iii^l 
 
 
 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 
 
 ^¥p Guji^iig^ "^ 
 
 IMTED STATES OF AMEKICA. 
 
A SHEAF OF SONG. 
 
 BENJ. F. LEGGETT. 
 
 Author OF "A Tramp Through Switzerland.' 
 
 Taketh the fruyt and let the ehaf be 6<<7Ze.— Chaucer. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 JOHN. B. ALDEN, PUBLISHER 
 
 1887. 
 
 

 Copyright, 1887, 
 
 BY 
 
 BENJ. F. LEGGETT, 
 
 "ARGYLE PRESS," 
 
 PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING, 
 84 & 26 WOOSTER ST., N, Y. 
 
TO MY MOTHER 
 
 THESE GLEANINGS FROM THE 
 
 HARVEST FIELDS OF MANY YEARS 
 
 ARE AFFECTIONATELY 
 
 DEDICATED. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 The Ballad of the King. 7 
 
 Capri 13 
 
 Burns' Birthday 15 
 
 The Comet 18 
 
 Eventide 19 
 
 Threescore 19 
 
 A Morning Song 21 
 
 Possession 22 
 
 Castle Windows 22 
 
 Beyond 24 
 
 Outward Bound 25 
 
 On the Heights 26 
 
 Alpine Echoes 27 
 
 A Word for Shakespeare 28 
 
 Anniversary , 30 
 
 Our Baby 31 
 
 An Autumn Idyl 32 
 
 Ruins 33 
 
 Another Year 36 
 
 Consider the Lilies 36 
 
 In Camp 37 
 
 December 39 
 
 To J. E 40 
 
 An Ancestral Ode 41 
 
 On a Fir-cone from Bayard Taylor's Grave 44 
 
 Indian Summer , 45 
 
 An Old Story Retold 46 
 
 Old and New 48 
 
 In Springtime 49 
 
 Peter Cooper 50 
 
 The Children's Day 51 
 
2 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 On Eeading an Old Poet 55 
 
 To E. A. B 56 
 
 October 56 
 
 Mt. McGregor— July 23, 1885 59 
 
 A Song in the Night 59 
 
 Sugar Time 61 
 
 At Last 61 
 
 Chippewanoxetti 63 
 
 Birthday 63 
 
 Nature's Plan 64 
 
 To H. W. Longfellow 65 
 
 On Pilgrimage 66 
 
 At Cedarcroft 66 
 
 To my Mother on her Birthday 68 
 
 Only Four 70 
 
 June 71 
 
 In War-time— 1864 73 
 
 To G. G. B 74 
 
 Lake Albano 74 
 
 An Alpine Lake 75 
 
 In the Hammock 76 
 
 On a Fossil Shell 77 
 
 The First Decade 78 
 
 In the Soudan 80 
 
 Orion 82 
 
 Ponte St. Angelo 82 
 
 Round Lake 83 
 
 Thanksgiving— 1866 86 
 
 Keats' Grave 87 
 
 To Oliver Wendell Holmes 88 
 
 Ravenswood 88 
 
 My Inheritance 91 
 
 Christmas 93 
 
 In Peace 95 
 
 At Dawn 95 
 
 April Days 96 
 
 Some After-Supper Lines 97 
 
 At the Gate ,100 
 
 To John G. Whittier .101 
 
 Our Refuge 102 
 
CONTENTS. 3 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Enfranchised 103 
 
 Only Two Summers 104 
 
 Under the Willows 106 
 
 After the War 108 
 
 Day by Day Ill 
 
 The New Succession Ill 
 
 Trust 112 
 
 The New Year 113 
 
 King Midas 114 
 
 My Quest 117 
 
 A Battle Relic 118 
 
 The Herb Called Heart's-Ease 120 
 
 On the Hills 121 
 
 To H. W. Longfellow on His Birthday 122 
 
 " Watchman ! What of the Night? " 124 
 
 Passing the Light 126 
 
 For the Brave 126 
 
 For a Crystal Wedding 127 
 
 Decoration Day 130 
 
 A New Year's Greeting— To J. G. W 131 
 
 To a Dead Poet 132 
 
 Dickens in Westminster Abbey 133 
 
 Lines read on the Tenth Anniversary of St. John's Lit- 
 erary Association, Sept. 17, 1885 134 
 
 The Dying Year 145 
 
 Gladstone 146 
 
 To a Nonagenarian 146 
 
 For a Silver Wedding 147 
 
 Morning ., 148 
 
 Absence 149 
 
 A Summer Madrigal 150 
 
 The Age of Gold 151 
 
A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 THE BALLAD OF THE KING. 
 
 What dawns would light the world again, 
 
 What shadows flee away, 
 What angels walk once more with men 
 
 If only Love held sway ! 
 
 An olden story : — ponder well 
 
 This legend here re-told, 
 How love dissolved a wicked spell 
 
 In knightly days of old. 
 
 'Twas in the age of old renown — 
 Long since the years have flown. 
 
 But still their glory fading down 
 Regilds with light our own. 
 
 Then Arthur ruled with gentle sway 
 
 And woke the minstrel song. 
 And mail-clad men in grand array. 
 
 Went forth against the wrong. 
 
 No baffled cause might vainly plead 
 For aid in knightly ear, 
 
A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 For Arthur's self gave royal heed 
 To beauty's smile and tear. 
 
 'Twas while he bravely fought and well 
 
 For maid in castle wall, 
 That he, through dire enchantment's spell, 
 
 Became a lowly thrall. 
 
 Now in brave Arthur's fallen state 
 The king shone true and grand, 
 
 As when with his retainers late. 
 He rode through all the land. 
 
 The wizard marked his royal grace 
 And signed that they should bring 
 
 His lowly captive face to face 
 With him, the mighty king ! 
 
 " Vain man ! go forth beneath my spell 
 
 A twelvemonth and a day. 
 If then your wisdom answers well 
 
 My question — go your way. 
 
 "But if the tale is then untold 
 
 What women one and all, 
 Do more desire than fame, or gold. 
 
 Ye still shall be my thrall." 
 
 Then with the sun the king rode forth 
 And wandered east and west. 
 
 Through sunny south and frozen north 
 Upon his royal quest. 
 
 And while he roamed the summer passed, 
 And autumn tints of flame. 
 
THE BALLAD OF THE KING. 9 
 
 Burned low to ashen gray at last, 
 And still no answer came. 
 
 The winter fled and spring grew gay 
 
 With violets hidden long; 
 That bloomed beside his weary way, 
 
 And earth was glad with song. 
 
 All vainly seemed the quest to grow 
 
 Till once he drew his rein. 
 At sight of one so foul and low, 
 
 He spurned her with disdain. 
 
 *'0 captive king, whose blinded zeal 
 
 Doth spurn my low degree. 
 Perchance thy quest I may reveal. 
 
 Though foul I am to see." 
 
 " If this thou canst," — his heart was stirred — 
 
 While nearer still he came — 
 '• Then thou shalt have, I pledge my word. 
 
 Whatever ye may claim." 
 
 " Then swear me this : — Of those who throng 
 
 Your royal court so wide. 
 Some brave young knight, both fair and strong. 
 
 Shall wed me for his bride ! " 
 
 She took this pledge of matchless worth. 
 
 Then did her own fulfill : — 
 " What woman values more than earth 
 
 Is but her own sweet will ! " 
 
 Then light of heart King Arthur sought 
 Through cool, sweet forest shade. 
 
10 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The wizard's home, and answer brought 
 The loathsome hag had made. 
 
 And lo ! the spell so strong before 
 Could not the truth gainsay — 
 
 The charm was broken, and once more 
 The king went on his way. 
 
 Then straight unto his palace wall 
 
 He rode all free and grand, 
 No more enchantment's lowly thrall, 
 
 But ruler of the land ! 
 
 Now when for valliant knight and lord 
 
 A royal feast was laid, 
 The king rehearsed to all the board 
 
 The pledge which he had made. 
 
 And when he asked of all the band 
 Who forth the hag would bring, 
 
 And place upon her withered hand 
 The golden wedding-ring ? 
 
 Fair knights who fain would bravely dare 
 
 All foes in beauty's name. 
 All hung their heads in silence there 
 
 Beneath the flush of shame. 
 
 Now of King Arthur's royal band 
 Who drew the knightly rein 
 
 None truer was in all the land 
 Than fair and brave Gewain ! 
 
 The youngest knight was he of all, 
 And proudly flashed his eye, 
 
THE BALLAD OF THE KING. H 
 
 When to his sovereign's royal call 
 None older made reply. 
 
 " No royal pledge shall be denied ! 
 
 Bring forth the golden ring : — 
 The loathsome hag shall be my bride 
 
 For honor of the king ! " 
 
 And 'mid the summer's passing state 
 
 He clasped the withered hand, 
 Of her who in her mean estate 
 
 Was lowest of the land ! 
 
 And so the loathsome and the fair 
 
 Before the king were wed — 
 By knight and hag in solemn prayer 
 
 The marriage vows were said. 
 
 But 'ere the royal feast had rest, 
 
 From all the menial train, 
 Gewain had heard the whispered jest 
 
 That filled his heart with pain. 
 
 And when the festal hours were flown^— 
 
 The bridal chamber nigh, 
 So sad of heart the knight had grown 
 
 He only longed to die ! 
 
 But when he sought his rest at last 
 
 With weary sigli and moan. 
 Before his gaze such beauty passed 
 
 As he had never known ! 
 
 No more in hated hideousness * 
 
 Did she before him stand. 
 
12 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 But clothed in queeiiliest loveliness ! — 
 The beauty of the land ! 
 
 Then did the bride to him confess 
 
 The secret kept so well, 
 How all her hated loathsomeness 
 
 Was but the wizard's spell ! 
 
 And since the bridal-ring she wore 
 The charm was half o'er- thrown — 
 
 Now half the time that form she bore 
 And half the time her own ! 
 
 Now would he choose that she should wear 
 
 Her beauty's sweet array, 
 By night when none would know her fair 
 
 Or in the light of day ? 
 
 But when he thought a moment's space 
 
 Of bitter jest and scorn. 
 Her beauty in its matchless grace, 
 
 He fain would keep for morn ! 
 
 Then breathing love's divinest stress 
 
 She told in tender tone, 
 How all her fairest loveliness 
 
 Was but for him alone ! 
 
 Then with the grace that beauty lent 
 
 The tenderest heart to thrill. 
 The gentle knight gave love's consent 
 
 To beauty's own sweet will ! 
 
 And then the charm was wholli/fiown 
 By night and day as well, — 
 
CAPRI. 18 
 
 The love that made his will her own 
 Dissolved the wizard's spell. 
 
 Then henceforth queen of beauty grand 
 
 In Arthur's royal train, 
 None fairer lived in all the land 
 
 Than bride of brave Gewain ! — 
 
 And still whatever spell may harm, 
 
 What influence grasp and hold, 
 Love still retains the potent charm 
 
 It held in days of old ! 
 
 O rosy dawn, light up again 
 
 The glad unclouded day, 
 When angels here shall walk with men 
 
 And only Love hold sway ! 
 
 CAPRI. 
 
 BLOOD-EED jaspcr from the haunted bay 
 Whose blue waves fondled thee, 
 
 1 marvel that thou wearest not to-day 
 The azure of the sea. 
 
 Hast thou no dream within thy warm heart kept 
 
 Of tender skies bent low ? 
 Of waves that sang while white foam softly crept 
 
 To touch thy lips with snow ? 
 
 I gaze on thee ; dream-like my eyelids close 
 
 While far sweet glories smile ; 
 No more I see the drifted winter snows, 
 
 But Capri's wave-beat isle. 
 
14 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The splintered crown of some lone mountain range 
 
 Uplifted bold and free, 
 With dizzy crags of beauty wild and strange 
 
 That hang above the sea, 
 
 Alone she stands, arrayed in purple hue 
 
 And fringed with foam and spray. 
 Her rifted slopes still mirrored in the blue, 
 
 And sphered by sky and bay. 
 
 Again her paths are trod by eager feet 
 
 Slow toiling from below. 
 And from her groves of lemon, cool and sweet 
 
 The airs of summer blow. 
 
 From time-worn crags that watch the beaten shore, 
 
 And landward look and lean, 
 St. Elmo's towers, above the azure floor. 
 
 And Ischia's heights are seen. 
 
 And like the incense of an offered prayer 
 
 Or smoke of sacrifice, 
 The dread volcano's white breath climbs the air 
 
 And mounts the summer skies. 
 
 A dreamy sound of voices from below 
 
 Floats up along the breeze, 
 And like the sea-birds ever come and go 
 
 The ships from Indian seas. 
 
 I seem to hear the lisp of dreaming palms 
 
 From lone Sahara's rim, 
 As south winds bring between the pulseless calms 
 
 The desert's wandering hymn. 
 
BURNS' BIRTHDAY. 
 
 All sounds and voices and the mellow light 
 
 Of that far sunny land, 
 Fade out at last before the stormy night 
 
 That beats our Northern strand. 
 
 O blood-red jasper ! warm with sunset glow 
 Caught from the wave and sky, 
 
 Thou boldest still above the frost and snow 
 The dreams that never die. 
 
 BURNS' BIRTHDAY. 
 
 O ROYAL-HEARTED Robert Burns, 
 
 So tender, true and strong ! 
 We crown again his natal day 
 
 With rustic wreath of song. 
 
 In every land, or near or far, 
 
 His gentle name is known ; 
 His songs far sweeping round the world 
 
 On wings of fame have flown. 
 
 Through all the dim-aisled century 
 
 His living numbers swell, 
 For well the poet wrought his charm 
 
 And wove his magic spell. 
 
 To-day his words are sweeter still 
 On music's trembling tongue, 
 
 And all the world is greener far 
 Since he has lived and sung. 
 
 While on his hills the gray light dawns, 
 The songful day returns, 
 
16 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 We tread again the bonnie land 
 So loved by Robert Burns ! 
 
 What charm lies on her purple heights, 
 
 And on her mea<lows fair, 
 As in a dream we wander forth 
 
 A sweet June day in Ayr. 
 
 The flowing waters through the town 
 
 The gray old arches lave, 
 And Wallace's tower stands stai-k and still 
 
 To hear the Twa Brigs rave. 
 
 There stands O'Shanter's cozy inn 
 
 A refuge from the storm, 
 Where Tarn so gloriously forgot 
 
 The wrath at home so warm ! 
 
 'Mid meadow lands of clover bloom 
 
 And clumps of snowy thorn, 
 Beneath the lowly thatch we stand 
 
 Where baby Burns was born ! 
 
 Glad bird-songs with the sunshine come 
 
 To cheer the dusky gloom, 
 As though the old sweet lullaby 
 
 Yet lingered in the room. 
 
 Beyond is auld Kirk Alloway, 
 
 All roofless save the sky. 
 Where witch -fires lighted up the dark 
 
 As Tarn rode reeling by. 
 
 Ah, how the warlock revel rang, 
 And how the windows glowed, 
 
BUBNS' BIBTHBAY. 17 
 
 Tam by all the clan pursued 
 Went thundering down the road! 
 
 Oh, what a goblin ride was that, 
 
 To make the stoutest quail, 
 In sooth it saved the man his life, 
 
 But cost gray Meg her tail ! 
 
 The Auld Brig clasps the banks of Doon, 
 
 The river slides away, 
 The hoof-beats of that hurried flight 
 
 Will ring and sound for aye. 
 
 The bonnie braes of Doon are glad 
 Through winding curves and turns, 
 
 And birds rejieat by burn and mere 
 The name of Robin Burns ! 
 
 No daisies bloom beside the way. 
 
 Nor star with pearl and gold 
 The broad green belt of meadow-lands, 
 
 But still his memory hold. 
 
 His birthday 'mid the Scottish hills 
 
 Is glad with love and song, 
 For dear they hold his precious name, 
 
 And burning hate of wrong : 
 
 For high above the shams of rank, 
 
 Or accident of birth. 
 He set the royalty of man 
 
 And loved him for his worth. 
 
 So comes the poet's natal day 
 With joy and gladness in : — 
 
18 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 For him the pure sweet charity 
 Which covers every sin. 
 
 Be just : speak not of wasted years, 
 But let his virtues shine ; — 
 
 Above his weak humanity 
 Was faith in the Divine ! 
 
 THE COMET. 
 
 Fak alone through the chartless seas she came, 
 
 Where never a sail was unfurled, 
 Till she shook the reefs from her folded flame 
 
 For a cruise by many a world ! 
 
 Through the measureless years, her red lights 
 shone 
 
 On the nebulous whirlpool spray — 
 On the trackless surf of the stars far blown 
 
 And the foam of the milky-way ! 
 
 And the drifting worlds caught her flaming light 
 
 And her banner above unrolled, 
 As she plowed her way with a tireless might 
 
 Round the cape of the sun's red gold. 
 
 How grandly she swept ! — how her head-lights 
 burned ! 
 
 At the sunward dip of her spars. 
 With the joy of the outward-bound she turn 
 
 Flag-ship of the fleet of the stars ! 
 
 Speed ever and on, O craft of the skies ! 
 Afar through the infinite spheres, 
 
EVENTIDE. 19 
 
 Past the utmost seas where the world-waves 
 rise, 
 On thy cru?se of the untold years, 
 
 EVENTIDE. 
 
 The ghostly heat of summer noon is laid, 
 The pallid fever of his reign is spent ; 
 
 A world-wide blessing woven of the shade, 
 Cool evening lifts the star-folds of her tent. 
 
 A subtle hint of balm is in the air : 
 
 The breath of flowers in dream-enfolded sleep 
 Floats like the incense of a lifted prayer, 
 
 While insect murmurs rhythmic measure, keep. 
 
 The valley's dusk in dewy silence lies. 
 
 For labor's song and weary tumult cease ; 
 
 The stars in quiet hold the summer skies, 
 
 And evening wears her perfect crown of peace. 
 
 THREESCORE. 
 
 The white day comes again, dear wife, 
 
 In beauty's flush and glow, 
 As first upon our wedded life 
 
 It dawned so long ago : — 
 That golden morn whose sweet light lay 
 
 On plighted hearts and hands, 
 Far kindling into rosy day 
 
 The yet untrodden lands. 
 
 Though fair the beckoning years before 
 To love-lit vision seemed, 
 
20 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 How well we know their golden store 
 
 Was vaster than we dreamed ; 
 For through the vanished summer, flown 
 
 Our footsteps all the while 
 Have bloomed with joys which love has grown 
 
 Beneath her patient smile. 
 
 With backward look we pass to-day, 
 
 Two pilgrims further bound, 
 Another mile-stone on lifes way 
 
 With autumn roses crowned. 
 And viewing all the past again, 
 
 Its hoarded wealth untold, 
 We know the years that yet remain 
 
 Hold love's uncounted gold. 
 
 Beyond us rise the height sublime, 
 
 And nearer, hill on hill, 
 The rosy smile of morning-time, 
 
 In vision lingers still. 
 While speed the swiftly changing scenes 
 
 Across our pilgrim way, 
 Still o'er our path a glory leans 
 
 That gladdens every day. 
 
 So tread we on with patient feet 
 
 The winding pathway through. 
 While two hearts hold for aye complete. 
 
 The old love always new. 
 Though summer-time may lose its crown 
 
 The dry leaves lisp and fall, 
 Across the slope we journey down, 
 
 And love is all in all. 
 
A MORNING SONG, 21 
 
 A MORNING SONG. 
 
 O FAIR and sweet is the summer morn — 
 A queen in her beauty crowned — 
 
 A mist-wreath over her shoulders flung 
 With pearls and diamonds bound. 
 
 So softly over the hills she came, 
 
 As still as the roses blow, 
 The valleys asleep heard not her step, 
 
 But woke at her smile aglow. 
 
 Her presence wore such a queenly grace 
 That the shadows gave her room. 
 
 She sweetened the air with dewy breath, 
 And kissed the flowers a-bloom. 
 
 So the clover-heads, and the buttercups, 
 And the daisies' white-rayed gold, 
 
 With the royal lilies sweet and tall 
 Her treasure and blessing hold. 
 
 The meadows swept by her garments' hem 
 
 Are beaded with gems of dew, 
 And the maple leaves for joy of her 
 
 Are tremulous through and through. 
 
 O brooding peace of the morning, stay ! 
 
 Nor swift as her presence fly. 
 Sing aye, my heart, as the wild birds sing, 
 
 While the sweet morn passes by. 
 
22 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 POSSESSION". 
 
 On wildwood slopes where April lays 
 
 Her wooing touch so tender, 
 To break the sleep of winter days 
 
 And waken starry splendor, 
 The Mayflower hides her modest worth 
 
 From gaze of carious seeing. 
 But still betrays her blissful birth 
 
 By odorous joy of being. 
 
 Deep in the dusk of tangled dells, 
 
 Else full of gloom and sadness, 
 The thrush's song of beauty swells 
 
 In sweet unmeasured gladness : 
 No ear may note the tender strain 
 
 The songful heart is giving. 
 Still on it flows in sweet refrain — 
 
 The very bliss of living. 
 
 The starriest splendor shuns the day 
 
 Nor wears its crown unbidden, — 
 The rarest beauty hides away. 
 
