
 T HAVE a friend, beyond the solar ray, 
 -■- To whom, I, pulsing reverent, send away 
 My tender love and gratitude today, 
 As bodied spirit to unbodied may; 
 
 "When you and I," he wrote me once, "a 
 
 cloud 
 Shall sit upon, calm-eyed and level-browed 
 We shall behold the mysteries unavowed 
 By destiny unto the earthly crowd;" 
 
 To him I turned, in hour of deep despair. 
 
 In that unconscious way is well aware 
 
 So thinketh not, "This friend is sure to care ; " 
 
 He stood beside my dying brother's bed. 
 His guidance to my marriage altar led — 
 His breath was blessing o'er my baby's head. 
 
 [53] 
 
II 
 
 "Be sure," he wrote me once, "you roam 
 
 about, 
 Through Alpine passes wander In and out. 
 And linger long where mountains, frozen old. 
 With silver summits pierce the molten gold;" 
 
 "Be sure," he wrote me once, "you note the 
 
 light 
 On Alfierl's tombstone falleth white; 
 And mark the antique grandeur of the way 
 Still MIlo's Venus standeth In our day." 
 
 "I never saw, before, a bobolink 
 So near," he said, "to ocean's crested brink; 
 Now think you could a bird yon sea foam 
 drink? 
 
 "But you, can singing, sip the clover dew 
 In pastures wide, from whence that warbler 
 
 flew. 
 And wildest meaning of the wind construe." 
 
 [54] 
 
Ill 
 
 **Once came succession," said he, "of sweet 
 
 days 
 To me, when all the while my spirit, sheathed 
 In tranquil blessedness, unspeaking, breathed 
 Thanksgiving to the Lord for all His ways; 
 
 "I murmured in reiterated phrase, 
 
 *0 God, I thank Thee that while floods have 
 
 seethed 
 The tree of life for me Is olive wreathed;' " 
 Thus spoke my friend with reminiscent gaze ; 
 
 And I, In silence listening, wondered when, 
 While civic passions stormed around him wild, 
 His soul had echoed psalm the Shepherd sang ; 
 
 Oh, is he blessed now, as felt he then? 
 I only know, that down on me he smiled 
 Where far-off fog bells over ocean rang. 
 
 [55] 
 
IV 
 
 His youth had struggled with the elements 
 Which rush along the lightning caverned 
 
 sky 
 And foam the madness of Niagara by, 
 
 And split the surface of the continents. 
 
 Bold, had he challenged purpose of events 
 Where peoples dash their force at law, and 
 
 try 
 How will the Golden Rule of Christ apply 
 
 When despots move their mailed armaments ; 
 
 No soldier had he been of holiday. 
 
 And though he once misread an order's 
 text, 
 And to a fog-like wraith responded "yea," 
 
 Pure as its restless flood, his Titan Soul 
 
 Was mystic as the sea by storm perplexed. 
 And fathomless as ocean's baseless bowl. 
 
 [56] 
 
Desire to help — that was the passion 
 Among his varied many, strongest ; 
 Ambition rose and sank, but longest 
 
 It moved in self-renouncing fashion; 
 
 When other wish, with embers ashen, 
 As righteous or as tired, he covered, 
 His hand, so kingly sworn, still hovered 
 
 O'er fragile creatures with compassion. 
 
 Ah, low I whisper, here, a mound beside, 
 "Sad asters, sign of mourning and of pride 
 And faith that can in field of loss abide, 
 
 "Calm asters, blooming where the woodbines 
 
 creep 
 When over Island rocks the breakers leap, 
 Be purple pall above my friend asleep." 
 
 [57] 
 
VI 
 
 A "Silver Saint," one called him in his days 
 Were later; and this name it ringeth true 
 To chord within my heart, and doth renew 
 
 A cadence there of thankfulness and praise, 
 
 A soft Amen to anthem that conveys 
 
 Deep joy — yet prayer withal that fain 
 
 would sue 
 Might something added be the faith unto' 
 
 Which doth that Amen on my rhythm raise ; 
 
 Amid the haloed and angelic band, 
 
 A Silver Saint, thus let him bear in hand 
 
 And show to gods our Autumn's astral bloom 
 As mourns it, regal, over Summer's tomb ; 
 
 It is the flower, in Sorrow's vintage stained, 
 Proclaiming so a battle lost — yet gained. 
 
 [S8] 
 
VII 
 
 Now sit I gazing through the window glass 
 That barreth out the North wlnd^s rude 
 
 harass, 
 And seem to see his face on clouds that pass, 
 As drawn by Titian's brush upon the mass; 
 
 As from such cloud, descended to the mold. 
 
 With dark hair blanched, once came he, white 
 and old; 
 
 "Now eighty years," he said, "my life en- 
 fold;" 
 
 Then Silence like a mist around him rolled ; 
 
 And I, who. In the long departed years. 
 Had roamed, a child, beside his manhood's 
 
 track. 
 Then stood an Imaged form of mystery black, 
 
 And, putting by, to gaze at him through tears, 
 A veil as sable as the midnight's drift. 
 Slow murmured, "Where I go I take your 
 gift." 
 
 [59] 
 
VIII 
 
 I sometimes think there must be shapeless 
 void 
 In some far space, where dwell the foggy 
 
 ghosts 
 Of all the pallid, palpitating hosts 
 Of days that died unborn yet undestroyed; 
 
 There float they, random, vague and un- 
 employed — 
 Thin sheeted films of being. On the coasts 
 Of Nothingness, they gibber empty boasts 
 
 Of deeds undone and triumphs unenjoyed; 
 
 And we who walk the solid earth below, 
 (Or is it close beside?) that realm, wind- 
 blown. 
 Where helpless moans aborted potency. 
 
 Can only half imagine all the glow 
 
 Of great achievements might have been our 
 
 own 
 Had but those days had vital energy. 
 
 [60] 
 
IX 
 
 Yet can there be beyond the starlight blur, 
 Not endless void, where doth oblivion glut 
 Oblivion, with our perished chances, but 
 
 A more than wizard God who cannot err, 
 
 And re-creates occasions past, which were 
 Else lost, in prisoning Chaos ever shut. 
 And makes them crystallize, as jewels cut 
 
 To glorify the sword Excalibur. 
 
 If so, one moment lost, I claim as mine. 
 When it shall gleam as amulet renewed. 
 And all its chances like to gems I link 
 
 Upon a golden thread, and close entwine 
 The aster blossoms, starry, purple-hued, 
 Which to my friend, I fling across the brink. 
 
 [6i] 
 
WENDELL PHILLIPS, 
 
 THE 
 
 HERMES 
 

 f: 
 
 / 
 
 ::■■•,; ~^-^_ 
 
 - 
 
 
 
 S<^^^}\ 
 
 \ 
 
 \ c 
 
 ^-. i 
 
 /, 
 
 
 J 
 
 
 
 
 ' ^<^ 
 
/^N high Olympus poised, spoke solemnly 
 ^^ White Hermes, " Christ hath risen from 
 the earth 
 Where dwell the men of miserable birth, 
 And as He rose he beckoned unto me ; 
 
 "Then plain I did His face and gesture see 
 Where stood I, with the Infant god of 
 
 mirth. 
 Who babbled playful murmurs at the 
 dearth 
 Of harvest grapes upon black Calvary; 
 
 "But when, Great Jove, I saw the Christ, 
 
 I felt 
 A tender yearning for the little ones 
 Ungodlike and unjoyous. He had left; 
 
 "Down at the feet of Christ, I, listening, 
 
 knelt. 
 He spoke; — then passed beyond the stars 
 
 and suns; — 
 I bear His message to a world bereft." 
 
 [65] 
 
II 
 
 The corrugated brow of mighty Jove 
 
 Grew closer grooved and blacker o'er his 
 
 eyes, 
 Where lightning seemed from forges to 
 arise 
 Whose onward bolts Vulcanic hammers drove ; 
 
 Spoke he; — his voice the frightened ether 
 clove 
 In cloudy fragments, tinct with sulphur 
 
 dyes. 
 Back rushing from that sound in groaning 
 sighs, ^ ^ 
 
 To flood with pain the twillt Delphic grove ; 
 
 Said Jove, "If thou shalt bear the Christian 
 
 word 
 To those vile creatures whom I madly made, 
 I doom thee, as I doomed Prometheus erst." 
 
 Up Hermes sang his answer, like a chord 
 Ascending from the sunlight's downward 
 
 glade, 
 *T do Christ's bidding, though by thee 
 
 accursed." 
 
 [66] 
 
Ill 
 
 Great Pan arose, as earthward Hermes sped, 
 And asked, "Who cometh now from cloudy- 
 fleece. 
 For I can bear no more, who never cease 
 
 To feel the throbbing dew on Calvary shed?" 
 
 From laurel thickets Daphne raised her head, 
 Soft moaning, "Canst thou any Art release. 
 From passion's Impulse that Is but caprice, 
 
 Whose tumult worketh only final dread?" 
 
 The Troll amid the rocks of Stonehenge cried, 
 "Dark vapor cold bedews my forehead damp. 
 The soul within hath labor-wearied died;" 
 
 Sang Hermes, "Hear the message that I 
 
 speak; 
 The Christ commands His angels forth from 
 
 camp 
 To battle for the helpless and the weak." 
 
 [67] 
 
IV 
 
 " 'TIs safe to leave to every man the rights 
 God gave him, and his labor's fullest due, 
 Though he be white or bearing other hue ; 
 
 And that it shall be thus, our country plights ; 
 
 "Nor must we ever let our love for sights 
 Are beautiful, for sounds accorded to 
 The rule of music, nor permit the dew 
 
 Of genial air, whose touch the flesh delights, 
 
 "To melt from out our soul and from our 
 
 sense 
 Of justice, higher than benevolence. 
 The conscious aching for another's need." 
 
 So from his youth to age, great Phillips gave 
 His counsel — so he lived, and so he clave 
 With heart and hand unto the Christian creed. 
 
 [68] 
 
V 
 
 He strode the steamer deck beneath the sweep 
 Of one proud banner flaunting o'er the deep, 
 And passion to its stars made winged leap ; 
 "I will with you," he said, "a vigil keep; 
 
 "Since, Douglass, men deny you roof and 
 
 berth. 
 May God make desolate my home and hearth 
 And mark my brow with sign of basest worth. 
 As I were Cain who roamed again the earth, 
 
 "If I lay down this auburn head of mine 
 Upon a pillow that too white Is deemed 
 To touch the curls that crown your dusky 
 brow." 
 
 He watched all night with Douglass, while 
 
 the brine 
 Behind the ship through phosphorescence 
 
 gleamed 
 And to the planets signaled clear his vow. 
 
 [69] 
 
VI 
 
 He walked beside the woman of the street, . 
 And reaching gentlest hand, low whispered 
 
 "Come;" 
 Then led her to the sheltering, refuge home 
 Where might her soul with Peace and Mercy 
 meet; 
 
 He stood before the legal judgment seat, 
 And for the convict made a brother's claim, 
 "Ah, help him out of sin and past Its shame, 
 
 For Justice would convert, not harsh entreat." 
 
 Thus, while he lived, there was a man who 
 
 cared 
 If well or 111 the throbbing millions fared, 
 He broke his heart to use for service bread; 
 
 He filled the Altar cup with his own wine — 
 The vintage flow from forth his love be- 
 nign; — 
 But mourn ye. Nations, now, for Phillips 
 dead! 
 
