THE old Squire said, as he stood by his gate,And his neighbor, the Deacon, went by,"In spite of my bank stock and real estate,You are better off, Deacon, than I."We're both growing old, and the end's drawing near,You have less of this world to resign,But in Heaven's appraisal your assets, I fear,Will reckon up greater than mine."They say I am rich, but I'm feeling so poor,I wish I could swap with you evenThe pounds I have lived for and laid up in storeFor the shillings and pence you have given.""Well, Squire," said the Deacon, with shrewdcommon sense,While his eye had a twinkle of fun,"Let your pounds take the way of my shillingsand pence,And the thing can be easily done!"1880.
"Rabbi Ishmael Ben Elisha said, Once, I entered into the Holy of Holies (as High Priest) to burn incense, when I saw Aktriel (the Divine Crown) Jah, Lord of Hosts, sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, who said unto me, 'Ishmael, my son, bless me.' I answered, 'May it please Thee to make Thy compassion prevail over Thine anger; may it be revealed above Thy other attributes; mayest Thou deal with Thy children according to it, and not according to the strict measure of judgment.' It seemed to me that He bowed His head, as though to answer Amen to my blessing."— Talmud (Beraehoth, I. f. 6. b.)
THE Rabbi Ishmael, with the woe and sinOf the world heavy upon him, entering inThe Holy of Holies, saw an awful FaceWith terrible splendor filling all the place."O Ishmael Ben Elisha!" said a voice,"What seekest thou? What blessing is thy choice?"And, knowing that he stood before the Lord,Within the shadow of the cherubim,Wide-winged between the blinding light and him,He bowed himself, and uttered not a word,But in the silence of his soul was prayer"O Thou Eternal! I am one of all,And nothing ask that others may not share.Thou art almighty; we are weak and small,And yet Thy children: let Thy mercy spare!"Trembling, he raised his eyes, and in the placeOf the insufferable glory, lo! a faceOf more than mortal tenderness, that bentGraciously down in token of assent,And, smiling, vanished! With strange joy elate,The wondering Rabbi sought the temple's gate.Radiant as Moses from the Mount, he stoodAnd cried aloud unto the multitude"O Israel, hear! The Lord our God is good!Mine eyes have seen his glory and his grace;Beyond his judgments shall his love endure;The mercy of the All Merciful is sure!"1881.
H. Y. Hind, in Explorations in the Interior of the Labrador Peninsula (ii. 166) mentions the finding of a rock tomb near the little fishing port of Bradore, with the inscription upon it which is given in the poem.
A DREAR and desolate shore!Where no tree unfolds its leaves,And never the spring wind weavesGreen grass for the hunter's tread;A land forsaken and dead,Where the ghostly icebergs goAnd come with the ebb and flowOf the waters of Bradore!A wanderer, from a landBy summer breezes fanned,Looked round him, awed, subdued,By the dreadful solitude,Hearing alone the cryOf sea-birds clanging by,The crash and grind of the floe,Wail of wind and wash of tide."O wretched land!" he cried,"Land of all lands the worst,God forsaken and curst!Thy gates of rock should showThe words the Tuscan seerRead in the Realm of WoeHope entereth not here!"Lo! at his feet there stoodA block of smooth larch wood,Waif of some wandering wave,Beside a rock-closed caveBy Nature fashioned for a grave;Safe from the ravening bearAnd fierce fowl of the air,Wherein to rest was laidA twenty summers' maid,Whose blood had equal shareOf the lands of vine and snow,Half French, half Eskimo.In letters uneffaced,Upon the block were tracedThe grief and hope of man,And thus the legend ran"We loved her!Words cannot tell how well!We loved her!God loved her!And called her home to peace and rest.We love her."The stranger paused and read."O winter land!" he said,"Thy right to be I own;God leaves thee not alone.And if thy fierce winds blowOver drear wastes of rock and snow,And at thy iron gatesThe ghostly iceberg waits,Thy homes and hearts are dear.Thy sorrow o'er thy sacred dustIs sanctified by hope and trust;God's love and man's are here.And love where'er it goesMakes its own atmosphere;Its flowers of ParadiseTake root in the eternal ice,And bloom through Polar snows!"1881.