 The sweetest songs are hidden : — 
 The poet's brow may wear the bays, 
 
 His name be ever ringing, 
 But still above the sweetest praise 
 
 He holds the joy of singing. 
 
 CASTLE AVINDOWS. 
 
 Fkom my spacious castle windows — 
 Airy castles of the brain — 
 
 I have looked abroad and listened, 
 Heard the bugle's mellow strain. 
 
CASTLE WINDOWS, 23 
 
 Seen the pngeant's passing splendor 
 
 With its glories manifold, 
 Seen the cloud-built towers illumined 
 
 With the dying sunset's gold, 
 And the dawn's far-reaching banners 
 
 From their pinnacles unrolled. 
 
 Full before the open casement 
 
 Fairest visions sweep and throng, 
 While the castle arches tremble 
 
 With the melody of song. 
 Gleams of eastern lands of story. 
 
 Fairy realms of old renown. 
 Crumbling w^alls whose faded glory 
 
 Wears the ivy's leafy crown. 
 While above the Neckar valley 
 
 Far and wide the ruins frown. 
 
 Tower and bastion rise below me, 
 
 On the mountain slope I stand, 
 And the vision waits before me 
 
 Of the glorious Fatherland. 
 From the forest wilds of Odin 
 
 Sweeps the river to the plain, 
 Where the castled Rhine rolls onward 
 
 To the breakers of the main, 
 And the meadow-lands are golden 
 
 With the largess of the rains. 
 
 Where the vineyard slopes are purple 
 
 With the vintage of the year, 
 iiinojs the mellow voice of labor 
 
 And the harvest songs of cheer : 
 Down the mountains paths I wander 
 
 To the ruins old and brown, 
 
24 A SKEAF OF POEMS, 
 
 Where the riven towers uplifted 
 Watcli above the quaint old town; 
 
 By the storied river dreaming, 
 With the castle for its crown. 
 
 Over castle, hill and mountain, 
 
 Still the autumn sunsets burn. 
 And the olden days long vanished 
 
 From the dusky past return : 
 Still the airy windows kindle 
 
 With a changeful glow and gleam, 
 Like the hues of fairy splendor 
 
 From the jewel's prisoned beam ; 
 And the vision passes onward 
 
 Like the glory of a dream. 
 
 BEYOND. 
 
 Where stays the year which waits to bring 
 
 Our long and last repose, 
 Whose golden gates shall open swing 
 
 For us, but never close ? 
 
 What fair, sweet month of all the year 
 
 Shall pillow on her breast 
 Our weariness, and drop her tear 
 
 Above our dreamless rest ? 
 
 When will the day so far and wide 
 
 In dawn's fair beauty bloom. 
 Whose flowers will stand for us aside 
 
 And yield a little room ? 
 
 Just where the final mile-stone stands, 
 Or where the meadows end. 
 
OUTWARD BOUND. 25 
 
 Whose fringes touch tlfe unknown lands, 
 And with the twilight blend, 
 
 Our blindness cannot see, or know, 
 
 Amid the dim earth-shine, 
 Yet Heaven's immortal lilies blow 
 
 But just across the line. 
 
 And sometime on that border land, 
 
 Beyond the last, long mile. 
 We'll clasp again the yanished hand 
 
 And greet the olden smile. 
 
 OUTWARD BOUND. 
 
 Out of the misty blue of the West 
 We sweep with our sails unfurled, 
 
 Out of the West and into the East, 
 Away with the rolling world. 
 
 Across the heaving disc of the sea, 
 
 Enzoned with a ring of mist. 
 Our reeling track is white with t'he foam 
 
 And fringed with the amethyst. 
 
 Above the horizon's glowing rim 
 
 Dawn's fiery splendor crawls, 
 And the mid-day sun rolls down the steep. 
 
 And into the ocean falls. 
 
 Across the sweei^ of the star-hung blue 
 
 The Zodiac's monsters shine, 
 And gloss themselves in the starry wave, 
 
 Then drop in the azure brine. 
 
26 * -^1 SIIEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Afar through the gray and ghostly mist — 
 
 The pallid and boding gloom 
 Whose fringes are torn by tempest wings 
 
 And the fog-horn's dismal boom — 
 
 Away and away, our foaming track 
 Reels ever from strand to strand, 
 
 Till the crags of the Old World lifted high 
 With a welcome, give us land ! 
 
 ON THE HEIGHTS. 
 
 Where dizzy ledges cleave the upper blue 
 
 And stunted balsams grow, 
 I breathe the freedom of the hills anew 
 
 And pause to look below. 
 
 So far beneath the winding valley lies, 
 
 No sound from thence can come 
 To scale the crags uplifted to the skies — 
 
 All life below is dumb. 
 
 Around the space wherein the valley winds. 
 
 As if to guard and bless, 
 Throng crowded leagues of ever-murmuring pines, 
 
 A swarthy wilderness. 
 
 Across the meadows drift the shadows fleet, 
 
 From island mists air-blown, 
 Whose trailing fringes are beneath my feet 
 
 Upon this mountain throne. 
 
 Beyond the hills, across the wooded land, 
 The storm-winged legions go ; 
 
ALPINE ECHOES 27 
 
 The sunsliine falls around me where I stand 
 The thunder rolls below. 
 
 And pausing here upon the heights sublime 
 
 To rest on beds of fern, 
 Afar I see from crags of eldest time 
 
 The clouds all golden burn. 
 
 Beneath me moans the tempest's angry pain ; 
 
 While livid lightnings play, 
 His stormy passion crumbles into rain. 
 
 And weeps itself away. 
 
 Upon the heights where peace and sunshine sleep, 
 
 And heaven is always blue. 
 Dwell thou, O pilgrim, and forever kee 
 
 Life's sunward side in view. 
 
 ALPINE ECHOES. 
 
 Fair valley stream, so glad with mellow song, 
 Vnd low, sweet laughter's gurgling melody. 
 
 Whose crystal feet are tripping toward the s 
 Thy voice I hear as when the idle throng 
 Of golden days in fair procession long 
 
 Hung tranced above thy beauty's dimpled grace, 
 
 And white and cool across the far blue space 
 The snowy cones were lifted clear and strong ! 
 And far above the tinkling bells I hear 
 
 From snow-fringed j^astures, green with sum- 
 mer's crown, 
 And mountain songs are ringing sweet and clear 
 
 From lifted slopes of sunshine drifting down. — 
 O far-off voices of the vanished days. 
 Whose echoes linger and whose sweetness stays ! 
 
28 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 A WORD FOR SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 When hawthorn hedges, foaming white, 
 Were sweet with mimic snowing, 
 
 He first beheld the April light 
 And heard the Avon flowing. 
 
 Like other children, then as now, 
 The olden summers found him, 
 
 He laughed and cried and knit his brow, 
 And ruled the world around him ! 
 
 Still was he wiser than they knew — 
 This child, the straw-thatch under, 
 
 Whose song three hundred years ago 
 Yet makes the wide world wonder ! 
 
 A child, from croon of cradle hymn 
 Above him in his slumbers, — 
 
 A youth, along the Avon's rim 
 He caught his tuneful numbers. 
 
 Full poet-souled the shy boy grew 
 To manhood's ripe completeness ; 
 
 What Nature taught he quickly knew — 
 Her wondrous lore and sweetness. 
 
 The years so fraught with weary toil 
 Were gladdened by his singing, 
 
 For well he heard through life's turmoil 
 Serenest music ringing : 
 
 As everywhere the world-wide throng 
 To-day who know and love him, 
 
A WOitB FOR SHAKESPEARE. 29 
 
 Throusjh his can henr the lark's sweet sons:. 
 That soared and sang above him. 
 
 Where'er he turned his eager feet, 
 
 Her smile o'er him was leaning, 
 He felt the heart of Nature beat. 
 
 And learned its hidden meaning. 
 
 What golden wealth from her he brought — 
 
 Her heir by this sweet token — 
 A power to clothe the hidden thought 
 
 That else had been unspoken. 
 
 What marvel that the race to-day 
 
 Toward him is fondly turning, 
 Who gave its hope a tongue for aye 
 
 To tell its deathless yearning? 
 
 All changing moods of being's state, 
 
 Life's sad or sunny fancies. 
 The smile of love, the scowl of hate. 
 
 Affection's sweet romances. 
 
 He holds embalmed in wondrous art — 
 
 A lore beyond the sages — 
 The wildest passions of the heart, 
 
 The tenderest love-lit pages. 
 
 Grand builder in the realm of thought ! 
 
 Through his wide-swinging portals, 
 Behold the fane his fancy wrought, 
 
 And peopled with immortals ! 
 
 The king of bards he stands revealed, 
 By very grace of giving, — 
 
30 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 "What hidden founts hath he unsealed, 
 And poured for all the living ! 
 
 His fame and song ring evermore 
 Above the centuries' thunders ; — 
 
 Though dead three hundred years and more, 
 Yet still the wide world wonders ! 
 
 ANNIVERSARY. 
 
 Dear wife, behold our wedding day ! 
 
 How swift the years have flown — 
 A score of summers ebbed away 
 
 Since you became my own ! 
 
 This glad sweet morn of summer's prime, 
 Whose dawn but just appears, 
 
 Fills up and rounds the measured time 
 Of twenty wedded years ! 
 
 What fairer dawns of splender rare 
 
 Have set our hills aglow. 
 Far grander than the vision fair 
 
 Of twenty years ago ! 
 
 And life yet wears the perfect crown 
 
 That never groweth old ; — 
 Love faileth not but ripens down 
 
 With autumn's ruddy gold. 
 
 And now, dear wife, while sunset gleams 
 
 Across our valleys play. 
 The choice of boyhood's glowing dreams 
 
 Is manhood's choice to-day ! 
 
QUE BABY. 31 
 
 OUR BABY. 
 
 Have you seen our baby ? 
 
 Wait a moment — stay, 
 Here she is — our treasure, 
 
 Two months old to-day ! 
 
 Have you seen her equal 
 
 Ever ? — anywhere ? 
 Note her blue eyes tender, 
 
 And her silken hair ! 
 
 See her soft cheeks dimpled 
 
 By the smiles that play — 
 Cheeks like tinted blossoms 
 
 Of the peach in May. 
 
 Lips like berries ripened 
 
 In the summer days, 
 This is sober earnest — 
 
 Can I oyer-praise? 
 
 See her fingers clasping, 
 
 See her hands outreach, 
 Hear the cooing music 
 
 Of her baby speech. 
 
 With the next sweet summer 
 When she comes to words. 
 
 Won't she rival fairly 
 All the sinofiuG: birds ? 
 
 o 
 
 When she came she brought us 
 Bliss without alloy — 
 
32 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Mother's blessed darling, 
 Father's perfect joy. 
 
 Fairest petalled blossom 
 On life's spreading tree, — 
 
 Little Princess Royal, 
 Queen of hearts is she ! 
 
 None-such she is truly. 
 Doubt it if you can. 
 Could a world of treasure 
 Buy our Baby Fan ? 
 
 Have you got a baby ? 
 
 Nay ? — It's very sad ! 
 Honestly and truly 
 
 Don't you wish you had ? 
 
 AN AUTUMN IDYL. 
 
 The autumn sunset burning low 
 Floods all the silent air, 
 
 The frosted maples wear a glow 
 Like saintly nuns at prayer. 
 
 Upon the uplands growing brown 
 Flames yet the golden-rod. 
 
 And silently the thistle-down 
 Is sowing all the sod. 
 
 The forest robes upon the hills 
 The breezes lift and blow, 
 
 Baring the beauty of the rills. 
 White-breasted as the snow. 
 
BUINS. 33 
 
 Across the lands all richly dight 
 
 A royal pageant strays, 
 With crimson banners bathed in light, 
 
 And russet gold ablaze. 
 
 With queenly grace the year goes down 
 
 The sunset slopes the while, 
 Upon her head October's crown 
 
 And on her face a smile. 
 
 RUINS. 
 
 By the woods and meadow-lands 
 Still the leaning ruin stands ; 
 Old and mossy, stained and gray, 
 Slowly crumbling to decay. 
 Rank weeds round the hearth-stone grow, 
 Where the red coals used to glow 
 In the winters long ago. 
 Through rent roof and rifted walls 
 Blue sky gleams and sunshine falls, 
 Autumn's rain and winter's snow 
 And birds of summer come and go : 
 Come, and on the rafters brown. 
 Under broad eaves sloping down, 
 In the braces, on the stays, 
 In the chimney's crooked ways 
 Build their nests and linger long 
 Till the blue eggs turn to song. 
 And the gables out of reach 
 Are musical with tender speech. 
 3 
 
34 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 II, 
 
 Thus we find it filled with song 
 After years of absence long, 
 And the notes of many birds 
 Seem the echoes of the words 
 Childhood's voices sweet and low 
 Uttered in the long ago. 
 How the vanished past appears 
 Through the mist of faded years! 
 Musing 'mid these dreamy sounds 
 Glimpse we vales whose sacred grounds 
 We shall never, soon nor late, 
 Tread again, nor pass the gate. 
 Though the doors swing open wide 
 Only outward footsteps glide : — 
 Dreaming only may we stand 
 Within the gates of childhood's land. 
 
 III. 
 
 Backward through the golden haze 
 Look we on the olden days. 
 Fair the sunshine trembled through 
 The freshness of the morning dew — 
 Morn that broadened all too soon 
 Into fervid heats of noon. 
 Never bluer skies outspread 
 Tent-like over childish head ; — 
 Never wild birds sang more sweet — 
 
 Potent charm to stay our feet — 
 Wildwood blossoms swinging wide 
 Seemed to beckon us aside : 
 Song of bird or nod of flower 
 Gave us many a truant hour, 
 
uuiJSfS. 35 
 
 When through shadows sweet and cool 
 We took the wood-path way to school. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Many, many years have fled, — 
 
 Some are living, many dead 
 
 Who within the pine's thick shade 
 
 In the golden summers played. 
 
 From the hillside sloping down, 
 
 Where the greenwood waved its crown, 
 
 And the shadows of the pines 
 
 Formed and marched in spectral lines, 
 
 Tramping with their silent feet 
 
 Out through clover blossoms sweet, — 
 
 Waving dusky hands of gloom 
 
 Through the meadow's fringe of bloom, — 
 
 All have vanished, all have flown 
 
 Save where one tree makes its moan 
 
 And the ruin stands alone. 
 
 V. 
 
 When the wide-mouthed chimney high, 
 
 Upward staring at the sky. 
 
 Holds no more the mellow note 
 
 Of nested swallows in its throat, — 
 
 When the memory-haunted wall, 
 
 Roof and rafter lean and fall, 
 
 And the passing years efface 
 
 Every vestige of its place. 
 
 We shall feel with throbs of pain 
 
 Something lost beyond regain. 
 
36 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 ANOTHER YEAR. 
 
 Another year, and still another year, 
 
 And yet no fruit is found ; 
 The bloom has faded and the leaves are sere, 
 
 Why cumbereth it the ground ? 
 
 The dews of heaven distil upon it there — 
 
 Of sun and rain no lack ; 
 It takes all bounty from the earth and air 
 
 And renders nothing back. 
 
 No golden fruit — a richly measured meed 
 Of praise for bounties strown : — 
 
 A feeble type of our ungrateful greed 
 The fig-tree stands alone. 
 
 Another year of sleepless eare may bring 
 
 The long delayed return. 
 And birds of praise may in the branches sing, 
 
 And ripe fruits hang and burn. 
 
 Another year, dear Lord, another year 
 
 Spare thou as in the past, — 
 The later blooms may hang mid leaves all sere 
 
 Some golden fruit at last. 
 
 CONSIDER THE LILIES. 
 
 Out of the dust the lilies spring, 
 
 Up from the blackest mould. 
 Touched by the sunbeam's flaming wing 
 
 They stand in pearl and gold. 
 
 Never a king on his gilded throne 
 Arrayed in jewels rare. 
 
IN CAMP. 37 
 
 With half ihe prhicely glory shone 
 The royal lilies wear. 
 
 Out of the dust their beauty gleams 
 
 Only a summer's day, 
 Mocking the pride of human dreams 
 
 With royalest array : 
 
 N'or toil, nor spin for robes they wear, — 
 
 Under His hand they grow, 
 Beyond all beauty of compare 
 
 And only bloom and blow. 
 
 Why take ye thought : — the Master's word — ^ 
 
 For robes that fade and fall ? 
 Alike he cares for flower and bird. 
 
 Are ye not more than all ? 
 
 More than the lilies' royal worth, 
 
 More than her robes of gold. 
 The endless years of another birth 
 
 After our dream is told. 
 
 Out of the dust and of the dust, 
 
 Akin to the soulless clod. 
 We climb by the rounds of faith and trust 
 
 To the endless life of God ! 
 
 m CAMP. 
 
 A hunter's camp by forest lake 
 
 With many a range around. 
 Of fir-fringed slopes and purple peaks, — 
 
 A wild enchanted ground. 
 
38 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 High over all the twilight heaven, 
 
 Below the waves at rest, 
 The green gems of the wooded isles 
 
 Asleep on beauty's breast. 
 
 The blue smoke of the camp-fire curls 
 In waved and twisted lines, 
 
 Across the trembling aspen leaves, 
 Among the whispering pines. 
 
 Sweet nature's hush is in the air. 
 
 And on the water lies, 
 Whose crystal deeps give back the blush 
 
 Of evening's tender skies. 
 
 White mists are floating on the hills ; 
 
 Across the silent air 
 Broad arms are spread in blessing forth 
 
 To make the scene more fair. 
 
 Against the blue-walled firmament 
 
 The curved and airy bars 
 Of vapor gleam like sabre blades 
 
 With jewelled hilts of stars. 
 
 In ashen white the camp-fire veils 
 
 Its faint and pallid gleams, 
 Wliile on the odorous balsam boughs 
 
 We pass to quiet dreams. 
 
 Till touched by midnight's magic spell, 
 From starriest dreams we wake, 
 
 To see the soft light on the hills. 
 The white mist on the lake 
 
DECEMBER. 39 
 
 Fold silently pale spectral arms 
 
 Across its jewelled breast — 
 The naiad of the waters set 
 
 To guard its starry rest. 
 
 And thus while on the barren hills 
 
 The drifted snows are piled 
 By winter gales exultingly, 
 
 With voices fierce and wild, 
 
 The summer camp in wildwood glades, 
 
 The forest's shaded ways, 
 Pass in review and charm again 
 
 As in the golden days. 
 
 Hang ever thus, O forest scenes, 
 
 Amid the starry throng 
 Of hours that mock the fairest dreams, 
 
 That shame the sweetest song. 
 
 DECEMBER. 
 
 O MONTH of song and wail ! 
 
 O month of mirth and cheer ! 
 With voice of storm and gale 
 
 Sing out the waning year. 
 
 Sing to the woodlands bare, 
 Sing to the hillsides brown. 
 
 Drop from the misty air 
 Thy snowy mantle down. 
 
 Hang where the wood-slope grieves 
 For robes of summer lost, 
 
40 A SHEAF OF POEMS, 
 
 Pearls for the faded leaves, 
 And beaded stars of frost. 
 
 O lull with frost and frown 
 The streamlets' noisy flow, 
 
 To mellow chime from fairy town, 
 Under the drifted snow. 
 
 Weave thou for waiting lands 
 Rare robes wdth ermine frills. 
 
 And fold them with thy jeweled hands 
 Around the shivering hills. 
 
 Breathe with thy frosty breath. 
 And paint on window-pane. 
 
 Mosses and ferns and heath. 
 And lilies wet with rain, 
 
 Grasses and leaves and sprays. 
 Forests and fanes and spires, 
 
 And mountain peaks ablaze 
 With light of opal fires. 
 
 And thus, O month of storms ! 
 
 Give for the flowers that blow, 
 Old winter's mythic forms 
 
 Of bloom in frost and snow. 
 
 TO J. E. 
 
 weary friend ! to whom has come at last 
 The blissful rest, the calm and perfect peace, 
 And full fruition after toils release, — 
 
 1 give thee joy for all the victories past! 
 
AN ANCESTRAL QBE. 41 
 
 This wreath of song upon thy grave I cast : 
 Could thy fond ear but catch the simple strain, 
 Then wouldst thou know how through all grief 
 and pain 
 
 Love lingers yet, while tears fall thick and fast. 
 Through fitful starlight crossed with banded gloom 
 
 To dawn's white splendor have thy feet attained ; — 
 The hills whereon immortal lilies bloom 
 
 Are thine, aye, — the goal forever gained ! 
 
 And so we part, till from the star-lit skies 
 
 On us who wait the unclouded dawn shall rise ; 
 
 1881. 
 
 AN ANCESTRAL ODE. 
 
 Why toil in rhyme? Dull, common j^rose 
 Could never half my thought disclose ; 
 And e'en the stately tread of rhyme 
 Perchance may fail the theme sublime. 
 Yet Atlas, toiling 'neath his load 
 Along the hot and dusty road, 
 With brawny shoulders bent and bare 
 Beneath his ponderous world of care, 
 Miojht smooth his wrinkled brow and smile 
 To trade his pack for mine awhile. 
 