 [70] 
 
VII 
 
 The Russian exile sighed, "His voice, alone 
 From forth unsympathlzlng crowds, came 
 
 blown. 
 With tender comprehension In Its tone. 
 To prison cells where fetters clamped me 
 
 prone." 
 
 Sad Ireland's peasant called, "Ah come to 
 
 me, 
 Thou, Western peer of high Democracy, 
 Thou, Scion of great England's Chivalry, 
 And bid thy English kinsmen set me free." 
 
 The Bright-eyed Indian woman cried, "My 
 
 heart 
 Is hopeful, knowing he will take my part." 
 
 Alaska's children plead beneath his roof, 
 But, proud, the negro held himself; aloof. 
 Enforced alien In his native land. 
 And said, "He bade me sit at his right hand." 
 
 [71] 
 
VIII 
 
 Amid the crowding throng, almost alone, 
 Life long, stood Phillips — as, some day at 
 
 noon, 
 In mart, before both merchant and buffoon. 
 The Future's Ghost should mount the ros- 
 trum throne — 
 
 Its portent face, illuminated shown, 
 
 By light was yet to be of coming moon. 
 Slow moving over Chaos' vast lagoon. 
 
 O'er which not yet the auguring wing had 
 flown; 
 
 Then cried the leaders to the startled mob, 
 "Why hearken ye to words of ghostly wrath? 
 What though a phantom lurk along your 
 path?" 
 
 Down Phillips crushed a stifled human sob. 
 And spoke his awful sentence, "Quick repent; 
 Cast ashes on your head and God content.'* 
 
 [72] 
 
IX 
 
 Bright was his aspect In his early years, 
 And as he older grew, It scarcely paled ; 
 He still resembled one who had Inhaled 
 
 The vivifying air of heavenly spheres, 
 
 Then breathed It unto men were not his peers 
 In god-like birth, nor had with "splendor 
 
 trailed" 
 Around them, winged on sunbeams, down- 
 ward sailed 
 For Incarnation into chevaliers ; 
 
 A shape of color, auburn haired and eyed 
 Like bluets steeped In melted pearls — his face 
 As that of Hermes changed by hearing dirge 
 
 That Christian lips were chanting at his side. 
 So Phillips looked when with a haughty grace 
 He did from city crowds to sight emerge. 
 
 [73] 
 
X 
 
 "For thirty years," said Phillips, "rode I 
 race. 
 For thirty years, I waged a desert strife — 
 What think you are the pathways now in 
 life 
 Where foot of mine would, shod in velvet, 
 pace? 
 
 "The Beacon hill, I know from top to base. 
 And I could summon herald drum and fife 
 To dash their music 'gainst the hisses rife. 
 
 And be my conduct to the Ruler's place ; 
 
 "And once perhaps I should have liked to 
 tread 
 That Beacon path on high, but, long ago. 
 In soul of mine, lay down Ambition dead — 
 
 "For my belov'd, whom I had loved to please, 
 These many years have lain 'neath grasses 
 low; 
 Nor more doth hiss at me their spirits tease." 
 
 [74] 
 
XI 
 
 He looked maid Science sternly in the face, 
 And said, "Thou daughter only art of God 
 When thou dost soften, for the feet un- 
 shod, 
 
 The flinty pavements of the market place;" 
 
 He laid his royal touch on hands that trace 
 The lines of Art and rhythmic period, 
 And said, "Now render thought of Him 
 who trod 
 
 The pathway to the sacrificial place; 
 
 "Though Carlyle sourly grimace as a Sage, 
 With Darwin cry, 'The Battle to the Strong,' 
 Though Scholars in Republics, aping, mock 
 
 "The manners of the Despot's minion flock. 
 The Sermon on the Mount hath cadence long. 
 And bids you serve the Weakness of your 
 Age." 
 
 [75] 
 
XII 
 
 I wonder, if upon his palm, he wore 
 The sign that Francis of Assisi bore, 
 Bestowed in that great hour of rapture, when 
 The Saint of Service stood apart from men; 
 
 For never on this earth hath mortal dwelt, 
 Since in Italian vales Saint Francis knelt. 
 More worthy through self-sacrifice to know 
 Stigmata's consecrating ruby glow. 
 
 Than he, who vowed, the stones of Boston's 
 
 pave 
 He would too holy make to bear a slave ; 
 
 Than he, who to its children, smiling grave, 
 The largesse of his unasked bounty gave; 
 
 Than he, who, old and weary, would not rest 
 While not, by ease, were aching millions blest. 
 
 [76] 
 
XIII 
 
 He took upon himself in age a load 
 Of newer social scorn for effort new, 
 And Midas from the hand of Jove withdrew 
 
 A thunder bolt fire-sharpened to a goad, 
 
 And hurled It where the gray-haired champion 
 strode, 
 And thus a baleful lighting round him 
 
 threw, 
 As forth he went his Master's task to do 
 Amid the laden workers on the road ; 
 
 Cried Midas, "I would statue build of gold 
 
 For you, and crown It with a laurel wreath, 
 If you would silent be now you are old;" 
 
 Said Phillips, *'I will sooner God deny 
 
 As holy, than be silent underneath 
 His Heaven, when I hear a pauper's cry." 
 
 [771 
 
XIV 
 
 The doctor spoke the sentence was of death; 
 "There Is for you no chance," he sadly 
 
 said; 
 Adown then Phillips laid his royal head, 
 And "Ann, Ann," whispered he with failing 
 breath; 
 
 But then he smiled, as having made his graith 
 For crusade long, when close beside his bed 
 As though she heard his Doom's approach- 
 ing tread, 
 Begged one who loved him, "Tell me of your 
 faith!" 
 
 "In Christ as Son Divine, I have believed," 
 He said, " In Him I see all problems solved ; — 
 Round Him have Ages satellite revolved ; 
 
 "He taught to me endurance when I grieved, 
 'Twas He who nerved my struggling toil for 
 
 man;" 
 Thus Phillips dying spoke — then murmured 
 
 "Ann." 
 
 [78] 
 
XV 
 
 The Negro stood, a figure black and gaunt; 
 
 And there, rag-clothen 'mid the Boston 
 throng. 
 
 He imaged fearfully the crime which long 
 Had crushed a race with weight of adamant; 
 
 Yet, from his lips, dumb wishes seemed to 
 pant, 
 As his was soul birth-strangled in a thong, 
 Then quickened unto sense by stabbing 
 prong 
 Till of itself not wholly ignorant; 
 
 A Celtic woman at the Negro stared, 
 Compassion, sympathy out-streaming from 
 Her Irish eyes which glistened through a 
 tear ; 
 
 "Would you," she whispered, "look on him 
 
 who dared 
 Both life and death for you? Then with me 
 
 come. 
 And let us mourn together at his bier." 
 
 [79] 
 
THE MINSTREL AND HELEN 
 
A DUET 
 Wherein the voice only of The Minstrel is heard. 
 
 Scene: by the Seekonk River. Time: the middle 
 of the Nineteenth Century. 
 
 ' I ''O me those young and white-stemmed 
 -*- birches, 
 
 Though clad they are in green, 
 Bring ever thought of brides in churches, 
 
 Their maids and grooms between. 
 
 Yes, like this brooklet is the Yarrow, — 
 
 You could a pebble toss 
 From bank to bank, — for 'tis as narrow 
 
 As Seekonk here across; 
 
 Well, every poet full doth own It, 
 
 The visloned Yarrow stream, 
 As wide as ever he hath shown it — 
 
 Nor wholly as in dream ; 
 
 That is the power to us Is given — 
 
 And right, to Nature change ; 
 It Is the will of gracious Heaven 
 
 That poets rearrange! — 
 
 [83] 
 
Oh, will you try to throw It over, 
 
 This Indian arrow stone. 
 And hit that tuft of russet clover 
 
 The farther bank upon? 
 
 Why should a blossom, dead, stay standing 
 
 Beside the golden rod, 
 Which empress Ceres holds commanding 
 
 When she Is harvest god ? 
 
 The golden rod Is Autumn's scepter, 
 
 The sickle Is but tool 
 For use of harvester, adepter 
 
 When working under rule ; 
 
 Yet harvester hath thought of blessing, 
 
 And of the household good. 
 And Ceres bountiful confessing 
 
 Madonna's Motherhood! 
 
 Now whisper — when hath come November, 
 
 Shall we together kneel 
 One hearthstone by, and rake the ember 
 
 While bells Thanksgiving peal ? 
 
 You say your friends your great surrender 
 
 In wedlock still oppose? 
 Oh Lady, are you then befriender 
 
 Of my determined foes? 
 
 [84] 
 
Ah, now you cling — above me stooping, — 
 
 You swaying woman vine. 
 Your blossomed being o'er me drooping, — 
 
 Like lovely columbine ! 
 
 My love for you were not diviner 
 
 Were I unbodied ghost; 
 It moveth unto issues finer 
 
 Than knows the gossip host ; 
 
 Perhaps 'twere well though were I specter, 
 
 On moonbeams fain to glide. 
 And sip the drops of odorous nectar 
 
 Down honeysuckles slide. 
 
 And then to rise and join the legion 
 
 Of sprites, in garments white. 
 Who animate the mystic region 
 
 Where glows Astarte's light. 
 
 But still to live on earth would please me 
 
 When sky above is blue, — 
 And Autumn's brownish tintings ease mc 
 
 As strains of music do; — 
 
 Ah, Helen, I adore you simply. 
 
 And only kisses crave 
 When both your cheeks are blushing dimply 
 
 Beneath your glances grave ! 
 
 [8s] 
 
Yet, deep I know, my star was fatal 
 Though brilliantly it glowed; — 
 
 Its portents, on my morning natal, 
 Disaster darkly showed. 
 
 No, solemnly I swear it, — sinning 
 
 Is price not I would pay, 
 So be I knew, for any winning 
 
 In game of life we play. 
 
 My impulses are not Satanic 
 
 Like those through Adam came, — 
 
 But have the source that throbs galvanic,- 
 Unto an end the same ! 
 
 Ah, let us cease our talk of forces 
 Which trouble bring or make. 
 
 And watch yon cricket as it courses 
 Where wind-blown asters quake. 
 
 Oh, that's a kingbird, he that twisteth 
 
 In nest a whitened thread; 
 Know you he follows as he listeth 
 
 The black crow overhead ? 
 
 Know you the orioles he loveth. 
 And when their young ones fly. 
 
 Sir Kingbird every chance improveth 
 To perch those fledglings nigh? 
 
 [86] 
 
In Autumn sit the kingbirds gravely 
 
 On fences In a row, 
 And stare they blankly and yet bravely 
 
 At Nature's fleeting show, 
 
 As failed within them aught aspiring 
 To rise and Southward fly, — 
 
 As breathed within a strong desiring 
 Here in the North to die. 
 
 Why, Helen, I have senses double, 
 For I was wizard made; — 
 
 You merely saw an iris bubble 
 Where sportive children played ; 
 
 You saw the colors, three, prismatic, 
 
 Upon the globule glow, 
 And at the sight, you grew ecstatic 
 
 Of such a lovely show ; 
 
 But I, — I also heard a warble, 
 
 As of a bobolink. 
 Ring softly from that airy bauble 
 
 Ere did it turfward sink. 
 
 Last eve I stood the sunset under, 
 My phantom raptured dumb, 
 
 And low I heard. In sound of wonder, 
 The moving darkness come ! 
 
 [87] 
 
Oh, I believe my soul was native, 
 Though not my limbs were born 
 
 Where sang the Stars the joy Creative, 
 When first was Eden's morn. 
 
 Yet, Helen, this you will discover, 
 
 If not our fates diverge. 
 Creative Song unto your Lover 
 
 Hath taken tone of dirge. 
 