The volume in which "The Bay of Seven Islands" was published was dedicated to the late Edwin Percy Whipple, to whom more than to any other person I was indebted for public recognition as one worthy of a place in American literature, at a time when it required a great degree of courage to urge such a claim for a pro-scribed abolitionist. Although younger than I, he had gained the reputation of a brilliant essayist, and was regarded as the highest American authority in criticism. His wit and wisdom enlivened a small literary circle of young men including Thomas Starr King, the eloquent preacher, and Daniel N. Haskell of the Daily Transcript, who gathered about our common friend dames T. Fields at the Old Corner Bookstore. The poem which gave title to the volume I inscribed to my friend and neighbor Harriet Prescott Spofford, whose poems have lent a new interest to our beautiful river-valley.
From the green Amesbury hill which bears the nameOf that half mythic ancestor of mineWho trod its slopes two hundred years ago,Down the long valley of the Merrimac,Midway between me and the river's mouth,I see thy home, set like an eagle's nestAmong Deer Island's immemorial pines,Crowning the crag on which the sunset breaksIts last red arrow. Many a tale and song,Which thou hast told or sung, I call to mind,Softening with silvery mist the woods and hills,The out-thrust headlands and inreaching baysOf our northeastern coast-line, trending whereThe Gulf, midsummer, feels the chill blockadeOf icebergs stranded at its northern gate.To thee the echoes of the Island SoundAnswer not vainly, nor in vain the moanOf the South Breaker prophesying storm.And thou hast listened, like myself, to menSea-periled oft where Anticosti liesLike a fell spider in its web of fog,Or where the Grand Bank shallows with the wrecksOf sunken fishers, and to whom strange islesAnd frost-rimmed bays and trading stations seemFamiliar as Great Neck and Kettle Cove,Nubble and Boon, the common names of home.So let me offer thee this lay of mine,Simple and homely, lacking much thy playOf color and of fancy. If its themeAnd treatment seem to thee befitting youthRather than age, let this be my excuseIt has beguiled some heavy hours and calledSome pleasant memories up; and, better still,Occasion lent me for a kindly wordTo one who is my neighbor and my friend.1883.. . . . . . . . . .
The skipper sailed out of the harbor mouth,Leaving the apple-bloom of the SouthFor the ice of the Eastern seas,In his fishing schooner Breeze.Handsome and brave and young was he,And the maids of Newbury sighed to seeHis lessening white sail fallUnder the sea's blue wall.Through the Northern Gulf and the misty screenOf the isles of Mingan and Madeleine,St. Paul's and Blanc Sablon,The little Breeze sailed on,Backward and forward, along the shoreOf lorn and desolate Labrador,And found at last her wayTo the Seven Islands Bay.The little hamlet, nestling belowGreat hills white with lingering snow,With its tin-roofed chapel stoodHalf hid in the dwarf spruce wood;Green-turfed, flower-sown, the last outpostOf summer upon the dreary coast,With its gardens small and spare,Sad in the frosty air.Hard by where the skipper's schooner lay,A fisherman's cottage looked awayOver isle and bay, and behindOn mountains dim-defined.And there twin sisters, fair and young,Laughed with their stranger guest, and sungIn their native tongue the laysOf the old Provencal days.Alike were they, save the faint outlineOf a scar on Suzette's forehead fine;And both, it so befell,Loved the heretic stranger well.Both were pleasant to look upon,But the heart of the skipper clave to one;Though less by his eye than heartHe knew the twain apart.Despite of alien race and creed,Well did his wooing of Marguerite speed;And the mother's wrath was vainAs the sister's jealous pain.The shrill-tongued mistress her house forbade,And solemn warning was sternly saidBy the black-robed priest, whose wordAs law the hamlet heard.But half by voice and half by signsThe skipper said, "A warm sun shinesOn the green-banked Merrimac;Wait, watch, till I come back."And when you see, from my mast head,The signal fly of a kerchief red,My boat on the shore shall wait;Come, when the night is late."Ah! weighed with childhood's haunts and friends,And all that the home sky overbends,Did ever young love failTo turn the trembling scale?Under the night, on the wet sea sands,Slowly unclasped their plighted handsOne to the cottage hearth,And one to his sailor's berth.What was it the parting lovers heard?Nor leaf, nor ripple, nor wing