 Shall I essay the utmost rim 
 Where distant suns burn pale and dim ; 
 Or seek the hidden cause to know 
 Which makes our burning sunsets glow 
 With crimson splendor soft and clear 
 Through earth's transfigured atmosphere ? 
 Nay, but I leap the mighty chasm 
 
42 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Beyond tbe reach of protoplasm, 
 And sail, and sail, the shoreless sea 
 Of matter's mighty protency ! 
 Ah ! theme sublime ! who shall aspire 
 To any bolder flight, or higher ? 
 
 Since longing will supply the wing 
 And teach the humble bat to sing, 
 Then why may we not mount and fly 
 As song-birds through the summer sky ? 
 How frail the walls which hold us in 
 Since we are all one kith and kin 
 With earth's wide fauna ! What a dream !- 
 Surpassing strange this wondrous theme ! 
 
 How passing sweet to linger here, — 
 
 To trace our growth from sphere to sphere, 
 
 To that far mystic time and age — 
 
 The morning of our pilgrimage, 
 
 As evolution strangely tells. 
 
 When we were mollusks in our shells ! 
 
 Doubt not : the crisp, sweet oyster pie 
 
 Is luscious by a kindred tie ! 
 
 But ages ere the bivalve grew 
 What vast development he knew! 
 From primal matter's potent strife 
 Dead atoms took the cue of life, 
 Because they must, and might, and should, 
 And could'nt help it if they would ! 
 And then the molecules by dozens — 
 Our ancient, dear ancestral cousins — 
 Swarmed out like bees from summer hive 
 And made the universe alive ! — 
 
AK ANCESTRAL ODE. 43 
 
 So Darwiu says, though some still scout it, 
 But Huxley '11 tell you all about it. 
 
 Was it, in sooth, a silly whim 
 In hoary aeons old and dim. 
 That discontented bivalves yearned 
 Till they to wriggling tadpoles turned ? 
 Not so ; progressions never fail — 
 Each bivalve gained thereby a tail ! 
 And wrestling with a dumb desire. 
 He still aspired to something higher, 
 Till changed again, as we may see, 
 At last a leaping frog was he. 
 Rejoicing in his liberty! 
 
 And now what hasty strides he made ! 
 Development, so long delayed. 
 Moved on apace, as well it should. 
 From kangaroo to monkeyhood : 
 Orang-outang and chimpanzee 
 Are in his line of ancestry ; 
 Till from progression's mighty span 
 Emerged the stately creature — man ! 
 All hail, illustrious pedigree ! 
 We bow and own our ancestry ! 
 What upright forms of graceful shape 
 Developed from the grinning ape ! 
 What brain and brawn, a priceless boon. 
 Transmitted from the sage baboon ! 
 Where lives the man whose very spine. 
 At thought of his ancestral line. 
 Has not been thrilled with filial pride 
 Till he for very joy has cried ? 
 
44 A SHEAF OF POEMS, 
 
 If sucli there be, go mark him well, 
 For him no minstrel measures swell " 
 From blithsome fen, or reedy pool, 
 Where kindred hold their singing-school. 
 Their alto, bass and baritone 
 No witching spell o'er him have thrown ; 
 He hears no song from shore to shore, 
 And so he bars and bolts his door, 
 Forgetful of the starry shine 
 That crowns his long ancestral line ! 
 
 ON A FIR CONE FROM BAYARD 
 TAYLOR'S GRAVE. 
 
 TO J. G. W. 
 
 When last the autumn's changeful glory gave 
 To field and woodland all its splendor rare, 
 While dreamful beauty melted through the air, 
 
 This fragrant cone dropped on the j^oet's grave. 
 
 And now while storms of winter wildly rave, 
 I hear again the rhythm sweet and strong 
 That trembled through the fir-tree's solemn song 
 
 As in its shade I saw its branches wave. 
 
 And still it sings of weary journeys done. 
 
 Of northern pines and drooping tropic palms. 
 
 Of desert sands and snowy summits won. 
 
 Of mingled storms and sunshine and of calms. 
 
 And welcome home ! — a lullaby that thrills 
 
 The listening silence of his native hills ! 
 
AN INDIAN SUMMER. 45 
 
 INDIAN SUMMER. 
 
 When spring-time sun and tender rain 
 
 Had set the buds aflame, 
 The royal gates swung wide again 
 
 And queenly Summer came. 
 
 Fair maiden queen of all the year — 
 
 God's beauty in the land, 
 We greeted her with smile and cheer, 
 
 We clasped her jewelled hand. 
 
 Through quiet haunts and dreamy dells 
 We went where wood-birds build, 
 
 In meadow vales, on upland swells, 
 Where sweetest songs are trilled. 
 
 In queenly ways of loveliness, 
 
 'Mid all things fair and sweet, 
 And fondly did the glad earth press 
 
 Her flower-ensandaled feet. 
 
 Through golden days we wandered wide — 
 
 She led through sun and shade, 
 And all the land seemed glorified 
 
 Where'er her footsteps strayed. 
 
 Where wild-birds sansj on wooded heis^hts 
 
 And laughed the mountain rills, 
 The beauty of her crowning lights 
 
 Touched all the leaning hills. 
 
 Yet strangely while her praises rang, 
 Sweet bride of every clime. 
 
46 ^ SHEAF OF POFMS. 
 
 Her heart was touched with secret pang- 
 The pain of parting time. 
 
 So on the sunward slopes awhile 
 She paused and vvaved her hand, 
 
 And going; left her parting smile 
 Upon the autumn land. 
 
 AN OLD STORY RETOLD. 
 
 Well sang the bard in verse sublimely true 
 That " distance lends enchantment to the view ; " 
 He might have added in the self-same tone 
 That she had never yet returned the loan ! 
 So by this spell through hazy years remote 
 She hides the glories of a ragged coat, 
 And shows to us through leagues of crystal air, 
 Some howling waste, as Eden, sweet and fair ! 
 
 But when she takes some bit of common clay 
 AVith spirit rife and full of passion's play, 
 And bids us look through purple reaches dim 
 To see the glories conjured by her whim 
 About this mortal so exalted grown. 
 Whose stature now so far exceeds our own, — 
 Just wipe your glasses — shade your dazzled eyes— 
 The second look may check your first surprise ! 
 
 Reflect a moment : throuorh the endless ransje 
 Of years and ages, most things seem to change ; 
 While star and sphere are through the spaces 
 
 whirled, 
 And throb of earthquake trembles round the world, — 
 Tides, seasons, mountains, and the sea that binds 
 
AN OLD STOBY RETOLD. 47 
 
 Are shifting alvvnys ns the cliangeful winds, 
 One thinq; is chanojeless — on this rollinoj ball 
 Old human nature holds its own through all 
 
 This fact assured, then keep within your ken 
 That boys are only little less than men ; 
 That past or present, wliether bond or free 
 A boy's a boy — at least he's apt to be. 
 This statement true becomes the key of gold 
 To this old story which is here retold. 
 
 Great was the man who seemed so wisely sent 
 
 To lead our armies — be our president ! 
 
 Not simply great in manhood he appears, 
 
 But great in boyhood's young and guileless years 
 
 He owned a hatchet, so the story goes — 
 
 You know the legend everybody knows, — 
 
 And how his father had a cherry tree, 
 
 Graceful and tall and beautiful to see. 
 
 One day our youth while busy hacking round 
 
 Fell on this tree, and cut it to the ground ! 
 
 Now when he saw his fatlier coming out 
 
 He hid his hatchet 'neath his roundabout. 
 
 And wlien 'twas asked, w^ho made the tree to fall? 
 
 He didn't know, nor could he guess at all. 
 
 But he surmised some colored youth somewhere 
 
 Had cut it down to get the cherries there ! 
 
 This boy was trying now, as well he might. 
 
 To keejD the hatchet from his father's sight ; 
 
 But while he circled cautiously around 
 
 At last he dropped the weapon on the ground ! 
 
 Ah ! sad indeed ! His was a piteous i^light, 
 
 With all his chances higher than a kite ! 
 
 Here might we pause, for doubtless on his part 
 
48 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 His father spoke the fullness of his heart; 
 
 Then reaching down he plucked a lithe, long shoot, 
 
 That grew in beauty from a hickory root. 
 
 And touched the youth in such a magic way 
 
 It turned his dark forgetfulness to day ! 
 
 And knowing now who made the tree to fall, 
 
 He spoke the truth and told his father all ! — 
 
 Kind friends take warning — do not reason why, 
 
 But like our hero, never tell a lie ! 
 
 OLD AND NEW. 
 
 While Midnight, with ensandaled feet 
 
 Walked the star-paved upper street, 
 
 Clad in her jewels rich and rare. 
 
 With dust of diamonds in her hair, 
 
 A bent and weary pilgrim old 
 
 Went shivering through the dreary cold, 
 
 With haggard face of pain upturned. 
 
 That through the darkness looked and yearned 
 
 For his lost youth : but when the clang 
 
 Of joy-bells through the arches rang, 
 
 He passed from sight. With radiant frame 
 
 An angel form of beauty came 
 
 And took his place. His eyes were wet 
 
 With tender tears of sweet regret ; 
 
 But, kissed by Midnight's calm content, 
 
 Adown the starry arch he went ; 
 
 And Morn swung wide her gates and smiled 
 
 Upon the New Year undefiled. 
 
IN SPRINGTIME. 49 
 
 IN SPRINGTIME. 
 
 SpriKg comes above the barren world 
 
 By winter ruled so long, 
 And where his snows were lately hurled 
 
 Sits April's life and song. 
 
 Through all the forest branches wide 
 
 She wakes the vital flood — 
 The burly chestnut's rugged tide, 
 
 The maple's amber blood. 
 
 She gives her blessing to the buds 
 
 Down all the sylvan ways ; 
 And bursting into green, the woods 
 
 Fling out their airy sprays. 
 
 From greening tints on all things laid 
 
 In wayward curve and line. 
 The swarthy hemlock takes a shade, 
 
 The needles of the pine. 
 
 The alders drop their golden dust, 
 
 The willows wave and gleam, 
 The lichens blotch the rocks with rust, 
 
 The snow-drops bloom and dream. 
 
 Sweet forms of beauty manifold 
 
 Are brought on April's wing : — 
 The spice-bush's threaded beads of gold 
 
 On budded branches cling. 
 
 Above the gray rock's hem of moss 
 The wind-flower nods and turns ; 
 4 
 
50 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The vines of goldthread run across, 
 The flaming pinxter burns. 
 
 By quiet pool and foaming run 
 
 The silken ferns unfurl, 
 And shining laurel drinks the sun 
 
 From tinted cups of pearl. 
 
 Where summer's faded leaves are laid 
 
 To rest in quiet dells, 
 The trailing raayflower twines her braid 
 
 And hangs her sweetest bells. 
 
 On sunward slopes that downward reach 
 
 To meadow-lands below, 
 The clouds of apple-bloom and peach 
 
 Are drifting like the snow. 
 
 Warm sunshine wooes the springing grain 
 
 To crown the waiting farms, 
 And God gives by His sun and rain 
 
 The sheaves for Autumn's arms. 
 
 So Spring-time keeps her league with earth, 
 And sweet flowers bloom and nod, — 
 
 From death springs life to fairest birth, 
 To keep our faith in God. 
 
 PETER COOPER. 
 
 God's gracious hand in silent tenderness 
 
 But touched the brow that age had wrinkled 
 
 deep. 
 And weary care made way for blessed sleep, 
 
CHILDREN'S DAY. 51 
 
 And peace immortal crowned his faithfulness ! 
 No more the years his silvered hair will press : 
 
 His work, well wrought, shall unborn thousands 
 cheer, 
 
 Who, weary toiling in the twilight here. 
 Shall teach their lips his honored name to bless. 
 So shall he live, loved by his fellow-man, — 
 
 In true affection held forever young : 
 No shaft is needed for a name so pure. 
 
 His deed and thought were part of God's own 
 plan : 
 Though brazen fame may give his name no tongue, 
 
 His work shall live, aj^proved, accepted, sure I 
 
 THE CHILDREN'S DAY. 
 
 To-day within these leafy shades 
 
 'Mid graceful columns springing. 
 What happy voices stir the glades 
 
 And blend with nature's singing: — 
 The glad leaves murmur mellow trills, 
 
 The birds their notes are trying, 
 And echoes from the breezy hills 
 
 Are glad in their replying. 
 
 'Tis well to leave the dusty street, 
 
 Its busy cares foregoing, — 
 To hear the pulse of nature beat 
 
 And feel her breezes blowing : — 
 For always she has songs to cheer, 
 
 The lowliest heart upraising, 
 If we but lend to her an ear, 
 
 To hear her reverent praising. 
 
52 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 God's voice is in the grove we tread, 
 
 We hear its whispered sweetness, — 
 His presence as the leaves o'erhead 
 
 Bends o'er our incompleteness : 
 And rosy childhood wears once more 
 
 The touch of His caressing. 
 As on Judea's hills of yore 
 
 He crowned it with His blessing. 
 
 Since this is childhood's holiday, 
 
 Let every lip be smiling, 
 And care and sorrow flee away 
 
 From every heart's beguiling : — 
 For ere they reach the wished-for years 
 
 Where lie the golden meadows, 
 Perchance will spring the fount of tears 
 
 And fall the woven shadows ! 
 
 We cannot bid the years remain. 
 
 Or stay in all their going, — 
 Too brief indeed is childhood's reign, 
 
 Too swift the time is flowing ; 
 But we may lend a kindly hand, 
 
 Or lift a gentle warning, 
 To make the paths of wonderland 
 
 All glorious as the morning ! 
 
 We all are pilgrims old or young, 
 
 Forever onward faring; — 
 Some cheer the way with songful tongue 
 
 And some go on uncaring ;— 
 Some far ahead see lights of home. 
 
 Some stray in tangled wildwood, 
 While far below the children roam 
 
 The sunny vale of childhood ! 
 
CRILDEEN'S BAY. 63 
 
 A wondrous valley neath the skies ! — 
 
 We all have known its winding: : — 
 How nearer fairy-land it lies 
 
 Than any after finding ! 
 A storied realm, where false and fair 
 
 Claim equal faith out-reaching, 
 Where wierdest forms that dreams may wear 
 
 Are true as any preaching ! 
 
 Alas ! when once we pass the vale 
 
 There is no backward turning, 
 Howe'er the dreams of life may fail, 
 
 Howe'er the heart be yearning : 
 But still its garnered wealth we hold 
 
 Though far beyond the portal, 
 And more than royal stores of gold, 
 
 Its memories immortal ! 
 
 O pictures ! hanging evermore 
 
 Upon the walls unfading, 
 How time re-touches o'er and o'er 
 
 Each tender tint and shading ! 
 Fair treasures held in endless tryst ! — 
 
 Alas! in Eden's wiMwood, 
 What glory Eve and Adam missed 
 
 Without a gleam of childhood ! 
 
 Of mother's power to soothe and bless. 
 
 Her smile above them leaning. 
 Of cradle song and sweet caress 
 
 They never knew the meaning ! 
 How much was lost from living then 
 
 With childhood yet unrisen ; — 
 No Daniel in the lion's den, 
 
 Nor Joseph in the prison ! 
 
54: A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Alas ! they knew no Jacob's dream, 
 
 Low on a stone reclining, 
 With golden ladder's lifted gleam 
 
 And angels white and shining ! 
 How David slew the giant strong, 
 
 The hosts of God defying, 
 Or how he soothed with harj) and song 
 
 Saul's demon yet undying ! 
 
 And yet with childhood's tales untold, 
 
 No sunny gleams returning. 
 They lived and loved, grew gray and old, 
 
 And never knew its yearning. 
 But fondly yet our memory clings 
 
 To tides still backward flowing, 
 While light as from an angel's wing 
 
 Is waved above their going. 
 
 Fair childhood wears a diadem 
 
 Unknown in song or story 
 Since One was born at Bethlehem 
 
 Who crowned it with His glory : 
 And when He came the angels told 
 
 In song the wondrous stranger, 
 And wise men came with gifts of gold 
 
 To worship at a manger ! 
 
 Since in that far Judean land 
 
 He gave His tenderest blessing 
 To childhood 'neath his loving hand, 
 
 In warm and sweet caressing ; 
 Since by the open gates of Nain 
 
 He changed to joy the weeping, — 
 Or woke a tender maid again 
 
 From death's still dreamless sleeping ;- 
 
ON READING AN OLD POET. 55 
 
 Since Galilean mothers brought 
 
 To him their babes, revealing 
 The depths of mother love, and sought 
 
 For them his touch of healing, — 
 How fairer far the world has grown 
 
 Through grace of His adorning, 
 How far good-will to man has flown 
 
 Since that first Christmas morning! 
 
 So childhood wears a fadeless crown, 
 
 And cloudless o'er it glowing 
 The skies of morn are bending down. 
 
 And breath of bloom is blowing ; 
 And when our years of wandering flee — 
 
 We gain the golden portal — 
 Perchance one joy of Heaven will be 
 
 That childhood is immortal ! 
 
 ON READING AN OLD POET. 
 
 A NIGHT of Storm ! The blinding flakes are blown 
 
 By frost-stung winds that smite the trees and 
 moan. 
 The leafless branches creak amid the cold. 
 
 While winter's storm-march sweeps the drifted 
 wold. 
 The casement rattles — on the window pane 
 
 A fairy artist builds Aladdin's fane — 
 A wondrous palace crowned with gleaming spires, 
 
 Whose opal windows blaze with diamond fires ! 
 
 Without, the storm's wild tumult and its din, — 
 Thy gladsome song makes melody within, 
 
56 ^ SIIEAF OF POEMS, 
 
 While on the hearth the wood-fire's blaze and glow 
 Defies the gale and laughs at drifting snow! 
 
 We own thy charm, and lo ! the caged birds 
 
 Are hushed to hear the music of thy words ; 
 And more and more thy woven spell holds sway 
 
 And haunts the night with visions of the day, 
 By mellow songs with matchless grace replete 
 
 And love's own rapture throbbing warm and 
 sweet. 
 To whose rare music swelling full and clear 
 
 The storm drifts by, and lo ! the stars appear! 
 
 TO E. A. B. 
 
 O FKiEND immortal in the summer land ! 
 
 I fain would greet thee as in days of old, 
 
 Whose thronging memories me to-night enfold, 
 And know again thy friendly grasp of hand. 
 The tidal years touch not thy golden strand, 
 
 Nor steal the strength of manhood's early prime ; 
 
 The shore unshadowed knows no passing time. 
 For life immortal hath no shifting sand. 
 O, loyal heart, what greetings manifold 
 
 Beyond the borders shall our spirits share? 
 
 When sundering years have parted for awhile ! 
 Thy shadow dim within my hand I hold ; 
 
 Nor can I doubt that in the morning air 
 
 Our clasping hands will wake the olden smile. 
 
 OCTOBER. 
 
 At morn the white mist fills 
 The valleys rimmed with hills. 
 Above the meadows shorn, 
 
OCTOBER. 57 
 
 And ripeued shocks of corn, — 
 Above the quiet streams, 
 ►Scarce wakened from the dreams 
 Of stars they saw in sleep, 
 The snowy garments sweep, 
 Till sunbeams, fold on fold, 
 Roll back the mist in gold, 
 To show how glad earth lies 
 Beneath October's skies. 
 
 A dreamy golden haze 
 Fills up the autumn days. 
 Wild asters linger yet 
 With ragged briars thick set, 
 And o'er the land far blown 
 The thistle-down is sown. 
 Round old trees moss-enshrined, 
 Where bitter-sweet is twined, 
 Its coral berries press 
 Against the sun-bright dress. 
 Like rustic beads and charms 
 On beauty's neck and arms. 
 
 The frost-grape's clusters shine 
 Alonsj the ramblinsf vine 
 Half hid by russet sjirays 
 Tangled in lawless ways 
 With branches wooed and won 
 To lift them to the sun. 
 
 Rare sunsets burning low 
 Transfigure in their glow 
 To garbs divinely fair. 
 The robes the woodlands wear. 
 
58 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The chestnut's changing crown 
 Is dropping bright leaves down, 
 And frosted burs spread wide 
 Their bearded globes of pride, 
 And let the brown nuts blow 
 To waiting hands below. 
 
 The hazels close besid ) 
 Are jeweled like a bride, 
 And stand aglow with bliss 
 Beneath October's kiss. 
 The maples change their dress 
 Of summer loveliness 
 For hues that quickly fade 
 Into a richer shade, 
 Till satisfied they blaze 
 In saintly robes of praise. 
 
 When autumn gales appear, 
 Singing the waning year. 
 Then all the woodland grieves 
 At loss of summer leaves. 
 Wind-swept in di-ifting herds. 
 Like flocks of golden birds. 
 While shadows thinner grow 
 On russet slopes below. 
 
 At last her work is done, 
 October's race is run. 
 The early promise sent 
 Has reached accomplishment : 
 Her ripened harvests told 
 Amid her brown and gold, 
 She takes her rest awhile 
 Wearing her patient smile, 
 
A SONG IN THE NIGHT, 59 
 
 While stubble fields lie bare 
 In hazy autumn air. 
 
 Mt. McGregor. 
 
 (July 23, 1885.) 
 
 It was morning on the mountains, 
 
 And the faintest flush of day 
 Stole in across the tree-tops, 
 
 And kindled far away : 
 Then the weary eyes grew brighter 
 
 As the curtains were withdrawn, 
 And afar they looked and waited 
 
 For the glory of the dawn. 
 