 No, Helen, no! — that bird, black, glossy. 
 
 That stalketh pompous so. 
 Among the lichens gray and mossy, 
 
 I'm sure it is a crow ! 
 
 But if it be a nightmare raven, — 
 
 Beloved, grant me then 
 The kiss that promises a haven 
 
 To nightmare-haunted men ! 
 
 Oh, dove-eyed darling, music choral 
 
 I hear with perfect bliss. 
 Though not for you, a sound is oral 
 
 In my permitted kiss ! 
 
 Well, dearest, I have seen you never ! 
 
 I dream but of your face. 
 Imagine it Madonna's ever 
 
 Behind your filmy lace ; 
 
 [88] 
 
I think, though, Botticelli's creatures 
 
 More softly outlined would, 
 When they are wildest, have your features, 
 
 If painted beings could ! 
 
 But not they can, for rhythmic motion 
 
 And varied color hue, 
 At every sad or gleeful notion. 
 
 Keep making you anew. 
 
 You talk of form ! Why, evanescent 
 
 Is all we name as form, 
 When color is in sunshine present 
 
 And changing shadows swarm. 
 
 Indeed, 'tis only mortals stolid 
 
 And those of silly mirth 
 Who think unsentlent Is and solid 
 
 This blossom-pregnant earth! 
 
 Why, color Is alive, and steepeth. 
 
 As elf magician may. 
 The earth's weird senses till it sleepeth 
 
 Its summer hour away. 
 
 What? Did you never really fancy. 
 
 That, by some wizard spelled 
 Who knows all tricks of necromancy, 
 
 The earth is slumber held, 
 
 [89] 
 
As from the Universal bases, 
 
 And wearing azure robe, 
 It goes patroling starry spaces, 
 
 A trance-bewildered globe? 
 
 And did you wonder should it waken 
 
 Where polar magnets lure, 
 If frightened would it feel forsaken. 
 
 Or 'mid the Stars secure? 
 
 But if the earth be frightened yonder 
 
 Alone where planets are. 
 How would a woman feel, was fonder 
 
 Of Eden than of Star? 
 
 Ah think, among the Borealis, 
 
 She drifteth on alone 
 Who drank with me the wine-filled chalice 
 
 Wherein a pearl was thrown ! 
 
 'Mid diamond spheroids of Orion 
 
 She jewels seeks in vain. 
 Who here on earth the dandelion 
 
 Once gathered glad and fain ; 
 
 Oh yes, I loved her — love the memory 
 
 Of her sweet bridal bloom 
 As 'twere the pearly shadow shimmery 
 
 Of lily on a tomb. 
 
 [90] 
 
A shadow heightens while it chastens 
 
 The beauty of this world, 
 As over meadows green it hastens, 
 
 Where sunset is unfurled, 
 
 And sinks all separate existence 
 
 In whitely blurring Stars, 
 Those silent witnesses to distance 
 
 That not a shadow mars. 
 
 This hour the Sun grants full effulgence, 
 
 As were he king or priest 
 Bestowing largesse of indulgence 
 
 Now backward to the East, 
 
 Or like an artist more than kingly 
 
 The landscape overthrows 
 With colors blended deep, or singly, 
 
 Till sapphire-like it glows 
 
 As in the backgrounds Titian painted 
 
 The Virgin far behind, 
 Rich-hued environments to sainted. 
 
 Incorporated mind. 
 
 Yon oak bush is a liveried varlet, 
 
 A serving Imp defiant. 
 With humpy shoulders robed In scarlet, 
 
 Beside the forest giant 
 
 [91] 
 
Which llfteth up a domed pavilion 
 
 Not Angelo could mock, 
 In shape or in its dark vermilion, 
 
 With his Italian rock. 
 
 Oh, legend from the age primeval 
 
 Comes sighing and alive, 
 To sing the song of that upheaval 
 
 When did Creation strive 
 
 With Something, in the primal quarry, 
 
 To carve a Love in stone, 
 And only made the Angels sorry 
 
 Such statue was begun ! 
 
 'Tis clematis ; that vine, so airy, 
 
 In Autumn bears that puff 
 Of lacy, greenish, slightly hairy 
 
 And delicatest stuff. 
 
 It's chambered hollow for a shelter 
 To elves when raindrops fall. 
 
 And run their ladies helter-skelter 
 To seek its goblin hall. 
 
 I know those fays; — when wanting tipple 
 They come a-clattering down 
 
 To break the foam upon the ripple 
 Of Seekonk's wavelets brown; 
 
 [92] 
 
The mouse Is priest of their carousal, 
 His round eyes opened shy, — 
 
 And always to an elf espousal 
 The rabbit cometh nigh. 
 
 Desiring elfin bride, the froggy 
 Comes, making lengthy jumps. 
 
 As leaps he mosses wet and soggy 
 Around decaying stumps; — 
 
 'Tis frolic Innocent, though tipsy 
 Through glimmer homeward flies. 
 
 At eve, the reeling firefly gypsy, 
 With sparkles In his eyes. 
 
 And llghteth up with wayward twinkle 
 The Imp frog's marshy yard. 
 
 Which ringeth full of softest tinkle 
 And twitter undebarred; — 
 
 Although the Star once lost from Seven 
 
 The nebulas amid 
 Still roams, nor finds It place In Heaven 
 
 With Angels panoplied. 
 
 And as It wanders, very distant 
 Doth seem the moon below, — 
 
 The moon that hath no light persistent, 
 And but reflected glow; — 
 
 [93] 
 
Yet constant In her white reflection, 
 
 Diana is supreme, 
 So making luminous selection 
 
 Forever of her theme ! 
 
 You, Helen, Dian-like, my color 
 
 Transmuted shall receive, 
 Nor shall it than the moonlight duller 
 
 Your goddess genius leave ! 
 
 But ere that day, a moan of madness 
 Will float a-down the street. 
 
 And bridal song of festive gladness 
 In mocking answer meet ; 
 
 And ere that day, in churchyard yonder. 
 
 Above the mounded moss 
 A croaking raven long will ponder 
 
 And step a ridge across ; 
 
 Then kiss me, Helen, kiss me slowly 
 
 While I am living still ; 
 You never more can kiss, — when lowly 
 
 Is the grave — I fill. 
 
 So kiss me, Helen, quick and often, 
 
 Before the raven flies. 
 Whose accent nevermore will soften, 
 
 Though much a woman cries ; 
 
 [94] 
 
And let me kiss you, till the pressure 
 
 Set deep upon your soul 
 The regnant marks of rhythmic measure 
 
 Shall all your life control; 
 
 So shall you be a type forever, 
 
 To ages thus remain. 
 Of that fine womanly endeavor 
 
 Doth constancy attain. 
 
 [95] 
 
SONGS FROM THE CLOISTER 
 OF AGE 
 
THERE are cloisters of many kinds 
 In this world of ours below, 
 And their builders had many minds, 
 As the arching gateways show ; 
 
 But the one, whence I gaze abroad, 
 
 As I hear the whippoorwills. 
 Hath the columns of stone unflawed 
 
 Over granite threshold sills ; 
 
 And its sodden footpath never turns 
 To the primrose-bordered way, 
 
 Though the heart that's within me yearns 
 For the bird-beloved spray; 
 
 'Tis the cloister of life and awe. 
 
 Where the rule of Time hath ceased, 
 
 And 'tis under religious law. 
 For incarnate Age is Priest; 
 
 And the censer, he swingeth slow. 
 Hath the far-off scent of musk, 
 
 That pervadeth the earth aglow 
 In the dewy evening's dusk ; 
 
 And the anthem, he solemn sings. 
 Doth, as whispering echo come 
 
 Of the voice, in the wind harp strings. 
 When the Morning was not dumb. 
 
 [99] 
 
AS IT WAS IN THE BEGINNING, 
 IS NOW, AND EVER SHALL BE 
 
 ^T^HE winsomest maiden under the sun, — 
 
 -*- Sang she, "Bobolink, whirl you nigh. 
 The holiest kisses have 'trothal begun, 
 And my glad tears are not dry" ; 
 
 The happiest woman under the sun, — 
 
 Sang she, "Baby bye, lullaby 
 My loveliest, beautiful, wondering One, 
 
 Sleepy orioles nestle high"; 
 
 The woefulest widow under the sun, — 
 Sang she, "Wail, ye bluebirds, and cry, 
 
 The lordliest living forever Is done 
 'Neath the spreading sunset sky" ; 
 
 The weariest mother under the sun, — 
 Sang she, "Cling to me till we die. 
 
 Thou darllngest being the planet now on 
 Where the bats at midnight fly." 
 
 [ loo] 
 
TO J. C. W. 
 I 
 
 THE mocking bird flew singing on the air, 
 The mystic jay bird donned his gayest 
 coat 
 And tossed like gleaming lance his shrillest 
 note, 
 To dusky people calling everywhere ; 
 
 The rose of Cherokee went climbing there, 
 While off from vines on tree trunks seemed 
 
 to float 
 Great yellow roses that the sunbeam smote, 
 
 Thus lifted open to its amber glare; 
 
 And thou and I, beneath the Georgian pines 
 Beheld the beauty, heard the happy sound. 
 And loved the violets that starred the ground. 
 
 But better loved the Northern sun that shines 
 On trees, low bending under Northern snows. 
 Than Southern light upon the Southern rose. 
 
 [lOl] 
 
II 
 
 GOLD-TINTED fell the Autumn leaves 
 one day, 
 And pelted soft your face, while on we 
 
 drove, 
 As they were kisses of the tender love 
 Maternal Nature gave your spirit gay; 
 
 We looked across the fields a little way 
 
 And saw down drifting slantwise in a 
 
 grove 
 Of maples, where In play the breezes 
 strove. 
 The floating leaves that seemed a sunlit 
 spray; — 
 
 Oh loveliest those leaves In amber shower ! 
 But they were dying though they shimmered 
 
 bright 
 And yellow, steeped translucent In the air; 
 
 E^en so, your being swaying to Its hour 
 
 Of close, Is smitten through with golden light, 
 
 And falleth beautiful beyond compare. 
 
 [102] 
 
Ill 
 
 I HAVE been grateful often In my day, — 
 For gayest pleasure, e'en for saddest tears. 
 For work that dignified the passing years, 
 And for the power within my soul to pray ; 
 
 For winter snows and for the bloom of May, 
 For little pattering feet, that to my ears 
 Made music such as but a mother hears 
 
 When nightfall brings her children home to 
 stay; 
 
 But that no flushing, bird-crossed sunset sky 
 Was e'er so beautiful in tint of rose. 
 So peaceful with its silver evening star, 
 
 As Is thy spirit pausing ere It fly, 
 
 While backward all its sweetness flows, — 
 
 For this, my thanks to God most fervent are. 
 
 [ 103] 
 
IV 
 
 THE ordered house, the child prone on 
 the floor, 
 The pictured Virgin, — that sweet one whose 
 
 look 
 Bewrayeth that her soul can scarcely brook 
 To be so raised, her very God before, — 
 
 Calm Venus in the corner watching o'er 
 The room, — the low lounge where an open 
 
 book 
 Reveals the verse whose rhyme my fancy 
 took 
 One moment, ere you called me to the door; 
 
 Thus I remember all, though now is wrought 
 A fatal change ; — for strangers ease their dole 
 And find their joy, e'en where you laughed 
 with me ! 
 
 But echo-like returns the haunting thought 
 Of some imagined world where scene and soul 
 Dwell on, and I again our home may see. 
 