of bird,But a listener's stealthy treadOn the rock-moss, crisp and dead.He weighed his anchor, and fished once moreBy the black coast-line of Labrador;And by love and the north wind driven,Sailed back to the Islands Seven.In the sunset's glow the sisters twainSaw the Breeze come sailing in again;Said Suzette, "Mother dear,The heretic's sail is here.""Go, Marguerite, to your room, and hide;Your door shall be bolted!" the mother cried:While Suzette, ill at ease,Watched the red sign of the Breeze.At midnight, down to the waiting skiffShe stole in the shadow of the cliff;And out of the Bay's mouth ranThe schooner with maid and man.And all night long, on a restless bed,Her prayers to the Virgin Marguerite saidAnd thought of her lover's painWaiting for her in vain.Did he pace the sands? Did he pause to hearThe sound of her light step drawing near?And, as the slow hours passed,Would he doubt her faith at last?But when she saw through the misty pane,The morning break on a sea of rain,Could even her love availTo follow his vanished sail?Meantime the Breeze, with favoring wind,Left the rugged Moisic hills behind,And heard from an unseen shoreThe falls of Manitou roar.On the morrow's morn, in the thick, gray weatherThey sat on the reeling deck together,Lover and counterfeit,Of hapless Marguerite.With a lover's hand, from her forehead fairHe smoothed away her jet-black hair.What was it his fond eyes met?The scar of the false Suzette!Fiercely he shouted: "Bear awayEast by north for Seven Isles Bay!"The maiden wept and prayed,But the ship her helm obeyed.Once more the Bay of the Isles they foundThey heard the bell of the chapel sound,And the chant of the dying sungIn the harsh, wild Indian tongue.A feeling of mystery, change, and aweWas in all they heard and all they sawSpell-bound the hamlet layIn the hush of its lonely bay.And when they came to the cottage door,The mother rose up from her weeping sore,And with angry gestures metThe scared look of Suzette."Here is your daughter," the skipper said;"Give me the one I love instead."But the woman sternly spake;"Go, see if the dead will wake!"He looked. Her sweet face still and whiteAnd strange in the noonday taper light,She lay on her little bed,With the cross at her feet and head.In a passion of grief the strong man bentDown to her face, and, kissing it, wentBack to the waiting Breeze,Back to the mournful seas.Never again to the MerrimacAnd Newbury's homes that bark came back.Whether her fate she metOn the shores of Carraquette,Miscou, or Tracadie, who can say?But even yet at Seven Isles BayIs told the ghostly taleOf a weird, unspoken sail,In the pale, sad light of the Northern daySeen by the blanketed Montagnais,Or squaw, in her small kyack,Crossing the spectre's track.On the deck a maiden wrings her hands;Her likeness kneels on the gray coast sands;One in her wild despair,And one in the trance of prayer.She flits before no earthly blast,The red sign fluttering from her mast,Over the solemn seas,The ghost of the schooner Breeze!1882.
AMONG the legends sung or saidAlong our rocky shore,The Wishing Bridge of MarbleheadMay well be sung once more.An hundred years ago (so ranThe old-time story) allGood wishes said above its spanWould, soon or late, befall.If pure and earnest, never failedThe prayers of man or maidFor him who on the deep sea sailed,For her at home who stayed.Once thither came two girls from school,And wished in childish gleeAnd one would be a queen and rule,And one the world would see.Time passed; with change of hopes and fears,And in the self-same place,Two women, gray with middle years,Stood, wondering, face to face.With wakened memories, as they met,They queried what had been"A poor man's wife am I, and yet,"Said one, "I am a queen."My realm a little homestead is,Where, lacking crown and throne,I rule by loving servicesAnd patient toil alone."The other said: "The great world liesBeyond me as it lay;O'er love's and duty's boundariesMy feet may never stray."I see but common sights of home,Its common sounds I hear,My widowed mother's sick-bed roomSufficeth for my sphere."I read to her some pleasant pageOf travel far and wide,And in a dreamy pilgrimageWe wander side by side."And when, at last, she falls asleep,My book becomes to meA magic glass: my watch I keep,But all the world I see."A farm-wife queen your place you fill,While fancy's privilegeIs mine to walk the earth at will,Thanks to the Wishing Bridge.""Nay, leave the legend for the truth,"The other cried, "and sayGod gives the wishes of our youth,But in His own best way!"1882.