 But coming in its beauty, 
 
 With crimson and with gold. 
 The eyes were all too weary 
 
 Its brightness to behold : 
 And when the growing splendor 
 
 Poured its glory over all, 
 It was morning on the mountains 
 
 Where the shadows never fall 1 
 
 A SONG m THE NIGHT. 
 
 At midnight wakened from unquiet sleep 
 
 By troubled dreams and pain, 
 I heard through darkness measureless and deep. 
 
 The music of the rain. 
 
 Day after day the earth had waited long 
 In speechless stress of prayer. 
 
60 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 And ear intent to catch the welcome song 
 Now borne upon the air. 
 
 No dew had cooled the tender grass at morn 
 
 The web the spider spun, 
 Of all its wealth of beaded beauty shorn, 
 
 Long rusted in the sun. 
 
 The clouds of promise only brought despair : 
 
 The corn leaves crisply rolled. 
 Long since had drained the dew's sweet jewels rare, 
 
 Like pleasure's queen of old. 
 
 My troubled heart was full of doubt and fear 
 
 And trust did almost die ; 
 Did God regard, and would he ever here 
 
 Again our feeble cry ? 
 
 But while I slept there came the blessed rain — 
 
 The boon withheld so long — 
 In crystal murmurs over hill and plain, 
 
 And filled the air with song ! 
 
 And while the music stirred the forest leaves 
 
 And through the darkness swept. 
 The nested birds beneath my dripping eaves 
 
 Chirped out their praise and slept. 
 
 Their notes recalled the old words sweet and true — 
 
 The words the Master said — 
 He feedeth them : and trust sprang up anew, 
 
 And doubt forever fied. 
 
AT LAST. 61 
 
 SUGAR-TIME. 
 
 Old winter wheels his sullen flight 
 Above the brown, uncovered hills, 
 
 While budding alders feel the pulse 
 And hear the songs of hidden rills. 
 
 Still earth, the sleeping beauty, lies 
 
 Half conscious, dreaming, while she turns. 
 
 And waits the sunshine's princely kiss, 
 For which her drowsy being yearns. 
 
 The brown eaves drop their crystal rain 
 
 In songful murmurs till the night 
 Hangs low a fringe of icy spears 
 
 Inlaid with stars and barbed with light. 
 
 Now all the woodlands feel the spell 
 
 Of waning dark and climbing sun, 
 And fragrant birch and whispering pine 
 
 Are thrilled with quickened pulses won. 
 
 The maples dream of autumn's gold 
 
 Transmuted under wmter snows, 
 Till all their wealth of amber blood 
 
 In honeyed sweetness overflows. 
 
 AT LAST. 
 
 As drifting shadows leave no sign 
 
 Each rounded year, 
 How many pass the border line, 
 
 And disappear ! 
 
62 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 For each is set a certain bound — 
 
 A course to run ; 
 And when the utmost goal is found, 
 
 All work is done. 
 
 Somewhere the shadow cuts the light 
 
 Across each way, 
 And there the starry, solemn night 
 
 Will close the day. 
 
 How far away the hilltops rise 
 
 Where Jl7iis stands, 
 Where dreamless sleep will close our eyes. 
 
 And fold our hands, 
 
 It matters not ; — or near, or far, 
 
 Alike are they : 
 The hand that guides the sweeping star 
 
 Will lead the way. 
 
 What though we glimpse through misty air 
 
 Some empty nest, — 
 No atom drifts beyond His care, — 
 
 His time is best. 
 
 As shadows sweep the summer hills 
 
 And vanish then. 
 Each life some rounded purpose fills, — 
 
 Threescore, or ten. 
 
 And when our work has grown complete, 
 
 Our triumph won, 
 We shall abide where rest is sweet, 
 
 When work is done. 
 
BIRTHDAY. 63 
 
 CHIPPEWANOXETTO. 
 
 A SCANTY pasture slope of brown 
 
 Where stunted bushes grow, 
 A ragged coast-line beaten down 
 
 By storm and tidal flow ; 
 
 A fisher's hut, a boat upturned, 
 
 A pile of driftwood near. 
 And ashen heaps where fires have burned 
 
 To make the noonday cheer ; 
 
 And southward, stretching like a hand, 
 
 When tides have seaward run, 
 A slender bar of gray wet sand 
 
 Is bleaching in the sun. 
 
 All dreamily they come and go, 
 
 The white sails drifting by — 
 They fleck the azure sea below 
 
 The broader sweep of sky. 
 
 With seaward tides they sail away 
 
 And vanish out of sight, 
 Beyond the wedge that cleaves the bay, 
 
 And lifts its warning light. 
 
 So hangs this picture on my wall, 
 
 A memory of the sea. 
 While old-time voices seem to call 
 
 The summers back to me. 
 
 BIRTHDAY. 
 
 A GLOOMY day of winter rain ; 
 
 The branches creak, the winds are sad. 
 The swift drops beat the sodden leaves. 
 
64 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 And still the old elm moans and grieves. 
 But 'tis your birthday once again 
 And so my heart is glad. 
 
 Dear wife, how brims our cup of joy ! 
 
 Your trusting hand in mine I hold : 
 For while the fleet years spin and run 
 
 Through all the courses of the sun, 
 To us they bring no base alloy, 
 
 But love's unminted gold ! 
 
 Far queenlier than a jeweled crown 
 
 Your coronet of silvered hair. 
 And more and more your love-lit eyes 
 
 Illume for me the darkest skies — 
 Sweet stars whose clear light beaming down, 
 
 Makes all the waste world fair. 
 
 Pass on, O years, with swifter flow ! 
 
 We build no more for nesting fears ; 
 But each will find us richer grown 
 
 In all things love has made our own, 
 And far beyond the after-glow 
 
 Still wait the eternal years ! 
 
 NATURE'S PLAN. 
 
 First the tender leaflet ; 
 
 After that appear 
 The bud and bloom of promise. 
 
 And the ripened ear. 
 
 Thus the folded life-germ 
 In the acorn found. 
 
TO HENDBY W, LONGFELLOW. 65 
 
 Makes the mighty monarch 
 Of the forest ground : 
 
 And the way-side beauty, 
 Growing all the while, 
 Glads the dusty highway 
 With its patient smile. 
 
 So the lands are golden 
 
 Neath the sun and rain, 
 With the yellow billows 
 
 Of the ripened grain. — 
 
 What are we the better 
 
 While the seasons flow, 
 And the years are passing, 
 
 If we do not grow ? — 
 
 Grow in all the beauty 
 
 Of the Master's grace 
 Unto heavenly fruitage 
 
 In our humble place ? 
 
 TO HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 SONGFUL bard ! whose fame the nations hold 
 Enshrined for aye, thy latest leaves of gold 
 
 1 turn to-night, and ease an hour of pain 
 With rarest fancies of the poet's brain. 
 
 So passing sweet thy witching spell is wrought 
 I fain would bless thee for thy pictured thought : 
 And so I breathe a warm heart's-uttered prayer 
 For heaven's own blessing on thy snow-white hair,- 
 That when thy years are rounded full and free 
 
66 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The gates of pearl may inward swing for thee. — 
 Now could some angel breathe to waiting sense, 
 The boon I crave hath wrought tliee no offence, 
 What rarer joy would lend its presence sweet 
 To cheat all pain and make the hour complete. 
 
 ON PILGRIMAGE. 
 
 The land is fair my footsteps journey through — 
 A land of promise filled with corn and wine. 
 
 Through shaded ways my winding pathway turns 
 In sweet green pastures by the rills of peace, 
 Or climbs the slopes where broadening vision sweep 
 The travelled way to sunrise-smitten hills. 
 And heights untrod that beckon farther on. 
 
 They come and go, the blessed days of peace : 
 No cloud glooms down but sunshine trembles through 
 And doubt stays not where patient faith looks up 
 And takes the good each sweet day holds in store 
 
 So on, and on, toward the sunset land 
 His strong arm leads, and clears the tangled way. 
 While from His hand unstinted bounty falls, 
 And undawned splendor brightens far beyond. 
 
 AT CEDARCROFT. 
 
 With songful heart so still at last 
 
 And brimmed with rest for aye, 
 He cannot know the shadow cast 
 
 Upon his hills to-day ! 
 
AT CEDARCEOFT. 67 
 
 So dear, so dear to all the land — 
 
 They loved him young and old, 
 The generous heart and friendly hand. 
 
 The man of royal mould. 
 
 How many homes for him are lone, 
 
 How many eyes are dim, 
 While winds of winter wail and moan 
 
 A solemn dirge for him. 
 
 Sad voices oft his name repeat 
 
 And call for him in vain, 
 They watch and wait the weary feet 
 
 That never come again. 
 
 And one who loves his memory well, 
 
 Looks back through misty tears 
 Beyond the shadow's woven spell 
 
 Upon the vanished years ! 
 
 The Kennett hills were robed in green 
 
 And glad with songs of morn, 
 The valleys wore the meadow's sheen 
 
 And waved with wheat and corn. * 
 
 The hedgerows made the waysides fair 
 
 Through tangled sun and shade. 
 Where through the sweet June haunted air 
 
 A dusty pilgrim strayed. 
 
 What songs made glad the summer ways 
 
 Of bird and leaf and breeze. 
 Till Cedarcroft to longing gaze 
 
 Rose 'mid her ancient trees. 
 
68 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The open gate and shadowed way, 
 
 The vine-encumbered wall, 
 The spacious lawn of bloom and spray, 
 
 With sunset over all ! 
 
 The kindly words of welcome said. 
 
 The friendly grasp of hand. 
 They still live on though years have sped 
 
 Since then across the land ! 
 
 A storm has swept his leafless wood. 
 And bowed the monarch forms 
 
 Of burly chestnuts which have stood 
 A thousand winter storms ! 
 
 Alas ! no more the singing birds ! 
 
 The branches wildly toss. 
 And one he cheered with kindly words 
 
 Is dumb with sense of loss. 
 
 TO MY MOTHER ON HER BIRTHDAY, 
 
 The brown earth wakens from her dream 
 
 With drowsy pulses low. 
 While April turns to catch the gleam 
 
 That makes her being glow. 
 
 Sunward her quick tides flush and rise 
 
 In raptures warm and sweet, 
 While mayflowers spring in mute surprise 
 
 Beneath her sandaled feet. 
 
 And while she weaves with cunning hand 
 The woodland's airy frills, — 
 
TO MY MOTHEB ON HER BIRTHDAY. 69 
 
 A deepening flush across the land, — 
 The green robe of the hills, 
 
 Northward she calls her singing throng, 
 
 Blue bird and thrush and wren, 
 To greet with glad and mellow song 
 
 Thy three-score years and ten ! 
 
 And while she lifts her buds half-blown 
 
 To deck thy natal day, 
 All tenderly another stone 
 
 She sets beside thy way. 
 
 On what far slope of tender green 
 
 The first its shadow cast ! 
 And all thy pathway lies between 
 
 The earliest and the last ! 
 
 A changeful way by vale and hill 
 
 Thy weary feet have run ; — 
 By winding valleys dark and chill, 
 
 By broad slopes glad with sun ! 
 
 We need not trace each mile to-day 
 
 The journey's hopes and fears — 
 The bloom and blight beside the way, 
 
 The joys, the smiles, the tears. 
 
 Enough that while each glance we steal 
 
 The shadows flit and fade, 
 And all the memory lights reveal 
 
 Far more of light than shade ! 
 
 To-day, with all the hill-slope fair. 
 Where runs thy pathway down. 
 
70 A SHEAF OF FOEMS. 
 
 We press upon thy silvered hair 
 Affection's golden crown. 
 
 Be Heaven's broad wealth of blessing thine- 
 
 Fresh manna strew thy way, 
 For only can some gift divine 
 
 The raother-love repay : 
 
 And while the dusky shadows grow 
 
 May sunset still unfold 
 Across thy way the kindly glow 
 
 From wide-swung gates of gold. 
 
 So shall the golden evening-time 
 
 Fairer than morning be, — 
 Some sweet flush wear of that glad clime 
 
 Where welcome waits for thee. 
 
 For while thy natal day we greet, 
 What vanished forms appear! — 
 
 What long-hushed voices low and sweet 
 Fall on thy listening ear ! 
 
 Perchance where on the hills they stand 
 
 Just veiled from sight away, 
 Thy birthday on the borderland 
 
 They keep with us to-day ! 
 
 OXLY FOUR. 
 
 O ROSY light of the summer dawn ! 
 
 Sweet flush of the kindling skies, 
 Steal softly over the dewy lawn, 
 
 And touch my darling's eyes. 
 
JUNE. 71 
 
 On the crimson lip and fringed lid, 
 
 One kiss of thy golden beams 
 Will open the blue eyes softly hid, 
 
 And call her back from dreams. 
 
 And tell her then why the bird-songs sweet 
 
 Ring out so mellow and clear — 
 Such music as only birds repeat. 
 
 And only birthdays hear. 
 
 And how the summers which she has known 
 
 By blossoms of pearl and gold, 
 Have passed in beauty and quickly flown 
 
 To make her four years old. 
 
 Then whisper above my darling's head 
 What the tenderest love might say — 
 
 What blessings and prayers for her are said 
 Who is only four to-day. 
 
 For the years to come, O write it down — 
 The yearning love and the prayer ; 
 
 There never can be a richer crown 
 For any child to wear. 
 
 JUNE. 
 
 From tropic lands afar 
 
 She comes with queenly grace, 
 Serene as any star 
 
 In all the worlds of space ; 
 And in her dreamy eyes 
 
 She bears the blue of summer skies. 
 
72 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Her shining brows are crowned 
 With roses sweet and rare, 
 
 While half-blown buds are bound 
 Araid her waving hair ; 
 
 And all her beauty's hue 
 
 Is only sunshine staining through. 
 
 Her gauzy robes conceal 
 
 In vain her beauty where 
 Her charms they half reveal ; 
 
 Her sun-brown arms are bare, 
 And in her jewelled hands 
 
 She holds rare gifts for many lands. 
 
 Her coming all things know ; 
 
 Across the emerald grass 
 The tiniest flowers that blow 
 
 Look out to see her pass, 
 While from her sweet face blown 
 
 They catch a glory for their own. 
 
 She gives all beauty rare 
 
 Through ages manifold, 
 Nor ever grows less fair 
 
 Her being's perfect gold ; — 
 All in her matchless truth 
 
 She keeps the peerless grace of youth. 
 
 Now fairy-like her tread 
 
 Is on the slopes of green, 
 Where Summer lifts his head 
 
 Her damasked robes are seen, 
 And evermore his bride. 
 
 She walks in beauty by his side. 
 
IN WAR TIME. 73 
 
 IN WAR TIME. 
 
 (1864.) 
 
 Bend low through all the Northern land, 
 
 Wild organ forests bend ! 
 Let ocean's voice frona strand to strand 
 
 With all your praises blend ! 
 
 Winds, sweep in might November's skies — 
 Her leafless woods and sprays, • 
 
 Wake all your grandest harmonies, 
 And roll them out in praise ! 
 
 Wild streams and rills and waterfalls ! 
 
 Sing while you foam and flow, 
 Glad praises through your crystal halls 
 
 From lips of pearl and snow ! 
 
 Leap, praises, on the buglers breath. 
 
 From rifle-pits and caves ; 
 Leap from the cannon's lips of death — 
 
 Ring over nameless graves ! 
 
 Gleam, sabres, in the growing light — 
 Gleam while the trumpet brays, 
 
 Wake, drum-beat, through the waning night 
 A nation's song of praise ! 
 
 Roll out the anthem, — let it swell : 
 God reigns ! — the wrong shall cease ; 
 
 Proclaim it, shot, and screaming shell. 
 Through broader curves of peace ! 
 
 All praise to Him ! — the ruddy gleams 
 Of morning gild the crimson bars 
 
74 A SHEAF OF POFMS. 
 
 Above our picket's sleepless dreams — 
 Our country's flag of stars ! 
 
 TO G. G. B. 
 
 To-night, O friend, I greet the stars again, 
 Whose kindly light o'er us so long ago, 
 Kept patient watch above the hills of snow. 
 Till flush of morning bade their glory wane ! 
 The self-same stars ! — and now my feet would fain 
 Reclimb the pass, as on that storm-shut day, 
 When night and tempest barred the mountain 
 way- 
 Save when the cloud-flash lit the spears of rain — 
 To see once more above the Alpine range 
 How fair they burned, the storm's wild fury spent, 
 Flooding the white hills with a beauty strange — 
 
 The ghostly pillars of the firmament ! 
 And with what rapture, their sweet gaze withdrawn, 
 Mont Blanc's white glory took the kiss of dawn ! 
 
 LAKE ALBAIsrO. 
 
 Fair Alban lake ! enzoned with lava gray — 
 The red volcano's glowing rim of yore. 
 From noon-day rest along thy haunted shore. 
 
 We turn to watch thy merry waves at play 
 
 Through shade and sunshine of the waning day. 
 A w^inding pathway led our feet to thee 
 Along the hillsides, while the distant sea, 
 
 Plain, city, mount, and all before us lay. 
 
 The palace walls that crowned thy peaceful shore 
 
AN ALPINE LAKE. 75 
 
 When Caesar's city was a thing unborn, 
 Have crumbled all I — Time leaves a trace no more 
 
 Of all the glory of that faded morn ! 
 So fades earth's glory, but the Roman plain, 
 The sea, the mountains, and thy smile remain ! 
 
 AN ALPINE LAKE. 
 
 From deep unfailing founts that play 
 
 Through sunless rifts below, 
 Upward the crystal currents stray, — 
 
 The singing waters flow. 
 
 Till deep within the blue-walled rim 
 
 Of mountains, azure crowned, 
 The goblin's granite bowl they brim, 
 
 And here the lake is found. 
 
 Alone upon the mountains wild 
 
 It wears its sweetest charms, 
 And mother Nature owns her child, 
 
 And bears it in her arms ! 
 
 Fair mirror of the summer heaven 
 
 That bends above its breast. 
 Or scowling storm of passion driven, 
 
 Across its peace and rest. 
 
 The gray old crags with beauty glow 
 
 From its entrancing face. 
 And distant cones of gleaming snow 
 
 Are grander for its grace. 
 
 As fair it smiles as when with blue 
 Broad arch above it drawn, 
 
76 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Its virgin freshness woke and knew 
 The kisses of the dawn. 
 
 No wrinkled trace of age it bears, 
 
 No shadow of decay, 
 With lilies on its breast it wears 
 
 Its primal youth for aye. 
 
 A crystal dream of rest it lies 
 
 By passion's breath unriven, 
 It holds the brightness of the skies — 
 
 The smile of earth and heaven. 
 
 Rare beauty of the lonely wild ! 
 
 Who on these heights shall stray, 
 May leave his care where thou hast smiled, 
 
 And bear thy peace away ! 
 
 m THE HAMMOCK. 
 
 In the mottled shade of the maple trees, 
 
 Where robin builds and sings, 
 And the cool leaves shake in the idle breeze 
 
 The children's hammock swings : 
 Breathe softly, O song of the summer air, 
 
 Bend tenderly down, O sky. 
 Nor suffer a cloud to darken where 
 
 Three wee, brown maidens lie ! 
 
 Aloft where the dusk of the twilight dwells, 
 The red-breast's hammock swings. 
 
 Where the delicate tint of sea-green shells 
 Has given place to Avings 
 
 Come, dreamy and sweet to their noonday rest 
 The softest airs that blow, — 
 
ON A FOSSIL SHELL, 11 
 
 To the birds asleep in the robin's nest, 
 And brownies asleep below ! 
 
 ON A FOSSIL SHELL. 
 
 Thou ancient raollusk from the oozy deep 
 
 Of vast Silurian seas, 
 I marvel much at thy untroubled sleep 
 
 On such a bed of ease ! ' 
 
 What mystic ages have above thee flown ! 
 
 Nor is thy slumber past ! 
 Thy plastic couch to bed of sandstone grown 
 
 Still holds thee folded fast ! 
 
 Since thou so long hast suffered heat and chill, 
 
 The biting frost and rain, 
 Do not thy stony joints with ague thrill, 
 
 Or sharp rheumatic pain ? 
 
 What storm and earthquake have about thee 
 whirled ! — 
 
 How changed the seas their place I — 
 O sleep no more, but wake and tell the world 
 
 About thy times and race ! 
 
 Ah ! could we know the record of thy reign, 
 
 And all which it befell ! 
 Perchance the heart to-day that beats in pain 
 
 Beat in that age as well ! 
 
 Thy shell no doubt was rifled ages since 
 
 By some relentless rogue ! — 
 Some kin of ours, perchaice a m mkey prince 
 
 Were clam-bakes then in voc^ue? 
 
78 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Or dklst thou slake some saurian monsters' 
 greed 
 
 In twilights old and gray ? — 
 Thy blameless self some hungry maw to feed, 
 
 Which cast the shell away ? 
 
 Are not our bivalves still allied to thee 
 
 By long ancestral line ? 
 And haunt they not, as thou, the shallow sea, 
 
 And sip its luscious wine ? 
 