 [ 104] 
 
THE changeless law of change, — Oh, not, 
 alas, 
 'Tis clearly graved alone on human brow, — 
 For earthquakes sink the sea, — the heavens 
 avow 
 The law, and planets like the fireflies pass. 
 
 While man doth still this petty globe harass. 
 And adds his little strength with axe and 
 
 plough 
 All things to change; — he maketh hillocks 
 bow 
 Their heads, and putteth stones in place of 
 grass; — 
 
 But once a poet sang, consoling mortal kind 
 With story of a kingdom saved from fate. 
 Where never fade the stars, nor fall the trees ; 
 
 Ah, in that changeless realm within the mind 
 Still stands my home with thee, inviolate. 
 And memory keepeth sure from rust the keys. 
 
 [105] 
 
ACROSS the gulfs of life to thee I cried, 
 Sweetheart ! 
 Across the fated storms, the lightning 
 chance, 
 The tumult and the crowded spaces wide, 
 The hurry and the whirl of circumstance; 
 
 Parched were my lips, my breathing dry and 
 hard. 
 
 Sweetheart ! 
 I vainly sought a still retiring goal ; 
 My feet were broken on the flinty shard 
 Where did the pebbles 'neath my footsteps 
 roll. 
 
 But ah, with what a splendor moved the 
 world. 
 
 Sweetheart ! 
 What softest winds of joy and mystery 
 Blew over gardens where, like blooms im- 
 pearled. 
 The lilies glowed, when thou didst come 
 to me! 
 
 Across the gulfs of death, to thee I cry; 
 We need thee so, Dear Heart, this world 
 and I! 
 
 [io6] 
 
LAKE GEORGE 
 
 ' I ^HE lake unto its bosom drew the hills, 
 •^ And held them painted proudly there at 
 noon, 
 And drowned them there before the wide- 
 eyed moon 
 While flying wildly sang the whippoorwills ; 
 
 Through twenty years that piercing music 
 thrills, — 
 O haste thee, Love, and slip the moorings 
 
 soon, 
 And let us float as in that far-off June 
 Upon the lake that drowns its circling hills; 
 
 Oh drift with me to regions far remote 
 And dip thy oars where other waters flow 
 And other birds ring challenge to our boat, — 
 
 'Mid hills of God that rise, oh let us float. 
 And let us float o'er hills of God below, 
 While other song repeats the earthly note. 
 
 [107] 
 
s. o. c. 
 
 THE boy like a mi'rage shape faded, 
 Or fled to the outermost spaces, 
 As his own loveliness aided 
 
 His flight to mysterious places ; 
 
 Red brown were his eyes, like the tinting 
 Of oak leaves that Autumn Is dooming. 
 
 When glory gives mystical hinting 
 Of darkness to follow Illuming; 
 
 A figure of dawn, or of even, 
 
 A phantom, In shining whatever 
 
 That throweth down glory from heaven, 
 He vanished from eyesight forever. 
 
 [io8] 
 
E. B. C. 
 
 np'HE house that seemed a vivid life to 
 -■• own 
 
 And sentient be itself — is senseless stone 
 Today, where sat my Mother on her throne, 
 As wife and widow, reverence round her 
 strewn ; 
 
 She was a woman of the Titan brood, 
 And had the goddess-like and varied mood 
 Which tells of changeless iron in the blood 
 That still with tender sweetness is imbued. 
 
 Ah Mother, wherefore should the house roof 
 
 stand. 
 When all thy race hath vanished from the 
 
 land? 
 Why should wistaria's plumage o'er it wave? 
 
 The windows stare like vacant eyes in woe, — 
 But roses red, around them, redder blow, 
 Deep nourished by the tears upon a grave. 
 
 [109] 
 
THERE IS A LOVE 
 
 ' I ^HERE is a love that no desiring knows 
 -■- Save, like a strain of music, to exist 
 And fluting move, like liquid amethyst. 
 Where temple walls the conscious soul inclose ; 
 
 A sound, that seemeth incandescent, goes 
 This wondrous strain, where sits the melo- 
 dist 
 Of life's great marvel and its organist, 
 Who sends it forth while anthem onward 
 flows, 
 
 And in that temple human loves that throb. 
 
 All aspirations as they thwarted sob, 
 
 And all the weird, wan phantoms of this life, 
 
 Who stalk with voices singing through its 
 
 strife 
 Together and incarnate render part, 
 And singing glow, — one miracle of art. 
 
 [no] 
 
THOMAS DAVIDSON 
 
 T HEARD the deep-souled Scottish Scholar 
 
 A say, 
 
 "The Grecian order, all that wondrous rule 
 Of life, which made it columned vestibule 
 
 And into marble turned the human clay, — 
 
 "It died, because beneath its method lay 
 No sense of real love, but only cool, 
 Fine consciousness In studio and school 
 
 That gesture should a calm effect convey." 
 
 The cadence of the Scholar's Gaelic voice 
 Was lingering richly In my charmed ear 
 When, turning as by music full controlled, 
 
 I saw the Hermes, — him a child doth hold 
 And look surprised to feel himself rejoice 
 To watch a child and find its aspect dear. 
 
 [ill] 
 
THE WOMAN AND THE GIRL 
 
 " ANNE," said the Wife, soft gazing at 
 -^ the Maid, 
 "You do not understand the truth, who 
 
 dream 
 Of love in marriage as the source of bliss 
 That shall upspring, through placid, azure 
 
 waves, 
 Spontaneous blossom borne upon a flood 
 Of limpid beauty tranquil in all change 
 While moving 'twixt the pastures green of 
 
 life. 
 You dream of marriage love as though it 
 
 were 
 That lily in the pond, — white, peaceful bloom 
 With golden heart of passion. Ah, mine 
 
 Anne, 
 Such dream is sweet and pure ; and there are 
 
 hours. 
 In wedlock, which fulfillment seem thereof — 
 Hours when the effort is forgotten quite 
 Of glacial and volcanic forces, when 
 Forgotten also are the rolling streams 
 That hollowed out the vale where rests the 
 
 lake 
 Which bears the quiet lilies up. 
 
 [II2] 
 
"Now hark 
 To what I say. Anne, marriage Is the gift 
 Of rare, fine opportunity which God 
 Hath fashioned for our noblest use, so may 
 We mortals join Him in creative work 
 In this world's studio where buildeth He 
 The breathing temple of the human man. 
 So, may we, by endeavor of our hearts' 
 Strong pulses, through renunciation much 
 Of hourly joy and madly great desire. 
 Perfect, each one the other's life and deed. 
 And if, as often chances, only one, 
 Of some united pair, doth fully know 
 The end of marriage, or is competent, 
 By nature, or preceding living trained. 
 To do the mystic, patient marriage task, 
 That miracle which turneth ruby red 
 The water in the glass of life which waits 
 For color, helpless, formless by itself, 
 Then must the wiser, nobler one, or wife 
 Or husband, do the greater work, as were 
 Self-sacrifice the purpose ultimate 
 And recognized of his creation. Christ, 
 Who knew His mission, died to save a world. 
 In marriage, must the wife or husband die 
 As special, separate existence, so 
 
 [113] 
 
To save the other's soul, and through that 
 
 soul 
 Help Christ to save the world; — and wait 
 
 and love, — 
 And wait again and love. Then bridal hours 
 Will dawn that truly bridal are, — such hours 
 As poets sing and lovers dream about." 
 
 **And will the dawning glory stay till eve?" 
 The maiden eager asked. 
 
 Deep peace shone deep 
 Within the woman's eyes, who answered low, 
 "Love is itself a bridal rite and hour 
 When one is married, ready always for 
 Renewal after lapse, — and still it is 
 Renewed! The altar cup upon the shrine 
 Awaits communion. And the Sacrificial Love, 
 Like Christ, both walks the earth and up 
 Ascendeth to the sky." 
 
 Reflected glow 
 Like moonlight radiance beamed upon the 
 
 face 
 Of Anne, as whispered on to her the Wife, 
 "Lay down your maiden hopes, — and, being 
 
 wed. 
 Lay down your hourly joy in marriage e'en, 
 
 T114] 
 
Before the chiseled god of marriage, for 
 
 The image needeth sacrifices ere 
 
 It can become ideal, breathing life. 
 
 Grant unto it your all through years of toil 
 
 And weary effort, — you shall know through 
 
 all 
 The most perfected peace that earth can give. 
 There is no love, that, as emotion mere, 
 Can yield a never failing rapture ; but 
 There is a love that out of sacrifice 
 Procureth joy. There is unselfishness 
 That germinateth love. And marriage is 
 A bond by Will created, which by Will 
 Should be observed, — or traitors we become 
 Unto God's highest law that maketh choice 
 Have sacramental power to weld our souls 
 To the supremest duty." 
 
 [IIS] 
 
OH hush thee, little, sobbing heart of mine. 
 What boots it thus to make thy childish 
 moan? 
 Dost think, in crying, thou art all alone, 
 And none before had reason to repine? 
 
 Look back a thousand years, thou soul of 
 mine, 
 A myriad aching hearts each year did groan, 
 Their groans are silent now, — and so thy 
 own 
 Will be, — thy fate 'tis easy to divine; 
 
 Red columbine above thy grave will blow, 
 And over it shall stream a fragrance wild 
 When breezes touch, near by, the elder's 
 bloom ; 
 
 As now, forgetful poppies make a show 
 Upon the turf 'neath which, quite reconciled 
 To death, those ancient mourners found their 
 tomb. 
 
 [ii6] 
 
SERGIUS STEPNIAK 
 I 
 
 MYSTERIOUS wizard seemed he, as he 
 stepped 
 Like Pluto upward from the Russian 
 
 gloom, 
 Which mimicked Hades' monster-laden 
 womb. 
 And, stern controller of an epoch, leapt 
 
 Where Liberty's bespangled garments swept 
 The daffodils, so matching stars and bloom. 
 And from the glory, like incarnate Doom, 
 
 He bore her where she must his will accept, 
 
 And be companion to that Slavic Fate 
 Which maketh man both artist be and clay 
 More marvelous than other in our day; 
 
 But as he held her swooned inanimate 
 With rapture, yet with fear of his embrace, 
 I saw that he belonged to Christian race. 
 
 [117] 
 
II 
 
 And yet who takes the sword and in the dark 
 Doth wield it, where the drowsing air is still, 
 And not a whisper giveth warning till 
 Down falleth low the tyrant cold and stark, 
 
 He slayeth other than his purposed mark, 
 He slayeth something of the righteous will 
 Within this world to overcome the ill, 
 And doeth somewhat of the Evil's work; 
 
 So evermore the text itself repeats 
 
 Of gospel and the law — yea, of them both, 
 
 And record both of Florentine and Goth; 
 
 Yet high above, John Brown the Russian 
 
 greets, — 
 For none, among the martyred army whole, 
 Than Stepniak possessed a nobler soul. 
 
 [ii8] 
 
EPIGRAMS 
 
A 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS 
 
 N Opportunist? No, he made the chance, 
 And hewed its palisades of Circum- 
 stance. 
 
 H 
 
 JOHN CRAWFORD WYMAN 
 
 IS genius had the rainbow's iridescence; 
 Alas, it had the rainbow's evanescence. 
 
 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON 
 
 A MAN, serene, determined, simply gay. 
 He fought the hugest battle of his day. 
 
 JOHN WEISS 
 
 AURORA BOREALIS gave the light, 
 ' Mysterious from the chaliced Northern 
 night. 
 When did a wizard wight 
 Mix diamond chips and marble dust and ice 
 With Southern rose perfume and Eastern 
 spice. 
 To make the soul of Weiss. 
 