 Thou speakest not : no answer can we see 
 
 Thy wrinkled visage make. 
 But still we clasp thy later progeny 
 
 And love them for thy sake ! 
 
 THE FIRST DECADE. 
 
 By the swift years one by one 
 All the web of life is spun. 
 Summers come and summers go, 
 Winters follow with their snow; 
 Gloom of storm and blue of sky 
 Mark the seasons passing by ; 
 Song of bird and sunny gleam 
 Make the long days shorter seem ; 
 Blended sunshine, sport and play, 
 Chase the winged hours away. 
 Till thy rounded years have made 
 Life's eventful first decade ! 
 
THE FIRST DECADE. 79 
 
 II. 
 
 So the summers passing fair 
 Over childhood free from care, 
 Leadinsc vales of dreamland throusrh — 
 Fairy valleys wet with dew, 
 Full of sweet enchantment grand, 
 Making life a wonderland, — 
 These have vanished while thy feet 
 Treading roses, rare and sweet. 
 All unconsciously have run 
 Through the shadow and the sun, 
 Till the changing seasons say 
 Thou art ten years old to-day ! 
 
 III. 
 
 Here upon the border line 
 What a legacy is thine ! 
 Better far than treasured wealth 
 Dew of youth and rosy health : 
 Eyes to see the beauty spread 
 All around and overhead. 
 Ears to hear the music sung 
 Not alone by lip and tongue. 
 Heart to feel and mind to know 
 How His bounties overflow, 
 Richer far than fable old. 
 Better than the touch of gold ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Therefore let the golden days 
 Touch thy lips with grateful praise. 
 Wreath thy brow with patient smile, 
 
80 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Keep thy tender heart from guile : 
 So may all the graces shine 
 In those dreamful eyes of thine ; 
 Faith look up with vision clear 
 Far beyond the utmost sphere ; 
 Hope with soaring pinion strong 
 Lift thee on the wings of song, 
 While the swift years drift away 
 Under Love's benignant sway. 
 
 V. 
 
 All the years, which lie before 
 Wait to bless thee with their store ; 
 Wealth of treasure, riches rare, 
 These may be thy portion fair. 
 Gladly face each rising sun 
 With the peace of duty done : 
 Let each sunset's fading glow 
 Note how love's sweet roses grow, 
 With divinest fragrance rife. 
 Sweetening all the toils of life : 
 So at last shall rest be sweet 
 When the last decade's complete ! 
 
 IN THE SOUDAN. 
 
 Gordon ! a name to thrill 
 The heart of the valiant still. 
 Noble and true and tender, 
 In the dust of Egypt's splendor, 
 Marred by hostile spears, 
 Mourned by a nation's tears, 
 The great commander lies 
 Under the desert skies. 
 
IN THE SOUDAN. 81 
 
 A soldier whose fame has flown 
 Where'er the winds have blown. 
 How shall we tell the story 
 Rehearsing his deeds of glory ? 
 How fair white honor crowned him, 
 And all the graces found him ? 
 
 Though dead by the slumberous stream, 
 That winds through Egypt's dream, 
 Where the tropic palms will wave 
 Forever above his grave, 
 The winds of the desert moan 
 For the valiant spirit flown. 
 And never his fame can be hid 
 In the land of the pyramid. 
 
 What deeds of valor done 
 'Neath the tropic's burning sun ! 
 The march of weary feet 
 Through the desert's blinding heat. 
 The siege at last and the doom 
 By the walls of far Khartoum — 
 The pride of the stream which flows 
 From Kenia's lifted snows. 
 Watched ever by palm and star 
 From the crags of Ankobar. 
 
 O city he held so long 
 
 With a few brave hearts and strong, 
 
 Where he swept with gracious sway 
 
 Oppression and wrong away, 
 
 Betrayed by the foe and lost 
 
 At such a perilous cost ! 
 
82 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 So perished three hundred men 
 Of old in a mountain glen ! 
 All marred by hostile spears 
 And mourned by a nation's tears, 
 The dead commander lies 
 Under Egypt's haunted skies I 
 
 ORION. 
 
 My room is darkened : through the window bars 
 Orion's light in unspent beauty burns, 
 As mailed in might he toils above nor turns 
 
 To note the calm procession of the stars : 
 
 With lofty purpose crowned and grim with scars, 
 The war club in his brawny hand he bears, 
 The slaughtered lion's shaggy skin he wears — 
 
 Type of the passion which the white soul mars. 
 
 And still he smites in his heroic wrath 
 
 The tossing horns that hedge his upward way, 
 
 Till every form of evil in his path 
 
 Bows low, at last, to his unchallenged sway. 
 
 And from the stars a clear voice rings, " Be strong! 
 
 Thou too shalt conquer in the strife with wrong! " 
 
 PONTE ST. ANGELO. 
 
 Beneath the stars that watch the Tiber's flow, 
 Slow winding through the glory of a dream — 
 The hush of midnight on the haunted stream — 
 
 I pace the ancient bridge, St. Angelo ! 
 
 The years in sooth have stained its marble snow 
 And dimmed the beauty of its early prime, 
 Yet still it hears the passing centuries chimes, 
 
ROUND LAKE. 83 
 
 Its strength unmarred as in the mornings glow ! — 
 O Roman splendor throned upon the hills ! 
 
 O dream of empire over every clime ! 
 How burns the heart thy classic story thrills, 
 
 How pale thy glories in the lapse of time ! 
 Thy kings are dust ; thy royal pageants flee ; 
 St. Angelo remains and Tiber seeks the sea ! 
 
 ROUND LAKE. 
 
 Long ages since when earth was new, 
 
 One glad and golden morn, 
 Beneath the bending arch of blue 
 
 The forest lake was born. 
 
 Earth cradled it among her hills, 
 The clouds gave blessing sweet, 
 
 And green slopes sent the laughing rills 
 To bathe its crystal feet. 
 
 What beauty bent above its dreams 
 
 While ages rolled away ! 
 By night the stars with tender gleams 
 
 The golden sun by day. 
 
 The rosy flush of kindling dawn, 
 
 The brighter glow of even, 
 The clouds across the azure drawn 
 
 The sunset fires of heaven. 
 
 Alone amid the wilderness 
 
 Its perfect grace it wore, 
 And kept its beauty none the less 
 
 Of pictured sky and shore. 
 
84 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Unseen, nntil the savage strayed 
 Unhindered through the wild, 
 
 Round Lake, enzoned with forest shade, 
 Looked up to heaven and smiled. 
 
 Here paused the Indian by its side 
 When shades of evening fell. 
 
 And hither came his dusky bride 
 To braid her tresses well. 
 
 And here she found what nature gave 
 
 For her adornment fair — 
 The water-lilies from the wave 
 
 To dress her raven hair. 
 
 The red man here in speechless mood, 
 Adored with bended form. 
 
 The spirit of the pathless wood, 
 Of sunshines and of storm. — 
 
 Swift years of changing beauty throng, 
 
 And fairest years unclose 
 The wilderness alive with song. 
 
 And blossomed as the rose. 
 
 For Art has laid her soft caress 
 On Nature's wayward child. 
 
 And won by force of tenderness 
 The rude and rugged wild. 
 
 Beside the lake's unruffled peace 
 Green walled with hills around. 
 
 Are groves whose shadows bring release 
 From Care's enchanted ground. 
 
BOUND LAKE. 85 
 
 The broad encampment's winding streets 
 
 Mid haunt of breeze and bird, 
 Cool shaded parks and dusk retreats 
 
 With songs of fountains heard. 
 
 The gleam of white tents in the shade, 
 
 By sunshine mottled fair, 
 And under dark green branches swayed 
 
 The cottage homes of prayer. 
 
 Where erst the Indian's stealthy feet 
 Roamed through the forest ways, 
 
 God's greenwood temple stands complete, 
 And sounding with his praise, 
 
 Through all its airy arches hung 
 
 Leaf-fretted 'neath the blue, 
 What melodies of heaven are rung, 
 
 What music trembles through ! 
 
 The songs of pilgrim worshippers 
 
 In blended triumph rolled, 
 The forest's-anthem as it stirs 
 
 Its branches mossed with gold. 
 
 The voice of prayer and praises given, 
 
 The Master's echoed words, 
 Down ringing from the rest of heaven, 
 
 And gladdest songs of birds. 
 
 Since first he built the spacious arch 
 
 Of blue above the land, 
 And stars and suns began their march 
 
 To music sweet and grand. 
 
86 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 No marble fane of praise and prayer, 
 
 In vast cathedral dim 
 With vaulted aisles has seemed more fair 
 
 Than forest grove to Him. 
 
 As in the olden years again 
 In shadowy glade and glen, 
 
 He whom the heavens cannot contain 
 Vouchsafes to dwell with men. 
 
 And though unseen, above we know 
 
 The ladder's starry rounds, 
 On which His angels come and go 
 
 Above the tented grounds. 
 
 And this is Bethel whose green walls 
 
 Ascending praises fill. 
 Where healing flows and manna falls 
 
 And God abideth still. 
 
 THANKSGIVING. 
 
 (1866) 
 
 Put off, O earth, thy faded dress, 
 
 Put on thy garb of beauty. 
 And in thy robes of righteousness 
 
 Stand forth arrayed for duty. 
 
 Hush every note of hate and wrong — 
 Each bitter wail of sadness ; 
 
 Let all thy voices swell one song 
 Of love and praise and gladness. 
 
 Wild winter storms that sift your snows 
 Above the withered daisies, 
 
KEATS' GRAVE. 87 
 
 Wake all your strength from its repose 
 And storm the heavens with praises. 
 
 O Land, bow lowly in the dust 
 
 The while ye lift your voices, — 
 God has but smitten where he must, 
 
 And Liberty rejoices. 
 
 Each peaceful grave where valor sleeps 
 
 In loyal rest unbroken, 
 Shall be to every eye that weeps 
 
 Our sins' perpetual token. 
 
 Praise Him ye vales of fair renown 
 Whose wrath your slopes has rifted, 
 
 Praise Him ye hills above whose crown 
 The battle smoke has drifted. 
 
 Praise Him ye men of loyal might — 
 Your gleaming eyes grow brighter. 
 
 Through God your arm has kept the right ; — 
 The world is growing lighter ! 
 
 Praise Him, O man, that in thy soul 
 
 Lacked faith for right endeavor — 
 God reigneth while the seasons roll. 
 
 And He shall reiorn forever ! 
 
 'O* 
 
 KEATS' GRAVE. 
 
 Thy leaf is withered but thy sweetness stays 
 
 Dear Pansy, grown where frown the ancient 
 
 walls 
 Above his grave, and gloom of cypress falls 
 
SS A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Across the sunshine of the Roman days : 
 Plucked long ago, I hold thee still in praise 
 
 Of him whose song full soon to silence grew — 
 
 Whose glorious morning faded with the dew 
 Yet lives immortal in his mellow lays ! 
 Not writ in water, nay, the swift years bring 
 
 But added lustre to his shining name : — 
 Forever young, untouched by passing wing, 
 
 His broken threads of song are dear to fame ! 
 Green is his grave from tears of love untold. 
 While English daisies star the grass with gold ! 
 
 TO OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 A CimiSTMAS greeting tangled in a rhyme 
 I give for sunshine on the clouded years — 
 For wholesome laughter brewing tender tears, 
 
 For words of cheer that gladden manhood's prime! 
 
 O world-wide Singer ! deem it not a crime. 
 
 Since thy sweet songs have made so many glad. 
 If one should sing not in the song-robes clad. 
 
 And utter praise ill put and out of time. — 
 
 Sweet peace be thine upon this Christmas-day 
 To lengthen out for thee life's lessening span, 
 To quicken good and laugh the bad away. 
 
 With merry heart that doeth good to man ! 
 God bless thee now, and if I do thee wrong 
 Yet love I none the less the Sincrer and his sonor. 
 
 o* 
 
 RAVENSWOOD. 
 
 O CLASSIC shades of Ravenswood, 
 Thy memory holds them fast ; — 
 
BAVENSWOOD, 89 
 
 Enfold them now, one brotherhood, 
 The children of the past ! 
 
 To-day the years anew will blow— 
 
 The coast of life will loom, 
 And olden times stand all aglow 
 
 In memory's light and bloom. 
 
 Wave all thy shadows cool and sweet 
 
 To lure the feet that roam, 
 While words of kindly welcome greet 
 
 The wanderer's coming home. 
 
 O tender smile of June bend low 
 
 From cloudless deeps of air — 
 Breathe softly summer winds, and blow 
 
 Thy welcome everywhere. 
 
 They come from far— they hear the call 
 
 Borne out upon the breeze — 
 From far and near they gather all 
 
 Kound Alma Mater's knees. 
 
 Not now as in the days of old, 
 When with their bashful tread. 
 
 They came at first through heat and cold 
 Where homesick tears were shed, 
 
 But gladly now do they appear— 
 
 The old-time girls and boys ; 
 They come and bring their children here,— 
 
 The precious household joys ! 
 
 Ah ! how the busy years have run 
 Their swift and silent way, — 
 
90 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 'Tis noon and past, by many a sun, 
 For some are turning gray ! 
 
 God bless you friends and comrades true ! 
 
 His bounty on you fall, 
 While faded dreams of life anew 
 
 Come sweet and fresh to all. 
 
 And well may those whom fate denies 
 
 To join the welcome band, 
 Look forth to-day from misty eyes. 
 
 And clasp each friendly hand ! 
 
 Ah yes, for where the coast is fair 
 And fresh with foam and spray, 
 
 And white sails gleam in summer air 
 Upon the broad blue bay, 
 
 Two loyal hearts who treasure well 
 Life's visions as they should, 
 
 Greet olden friends to-day and dwell 
 On scenes of Ravenswood ! 
 
 They muse on all the vanished years, 
 Rich memories held in store. 
 
 And while the shifting past appears 
 They count the pictures o'er. 
 
 Ah, how in memory's light they blend 
 
 Each faded tint and line. 
 With smile of each remembered friend 
 
 Inwrought in the design. 
 
 Again they send you words of cheer 
 From far New England's strand : — 
 
MY INHERITANCE. 91 
 
 To all in memory held so dear 
 They reach the clasping hand. 
 
 And well they know how on the green 
 
 Where many fondly stray, 
 A presence felt, but all unseen, 
 
 Walks in your midst to-day ! 
 
 The suns of many years have set — 
 We've journeyed many a mile. 
 
 And still we hold, nor can forget 
 Her old remembered smile ! 
 
 And others swell unseen the throng, 
 
 Or linger fondly near — 
 To old familiar words of song 
 
 They lend a willing ear. 
 
 We may not clasp the viewless hand, 
 
 Nor bid them speak, or stay, 
 But still unbroken is the band, 
 
 Nor they are near to to-day ! 
 
 They linger still,— they are not dead ; 
 
 And when the years are passed, 
 In grand reunion just ahead, 
 
 We all shall meet at last ! 
 
 MY INHERITANCE. 
 
 All meanly as one lowly born, 
 Though noble blood was mine, 
 
 I took the ways of doubt and scorn 
 Heir of a royal line ! 
 
92 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 And forth in far unfriendly lands 
 
 My wayward feet did roam, 
 Through desert wastes and burning sands 
 
 Afar from peace and home. 
 
 Above me spread no palm-wide wings 
 
 Across the blinding way ; — 
 No shade of rocks, no cooling springs 
 
 To cheer my lonely way. 
 
 My garb was utter wretchedness 
 That wrapped me round and round, 
 
 And only want and weariness 
 In all the land was found. 
 
 If seeming rest remote and far 
 
 Did lure as something fair, 
 At last it fled, a mocking star, 
 
 Through hot, illusive air. 
 
 And hope each passing year grew less, 
 The desert seemed more wide. 
 
 And all its joys were emptiness — 
 Its dreans unsatisfied. 
 
 So broadly stretched the weary waste 
 
 Unfanned by angel wing, 
 Till one day came to me in haste 
 
 A message from the king ! 
 
 What gladsome news to one so vile ! 
 
 How fled my doubt and care ! 
 The king had loved me all the while 
 
 And made me now his heir ! 
 
CHBISTMAS. 93 
 
 The title-deed to wealth untold, 
 
 With royal seal and sign, 
 My eager hands now grasp and hold — 
 
 Its treasures all are mine ! 
 
 I pause not here to count them o'er, 
 My wealth transcends all thought, 
 
 Though grasping ever more and more. 
 The wealth that Love hath wrought ! 
 
 No more I tread the desert sand 
 Nor look through blinding tears, — 
 
 Co-heir of heaven and earth I stand, 
 And the eternal years ! 
 
 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 Far from Eastern lands and climes, 
 
 First to hear the angel chimes 
 
 From the walls of sapphire flung. 
 
 From the towers of jasper rung, — 
 
 From the hills where listening long 
 
 Shepherds caught the wondrous song 
 
 "Peace on earth," — the Christ is born, — 
 
 " Good will to men : " — from thence the morn 
 
 That smote the dusky slopes with praise. 
 
 Dawns now as in the olden days. 
 
 O welcome day, O welcome morn — 
 Good will to men, for Christ is born ! 
 From the steeples high in air 
 Ring, O bells, ring everywhere, 
 Till the music throbs and thrills 
 Through the valleys, o'er the hills ; — 
 
94 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 On the woodlands bare and brown, 
 The crowded mart, the busy town, 
 Ring the joyous welcome down ! 
 
 Come thou morn of song and mirth, 
 Make glad tlie white-robed, waiting earth. 
 Spread all thy treasures far and near, 
 Make all hearts warm, dry every tear. 
 Bring thou afresh to every thought 
 The living words divinely taught, 
 The deeds of love the Master wrought. 
 Let that glad song the angels sung 
 With trembling harp and glowing tongue, 
 Find answer in the self-same words, 
 That woke of old the golden chords. 
 And sweetly from the shining wall 
 Came down to earth — " Good will to all. " 
 
 We hail thy dawn ! — bring cheer to men 
 And warm the old year's heart again. 
 With snowy locks December stands 
 Mid sleet and storm ; — his wasted hands 
 A frosty scepter grasp and hold, — 
 His frame is bent, his limbs are old, — 
 His bearded lips are iced and pale, 
 He shivers in the winter gale. 
 Come then, O day of warm heart-cheer, 
 Make glad the waste and waning year. 
 While old December shivering goes 
 To rest beneath the drifted snows ! 
 
AT DAWN. 95 
 
 IN PEACE. 
 
 Across the dewy hills of dawn 
 
 The bugle call is blown ; 
 Why leap the echoes through the morn 
 
 When clouds of war have flown ? 
 
 A sweeter strain than rang of old 
 
 'Mid war's discordant bray, 
 It calls from mellow throat of gold 
 
 In camps of peace to-day ; 
 
 Broad fields where rest in wave-like flow, 
 
 O'er-run by summer's sheen, 
 With foamy spray of bud and blow, 
 
 The silent tents of green. 
 
 Through crowded ranks along the sward, 
 
 By unfrequented ways, 
 We pass unchallenged by the guard, 
 
 With flowers of love and praise. 
 
 From fields that drank the warm red rain 
 
 Their valor won release, — 
 No bugle call can break again 
 
 Their golden dream of peace. 
 
 AT DAWN. 
 
 All tired of life and full of weariness, 
 How oft we come to blessed night's repose 
 And 'ncath the veil that sleep about us throws, 
 
 Lose all our cares in sweet forgetfulness. 
 
 So far removed from busy jar and stress 
 
96 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 While sleep rebuilds the wasted tower of strength, 
 We scarce believe when morning dawns at length, 
 
 The stars have trod their round of watchfulness! 
 So when we waken full of rest at last 
 In matchless glory of the cloudless dawn — 
 
 This earthly span of being over-past, 
 
 Its luring phantoms evermore withdrawn, — 
 Refreshed by airs of that diviner sphere, 
 
 How like a vanished dream will all the past appear! 
 
 APRIL DAYS. 
 
 April morning rich and rare. 
 Sunrise glory in the air. 
 Birds of song are on the wing, 
 Ah, the melodies they bring. 
 Through the quiet morning hush 
 Note of sparrow, song of thrush. 
 When the robin's strain of praise 
 And the blue-bird's liquid lays ; 
 Sweet the peewee's song and then 
 The nervous twitter of the wren. 
 
 All the woodlands feel again 
 The touch of April sun and ram. 
 On the forest sloi:)es are seen 
 Nature's softest tints of green ; 
 Bursting buds are here and there 
 Waving in the golden air, 
 Tufted plumes and fairy frills 
 Seen against the leaning hills. 
 Buds that hid in many a fold 
 Petals of the rarest gold. 
 Tints of azure or of flame, 
 
SOME AFTER-SUPPER LINES, 97 
 
 Foam or flush of maiden shame 
 Now reveal their wealth between 
 Bursting bodices of green. 
 
 Where the runnel's winding ways 
 Gurgle under budding sprays, 
 And its limpid crystal drips 
 O'er the ledge's mossy lips, 
 Gladdening all the quiet glooms 
 There the alder hangs its plumes. 
 And the drooping willow grows 
 Greener where its laughter flows. 
 