 [I2I] 
 
LUCY STONE 
 
 HER soul, Incarnate In a lion's form, 
 Seemed walking by her through the 
 civic storm; 
 While she herself, so guarded, looked like 
 
 one 
 Was both madonna and unconscious nun. 
 
 JOHN BROWN 
 
 LIFE was the great archangel who be- 
 -' stowed on Death 
 The power to waft his fame upon eternal 
 breath. 
 
 JULIA WARD HOWE 
 
 A SYLPH-LIKE woman, delicate and 
 fair, 
 She placed Minerva's helmet on her hair, 
 Then rose like Venus from the cosmic sea 
 And sang to soldiers, ''Die to make men 
 free." 
 
 [122] 
 
ELLEN TERRY 
 
 A N elf she was of amber, 
 -^^^ Not born but miracle-created, 
 While Ariel played a tambour 
 And Psyche's spirit palpitated. 
 
 [123] 
 
ORCHARD BLOSSOMS 
 
IN THE ORCHARD 
 
 T STOOD beside an apple tree 
 
 -*- An airy hummer flew 
 From out of leaves and looked to see 
 What would I do ; 
 
 For on a bough, the smallest nest, 
 
 A lichen-covered cup, 
 Did, fibre-holden, nigh me rest, 
 
 Round opening up ; 
 
 My hand, uplifted, softly lay 
 In pressure on the branch ; 
 
 Mine eyes along the green-hued way 
 Did glances launch 
 
 And target met of sombre spark 
 From eyes were lidded round. 
 
 Where smoldering of a challenge dark 
 Did fierce abound, 
 
 While panting paused the creature still 
 
 Amid the budding fruit, 
 Its dainty bosom heaving thrill 
 
 Of passion mute; 
 
 [127] 
 
So there we at each other gazed — 
 
 Two mortals having birth 
 Where blossoms flushed and cattle grazed 
 
 Upon the earth ; 
 
 But I had dwelt in hall and mart, 
 
 The hummer in the wood, 
 And neither knew the other's heart, 
 
 For neither could ! 
 
 Then, as emboldened by the sight 
 
 Of me who had not stirred. 
 Came dashing by in angry flight 
 
 The humming bird. 
 
 And in the nest it frankly dropped, 
 
 A title to proclaim, 
 Too haughty proud to be estopped 
 
 By human dame; 
 
 I never saw an elf more brave 
 
 Than was the pygmy bird, 
 Who so a wild defiance gave 
 
 And o'er me whirred; 
 
 [128] 
 
The tiny bunch of feathers frail 
 That seemed like thistle blown, 
 
 Not substance fleshly on the gale, 
 Did spirit own. 
 
 So yet the little fairy flies 
 
 Where wizard beings go. 
 My comrade In the pageant skies 
 
 It did not know 
 
 When under orchard trees It gleamed 
 
 By nature's Impulse bid. 
 And like a darting arrow seemed 
 
 Sun rays amid; 
 
 It had the shadowed color there, 
 Doth hue half hinted show 
 
 May other be In radiance where 
 The dewdrops glow ; 
 
 But now It hath for vision mine 
 
 Those iridescent wings 
 That Perugino's pencil fine 
 
 To angel brings. 
 
 [ 129] 
 
MINNIE 
 
 DO you know the odorous mignonette? 
 As you walk the garden through 
 Scarce you see the blossom where 'tis set, 
 
 Though its fragrance comes to you, 
 And it seems as if it blows 
 To your senses from the rose. 
 
 But quite empty doth the garden seem 
 When you walk its pathways through, 
 
 As they were the labyrinths of dream, 
 And no fragrance comes to you 
 
 From the perished mignonette, 
 
 Though your tears are falling wet. 
 
 [ 130] 
 
AFTER GOETHE 
 
 INTO forests I wandered, 
 In the wooded aisles, 
 On the mystery pondered 
 That reconciles ; 
 
 Then a blossom uprising, 
 
 Like a star below, 
 With a beauty surprising 
 
 Emitted glow ; 
 
 And enamored to break It, 
 
 With a gestured love 
 That was eager to take It 
 
 I stooped above ; 
 
 By the blossom was spoken 
 
 Thus a word to me, 
 *'Must I shriveled and broken 
 
 And withered be?" 
 
 With Its rootlets soft burled 
 
 In mosses about. 
 That blossom I homeward carried 
 
 And set it out ; 
 
 [131] 
 
And now, blooming forever 
 In a peaceful spot, 
 
 It is lovely as ever, 
 And fadeth not. 
 
 [132] 
 
SABBATIA COTTAGE 
 
 THIS moment e'en, the feet of aliens 
 tread 
 The staircase, where, In some fantastic 
 
 gown, 
 The lady of our revel wandered down 
 With step dramatic and a lifted head; 
 
 O'er other dancers now the hearth fires shed 
 Their gayly flickering lights from foot to 
 
 crown, 
 And deep, the ocean sounding near, doth 
 drown 
 The voice of other lovers lately wed — 
 
 I know the rooms are ringing with the calls 
 Of youth to maid — of laughing guest and 
 
 host. 
 While all around the children babbling talk; 
 
 Yet, In my fancy, silent are those halls. 
 And empty Is that staircase, where, a ghost 
 Uprisen from the dead, I softly walk. 
 
 [133] 
 
A JULY DAY 
 
 TT scarcely seems as If these flowers, though 
 -*• near 
 
 My hand, were such in kind as sense can 
 know, 
 
 Or trees and grass did really live and grow 
 Within this air so hot and still and sheer- — 
 
 This air that, like a magic crystal clear, 
 Hath some enchanting power o'er things, 
 
 I trow, 
 So firm their outlines in its mirror show. 
 
 E'en while it seems to make for them a sphere 
 
 Where sense is not, and only soul can see. 
 And as I gaze, I feel my eyeballs strain 
 And sight supernal almost come to me — 
 
 For something more than cloud is in the sky — 
 Those elms are strange as dreams that wax 
 
 and wane — 
 Yon sparrow's note is like a spirit's cry. 
 
 [134] 
 
APPEAL 
 
 IS ever one in Heaven lonely 
 Who left his best beloved below, 
 Though circling angels sing around him, 
 And nowhere is the face of foe? 
 
 To be in Heaven always lonely 
 
 Must be the hopeless most of woe; 
 
 Doth God, while angels sing around Him, 
 An uncompanioned sorrow know? 
 
 THE OLD STORY 
 
 HIS life was by a woman spoiled — 
 God help us who still women be ! 
 We are ashamed, because, when coiled, 
 
 Resemblance in our hair we see 
 To hers who thus his purpose foiled. 
 
 [135] 
 
PREDRIKA BREMER stood upon the 
 
 -■- rock 
 
 That vainly tries to hold Niagara In, 
 
 And sang, "When Nature youthful was, and 
 
 felt 
 How good was God and that she loved Him 
 
 much. 
 She sent her love ascending on the spray 
 Niagara flingeth high to Him." 
 
 Upon those crags a young man, standing, said, 
 "Now hurl I life adown Niagara's flood. 
 For God, who gave me strength to wrestle 
 
 hard 
 With waves that fain would dash me on the 
 
 rocks. 
 Himself will bear my soul In safety up, 
 Whate'er He letteth happen to my flesh." 
 Then plunged the boy the stream within — 
 
 and God? — 
 It must have been a god who bore him on. 
 
 [1361 
 
THOMAS WENTWORTH 
 HIGGINSON 
 
 A SOLDIER hath fallen, 
 A knight lleth low, 
 And memory doth backward 
 Through long seasons go. 
 
 And sees him assaulting 
 The bastion in town, 
 
 Where lost was the battle 
 But saved was renown ; 
 
 And memory beholds him 
 
 Endowing the slave 
 With prestige and prowess 
 
 Of manhood that's brave; 
 
 And, everywhere, vision 
 
 It showeth him true 
 Companion of woman — 
 
 Sir Galahad too ! 
 
 A scholar and critic, 
 
 For art well he wrought; 
 
 A teacher religious. 
 
 The world 'twas he taught. 
 
 [137] 
 
Oh, proud is the mourning, 
 Though sad by the bier 
 
 Where kneeleth a country 
 Doth wholly revere. 
 
 For always his beauty, 
 To age from his youth. 
 
 He wielded as weapon 
 And sign of the Truth. 
 
 [138] 
 
ANNA REDFIELD 
 
 SHE was a girl who seemed the bodied 
 sprite 
 Of Browning's song, a girl too fragile, slight. 
 Almost, to be that "phantom of delight" 
 Which beamed on Wordsworth's sagely rap- 
 tured sight. 
 
 Yet Anna, in her hands, so sylph-like, held 
 Life's shuttle, and its motion firm compelled 
 Through all the threaded maze of forces eld 
 And new close tangled — till the church bell 
 knelled ! 
 
 How shall my sonnet round unto complete- 
 ness? 
 Broken was the shuttle to the chiming dirge, 
 Broken sighs the mortal breath I vainly urge 
 To bear her name along in fluting sweetness. 
 
 Thirty years and five have flitted since she 
 
 died; 
 I recall her — who remembers her beside? 
 
 [ 139] 
 
INTERLUDES 
 
THE WAR SECRETARY 
 
 The Secretary 
 
 SO Curtis calls me rank law-breaker ! Bah ! 
 That's speech by Benjamin to make one 
 
 smile; 
 It cannot be his pulses know the ache 
 Of sympathetic throb for captives. He, 
 Ben Curtis, sat up nights and toiled through 
 
 days 
 To find interpretation of the law 
 Which would consign a little girl to chains, 
 Tight drawn around her tiny wrists, so 
 
 dragged 
 She might be easily to market sale. 
 I sat a child, on Lundy's knee, and though 
 I never was an Abolitionist, 
 The man I am prefers to tinkle bell. 
 And order to the fortress Lafayette 
 Some man or woman, but suspected of 
 The deed or wish Is treacherous, and let 
 The little children, Christ-beloved, go free. 
 
 Oh, yes, I know Judge Curtis thought to save 
 The Union, when he hunted fugitives 
 From off the Bay State soil, while uncles 
 
 beamed. 
 And brothers, and his brothers, by the law, 
 
 [143] 
 
All clapped him on the back approvingly, 
 Or did his mandates. Oh ! well, let him have 
 All glory that recording angels choose 
 To give him for his Union saving zeal. 
 I'm Union saving too, — or making o'er, 
 As Butler says, in newer shape, — and, faith, 
 My task befits my fancy better much 
 Than would the hounding one that Curtis 
 
 chose, 
 Whate'er may be the law, or way old texts 
 May still be read by blinking eyes of age; 
 That man is idiot, not a statesman, who 
 In hour of crises standeth letter chained 
 Before the need for stretching both his legs, 
 And kicking something hard. 
 
 Let Curtis growl 
 Until his legal soul is satisfied 
 With consciousness, supreme, that he has 
 
 raised 
 And full exploited every quibble, that 
 Might damn our Nation, ere 'tis wholly born, 
 I am its rough physician, and I'll pull 
 It through. 
 
 \_A messenger enters and gives a letter, 
 which he reads'\ 
 
 [ 144] 
 
The Secretary 
 That's proof enough. I smelt that rat 
 In darkness nibbling at the cheese. 
 
 \_He touches a hell, and then whispers to 
 the messenger, who goes out^ 
 
 The Secretary 
 
 There Is 
 A cell now vacant In Fort Lafayette; 
 It will an Inmate have tonight, who'll howl 
 The midnight through alone, and Curtis will 
 In most judicial manner rage at morn! 
 