 In the dells are lifted up 
 Many a sweet and tender cup, 
 Where the timid wild-flowers grow 
 By the lingering drifts of snow ; 
 'Neath the dead leaves hidden, twines 
 The modest may flower's rustic vine. 
 While its blooms in glad surprise. 
 Look up to the April skies, — 
 Sweetest wild-flowers wooed and won 
 By the fickle April sun. 
 All the hosts of growing things 
 Feel a stirring as of wings, 
 And are wakened from their dreams 
 By the warm and sunny gleams 
 Of April sunshine in the air, — 
 Springtime's splendor everywhere. 
 
 SOME AFTER-SUPPER LINES. 
 
 I MET a man the other day 
 
 Whose face with nipture beamed, 
 
 7 
 
98 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 I wish that all were half as glad 
 As that dear fellow seemed ; — 
 
 He took me kindly by the hand, 
 His smile was gay and light, 
 
 And whispered, '' Would I come and see 
 The Philos feast to-night?" 
 
 I shook my head — I couldn't tell — 
 
 And then he opened wide 
 His bearded lips and said^ " Of course 
 
 You'll feast yourself beside ! " — 
 That settled it : — I'd truly come ! — 
 
 Perhaps you may have heard 
 Some one regret the famine here 
 
 Because I kept my word ! 
 
 But back of this I queried well 
 
 What fare might here be had ; 
 In sooth to say, I learned too much, 
 
 It only made me sad. 
 Who could but grieve at such a time,- — 
 
 His eyes with sorrow fill, 
 That prosy speech must end the day, 
 
 That toast was on the bill ? 
 
 " Of course," he said, " You'll make a si^eech, 
 
 And write it out with care, 
 Impromptu things will never do 
 
 For this high-toned affair ! " 
 And furthermore he grieved to say, 
 
 Then closed his eyes and sighed, 
 "The Philos think a joke is green 
 
 Unless it's cut and dried ! " 
 
^OME AFTER-SUPPER LINES. 99 
 
 Since then I've racked my weary brain, 
 
 While fancy wandered far, 
 In search of some propitious trail 
 
 Beneath some kindly star. 
 But thought won't always come at will 
 
 No more than cream will rise 
 On milk already skimmed to death 
 
 And blue as April skies ! 
 
 You'll find it thus, — the sprites that keep 
 
 Thought's spindles whirling round. 
 Will sometimes take a holiday, 
 
 Not one can then be found ! 
 Then though it be a song, or joke. 
 
 Or speech, or what you will, 
 No grist can then be ground because 
 
 No sprite will turn the mill ! 
 
 Who has not mourned when all too late 
 
 His faulty prose or rhyme, 
 The brilliant things he might have said 
 
 If he had thought in time ? 
 So when this feast is fully past 
 
 And all the mischief done, 
 The merry sprites will homeward flock, 
 
 And turn the mill for fun ! 
 
 Most surface things are flat and stale, — 
 This doubtless you may know, — 
 
 But still we have to take the foam 
 To get the undertow. 
 
 The rarest thought comes always late, 
 I had no time to borrow, — 
 
100 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Please try this banquet o'er again, 
 And call on me to-morrow ! 
 
 AT THE GATE. 
 
 Down through the skies, from Heaven's portal 
 straying, 
 
 In beauteous guise she came, 
 Nor long enough her term of earthly staying 
 
 To take a shade of blame. 
 
 The summer voices caught a note of sweetness 
 
 From her first spoken words, — 
 Far richer, sweeter, in their full completeness, 
 
 Our darlings than the birds. 
 
 Where morning dwells is always golden bright- 
 ness — 
 
 She was our household dawn ; 
 Fairer she grew than lily in its whiteness, 
 
 Till from our sight withdrawn. 
 
 Astray from Heaven, the angel love supernal 
 
 Through her brief absence yearned, 
 Till calling her they crowned with life eternal 
 
 Her brow when she returnedo 
 
 And now she lives the blessed life immortal, — 
 
 Though tears will fall above her — 
 Forever safe within the golden portal. 
 
 Where still the angels love her. 
 
 Somewhere our way shall brighten like the dawn- 
 ing 
 
TO JOHN G. WHITTIER. 101 
 
 When dusky night has flown, 
 And we shall greet the ever-cloudless morning 
 And clasp again our own ! 
 
 Meanwhile the years grow weary with delaying, 
 
 The years that we must wait, 
 Till far beyond the shadows, Heavenward straying. 
 
 We meet her at the gate. 
 
 TO JOHN" G. WHITTIER. 
 
 O MINSTREL crowned with snow-white years, 
 
 And praised by many a tongue ; 
 How many eyes forget their tears 
 
 For words which thou hast sung. 
 
 How ring for right and truth thy lays 
 
 Along the toilful past, 
 What sunshine upon shadowed ways 
 
 Thy mellow songs have cast. 
 
 For briars of doubt and thorns of care 
 
 That weave a tangled maze. 
 Thy calm sweet faith and hopeful prayer 
 
 Have given flowers of praise. 
 
 For me, O poet, song arrayed. 
 
 The charm thy words impart, 
 Like singing birds of June have made 
 
 Glad summer in my heart. 
 
 And still I hold, though years will pass 
 
 Thy smile and cheer that day, 
 'Mid waving shadows on the grass. 
 
 And breath of new-mown hay. 
 
102 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 O restful hour !^how swift it sped : 
 
 But when I left thy door, 
 My doubtful starlight overhead 
 
 Had turned to dawn once more ! 
 
 So while the waning years depart 
 
 Across the winter snow, 
 Thy words of welcome in my heart 
 
 Make cheerful afterglow. 
 
 breathe thy words : — His ear will heed 
 The prayer by love upborne, — 
 That Heaven will down the slope still lead 
 As up the hills of morn." 
 
 Yea, more for thee my heart would claim, 
 
 But lip and tongue forbear, 
 My fairest speech would fail to frame 
 
 The still unuttered prayer. 
 
 One boon I crave : — forgive to-night 
 What best had been untold ; — 
 
 The head may err, — the heart is right, 
 And love is sometimes bold. 
 
 OUR REFUGE. 
 
 Though guiding suns and systems in their flight 
 
 Through realms sublimely fair, 
 No earth-born atom drifts beyond the sight 
 
 Of His most tender care. 
 
 No trill grows silent in the sparrow's song, 
 Nor timid eye grows dim. 
 
ENFRANCHISED. 103 
 
 No lily pales amid the meadow throng 
 But it is known of Him. 
 
 He is our refuge ; — safe on either hand, 
 
 By noonday, or by night, 
 Xo pestilence can smite us where we stand, 
 
 Nor poisoned arrow's flight. 
 
 His presence wraps us like a garment round ; 
 
 Together day by day 
 We journey on, while sweeter streams abound 
 
 And fairer grows the way. 
 
 ENFRANCHISED. 
 
 It comes at last, so long delayed, 
 
 By red ways battle-trod, 
 By cannon peal and flashing blade, 
 
 The victory of God. 
 
 land beloved, ye knew full well 
 God's vengeance sure and strong 
 
 Turned never backward, where it fell 
 It crushed the foulest wrong. 
 
 And still ye trod through clouded years 
 
 The wanton ways of shame. 
 Till voice of blood and voice of tears 
 
 Called down the avenging flame. 
 
 Well have ye learned by storm and blood 
 
 In fierce war's fiery van. 
 How vain to lift for help to God 
 
 The chains that shackle man. 
 
104 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Lift up your heads, O dusky race ! 
 
 Above Wrong's fading frown 
 Sits Justice with her patient face, 
 
 With manhood's robe and crown ! 
 
 ONLY TWO SUMMERS. 
 
 Sweetest Rosebud ! it was naeet 
 She should come when all things sweet 
 Had their waking — had their birth 
 For the glory of the earth. 
 
 So when springtime's bud and spray 
 Were touched with beauty by the May,- 
 When the early crocus' gold 
 Shook above the quickened mold 
 And the violets dewy wet 
 In the wayside nooks were set ; — 
 When arbutus' breath revealed 
 All its blossoms though concealed 
 Under dead leaves old and gray 
 Of the summers passed away ; — 
 With the bloom of apple-trees 
 And the hum of golden bees, 
 With the cherry clumps o'errun 
 With foamy blossoms in the sun. 
 With the sweetest music trilled 
 By the song-birds as they build 
 'Mid the branches' woven shade, 
 Then in angel light arrayed, 
 Down from Heaven's pearly gate 
 Strayed one day the baby Kate. 
 
ONLY TWO SUMMEBS. 105 
 
 Little do we dream or know 
 IIow the lilies bloom and grow, — 
 How from sun and air and mold 
 Build they cups of pearl and gold 
 Neither can we know or say 
 How our Rosebud day by day, 
 Grew to beauty in the land 
 Silently as flowers expand, 
 Only this we know is true, 
 Never bud or blossom grew 
 Where the golden sunbeams fall — 
 She was fairer than them all. 
 
 Sweeter than the sweetest thought 
 "Was the music that she brought. 
 Truly dimpled hands outreach 
 With more eloquence than speech. 
 Do not dainty finger-tips, 
 Rosy cheeks and rosy lips, — 
 Cooing tones, like mated birds, 
 That lack the rounded form of words. 
 Little pattering feet at loss 
 How the rill of light to cross 
 That the sunshine quivering o'er 
 Pours across the shaded floor, 
 Match for beauty, song and worth, 
 All the treasures of the earth ? 
 
 Who can tell the thoughts and plans 
 That busied little brain and hands, 
 While two summers' shade and shine 
 Stained the tulip cups with wine? 
 While her thoughts grew up to reach 
 
106 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Utterance in prattling speech, — 
 Sweeter far the lisping words 
 Than the rippling song of birds — 
 Summer faded ; — well-a-day, 
 Swift the seasons glide away. 
 Silently the golden days 
 Swam away in dreamy haze, 
 And the winter's rain and sleet 
 Crushed the dead flowers under feet. 
 
 White drifts now are piled between 
 Two summers' damasked robes of gre 
 Did she hear sweet voices call- 
 Voices from the jasper wall ? 
 Did the angels wish her home, 
 And softly beckon her to come ? 
 
 How could roses boom and grow 
 In an atmosphere of snow ? 
 They that have the Master's care 
 Bloom in Heaven's own lischt and air. 
 
 UNDER THE WILLOWS. 
 
 Where wild-birds build in quiet dells, 
 And soft, sw^eet airs around them stray,- 
 
 In cool glades where the twilight dwells, 
 We dream the hours away. 
 
 Within these wild- wood temple halls 
 Where music breathes in undertone, 
 
 How cool the noon-day shadow falls 
 On mossy crag and stone. 
 
UNDER THE WILLOWS. 107 
 
 The graceful birch with silver stem 
 
 Is fringed with wild vines trailing o'er— 
 
 Its broad tent wears the ivied hem 
 It wore in days of yore. 
 
 Its tangled clumps have thicker grown, 
 And hang like sunset's ruddy flames, 
 
 Against the carved trunk's snowy zone 
 And over sculptured names. 
 
 O, sweep the trailing fringe aside,— 
 
 The letters trace through dark brown stain, 
 
 While sunshine floods with golden tide 
 The fading lines again. 
 
 h ! rose-red lips and laughing eyes ! 
 Sweet angel faces, round me stand ! 
 Fair forms that passed beyond the skies 
 From childhood's sunny land. 
 
 One wears the same thick, curly hair 
 And clear, glad smile he ever wore ; 
 
 And one, the fairest of the fair, 
 Looks toward the peaceful shore. 
 
 One stands as in the long-lost years. 
 His brow by light-airs softly fanned ;— 
 
 One clasping in her childish fears. 
 Her brother's sun-browned hand. 
 
 Through golden years that would not stay, 
 These arches rang with youthful games, 
 
 And resting here one summer day, 
 We rudely carved our names. 
 
108 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Adown the hillside, through the shade, 
 The gleaming mill-stream winds and turns, 
 
 Tangling its vine of silver braid 
 Among the drooping ferns. 
 
 Bare feet tread lightly by the shore. 
 
 Sweet lilies wave from wet, white hands. 
 
 And childhood's voices ring once more 
 Along the embroidered sands. 
 
 The waves glide on, the lilies fall 
 
 And float far down the winding stream — 
 
 The old-time voices fainter call 
 The echoes through my di'eam. 
 
 Ah ! many years the robin's nest 
 
 Has swung in winds that moaned with cold. 
 And Junes, above the dreamers' rest, 
 
 Have tossed the daisy's gold. 
 
 Far through the vista's airy sweep. 
 Beyond the dusky twilight's gloom, 
 
 The meadows in their greenness sleep 
 And wave their clover blooms. 
 
 And farther where the marble stands 
 Beneath the willow's drooping spray, 
 
 The sleepers wait for angel hands 
 To roll the stone away. 
 
 AFTER THE WAR. 
 
 It is done ! 
 Hell has lost and heaven has won ! 
 Thunder it from every gun ! 
 
AFAEB THE WAR. 109 
 
 Let tlie cannon's wrathful lips 
 Tell of treason's dark eclipse, 
 Let its black throat belch and blaze 
 In a carnival of praise 
 
 Loud and long : — 
 God is just and truth is strong ! 
 
 Ring, O bells ! 
 On the throbbing air of spring- 
 Breath of bloom— your gladness fling. 
 Beat the warm air with your praises 
 Till it bursts the budding daisies, 
 Pearl and gold and hangs the roses 
 Where each patriot form reposes 
 'Mid the storm of shot and shell, 
 
 Where he fell! 
 
 Lips of prayer ! 
 Let your praises everywhere 
 Ring through all the crystal air. 
 See ! the rifted clouds withdrawn ! 
 Lo I the hill-tops bright with dawn ! 
 And over all the war-swept scene 
 Falls the light of peace serene ! 
 Awake and praise— the storm is spent, 
 God's smile is in the firmament ! 
 
 Sing, O Land ! 
 God, by his almighty hand. 
 Hath builded thee a temple grand ! 
 By His pillared cloud and flame 
 He hath led thee out from shame— 
 From oppression's night of gloom. 
 
liO A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Through the Red Sea's crimson foam ! 
 redeemed, awake a 
 The Lord is Kins:! 
 
 O land redeemed, awake and sing, 
 
 Sing, O birds ! 
 Warble out the sweetest words 
 Captive ears have ever heard. 
 To the weary bondman call, 
 Where the orange blossoms fall : — 
 " Hearts of anguish, brows of pain, 
 God's own hand hath loosed thy chain ! 
 Flit and sing, O birds of spring, 
 Well may all the heavens ring 
 
 With the nation's jubilee ! 
 
 Columbia's free ! 
 God be praised for liberty ! 
 Ye who waited sad and long 
 In your heritage of wrong, 
 Chained and bleeding, lashed and torn. 
 Watching for the coming morn. 
 Clash your cymbals — broken chains ! — 
 With Miriam sing — Jehovah reigns — 
 " He hath triumphed gloriously ! " 
 
 Mountain spars ! 
 Bear aloft o'er battle's scars 
 The Flag of Beauty !— Flag of Stars ! 
 Forever glow, O web of light. 
 More proudly burn, ye star-fires bright, 
 More grandly wave, o'er land and sea, 
 Thou emblem of true liberty ! 
 From dust and blood ye rise to wave 
 Henceforth above no bleeding slave ! 
 
THE NEW SLTCCESSION. HI 
 
 DAY BY DAY. 
 
 Do we gather and glean from the golden days 
 The measure of good tlieir connng brings, 
 
 Or grovel and grope in the crooked ways, 
 
 Unfanned by the breath of the passing wings ? 
 
 For the angels pass with the shining hours. 
 And sweet dews fall for the buds that yearn. 
 
 And touch with beauty the drooping flowers 
 That only to heaven in waiting turn. 
 
 The sweetest of manna our hearts may find 
 Each morning sown for our utmost needs ; — 
 
 But groping alone in the dark, and blind. 
 
 We may fill our hands with the rankest weeds. 
 
 Shall we trample the harvest's waving gold 
 Under our feet for the sluggard's bread? 
 
 Shall we feed on its bounties manifold. 
 
 Or hunger, and shrivel, and starve instead? 
 
 O gather no more the thistles of care. 
 The briars of hate and nettles of wrath. 
 
 When beautiful roses sweeten the air 
 And border with beauty our daily path. 
 
 THE NEW SUCCESSION. 
 
 The temple arches of the midnight glow 
 With diamond splendors o'er the hills of snow. 
 
 A bended form with wrinkled visage waits 
 Before the threshold of the starry gates. 
 
112 A SltEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The old light glows and kindles in his eyes, 
 While past his gaze lare visions sweep and rise. 
 
 And while he waits the soft and mellow chime 
 Of jangled sweetness from the bells of time 
 
 Breaks into song! — the gates of midnight swing, 
 And he is gone ! — the young New Year is King ! 
 
 TRUST. 
 
 Once more the song birds set the air athrill 
 
 With symphonies of praise. 
 And buds and blossoms grow to music's trill 
 
 In warm and sheltered ways. 
 
 How fair the earth in tender green arrayed, 
 
 How sweet the wild notes sung. 
 When tufted branches weave a web of shade 
 
 And new-made nests are swung. 
 
 How know the wild-birds when to take the wing 
 
 From Southern grove and clime? 
 What voices tell the dreaming earth that spring 
 
 Has brought the waking time ? 
 
 Nay, question not, nor doubt but birds can tell 
 
 The time to come and go, — 
 The earth to wake the sweet flowers in the dell. 
 
 Doth God not always know ? 
 
THE NE W TEA E. 113 
 
 THE NEW YEAR. 
 
 Rare splendor of the morning fall 
 
 On Time's heir softly down, 
 Who last night in the starry hall 
 
 Of midnight took his crown ; 
 Alone he stood beside the bier 
 
 And bowed his shining head 
 In silence o'er the crownless year 
 
 So pallid, cold, and dead ! 
 
 Light up, O dawn, his untrod way ! 
 
 O bells of gladness, ring ! 
 Crown him with joy this happy day, 
 
 The royalest new king ! 
 O ring till doubt and darkness flee, 
 
 Till shadow-flags are furled, 
 For over land and over sea 
 
 The New Year rules the world ! 
 
 Long live the King ! A happy reign ! 
 
 A loyal realm his own ! 
 No fields be his of gory slain, 
 
 But peace his pillared throne : 
 May no plague smite his heritage, 
 
 No secret foe beguile, 
 But ever on from youth to age 
 
 May golden plenty smile ! 
 
 O New Year, hailed with joy to-day, 
 
 Through all thy kingdom's span, 
 Work in thy reign the blessed sway 
 
 Of love that conquers man ! 
 
 Leave room no more for feud and hate, 
 8 
 
114 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Nor place for cruel scorn, 
 Sweep hollow shams from church and state,- 
 Be peace and good-will born ! 
 
 Speed on, O year, the time foretold, — 
 
 By bard and minstrel sung ; 
 Lead on the coming age of gold. 
 
 And give its praise a tongue : 
 So shall dissension's voice be stilled, 
 
 While strife and malice flee, 
 And earth's green hills and vales be filled 
 
 With sweetest charity. 
 
 KING MIDAS. 
 
 Once in the golden long ago, — 
 
 So says mythology, 
 The god Silenus old and gray 
 
 Went out upon a spree, 
 And got as drunk the records say, 
 
 As any man might be ' 
 
 And so it chanced while in this plight. 
 
 And reeling round one day, 
 Some merry clowns who crossed his path 
 
 Made him an easy prey, 
 And led him thus unto their king 
 
 To see what he would say. 
 
 King Midas saw his maudlin state 
 
 With bitter grief and pain. 
 And cared for him all tenderly 
 
 Since drink had been his bane, 
 
KING MIDAS. 115 
 
 Till old Silenus sober grew, 
 And was himself again. 
 
 And then a royal feast was spread 
 
 All ordered by the crown, 
 days of music, mirth, and cheer. 
 
 Through all the goodly town, 
 To honor this hilarious god 
 
 Who now had sobered down ! 
 
 The banquet done, the music hushed, 
 
 The echoes silent grown. 
 The generous god approached the king 
 
 Who sat upon his throne. 
 And begged that he would ask of him 
 
 Some boon for favors shown. 
 
 Now Midas was a greedy king 
 
 As ever reigned of old — 
 If we believe what chroniclers 
 
 Have plainly writ and told— - 
 For nothing here was half so fair 
 
 To him as yellow gold. 
 
 And so he craved of old Silene 
 
 That all his hands should clasp. 
 Or even touch, might turn to gold 
 
 Within his very grasp : — 
 A very foolish thing indeed 
 
 For any king to ask ! 
 
 Straightway the boon was granted him : 
 
 Ah, happy king, you say. 
 To have his coffers heaped and filled 
 
 In such a charming way — 
 
116 SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Such countless stores of yellow gold 
 And none to say him nay ! 
 
 And so King Midas thought himself, 
 And with his might and main 
 
 He wrought with his celestial charm 
 To win him golden gain, 
 
 Till weary with his toil he paused 
 With hunger's gnawing pain ! 
 
 The board was spread, the outpoured wine 
 Like rubies flashed and burned, 
 
 But on his lips to yellow dust 
 The mellow liquid turned ! 
 
 His touch transformed his very food ! 
 And left him starved and spurned ! 
 