 My head aches, — well, I would Incarcerate 
 My life In that low cell, which ne'er again 
 Is empty, having once been filled ; there would 
 I lay these weary limbs of mine to save 
 My country, — and I think that grave v/Iil 
 
 yawn 
 For me before m.y work is fully done. So be ! 
 I am content. If Lafayette be full 
 This night of traitors safely housed. 
 
 \_J child enters'] 
 
 [145] 
 
The Secretary 
 
 Ah, Tad, 
 ril make you now lieutenant of the guards. 
 
 The Child 
 And can I orders give to them, to march 
 Or wait all night before the White House? 
 
 The Secretary 
 
 Yes. 
 The Child 
 And must my father do as I command? 
 
 The Secretary 
 The President must every word of yours 
 Obey. 
 
 The Child 
 And Mother too? 
 
 The Secretary 
 
 That's doubtful. Tad; 
 The law is not quite settled as to that. 
 But here is your commission signed and sealed. 
 
 The Child 
 I'll practice with the guards tonight, and go 
 Tomorrow morn and catch old Lee and bring 
 
 [146] 
 
Him straight to you. What will you do with 
 him? 
 
 The Secretary 
 Lieutenant Lincoln, if you please, I have 
 Not quite decided yet. 
 
 [147] 
 
THE SECRETARY OF STATE 
 
 1863 
 
 He sits by a table in his office. He throws 
 a newspaper on the floor. The sheet has head- 
 lines which announce the recent delivery of an 
 oration in Cooper Institute, New York. 
 
 CO, ^'all the dogs, Tray, Blanche, and 
 
 *^ Sweetheart, bark 
 
 At me!" Well, when the thunder pealeth 
 
 loud. 
 Who cares for yelping of a cur behind 
 A shed, because his kennel door is closed. 
 And puppy is a little overdrenched? 
 
 Ah, but, when loose the dogs of war are 
 
 slipped. 
 Suppose that Cerberus joins the pack to filch 
 From every raging hound his bit, as sop 
 To that enormous appetite, he nursed. 
 In age long hunger, at the mouth of hell, — 
 If that should chance, the dogs we lead along 
 Our chosen warpath to the victor's field 
 Might, snarling, turn upon each other, and 
 Upon that greedy Cerberus, even more 
 Than on the lawful foe, although the hound 
 
 [148] 
 
Of destiny do call himself a god, 
 Olympic born, and not a hell hound fiend. 
 
 Diana's stag hounds tore a mortal once, 
 Who only glimpsed eternal loveliness 
 And ne'er possessed It. Ah, I wonder If 
 The myth hath meaning such; — and doom 
 
 befell 
 Because he only caught a glimpse, and lacked 
 The wit and courage on to press, and seize 
 The stainless creature of the moon, and so 
 Proclaim, and make, himself the peer of gods. 
 
 \^The Secretary rises, walks about, sits down 
 
 again, picks up the paper, reads a while, 
 
 then slowly lays it aside, and speaks'] 
 
 He once imagined necromancy, that 
 
 Should cause my word, of some preceding day, 
 
 To ring throughout the upper atmosphere. 
 
 The very moment that I spoke below. 
 
 Contrasting speech to other purpose, so 
 
 The listening crowd should hear It all at once ; 
 
 He called one utterance, "deviltry," — "di- 
 vine," 
 The other. Whew! 'Tis lucky we're a race 
 At bottom amiable, — we Yankees. 
 
 [149] 
 
Ah, 
 I will permit my tongue to whisper in 
 Mine ear, I'm sorry after all, and know 
 My wife will sadly grieve, because those lips. 
 Bee-kissed to honeyed bitterness of breath. 
 Have blown such potent blast abroad, that 
 
 thick 
 The air around me seems with golden spears. 
 Most beautiful, but deadly, — hurtling shafts. 
 Well aimed at my bare breast, and piercing it 
 In time and tune of faultless melody, 
 Yet pointed as Apollo's darts that slew 
 The sons of Niobe. And, so serene. 
 Stands Phillips, thus discharging bolts of 
 
 death. 
 As does the marble image of the god. 
 
 I wish I had a presence like to his; 
 
 The figure, feature, voice, and graceful 
 
 pose ; — 
 I've done the best I could with nasal twang. 
 And wagging head, and spiteful Nature's gift 
 Of all endowments are unsuitable 
 For practice of the oratoric art. 
 Yes, pretty well I've done, — at Freeman's 
 
 side, — 
 Poor idiot, whom I saved from undeserved 
 
 [150] 
 
Calamity; — and on the prairies too, 
 Where men, mad, shouted great amens to 
 
 words 
 Of mine, — and in the halls of Congress when 
 I dared confront the Southern law, and speak 
 Of law was ''higher;" 
 
 Home I went that eve. 
 And how she smiled and wept and softly 
 
 kissed. 
 As with betrothal gladness o'er again, 
 "You shall both prophet and the leader be," 
 She cried; "As unto Moses, so to you 
 The law hath given been. 'Tis graven, not 
 On stony tablets ; here, upon my heart 
 And in your mind, the perfect rule is writ. 
 O Love of mine, I now anoint you priest 
 And true Lawgiver, and your feet shall tread 
 The Promised Land; beside its flowing brooks 
 And o'er its prairie pastures, stretching west 
 From one free ocean to another — free. 
 You shall not merely gaze, from far, across 
 The intervening desert ere you die ; 
 Love, Love, you shall our country's legions 
 
 lead 
 In triumph through each Rocky Mountain 
 
 pass 
 
 [151] 
 
And Southward, to the shores beside the 
 
 Gulf." 
 Thus spoke she, panting on my breast, my 
 
 wife, 
 Who had for thirty years of married love 
 Looked beautiful to me as on the day 
 When first we wedded. 
 
 \_He sighs, pauses a moment^ then 
 continues^ 
 
 Once Phillips praised 
 My power to sway an audience. It was when 
 We both orated to New England folk 
 By Plymouth Rock, and high as Heaven flew 
 Our double aspirations soaring; wide 
 As ocean, level as its surface, seemed 
 The pathway he and I might tread to goal 
 Of conquest. 
 
 I had wished to meet with men 
 Belonging to the section most extreme 
 Of abolition purpose, when I went 
 That year to Massachusetts. Him I saw 
 And much admired. I know when I behold 
 A man whose soul is diamond firm, yet hath 
 The tints are opaline, warm flashing through 
 
 [152] 
 
Its facets, with a changeful constancy. 
 Such gem, — creation of Aladdin's lamp. 
 Not chemic process, is his genius. 
 
 Now, 
 Aloof he stands, his sapphire-colored eyes 
 Brimful of azure scorn, the while his lips 
 Refuse to smile at any clever trick 
 Which would provoke a grin on other face. 
 I wonder what he thinks he sees, when thus 
 He gazes? I suppose he fancies he 
 Perceives the way each thread is spun that 
 
 makes 
 My nature's warp and woof, and knows if 
 
 flax. 
 Or wool, or cotton, or if shoddy be 
 Both thread and woven fabric ; — well, if sure 
 He knows my loom and product, and the 
 
 thread 
 Behooveth best its shuttle's motion, well 
 He knows a lot of things I don't, — Not I. 
 
 Yes, on my word unto myself, although 
 I know I'm clever, not I am acquaint, 
 Quite fully, with a man who bears the name 
 Of Seward. He surprises me at times. 
 
 'Tis rather strange, the things a man can do 
 
 [153] 
 
And those he can't. I could with Davis chaff 
 And pleasant converse hold, and dinners give 
 To all pro-slavery men before the war, 
 And laugh with every rank Secessionist; 
 I can Abe Lincoln manage now and then, 
 Play bluff with Butler, — beat him too, and 
 
 keep 
 Him back, when he would stop the Emperor 
 From marching into Mexico. I could 
 Twist Adams round my thumb, and twirl his 
 
 wits 
 Upon a bobbin compromise. I can 
 Outwit Lord Russell, — subtly turn defeat 
 To victory, and spread a future snare 
 For England's foot, anent those two "old 
 
 men" 
 
 Who went to sea in bowls of leaky law ; 
 
 I can retain the love I love, and hold 
 — I think — her faith until I half believe 
 I'm worthy of it. Ah, I am too sure 
 She would forgive the flaw she seeth not! 
 
 I can keep Sumner's friendship, though 'tis 
 
 task 
 A trifle difficult; for he's a man 
 Of most punctilious righteousness. But there's 
 
 [154] 
 
A spot in Sumner's 'cello heart that yields 
 A note, accordant to my practiced touch, 
 And vibrant of an olden love and wish; 
 Thus can I cope with Sumner ; — but one thing 
 I cannot do, — make Phillips deem I am 
 A bona fide champion of the law 
 That's "higher." Well, he is particular 
 About that law ! There's nothing else to say. 
 
 \^Leans hack in his chair and laughs. After 
 a moment he says^ 
 
 And now TU write my wife and tell her how 
 Yon white rose gleameth in the sunlight there 
 Beyond the window pane, — each petal with 
 A moonstone shimmer, warmer, finer than 
 The changeless chastity of ocean's pearl. — 
 Diana's moonstone, — and her beauty 
 
 glimpsed. 
 Not caught and held! Ah me; O Rose, O 
 
 Stone, 
 Of radiance made, that holds supernal glow 
 White, — white yet throbbing even In the 
 
 glare 
 Of noonday sun ! — Til write unto my wife, — 
 About the sunlight and the rose and moon. 
 
 [155] 
 
SIC SEMPER 
 
 1865 
 
 \_A man lying on a floor tries vainly to lift 
 himself and speaks~\ 
 
 I HAD a dream, so must have slept. I 
 heard 
 A voice which cried, "Sic semper"; — that 
 
 was all; 
 'Twas but a moment that I dozed; then came 
 The frightful pain that woke me. Up I rose. 
 And dragged me hither to this barn. Ah, 
 
 God, 
 I am one mass of pain. '^Sic semper/' still 
 I hear the words as erst I shouted them. 
 But not the voice which speaketh is mine own. 
 'Tis that which cried them through my fitful 
 
 sleep ; 
 Yet, sometimes doth it change, and taketh first 
 One accent, then another, till it seems 
 As though a file of angels, clarion-voiced. 
 Were marching by me, each one uttering 
 
 words 
 Announcing doom, of which I only hear 
 Those two, ^^Sic semper" — fearful echo sound 
 Both of each other's cries and of mine own 
 
 [156] 
 
Which rang across a mimic stage — quick 
 
 changed 
 To setting of immortal tragedy, 
 The greatest since that one at Harper's town 
 Whereat I too assisted. ^'Sic semper," — thus 
 The phrase reverberates, — but never moves 
 To end that would declare a tyrant's doom ; — 
 No, never, though I strain my sense to hear ! 
 
 What shall be always unto him, whose head 
 My pistol touched that eve ? 
 
 What shall it be 
 Forever unto me? 
 
 I wonder did 
 He suffer much and long before he died. 
 
 God, I cannot kneel, — but lying prone 
 
 1 pray he neither knew, nor felt, nor heard 
 The crying of his wife and children round 
 His couch. There is no nerve in me that 
 
 thrills 
 To cruel wish. My God — not one. 
 
 A name 
 I'm trying now to speak, — and cannot; — 
 God's, 
 
 [157] 
 
And Edwin's. — I can speak those names, 
 
 when I 
 Would pray or sob along their cadences, — 
 Not his. My lips are paralyzed; my brain 
 Is numb, when I would speak or think that 
 
 name. 
 Although I ever see his image clear 
 And white upon a cloud. 
 