 And when to quench his burning thirst, 
 His outstretched hands would seize 
 
 The luscious fruit, he found it grown 
 In far Hesperides, 
 
 And cursed with golden food he fell 
 Upon his royal knees, 
 
 And earnestly besought the gods 
 That they would him behold, 
 
 While he confessed his greed and shame 
 And penitently told 
 
 How daily gifts of heaven surpass 
 The touch that turns to gold. 
 
 From morn till noon, from noon till night 
 
 From dusky eve till dawn 
 Swe])t in her robes of royal state 
 
 Across the palace lawn, 
 
MY QUEST, 117 
 
 He begged the gods unceasingly 
 To have the boon withdrawn. 
 
 The gods propitious heard his cry. 
 
 And took his charm again, 
 And bade him bathe where Pactolus 
 
 Rolls on to meet the main, 
 And lo ! its borders gleamed with gold, 
 
 And golden still remain ! 
 
 And still the river winds to-day. 
 
 Though centuries have trod 
 Across its shining sands of gold 
 
 With lifted scepter rod, 
 And babbles of a, foolish king 
 
 And of a drunken god. 
 
 MY QUEST. 
 
 My friend with me one summer hour 
 Strolled in the waning light, 
 
 But while I paused to pluck a flower, 
 He passed beyond my sight. 
 
 I marveled not, the path did wind 
 And turn so much ; I said. 
 
 My eager steps the lost will find 
 A little way ahead. 
 
 So fared I as the foot-path led 
 Till long the distance grew ; 
 
 Alas ! his silent feet had sped 
 Yet farther than I knew. 
 
118 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 And still my eager quest is vain ; 
 
 No lisp of song or sound, 
 Brings healing for my growing pain, 
 
 The lost is yet un found ! 
 
 So late he walked the busy street, 
 
 The crowded ways of men, 
 I half expect 'mid those I meet 
 
 To see him come again. 
 
 What spell can stay his willing feet ? 
 
 O summer winds far blown, 
 Waft back some word of comfort sweet, 
 
 Some old familiar tone ! 
 
 Somewhere he waits though foot-path turns 
 
 And crao^s shut out the lio^ht : 
 I know the star in beauty burns 
 
 Though it be out of sight. 
 
 So while I watch the ebbing sands 
 
 A faith not wholly dead, 
 Whispers sometimes of clasping hands 
 
 Not very far ahead. 
 
 A BATTLE RELIC. 
 
 (Fort William Henry.) 
 1757. 
 
 A MISSILE of hate from the field of death. 
 Battered and bruised among the spheres 
 
 It hurtled against in the battle's breath, 
 And gnawed by the rust of a hundred years 
 
A BATTLE RELIC. 119 
 
 From the land it ploughed in the days of old, 
 By the sylvan lake's bewitching grace, 
 
 The ploughshare turned from the mellow mold 
 The crusted shot from its hiding place. 
 
 From its dreamless rest by the peaceful shore, 
 From the sleep of a century lone and long, 
 
 It comes again to the light once more, 
 The theme of the minstrel's humble song. 
 
 And this is the story it tells of shame. 
 The murderous deeds of a savage clan. 
 
 The withering blight on a soldier's name — 
 The broken faith of a perjured man. 
 
 Full softly the light of the dawning fell 
 
 Across the lake in a rosy glow, 
 And lighted the rude old fortress well. 
 
 That morn of a hundred years ago — 
 
 That morn when the winged missile flew 
 To its dreamless rest from a throat of flame, 
 
 While the notes that the bugle sternly blew 
 Closed the gap it made in the ranks of fame: 
 
 Ere the flush of the sunset laid its spell 
 
 On the heights where the fair morn looked 
 and smiled, 
 
 The fortress's banners forever fell 
 
 And its brave lay dead in the lonely wild. 
 
 And the smoke of battle and ruin filled 
 
 The valley of death, and the mouldering 
 brand 
 
120 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Marked the ghastly scene, while the wilderness 
 thrilled 
 With a shudder that crept through the des- 
 olate land. 
 
 More than a hundred years have swept, 
 Across the vale where the fortress stood. 
 While the murderous shot in the earth has slept, 
 Crusted and marred and stained with blood. 
 
 And this is the story the missile tells 
 
 Of the sack and siege by the treacherous foe 
 
 By the beautiful lake in the mountain dells 
 More than a hundred years ago ! 
 
 THE HERB CALLED HEART'S-EASE.' 
 
 Nay, nay, 'tis but a legend old, 
 
 A fable, not a truth, 
 Like that which led the Spaniard long 
 
 To seek the fount of youth. 
 
 And so I said there is no land 
 
 To-day that gives it room, 
 No patient star looks down upon 
 
 Its sweet and perfect bloom. 
 
 Perchance in some far distant clime 
 
 Its fragrance once was shed, 
 But now it lingers here no more, 
 
 The plant is long since dead. 
 
ON THE HILLS. 121 
 
 The years passed on : — my garden close, 
 
 Which I had thought so fan-, 
 Took seed one day from passing wings, 
 
 Which grew to something rare. 
 
 A lowly plant at first it seemed, 
 
 But grew from grace to grace, 
 Till brooding peace o'er-shadowed it, 
 
 And rested in tlie place. 
 
 And strangely still its beauty grows 
 
 And swings its bloom in air, — 
 No more a myth, or legend old. 
 
 For Heart's-ease groweth there ! 
 
 ON THE HILLS. 
 
 Along the hillside's tender green 
 The winding footpath strays, 
 
 Still mounting toward the breezy heights 
 We climbed in other days. 
 
 Across the clover fields of bloom 
 
 The rarest odors pass, 
 All silently as shadows drift 
 
 Above the waving grass. 
 
 Upon the wayside rocks I lean 
 
 And watch the sunset glow, 
 So like the golden light that fell 
 
 On us so lonsf acjo. 
 
 So fair ! and yet the perfect grace 
 The olden landscape wore, 
 
A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The years will never bring again, 
 Nor yet my loss restore. 
 
 For while the songs of brook and bird 
 
 Are trembling on my ear, 
 One sweeter strain of other days 
 
 I can no longer hear. 
 
 Could but the same old sunset fires 
 
 Upon the hill-tops burn. 
 And all the loss of vanished years 
 
 To me again return, 
 
 Alone I need not climb the way 
 
 All wearily and slow ; — 
 But you are on the hills of heaven, 
 
 And I the hills below. 
 
 TO H. W. LONGFELLOW ON HIS BIRTH- 
 DAY. 
 
 O rare sweet singer whom the nations honor. 
 
 For whom the people pray. 
 How many hands are lifted ujj in blessing 
 
 Above thy head to-day ! 
 
 For still a pilgrim on the busy highway, 
 
 Now sloping toward the sea, 
 Thou leanest to-day upon the Golden Milestone — 
 
 Three-score and ten and three. 
 
 It is thy birthday : where thy songs have w^andered 
 Glad hearts will speak thy nmae. 
 
TO LONGFELLOW ON UTS BIRTHDAY. 123 
 
 And twine affection's roses with the laurel 
 Of thy undying fame. 
 
 How fair thy crown ! How grand thy poet mission ! 
 
 To wing with truth thy song ; — 
 To lift the head bowed low in bitter anguish, 
 
 To make the weary strong ! 
 
 O songful gleaner in the fields of story ! — 
 
 From meadows near and far, 
 From starry voices softly o'er us bending, 
 
 Tliou teachest what we are. 
 
 Thy magic pen, like wand of the magician. 
 
 Waves o'er the dark unseen, — 
 And lo! in love's own royal grace and beauty. 
 
 Walks forth Evangeline. 
 
 For thy sweet song is hushed the voice of weeping 
 
 By firesides lone and sad. 
 Till doubt departs and sorrow is transfigured 
 
 To hope that maketh glad. 
 
 We joy with thee : — for even as love's evangel 
 
 Breathes through thy mellow lay, 
 From loyal hearts a silent benediction 
 
 Descends on thee to-day ! 
 
 So fare thee on, adown the slope descending, 
 
 Led by His gracious hand. 
 So ehalt thou bear at last " Hope's tender blossoms 
 
 Into the Silent Land." 
 
124 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 '« WATCHMAN ! WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? " 
 
 To-day the bugle's battle hymn 
 
 Is ringing from its throat of gold, 
 And War's red lips are fiercely grim 
 
 With mutterings of the wrongs of old ; 
 The measured tramp of armies breaks 
 
 The quiet hush, the peaceful calm, 
 The dreaming echo starts and wakes 
 
 To hear the cannon's murderous psalm. 
 
 It rings through all the stormy din, 
 
 Above the wrathful billow's swell, 
 The wild unrest of treason's sin — 
 
 The loathed and hated spawn of hell ; 
 Amid its solemn j^ause we hear 
 
 The ragged curse of dying wrong, 
 And then it swells so full and clear. 
 
 We know 'tis Freedom's deathless song ! 
 
 Though millions weej3, the noble slain 
 
 Who wear their badge of glorious scars. 
 Who sleej) and dream upon the plain 
 
 Their loyal dreams beneath the stars; — 
 The battle-troubled wave of time 
 
 To-day which rolls and cannot rest. 
 Shall bear through all the years sublime 
 
 A deepening glory on its crest ! 
 
 Lo ! gleaming shafts of cheering light 
 Flash up to heaven their golden spires, 
 
 They point to God through all the night — 
 Eternal Freedom's altar fires ! 
 
 And they shall burn despite the blood 
 
WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT. 125 
 
 In crimson storms upon them rained, 
 And nfiught can stay the arm of God 
 
 From justice to the scourged and chained I 
 
 We know the golden day will dawn, 
 
 Though night be dark, and stars be dim. 
 When Freedom, flooded by the morn, 
 
 Shall wake like Memnon, with a hymn : 
 For God is just who reigns on high, 
 
 And wrath divine, whicii slumbered long. 
 Is falling from the brightening sky 
 
 Upon the reeling hosts of wrong. 
 
 The clustering stars our banner bears 
 
 In constellated light shall glow. 
 Though Treason kindle direst wars 
 
 And crimson rivers stream and flow. 
 No star-bedimmed — no Pleiad lost ! 
 
 No reign of chaos' wildest night 
 Shall quench one beam of peerless cost, 
 
 Or stain one s^^ray of purest light ! 
 
 God speed the day whose dawning hour 
 
 Shall flood with light the crimson rain, 
 And see the avenging arm of power 
 
 Sweep from Columbia every stain ; — 
 And crush foul Treason's hydra head 
 
 'Neath Freedom's bannered stars unfurled, 
 And Right, and Might, and Justice wed 
 
 Through all the kingdoms of the world. 
 
 1864. 
 
126 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 PASSING THE LIGHT. 
 
 As one who sails the blue waves of the sea, 
 
 By wind and wave borne on across the foam, 
 By night oft passes where the headlands lift 
 
 Their steady lights by which he steers for home 
 So we, borne on across the sea of years, 
 
 Long tossed, but gaining on the homeland shore 
 While stars dip down along the fading track 
 
 And brighter constellations rise before. 
 Pass once again the beacon's friendly light 
 
 Whose genial glow lies on the waters cold, 
 And kindles far along the homeward track, — 
 
 On spar and sail the storms so oft enfold ; 
 And on we drift where tides turn never back, 
 
 And this way lie the shining capes of gold. 
 
 FOR THE BRAVE. 
 
 The murky clouds of war have flown, 
 
 Our battle-flags are furled. 
 The cannon's breath no more is blown 
 
 Across the startled world. 
 
 The stormy years of strife have fled. 
 
 The peace which reigns to-day. 
 Was won by blood of martyred dead 
 
 Beneath the flowers of May. 
 
 We breathe the freshened air that fills 
 
 The summer dome of blue 
 And fans with life our northern hills, 
 
 Since they were brave and true. 
 
FOR A CRYSTAL WEDDING. 127 
 
 For them the kindly May returns 
 
 With generous sun and showers, 
 And o'er our martyred heroes yearns 
 
 With all her soul of flowers. 
 
 We hold them brave and loyal yet, 
 
 And twine with greener sprays, 
 A fresh wreath round their memories, set 
 
 With bud and bloom of praise. 
 
 FOR A CRYSTAL WEDDING. 
 
 When Adam left the guarded gate 
 
 To wander far and wide. 
 One ray of sunshine cheered his fate — 
 
 Eve wandered by his side ; 
 And though their weary feet did press 
 
 The waste for many a mile. 
 Love planted all the wilderness, 
 
 And made the desert smile. 
 
 O sacred bond of heavenly birth 
 
 That makes the world so fair ! — 
 The richest legacy to earth 
 
 Since loss of Eden rare ; — 
 Sweet boon to gladden high and low 
 
 And light each clouded way, 
 With home's bright altar-fires which glow 
 
 Where wedded love holds sway. 
 
 Since earth in darkness may have wheeled 
 
 Through rayless realms of cold 
 Had bridal bells no gladness pealed, 
 
128 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Nor plighted vows been told; — 
 We well may clasp the angel hand 
 
 Of Love that reaches down, 
 And hail the light of Eden-land 
 
 Which comes our race to crown ! — 
 
 Alas ! the years, how swift they pass, 
 
 How fleet the seasons fly ! 
 Old Father Time with scythe and glass 
 
 Is always jogging by; 
 No shady wayside cool and sweet 
 
 Can ever lure to stay. 
 Or pause to rest his weary feet 
 
 A moment by the way. 
 
 Still on and on his pathway runs 
 
 Through lands of blight and bloom, 
 'Neath tropic heat of summer suns 
 
 And frozen wastes of gloom ; 
 With bended form and wrinkled face 
 
 And shadowed brow of pain, 
 He journeys on with solemn pace 
 
 And ne'er returns again ! 
 
 We may not stay his silent flight 
 Nor hope to lure him back, 
 
 Yet memorv sifts her sands to-nis^ht 
 Far down his beaten track; 
 
 And lighted by their golden glow 
 Again the past appears, 
 
 Far winding through the vale below 
 Of fair but vanished years ! 
 
 We need no magic glass to see 
 The valley leading down, 
 
FOE A CRYSTAL WEDDING. 129 
 
 The bill-slope and the spreading tree, 
 Ahe farm-house old and brown : — 
 
 Just as it stood, to-day it stands, 
 While vines are trailing low. 
 
 To shut it in from meadow lands, 
 As years and years ago. 
 
 What plighted vows were whispered here ! — 
 
 What sweet romances spun ! 
 In that divinest atmosphere 
 
 What ojolden dreams bei2fun ! — 
 You know it all ; I need not tell 
 
 The story never old, 
 First learned in Eden's shady dell 
 
 And since through ages told ! 
 
 And so we joy with you to-night 
 
 Full loyally and true, 
 By day your pathway glows, with light, 
 
 By night the stars shine through ; 
 For Love hath winged the weary feet 
 
 And sunshine crowned the day, 
 While childhood's voices clear and sweet, 
 
 Have gladdened all the way. 
 
 Dear friends whom now we greet and cheer 1 
 
 Heaven's blessing on your store. 
 And still through every changing year 
 
 God speed you more and more, — 
 Till all the weary miles are passed 
 
 And shadows merge in sun. 
 Where life's long valley ends at last 
 
 And golden heights are won ! 
 
130 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 DECORATION DAY. 
 
 While through the loyal land to-day 
 Whose peace no passion mars, 
 
 The mellow bugles ring and play, 
 The old flag lifts its stars. 
 
 Above the green and grassy mounds 
 Where hands are crossed in rest, 
 
 The sweetest Mayflowers' woven crowns 
 Are laid on valor's breast. 
 
 The rarest blooms of sun and rain 
 
 Are not too sweet nor fair. 
 To deck the silent ranks of slain 
 
 Who sleep in glory there. 
 
 AYhere red war SAvept the wasted land 
 
 With fever-breath of flame, 
 They bore the battle's lifted brand 
 
 In freedom's sacred name. 
 
 The green earth gives them quiet room, 
 And guards them far and near; 
 
 She gives her bud and leaf and bloom, 
 Nor holds her gifts too dear. 
 
 And those who sleep where none may know. 
 Unmarked by stone or name, — 
 
 Who heed not how the seasons go — 
 The voice of praise or blame, 
 
 Kind nature keeps with tender care, 
 
 The stars watch from above. 
 And May-time sets her glad smile there 
 
 With all its wealth of love. 
 
A NEIV YEAR'S GREETING. 181 
 
 Above their dreams the grasses lean 
 
 Through all the summer days, 
 To keep their loyal memories green 
 
 With tenderest meed of praise. 
 
 And where they lie in all the land, 
 
 On plain, or mountain's crest, 
 Sweet May has spread with lavish hand 
 
 Her flowers above their rest. 
 
 A NEW YEAR'S GREETING. 
 
 To J. G. W. 
 
 From southern slopes still clad in sober brown, 
 Where briefer winter breathes in milder gales 
 Than those that sweep thy own New England vales 
 And hills of white beneath a snowy crown, 
 I send thee greeting: though the skies may frown 
 And bitter chill hold all the land in thrall. 
 One heart, in love, would blessing on thee call ; — 
 God send on thee his peace and quiet down. 
 Thrice Happy New Year ! O my friend, to thee ! 
 Each golden hour from ill bear sweet release, 
 May sunshine bid each dusky shadow flee, 
 And o'er thee shine the blessed stars of peace. 
 God crown thee well and make thy journey long, 
 Whose four-score years have gladdened earth with 
 song. 
 
132 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 TO A DEAD POET. 
 
 O FBiEND who sang of "Summer Dreams," 
 
 How hushed thy mellow lay, 
 How dark the world without thee seems. 
 
 Where strayest thou to-day ? 
 
 We know not where thy footsteps are. 
 
 But in thy manhood's prime, 
 We know that thou hast wandered far 
 
 Beyond the gates of time. 
 
 So far, and yet no word of thine, 
 
 Nor laurel freshly won. 
 Breathed faintest hint, or secret sign, 
 
 That half thy work was done ! 
 
 Was that a prophecy inwrought 
 
 Upon thy pictured page. 
 Where glows the poet's golden thought 
 
 With wisdom of the sage ? 
 
 Three vases there hold precious hoard ; 
 
 In two the wealth is told. 
 And from the broken crystal poured. 
 
 Is seen the ruddy gold. 
 
 But one, unbroken, still is sealed, 
 
 And holds its treasure fast. 
 Till on the glowing page revealed, 
 
 Behold the third, and last! 
 
 And didst thou know, so young and strong, 
 When life with love was sweet. 
 
 That breaking this fair vase of song 
 Would make thy task complete? 
 
DICKENS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 133 
 
 It may be thus : we may not know 
 What new sense nearness brings, 
 
 Since some have felt the daisies grow, 
 And heard the noise of wings ! 
 
 Rest on, O friend 1 the guerdon won, 
 
 And sweet thy rest shall be ; 
 Dream on, thy work is nobly done. 
 
 And love shall follow thee. 
 
 Thy goal was not this shadow-land, 
 
 But far beyond the blue. 
 And thou hast reached the golden strand, 
 
 And all thy dreams are true ! 
 
 DICKENS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 
 
 Amid the silent throng. 
 
 Immortal grown in song. 
 
 We trace his carven name. 
 
 So dear to deathless fame. 
 
 Praise cannot flatter him 
 
 Beyond the border din, 
 
 Though love's sweet flowers may shed 
 
 Their fragrance round him dead. 
 
 Within the solemn gloom 
 
 That watches o'er his tomb. 
 
 Since where he lived and wrought 
 They bless him for his thought, 
 Not less to-day, may we 
 Revere his memory. 
 Though dead his influence thrills 
 O'er all the tented hills— : 
 
134 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 Where'er his native tongue 
 In melody has rung, 
 On every land and shore 
 His fame lives evermore ! 
 
 Who by his magic power 
 Lighted the gloomy hour, 
 And with his wizard pen 
 Made glad the hearts of men 
 On whom no ray was shed 
 From starlight overhead ; — 
 Who for the lowliest lot 
 Touched the dark leprous spot 
 Of want and woe and sin, 
 And let the sunshine in ; — 
 Who wrought as best he could 
 To lure all men to good, 
 And so by loyal ways 
 From all hearts gathered praise- 
 Him can no people claim. 
 For world-wide is his fame. 
 
 Proud England laid him down, 
 Made royal by no crown 
 Save that which genius brings 
 Amid her queens and kings. 
 With folded hands at rest 
 Upon his manly breast — 
 The minster gloom his pall, 
 The kingliest king of all ! 
 
 There in the Abbey old 
 Where twilights soft enfold 
 Beneath their dusky wings 
 
DICKENS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 135 
 
 The orarnered dust of kinoes 
 We muse amid the gloom 
 Beside his loyal tomb, 
 'Neath fretted arch and wave — 
 His grand cathedral grave. 
 
 Around him here and there 
 In the great fane of prayer 
 Are kings in days of old 
 Under the marbles cold ; — 
 Queens who reigned and died, 
 Now lying side by side ; — 
 Queen Bess of royal fame, 
 And Mary of Scottish name, 
 Long lines of princely sway, 
 Whose thrones have j^assed away, — 
 Almost their names unknown 
 Except for car v en stone ; 
 Soldiers whose brows austere 
 Have gloomed a hemisphere ; 
 The hero of peace so grand 
 Brought home from Af ric's land ; 
 Statesmen whose words are still 
 Nerving the heart and will ; 
 Poets whose songs sublime 
 Will ring through coming time ; 
 And him who saw afar 
 Beyond the utmost star 
 The law which all outruns, 
 Threading the stars and suns ! 
 Such is the silent throng 
 Waiting around him long. 
 
136 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 But when the waning light, 
 Through Chancel's window dight 
 With storied pilgrim train 
 Of old romance again, 
 Touches with fading glow 
 Statue and tomb below, 
 While dusky twilight waits 
 Before the starry gates 
 In beauty wide unfold, 
 What visions are unrolled ! 
 
 Perchance 'twill only seem 
 As but an idle dream : 
 But when the organ's tone 
 Trembles through every stone, 
 And rolls its swelling wave 
 Through chapel, crypt, and nave. 
 The children of his brain 
 Throng round him there again, 
 And through the mystic glow 
 Pass forms that you may know ! 
 Yonder with shining face 
 And form of manly grace, 
 A portly form draws near, 
 Whom sages nod to hear ! 
 And one whose hopeful smile 
 Beams sweetly all the while. 
 Still trusting more and more 
 For greater good in store. 
 Another passes near 
 Through the dusky atmosphere, 
 His hungry youth is o'er, 
 He pleadeth not for more, 
 
DICKENS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 137 
 
 But in his manhood's pride, 
 With beauty by his side, 
 He seemeth satisfied. 
 
 Hard-hearted, grim and old 
 Bends Scrooge above his gold, 
 While ghastly, pale and shy. 
 Old Marley's ghost flits by ! 
 Not least amid them all 
 Is Dombey's little Paul ; 
 So fair, yet full of pain. 
 Borne on amid the train. 
 He hears the waves at play 
 Still wondering what they say. 
 
 Now through the shadows dim 
 Stalks Squeers, the master grim, — 
 Type of the soulless greed 
 That fattens on childhood's need, — 
 While Fagin with thievish leer, 
 And fiendish Quilp appear. 
 
 There pillowed on her bed. 
 Passes a shiny head. 
 As though some sunny sheen 
 Had softly slid between 
 The shadows, making clear 
 The dusky atmosphere ; 
 They stand about her there 
 As tranced in solemn prayer, 
 And when the shadow falls 
 Darker on Abbey walls. 
 With heart-ache none can tell 
 They weep for Little Nell. 
 
138 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 The shadows deepen where 
 Waves Little Dorrit's hair ; 
 Round Barnaby's wild joy, 
 And Dot's entrancing boy ; 
 Round Mckleby, the tried, 
 And Coi3perfield beside, 
 And hosts I cannot name, 
 All born to deathless fame. 
 
 Moonrise is in the sky ; — 
 The phantoms fade and fly, 
 As stars are lost in light 
 They vanish out of sight ; 
 And drawing near his grave 
 In the great temple's nave. 
 My withered buds of praise 
 I lay beside the bays 
 Which faithful love has thrown 
 Upon his sculptured stone, 
 And leave amid the gloom 
 The dead magician's tomb. 
 
 THE DYING YEAR. 
 
 " The King is dead I — 
 Long live the King! " 
 
 The year's last sunset burning low 
 
 Has faded from the sky, 
 And all the hill-tops white with snow 
 
 Have blushed to see it die. 
 
 Where first he stood in kingly might 
 To take his shining crown, 
 
THE DYING YEAR. 139 
 
 The year will pause awhile to-night 
 To lay his sceptre down. 
 
 And in the lonely midnight hall — 
 
 His royal s23lendors fled — 
 Old winter's white-frilled robe will fall 
 
 To hide his crownless head. 
 
 The stars will lend their fitful gleam 
 
 To gild the midnight snows, 
 So softly folded o'er his dream 
 
 In sleep's sublime repose. 
 
 So passes all his glorious prime 
 
 As endless years have done, 
 Since first the morning hills of time 
 
 Grew golden in the sun. 
 
 And while we fondly linger near, 
 
 The final dream unsought, 
 We hold the Old Year's memory dear 
 
 For all the good he wrought. 
 
 So kindly was his gentle sway, ^ 
 
 So glad his golden reign. 
 We linger by his closing day 
 
 And wish him crowned again. 
 
 Lo ! how through all the waiting land 
 
 Beneath his lifted crown. 
 His train went forth — in beauty grand 
 
 To scatter largess down ! 
 
 On rich and poor alike has laid 
 The bounty he has won, 
 
140 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 While once again the world has made 
 The circuit of the sun. 
 
 He called the earth from slumbers deep, 
 He broke her frozen dream, 
 
 And warmed the sluggish pulse of sleep 
 "With springtime's sunny gleam : 
 
 Till all the tides of life grew strong 
 Through nature's hidden ways, — 
 
 Till wind and wave and bird and song 
 Were glad with summer's praise. 
 
 From songful rain and golden sheen 
 When winter storms were furled, 
 
 He wrought the meadow's woven green, 
 The harvests of the world. 
 
 The luscious fruits of autumn-time 
 Were scattered in his train, 
 
 And where he passed in every clime 
 Were garners heaped with grain. 
 
 If ever o'er his peaceful path 
 ■^ The baleful fires have spread 
 
 Of lurid passion's kindled wrath, 
 Of battle's stormy tread ; — 
 
 If in some vine-wreathed land afar 
 Where summer laughed and leaned 
 
 Beneath the deadly plague's red star. 
 The silent Reaper gleaned ; 
 
 If 'neath the sunshine's gracious smile 
 
A DYING VEAB. 141 
 
 Want's ghastly presence stood awhile 
 And cast its spell of pain ; 
 
 His breath across the azure bay — 
 
 The shoreless sea of blue, 
 Far swept the murky clouds away 
 
 And let the sunbeams through. 
 
 And over wave and over wood 
 
 He poured the mellow shine, 
 That stayed the reaper where he stood 
 
 Amid the hills of vine. 
 
 From stores of plenty's golden grain 
 
 His bounty ripened well. 
 He stilled the cry of Imnger's pain 
 
 Where blight and famine fell. 
 
 And every land beneath the sun 
 
 Has felt his genial sway, 
 His gracious ministries have run 
 
 World-wide their shining way. 
 
 And when the starry line drew near 
 
 No sandalled foot hath trod. 
 He brought the kindly Christmas cheer, 
 
 The gracious gift of God. 
 
 When peace on earth, good-will below, 
 
 On wings of song uprose, 
 He paused above the hills of snow 
 
 As waiting for its close. 
 
 Awhile beneath the patient blaze 
 Of starry midnight's spell, 
 
142 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 He turned below his longing gaze 
 On lauds he loved so well. 
 
 But when the solemn chimes were told 
 
 Above his royal head, 
 Low drooped his sceptre's frosted gold- 
 
 The crownless king was dead ! 
 
 Alas ! alas ! the gray Old Year ! 
 
 This wreath of song we bring 
 To lay upon his white-robed bier ; — • 
 
 Then cry — " Long live the King ! " 
 
 LINES 
 
 Read on the Tenth Anniversary of St. John's Literary 
 Association, Sept. 17, 1885, Concord, Pa. 
 
 Alas, for me ! no help is mine, 
 
 I build my tower alone ; 
 Not one of all the singing nine 
 
 Will lift a hand, or stone. 
 
 How sweetly some are born to shine 
 
 Without a thought or care ; 
 While some in sorrow must repine, 
 
 Or borrow what they wear. 
 
 The dandelion's disc of gold 
 
 When all its race is run, 
 Is but a nodding gray-beard old — 
 
 A seed-globe in the sun ! 
 
 The ragged thistle, brave and gay, 
 Keeps all its sabres keen — 
 
LINES. 143 
 
 When frailer blooms are passed away, 
 Its armor still is green. 
 
 The brightest colors quickly fade, 
 
 All fashions have their day ; 
 The dude will mildew in the shade. 
 
 When sober sense will stay. 
 
 What limitations hedge us round ! 
 
 But set the pinion free, 
 How might we scale the closing bound ! — 
 
 What sages might we be ! 
 
 The soaring thought would rise and grow — 
 
 Its wings unfurl in air ; — 
 The mind immortal grasp and know 
 
 The how and why and where ! 
 
 Canst tell how white-rimmed daisies grow ? 
 
 Where drift the clouds away ? 
 Why all the leaves do whisper so 
 
 Or what the wild waves say ? 
 
 In vain, in vain, we question so ; 
 
 The anxious thought returns ; — 
 But oh, to scale this height and know — 
 
 How hope aspires and burns ! 
 
 So runs our dream — we sleep and wake — 
 
 Nor know the how or why 
 Of half the common things that break 
 
 Upon our longing eye ! 
 
 Still hangs our being's pictured scroll — 
 So pass the shadows by, 
 
 i 
 
144 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 . Wbile golden years of life unroll 
 Beneath a changeful sky. 
 
 A wondrous web of woven days, 
 All crossed by changeful bars 
 
 Of rising morns, and noontide blaze— 
 Of setting suns and stars. 
 
 Whereon a glowing picture stands, 
 
 A strange design appears, 
 All blindly wrought by careless hands 
 
 Through light or clouded years. 
 
 A greening leaf — a bud full blown — 
 A blotch of autumn's gold — 
 
 So soon the perfect flower is grown, 
 So soon its life is told ! 
 
 Behold the lilies, how they grow ! 
 
 Rare green and gold their crown, 
 Or whiter than the drifted snow, 
 
 They drop their petals down. 
 
 Their glory passes quickly by. 
 So soon their robes are lost ! 
 
 While hazels bloom 'neath winter's sky 
 Unmindful of the frost. 
 
 So in the meadow's pictured lin 
 And in the gardens crowned, 
 
 In blooms that neither toil nor spin 
 Our changing state is found. 
 
 Above the fair green-bladed hills 
 Our footsteps tread to-day, 
 
LINES. 145 
 
 What light the bended heaven fills ! — 
 What shadows flee away ! 
 
 The rugged path with song is rife 
 
 'Neath fortune's favored smile, 
 While birthdays build the shrines of life 
 
 Where each may rest awhile. 
 
 The way is long — so pause we here, 
 
 Though heaven be clear or wild, 
 We come from far — we come from near, 
 
 With greetings for our child ! 
 
 Ten years ago, 'mid autumn days, 
 Whose glory crowned the earth — 
 
 Amid the Indian summer's haze 
 Our nurseling had her birth. 
 
 This is her birthday ! — only ten ! — 
 
 A goodly child and strong ; 
 What grace through all the walks of men 
 
 She bears amid the throng I 
 
 If half a score of years unfold 
 
 Such matchless beauty rare, 
 When other added years are told 
 
 What will the measure bear ? 
 
 All hail St. John's ! — the name we tell 
 
 Still lingers on the tongue. 
 To-night for her our praises swell, 
 
 And birthday bells are rung ! 
 10 
 
146 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 GLADSTONE. 
 
 Brave chieftain thou in battle's stormy van ! 
 
 Thy snowy hair is more than regal crown — 
 
 White badge of triumph over error's frown, 
 Through toilful years where thou hast wrought for 
 
 man ! 
 Opposed by greed and blinded faction's clan 
 
 Bravely thy words the burning wrong assail ! 
 
 Take heart — hope on ! The right shall yet 
 prevail ! — 
 Truth lives forever ! — wrong the briefest span. 
 
 Thou canst not fail ! —the work so well begun, 
 
 The passing years can never long delay ; 
 Thine be the triumph Avhen the strife is done, 
 
 When hate shall yield to love and pass away. 
 Proud England then, forgetful of her shame, 
 Shall crown her son and keep his deathless fame ! 
 
 1886. 
 
 TO A NONAGENARIAN. 
 
 Thy pilgrim feet have journeyed far 
 Beyond the measured span — 
 
 The three-score years and ten that bar 
 The weary life of man. 
 
 As one upon some mountain's crown 
 Stands in the golden gleam. 
 
 Of broad horizons bending down. 
 Aglow with sunset's dream, — 
 
FOR A SILVER WEDDING. 147 
 
 So standest tbou upon the height 
 
 Whose glory now appears, 
 Transfigured in the mellow light 
 
 Of ninety golden years ! 
 
 A mount of vision ! far and wide 
 
 The goodly landscape lies, 
 Far reaching to the morning tide 
 
 Beneath the glowing skies. 
 
 While fair the winding valleys sleep 
 
 In deep repose below, 
 May all the forward slope still keep 
 
 The sunset's rosy glow ! 
 
 So shall the light of eventide 
 
 Fall round you where you stand, 
 
 Till all the starry gates swing wide 
 To show the Morning Land ! 
 
 FOR A SILVER WEDDING, 
 
 Dear friends from out the blinding storm 
 
 Of winter's sullen sway. 
 From hearts with old-time memories warm, 
 
 We send you cheer to-day. 
 
 A Happy New Year ! well you know 
 What joy the greeting bears — 
 
 How all the past stands out aglow 
 Above its vanished cares= 
 
 Well may you turn and backward gaze 
 O'er paths your feet have trod — 
 
148 ^ SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 O'er sunward slopes and shaded ways, 
 Beneath the smile of God. 
 
 From toil-worn heights of glowing noon 
 Row short the way appears, 
 
 Where two have trod with sandal-shoon 
 The half of fifty years ! 
 
 So take your wayside rest to-day, 
 O friendsj and still be strong : — 
 
 God's peace make fair your future way, 
 And ever glad with song. 
 
 As down the winding slope you turn 
 Where autumn's sun-tints gleam, 
 
 May all the kindly lights that burn 
 Show true your fairest dream ! 
 
 Fly on, O wedded days of gold. 
 As shadows sweep the lawn : — 
 
 God grant when all the years are told, 
 You hear the bells of dawn ! 
 
 MORNING. 
 
 Faintly stars are gleaming 
 
 On the brow of day. 
 Softly shadows stealing 
 
 From the world away ; 
 Rosy light of morning 
 
 Gilds the clouds unfurled 
 Waving like a banner 
 
 O'er the wakincc world. 
 
ABSENCm 149 
 
 Golden sunbeams falling 
 
 Over hill and plain, 
 Wreathing forms of heauty 
 
 Float to heaven again ; 
 Pearly dew-drops sleeping, 
 
 'Mid the blushing flowers, 
 Flashing gems of beauty, 
 
 Gleaming from the bowers. 
 
 weetly bird-notes chiming, 
 
 With the gushing streams, 
 Rippling through the shadows. 
 
 Floating, murmuring dreams ; 
 Loftly floats the music 
 
 On the balmy air — 
 Morning, glorious morning, 
 
 Smiling everywhere ! 
 
 ABSENCE. 
 
 O Summer days, why linger so ? 
 Why idly o'er the meadows go ? 
 When Love was here and hand in hand 
 We walked together through the land, 
 You sped so swiftly on your way 
 We sued to have you pause and stay. 
 
 O would St thou then the secret know, 
 Why thus so dreamily we go ? 
 Why by the breath of roses fanned 
 We linger idly o'er the land ? — 
 Ah ! fleet wings weary in their flight 
 Always when Love is out of sight ! 
 
150 A SHEAjr OF POEMS. 
 
 Then hasten Love and homeward flee 
 To arms that wait to welcome thee ! 
 N"or flight of days, or swift or slow, 
 Shall keep us from the joys we know, 
 When side by side and hand in hand 
 We walk again the summer land. 
 
 A SUMMER MADRIGAL. 
 
 I'm wandering by the brookside 
 
 With Mary Ann to-day. 
 The while I fan my classic brow 
 
 And brush the flies away, 
 And I shall linger here full long 
 
 If Mary Ann will stay I 
 
 The singing brook runs on and on 
 
 As in a quiet dream, 
 And all the meadow hills around 
 
 Are mirrored in the stream — 
 The very lilies in the brook 
 
 Give back a fairer gleam ! 
 
 The shadows lie so sweet and cool, 
 The grove with rapture thrills, 
 
 The fishes seek the reedy pools 
 To cool their crimson gills. 
 
 While singing ducks glide down the stream 
 And liquidate their bills ! 
 
 The August sun is at its best. 
 
 The pigeons flit and coo, 
 Pet here along the brookside 
 
 The tempered air will do — 
 
THE AGE OF GOLD. 151 
 
 Though doubtless hot for tliree, or more, 
 It's cool enough for two ! 
 
 We heed no more the heated term 
 Though mercury rise like leaven, 
 
 Or soar upon its seething wing 
 Way over ninety-seven — 
 
 Have we not, 'mid the shadows here, 
 Almost a taste of heaven ? 
 
 What vistas ope— what scenes appear? 
 
 What airy rainbows span 
 Our winding path with not a breath 
 
 To mar the dream, or ban — 
 I think it most exquisite here — 
 
 And so does Mary Ann ! 
 
 THE AGE OF GOLD. 
 
 In every land — in every favored clime, 
 
 All down the ages since the birth of time. 
 
 Each puny king has sought to set his name 
 
 High over all upon the lists of fame. 
 
 And thrones and kingdoms tottering to their fall 
 
 Have deemed their age the wisest, best of all. 
 
 So through all lands where war's red course has run 
 And conquest spread its borders 'neath the sun, 
 Where might has ruled as with an iron sway. 
 While right, defenseless, could but weep and pray. 
 The bards have sung, and sages wise have told 
 The shining splendors of the Age of Gold. 
 
 So classic Greece amid the purple seas 
 Saner in her time the age of Pericles. 
 
152 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 When shone the sun on such a land as this, 
 So grandly crowned with her Acropolis ? 
 There proudly sprang the Parthenon sublime — 
 The marble wonder of the latest time — 
 Whose sculptured friezes as a written scroll 
 Her deeds of glory to the world unroll. 
 Rare splendors live on history's glowing page 
 To mark the era of her golden age, 
 While fane and temple, rent and crumbled down, 
 Declare the glory of her old renown. 
 
 The later bards have sung in measured rhyme 
 The grander glories of the Roman time, 
 When wise Augustus ruled with golden sway, 
 And Rome was changed to marble from its clay. 
 Then sprang and grew those grand, heroic lays, 
 Which from the ages take their meed of praise; 
 Then Tully's thunders in the senate hurled. 
 Shook thrones and kingdoms and the Roman world ; 
 Her name and fame the conquering legions bore 
 In royal triumph to the farthest shore. 
 And tribute brought from olden lands and new 
 Proclaimed how far the Roman eagle flew. 
 
 Her glory faded — still her bards remain 
 And live immortal in the epic's strain ; 
 And Ctesar's j^alace even in decay 
 But shadows faintly that imperial day. 
 Whose brightness faded with its slow decline. 
 While dust is heaped on Caesar's royal line ! 
 
 Fair Albion throned amid the stormy roar 
 Of northern seas that beat her rocky shore, 
 Full proudly gloried in the golden sheen 
 
THE AGE OF GOLD, 153 
 
 That centred round her stately, virgin queen ; — 
 An age of learning worthily enrolled 
 As royal England's boasted age of gold, 
 
 When valiant Sidney told in golden phrase 
 The simple story of Arcadian days, 
 And dreaming Spenser saw with vision keen 
 The charming guest of beauty's Fairy Queen ; — 
 When Shakespeare reared the drama's mighty fame 
 And peopled it from his prolific brain, — 
 And later, Milton sang, in strains sublime, 
 The grandest epic known to any time ; — 
 Search through the ages — still it will be found — 
 No brighter era has her annals crowned. 
 
 And so all lands reveal on hisitory's page 
 
 Some favored time they call the golden age, — 
 
 Some shining era glowing with renown, 
 
 Whose light and beauty are the nation's crown. 
 
 Yet grander far than all the ages flown 
 
 The grand to-day — the age we call our own 
 
 How far surpassing any ancient dream 
 
 The magic wonders of the age of steam ! 
 
 The age that tames the lightning's fiery will 
 
 And zones the world with thouo'ht's electric thrill ! 
 
 How grander yet than deed of olden fame 
 
 The spoken word borne on the wing of flame ! 
 
 And far transcendins: all the ao^es done. 
 
 The electric light, resplendent as the sun ! 
 
 If any age from time's first morning down 
 Might claim to wear the brightest, starriest crown, 
 Or highest write its most resplendent name 
 In curves of light on beaded roll of fame, 
 
154 A SHEAF OF POEMS. 
 
 That age is passing in its splendor now — 
 We claim the crown for fair Columbia's brow ! 
 For resting now from battle's wrathful jars, 
 She wears in peace her constellated stars. 
 
 But not for her the golden age we claim — 
 A grander light shall gild, at last, her name, 
 To finer grace her changing beauty grow, 
 In purer light her living annals glow. 
 The mighty past, the present age sublime, 
 Are but the prelude to a grander time. 
 Whose dawning splendors yet will surely rise 
 To gladden earth and fill the waiting skies. 
 
 And when its morn shall grow to noon-tide ray, 
 The Prince of Peace shall bear divinest sway; — 
 Then through all lands as bards have sung and told) 
 Shall come at last the one true Age of Gold! 
 
 All hail the aay whose faintest dawn appears 
 To brown the cloudless glory of the years. 
 When man shall rise forevermore unbound, 
 Nor serf, nor slave, in any land be found ; 
 When Circe's cup, where seeming jewels shine, 
 Shall tempt no more to grovel with the swine ; 
 When wrong shall die, and war forever cease, 
 And earth shall know the golden reign of peace 
 
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