 It seems to me 
 If I could cry to him aloud, that he 
 Would succor me, — would come adown those 
 
 ranks 
 Of angels, trumpet-tongued, proclaiming 
 
 doom. 
 Would raise his hand, and bid them all be 
 
 still ; 
 So silence merciful should soft surround 
 My soul, now deafened by those clarion cries 
 Unending. 
 
 Ah, will Edwin bear a pain 
 Thus always in his heart because of me. 
 And never in the lowest whisper breathe 
 My name, — tongue-tied unto its syllables, 
 As I unto another's on this day? 
 
 [158] 
 
What! Here they come! — Was that my 
 voice that shrieked? 
 
 God, but I hope none heard it of the men 
 Who come, avengers of the blood that fell 
 Down trickling from the slowly sinking head 
 Of majesty. 
 
 Ah, not alive will I 
 Be ta'en. I cannot fight or run or hide; — 
 But I can stand before yon marksman's gun 
 And take his fire. Oh ! can I even stand? 
 
 I must. I must. So — So! Now, soldier 
 
 shoot 
 Between the flames around me. Edwin will 
 Deep bless thee for that bullet evermore. 
 Ah! Ah! 
 
 Great Lincoln pardon me ! 
 
 My lips 
 Have spoke his name ! 
 
 And, having spoken, sure 
 My spirit hath become of mercy, where- 
 Soe'er it goes. — ^^Sic Semper/' 
 
 [159] 
 
ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS 
 
 1880 
 
 A chamber in Washington, D. C. An old 
 man, very small and fragile, and an evident 
 cripple, sits in a wheeled chair. He is speaking 
 to a fair-faced, middle-aged woman, who is very 
 simply dressed in drab-colored garments. 
 
 I NEVER did desire the bond should be 
 So ruptured, and the country cloven twain ; 
 Just read my record. But there's frantic blood 
 In me, and at the last It maddened grew; 
 And I believed In Georgia, — loved the state, 
 And rioted In dream of empire. 
 
 Well, 
 This hand of mine Is smaller much than yours, 
 Yet it has often clutched the bowie knife; 
 You say my eyes are as a woman's, soft? 
 They stared up straight and open once at him 
 Whose fingers grasped my throat, as prone 
 
 Hay 
 Beneath his body, and I cried, "Strike on, 
 Cut deep!" It makes me smile today, to 
 
 think 
 He dared not murder me outright that hour. 
 Do you suppose his conscience stirred? Mine 
 
 slept 
 
 [160] 
 
Most peaceful sleep whene'er I drew a dirk. 
 It was the fashion of my time, the whim 
 Of bravery in the male and Southern soul 
 To draw the knife. Perhaps, as Hamlet says, 
 However, 'twas a custom, honored most 
 When not observed. But I observed it well. 
 
 I was such pigmy in my stature, that 
 My spirit overflowed its limits, mad, 
 And entered in my bowie knife ! 
 
 Yet stroke 
 Of mine did never quite let out a soul 
 Unto the universal spaces. 
 
 Yes, 
 Today, as sit I helpless in my chair, 
 I'm rather glad of that ; though scarce I know 
 If I've backslidden in opinion toward 
 Your Quaker doctrines. Still the Prince of 
 
 Peace 
 Does seem more real now to me than once ; — 
 And He would ne'er have drawn a bowie 
 
 knife. 
 
 What think I of the Union and its cause? 
 And of our present nation-building task? 
 
 I've taken oath, — received forgiveness too, 
 [i6i] 
 
Dreed out my weird In prison first besides; 
 
 Done all the necessary drudgery hard. 
 
 I hope I am a loyal gentleman, 
 
 But scarcely feel myself repentant sinner. 
 
 I did prefer, and still I should, a league 
 Of States; each one with local pride and law 
 And song and old tradition. Davis played 
 The Southern federation false in that, 
 And tried to rule as despot o'er a realm 
 Down lying, — wide and even plain beneath 
 His sway. While I desired the hills and vales, 
 Diversified in form, and every road 
 The peasant, going to his wedding, traced 
 Between the mountains, nor surveyor knew; — 
 And so I broke with Davis, — that is all. 
 
 I never said It quite, but on my word 
 
 If we must be a welded nation, not 
 
 A linked, contracted chain of equal rings, 
 
 I do prefer the Great Lakes bound us north, 
 
 And so on, south and east and west 
 
 Betwixt the gulf and oceans, as we learned 
 
 The atlas when at school. 
 
 The Negroes? Oh, 
 I squirmed at first that they should walk on 
 floors 
 
 [162] 
 
Of parlors and of Congress halls and march 
 All grinning to the ballot box. I felt 
 Exactly as if pigs and sheep and cats 
 Were voodooed into images of men 
 By wizards foul, and set above the race 
 For whom a God had made the earth. I had 
 Most honest spoken, ere the war began. 
 When said I God had meant that they should 
 
 serve, 
 And slavery be the changeless corner stone 
 Unto the temple of the white man's life. 
 But now I'm old; — a helpless invalid 
 I sit, and look with ancient eyes upon 
 An altered world, where hues and forms are 
 
 not 
 The same as those that in my youth I saw ; 
 And Lincoln's dead, and Sumner too. 
 
 I live. 
 And stare around me, and I sometimes think 
 God's purposes I failed to understand, 
 Hot-headed in my fancies. Sumner full 
 Believed in equal human brotherhood. 
 Not quite did Lincoln. There is sweetness in 
 That thought of brotherhood to age like mine, 
 That feeleth need of tenderness. Perhaps 
 Fraternal love is corner stone the best 
 For this Republic. 
 
 [163] 
 
Nay, but spare me more, 
 Nor force, from Southern lips, admission full ! 
 But if my manhood's strength was given 
 
 wrong 
 It Is tremendous thought to have in age, 
 And shoulders such as mine, — they well may 
 
 bend 
 Beneath such burden of mistake. Although 
 I try to lift mine eyes with steady glance 
 Above a million graves of men who might 
 Today have walked the pastures green of life, 
 Had we surrendered slavery to a world 
 That had decreed its death. 
 
 [164] 
 
A MAN UNKNOWN TO HISTORY 
 
 He sits pillowed In a large chair on an open 
 porch, over which a banksia rose vine is In 
 full bloom. He Is about eighty years old. A 
 younger man sits near him, who has a typical 
 New England face, narrow, fine-featured, and 
 blond. The old man speaks brokenly, fre- 
 quently pausing, and also often, without pause, 
 Interrupting himself, both because of physical 
 and emotional distress and disturbance. He 
 wears a faded Confederate army overcoat. 
 
 TX ZELL, yes, I reckoned that he was my 
 ^ ^ son ; 
 
 He might have been, I knew; but, — it is hard 
 To make you Abolition fellows know 
 The way we Southern gentry feel, — though 
 
 why 
 You should not understand, I cannot guess ! 
 No, not at all. 
 
 Look here, you're white like me. 
 Though black Republican, I'm told; now 
 
 think, 
 I'm white, and feel so, — why don't you feel 
 
 white? 
 A Negro wench may bear a Negro boy, 
 
 [165] 
 
A little yellow-stained ; those things occurred ; 
 It was a Negro still, — the mother's stamp 
 Upon it deep. Of course; Oh, damn it! help 
 Me out I say ! I want to use a speech 
 That's decent. Always did I speak as though 
 Some lady might be listening. 
 
 Well, the boy, — 
 What was I saying? Why, I babble now, 
 My wife, she would have laughed to hear my 
 
 tongue 
 So stammer. Such a laugh she had ! 'Twas 
 
 like 
 The music of the mocking bird around 
 Our home, — our fine, old Southern home, in 
 
 years 
 Before you Northern meddlers, and that man, 
 From England, brought a discord to the land. 
 
 Such happy Christmas gayeties we had ! 
 My wife was like angelic hostess then; 
 The neighbors drove plantations o'er to ours, 
 And stayed for days, and back with them we 
 
 went; 
 'Twas all one holiday. The earth was glad. 
 And how the boys, they courted, — had to 
 
 court 
 
 [i66] 
 
If they would win! Our Southern girls are 
 
 proud 
 And pure; — the purest women In the world, 
 The fairest and most faithful maids and 
 
 wives. 
 We went to church In Christmas week; — 
 
 communed, 
 And never in our home we danced ; my wife 
 Thought dancing sinful ; and she had her way, 
 In that. 
 
 I think a gentleman should yield 
 A great deal to his wife's religion. When 
 He comes to sit, as oft I sit, upon 
 A wide veranda quite alone, he will 
 Be glad he never danced — before her eyes, 
 When looked they on him full of holy light. 
 Rebuking, yet so grieved, that they must look 
 Reproach ! You know that light in women's 
 
 eyes ! 
 Oh, no, you can't. Your Northern females are 
 Unlike our high-souled ladies. They are cold 
 And prim, or vixenish, when they reprove. 
 I say I know whereof I speak ! I knew 
 A Northern spinster once; — a governess 
 My sisters had, when we were children ; 
 
 [167] 
 
No, 
 
 I thank my God, I never trod the soil, 
 
 Polluted so, in Massachusetts, by 
 
 The steps of men who sought to steal our 
 
 wealth, 
 (Because we had a kind could walk and eat,) 
 And tried to drive it in their muddy yard 
 Of level surface, there to idly bask. 
 
 We let our servants in the Christmas time 
 
 rejoice ; 
 Gave presents, handkerchiefs and extra food. 
 It made my wife right happy so to give ! 
 We let them all get drunk, and only laughed 
 To see them lying round in lazy sleep. 
 
 I had to hire that yellow youngster out; 
 He needed breaking in. His saucy eyes 
 Annoyed my wife, although her temper was 
 An angel's, but, of course, she had her whims. 
 — I'm old and sick. I can't restrain myself! 
 Give me a drink. She always used that glass ! 
 White as its crystal was her soul, — a jar 
 Of earthenware was mine; — and yet 'twill 
 
 stand 
 Some day, in heaven, by hers. The potter 
 
 shapes 
 
 [ i68 ] 
 
His clay and mixes it for diverse use, — 
 What is the text ? 
 
 Oh, yes, I mind me now; 
 It was the boy that I was telling of ; 
 I did not like to flog him hard, and sent 
 Him to a nigger manager, far-famed 
 The country through for daring, forceful skill. 
 Back came the boy, one day, all gashed and 
 
 bruised 
 (He had been kicked as well as flogged a bit) . 
 He stood before me; — he was seventeen; 
 ('Twas that which angered so my lovely wife. 
 For we had wedded been a score of years;) 
 Oh, well, the boy, — he had the maddest eyes, 
 So big and wild and stag-like ! Once I shot 
 A stag; — I know the way such creatures look 
 When wounded, staggering unto death, they 
 
 glare, 
 Before they fall. The boy had such a glance. 
 There standing beautiful and dark, though 
 
 stained 
 With blood and grimed with dirt, and torn 
 
 with thorns, — 
 (He had run barefoot through the woods, 
 
 you see!) 
 Say, do you know how beautiful those boys 
 
 [169] 
 
And girls — mulatto-colored, sometimes are? 
 Oh, yes, he begged me then to take his part 
 Nor send him to the driver more ; he did ! 
 
 I'm old — I do not care, — but in my eyes the 
 
 wind 
 Is blowing. Move the screen. Thanks, that 
 
 is all. 
 
 What could I do? My wife was sick that 
 
 day. 
 How could I cross the fancy of her heart? 
 
 'Twas our misfortune, that we gentlemen, 
 Here in the South, must such a prayer refuse. 
 As was that boy's. We walked upon a crust ; 
 The gulf below was worse than icy flood. 
 Our wives and daughters, all their happiness. 
 Their safety too, — those were the things at 
 
 stake. 
 Our place within the Union, all our rights; — 
 One Negro unsubdued was like a torch, — 
 And every dwelling is combustible ! 
 
 What though the boy resembled so a stag? 
 He was a slave and m.ust a slave remain, 
 And as a slave submit unto the whip : — 
 
 [ 170] 
 
Ugh, — but my flesh crawls at the thought 
 
 today ! 
 I sent him back, — then hid myself and cried. 
 
 You Northern fools could never understand, — 
 Or would not, — all we had to do and bear. 
 We Southern gentlemen of family. 
 
 Pshaw, yes, he was my property. Why not? 
 
 I sold his freedom to him at the last. 
 
 My wife was ill again, — I would have sold 
 
 My soul for her, — say naught of Fred. Be- 
 sides, 
 
 It made him free. Why should not you be 
 glad 
 
 One nigger got off so, when I was poor ? 
 
 \_A Pause'] 
 
 I was the oldest soldier in the field. 
 Through four long years of war ; 'twas hard, 
 hard work. 
 
 We fought for liberty, — and lost, — and lost. 
 
 My wife was dead when came I broken home, 
 And Southern freedom lay beside her slain ! 
 
 [171] 
 
Oh ! damn your drivel talk of niggers now 1 
 
 And yet the boy was beautiful and tall; 
 Know you if he is living in the North? 
 What! he? A mighty man, and high es- 
 teemed? 
 Don't jest; how could a Negro be such man? 
 
 I'm quite in earnest; Southern gentlemen, 
 Like me, took always kindly interest 
 In their old slaves. I do, — ungrateful beasts 
 Although they are! — No, no, I choke; — Let 
 go! 
 
 I'm dying! Well, why not? The Southern 
 
 flag 
 Has fallen; — it is right that now I fall! 
 
 flag of beauty and the will of God ! 
 
 1 tell you God Almighty meant that we 
 Should rule these Southern lands, and sail the 
 
 streams 
 And own the Gulf of Mexico, and all 
 Adjacent territories, and be lords. 
 In free and equal law; — above the serfs 
 Whom God created such, on purpose. Yes! 
 Or else they fell to that estate ; and just 
 
 [172] 
 
It Is they there remain, so we can move, 
 We Saxon men, in majesty, around. 
 Unhampered in our great desires and joy 
 Of haughty living. That's what Stephens 
 
 said; — 
 I know. 'Tis what the Bible means. My 
 
 wife 
 Oft read the Bible; she declared 'twas so. 
 You infidels have got up notions, but 
 The Bible is against you, — and the law 
 Our fathers framed; it was against you too. 
 How dared you tamper with the compact 
 
 thus. 
 The Constitution? Well, we'll not obey 
 Your patched, new-fangled one; I speak out 
 
 plain. 
 
 A nigger have a man's ambition? Stuff! 
 A nigger has but sauciness, — that's all. 
 
 But I am dying, — never more shall see 
 The Christmas glory in the land, nor hear 
 The banjo in the Negro's hut, when low 
 The sinking sun drips liquid rubies down 
 Upon the old plantation fields beside 
 The swamp. 
 
 [A Pause"] 
 
 [173] 
 
On, on boys, charge the Yankees back ! 
 The mudsill spoilers of our homes. 
 
 I'm faint. 
 But one word more ! If ever you see Fred, 
 Take him aside, and say his father loved 
 Him all the while, and wished that he were 
 white. 
 
 Dear Lord, receive my soul, — wash out my 
 
 sins, — 
 Forgive me ! O Estelle ! — Estelle ! 
 
 [174] 
 
A MAN OF THE PERIOD 
 
 He Is between fifty and sixty years old, tall, 
 dark, and thin-faced. He wears a loose negligee 
 costume, and sits on a wide, open veranda, the 
 wooden posts to which are a little rickety and 
 weather-stained. No one is with him, but he 
 acts as if he thought some one were sitting in an 
 empty chair near him, and he seems to speak 
 to such a person. 
 
 /^ H, are you there again, like Banquets 
 ^^ ghost, — 
 
 Your face much whiter than It used to be? 
 I'm not afraid of you, although you wear 
 A shroud, to which the soggy mosses cling 
 That grow In marshes; — and I dare to look 
 On you, and without flinching tell to you 
 The legend of my life. The tale is brief. 
 
 I was a Harvard boy; I sat within 
 Its academic hall, and heard a voice 
 Unlike all others ever sounded through 
 The palpitating ether to mine ears; 
 'Twas like the ringing of a golden bell, 
 That ringeth sole, in answer to a chime, 
 Unheard by mortal men, of Instruments 
 In Heaven; and I saw a face that brought 
 
 [175] 
 
Full revelation of the poet's dream — 
 Who likened Arthur's to an Angel's, when 
 The great Pendragon flamed above his helm, 
 And he had clear announced the law of God, 
 Its justice and its mercy both. 
 
 I went 
 From college home to Mississippi, where 
 My father kept a mourning fast, each year, 
 Upon the day the Yankee Presidents 
 Proclaimed Thanksgiving with their brazen 
 tongues. 
 
 I vowed unto my sire, my bride and soul, 
 That since I had been born too late to fight 
 For Southern rights, in open field, I would 
 Be champion daily, — by the homestead hearth. 
 Beside the rivers, in the graveyards, fields, 
 And in the courts, and never would I yield 
 A point of law, or any chance that could 
 Be seized, unto the Northern wish or thought. 
 
 That vow I kept. I heard its mandates new. 
 Each year, interpreted for newer case. 
 I followed blast as of a herald's call 
 With summons here and there, through fog 
 and fen, 
 
 [176] 
 
Through city streets, and highways long and 
 
 wide, 
 Through hidden paths, and tangled under- 
 growth 
 Of passion and of action. 
 
 Every inch 
 Of way I fought, with weapon whatso'er 
 My hand could grasp ; and every inch I rode 
 Whatever steed would bear me on. 
 
 I saw 
 A blended mass of living blackness stand 
 Between me and my goal. I rode it through. 
 And drove its fragments foul adown the night. 
 
 That's all I have to say, — save this, that now. 
 Without or sense or reason, sounds that voice 
 Of golden beauty in my ears, as erst 
 I heard it in Fair Harvard's hall, and these 
 Are words it saith, ''Our God intends all men 
 Should equal be and free." And, while I hear, 
 I think of faces black as yours was when 
 You said you were my brother, and I shot 
 You by the ballot box. Then rises clear 
 A great Avenging Angel to my sight. 
 Fair-faced, and golden-haired, and azure- 
 eyed; 
 He Cometh from that blackened mass and loud 
 
 [ 177] 
 
He salth, as certain of his right to speak 
 The holiest words that sinful, mortal men 
 Ere heard, "The little ones of Christ thou 
 
 hast 
 Offended, and, through them, thy Master." 
 
 Then 
 A wall of green and shining cymophanes 
 Comes forward, like a living form, across 
 The cotton field. He turns, and lo, each stone 
 Forth darteth fire, as of a living eye. 
 Green, wondrous, meeting thus the azure ray 
 Of his commanding glance, till all the air 
 Between Is full of intermingled beams 
 Of color, green and blue, all vivid, yet 
 Not clashing, — only glowing side by side. 
 And full athwart each other. Then he lifts 
 A hand, as white and inly radiant as 
 It fashioned were of fibrous, flexile pearl. 
 And at the gesture, slow the gleaming wall 
 DIvideth, while a saffron mist uprises. 
 And, veiling, hides those chrysoberyl eyes ; 
 His hand then sinketh down and leaveth trail 
 Like moonbeam in the air, while quick the 
 
 fog 
 Back rolleth, as a curtain, to reveal 
 A host of seraphs, clad in green and gold, 
 
 [178] 
 
Large-eyed and solemn, moving on to me 
 Across the cotton field. He, whirling round, 
 Comes forward, leading them, and scimitars, 
 Fierce radiating silver lances light. 
 Rise flashing, held in every seraph grasp. 
 They are most terrible In beauty, thus 
 On-coming after him. 
 
 Ah look, I beg! 
 Protect me from him and his seraphs, though 
 I shot you down and dragged you to the 
 
 swamp 
 And hurled you deep Into the muddy ooze. 
 
 God! can it be you are my brother born. 
 And meant as such by God, — though black 
 
 you are? 
 And I — I knew It not. 
 
 [I7Q] 
 
HELEN PITTS DOUGLASS 
 
 SHE rose up, queenly In her womanhood 
 As Duchess May of whom the poet sang, 
 And standing thus dark-eyed and calmly 
 
 mouthed, 
 She flung her white kid glove full In the teeth, 
 Close-set for snarling, of a country's scorn. 
 She flung a glove as white as pearl, as soft 
 As her pure fingers, and she said : " Make you 
 A Nation out of human fragments, this 
 Or that of God's creation, — as you please; 
 For I win wed the man I love and deem 
 So great, that It Is honor to my soul 
 He deigns to reach to me his hand with faith 
 That mine hath equal clasp. So will I wed 
 And ride, both through the castle gate with 
 
 him. 
 And on the castle wall, and proudly hurl 
 Myself down battlemented heights with him, 
 If need shall be of such companion-act. 
 So win I do whatever be your dreams 
 Of science and heredity, whate'er 
 Your racial preference, or purposes 
 Of empire. For, behold me, I today 
 Am soul Incarnate and alive to love 
 That maketh duty. I obey the law 
 
 [i8o] 
 
Which is for living women. I have seen 
 A human god and heard his call to come 
 And be a goddess at his side.'* 
 
 She spoke, 
 Then moved majestic from the glaring light 
 Filled full of curious eyes. Back smiling 
 
 scorn 
 Of womanhood for social scorn, she went 
 Unto a temple which she entered in, 
 A ring upon her hand. There she abode 
 Thenceforth with wifely dignity. 
 
 [i8i] 
 
L'ENVOI 
 
 "QHALL I not see the flowers again," she 
 ^ said, 
 My mother, ere she died, and wistfully. 
 With old, sweet eyes did gaze and question 
 me 
 Who could not speak, but sought to smile 
 Instead; — 
 
 In purple glory doth wistaria spread 
 
 Along her house, red Is her hawthorn tree, 
 And near her cottage by Atlantic sea 
 
 Sabbatia lifts her radiated head. 
 
 That bright pink flower she loved, to thee I 
 
 bring, 
 And wonder as the pregnant year moves on 
 What blossoms open whither she has gone; 
 
 Ah, who will tell me any secret thing 
 That God keeps hid in His immensity, 
 While here I wait the doom that comes for 
 thee? 
 
 [182] 
 
ROSE petal now of God, art thou, mine 
 own, — 
 A star-like part of that effulgent light, 
 That central Flower whence radiance 
 streameth bright 
 To all the suns and systems in the zone, — 
 
 While I, prostrated on the earth am thrown. 
 And over me, thus lying in the night, 
 Dark shadows chasing phantoms take their 
 flight 
 
 And winds of destiny in passing moan; — 
 
 If God, in truth, thy being doth inclose 
 Will He permit a prayer to thee through 
 
 tears. 
 Since I can use no common speech with thee ? 
 
 If not mine earthly, be my Heavenly Rose 
 And breathe, I pray, thy sweetness down the 
 
 spheres 
 To trance my spirit with thy love for me ! 
 
 [183] 
 
JUL 9 19»» 
 
LIBRARY