The following is a copy of the warrant issued by Major Waldron, of Dover, in 1662. The Quakers, as was their wont, prophesied against him, and saw, as they supposed, the fulfilment of their prophecy when, many years after, he was killed by the Indians.
To the constables of Dover, Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Rowley,Ipswich, Wenham, Lynn, Boston, Roxbury, Dedham, and until thesevagabond Quakers are carried out of this jurisdiction. You, andevery one of you, are required, in the King's Majesty's name, totake these vagabond Quakers, Anne Colman, Mary Tomkins, and AliceAmbrose, and make them fast to the cart's tail, and driving thecart through your several towns, to whip them upon their nakedbacks not exceeding ten stripes apiece on each of them, in eachtown; and so to convey them from constable to constable till theyare out of this jurisdiction, as you will answer it at your peril;and this shall be your warrant.RICHARD WALDRON.Dated at Dover, December 22, 1662.
This warrant was executed only in Dover and Hampton. At Salisbury the constable refused to obey it. He was sustained by the town's people, who were under the influence of Major Robert Pike, the leading man in the lower valley of the Merrimac, who stood far in advance of his time, as an advocate of religious freedom, and an opponent of ecclesiastical authority. He had the moral courage to address an able and manly letter to the court at Salem, remonstrating against the witchcraft trials.
THE tossing spray of Cocheco's fallHardened to ice on its rocky wall,As through Dover town in the chill, gray dawn,Three women passed, at the cart-tail drawn!Bared to the waist, for the north wind's gripAnd keener sting of the constable's whip,The blood that followed each hissing blowFroze as it sprinkled the winter snow.Priest and ruler, boy and maidFollowed the dismal cavalcade;And from door and window, open thrown,Looked and wondered gaffer and crone."God is our witness," the victims cried,We suffer for Him who for all men died;The wrong ye do has been done before,We bear the stripes that the Master bore!And thou, O Richard Waldron, for whomWe hear the feet of a coming doom,On thy cruel heart and thy hand of wrongVengeance is sure, though it tarry long."In the light of the Lord, a flame we seeClimb and kindle a proud roof-tree;And beneath it an old man lying dead,With stains of blood on his hoary head.""Smite, Goodman Hate-Evil!—harder still!"The magistrate cried, "lay on with a will!Drive out of their bodies the Father of Lies,Who through them preaches and prophesies!"So into the forest they held their way,By winding river and frost-rimmed bay,Over wind-swept hills that felt the beatOf the winter sea at their icy feet.The Indian hunter, searching his traps,Peered stealthily through the forest gaps;And the outlying settler shook his head,—"They're witches going to jail," he said.At last a meeting-house came in view;A blast on his horn the constable blew;And the boys of Hampton cried up and down,"The Quakers have come!" to the wondering town.From barn and woodpile the goodman came;The goodwife quitted her quilting frame,With her child at her breast; and, hobbling slow,The grandam followed to see the show.Once more the torturing whip was swung,Once more keen lashes the bare flesh stung."Oh, spare! they are bleeding!"' a little maid cried,And covered her face the sight to hide.A murmur ran round the crowd: "Good folks,"Quoth the constable, busy counting the strokes,"No pity to wretches like these is due,They have beaten the gospel black and blue!"Then a pallid woman, in wild-eyed fear,With her wooden noggin of milk drew near."Drink, poor hearts!" a rude hand smoteHer draught away from a parching throat."Take heed," one whispered, "they'll take your cowFor fines, as they took your horse and plough,And the bed from under you." "Even so,"She said; "they are cruel as death, I know."Then on they passed, in the waning day,Through Seabrook woods, a weariful way;By great salt meadows and sand-hills bare,And glimpses of blue sea here and there.By the meeting-house in Salisbury town,The sufferers stood, in the red sundown,Bare for the lash! O pitying Night,Drop swift thy curtain and hide the sight.With shame in his eye and wrath on his lipThe Salisbury constable dropped his whip."This warrant means murder foul and red;Cursed is he who serves it," he said."Show me the order, and meanwhile strikeA blow at your peril!" said Justice Pike.Of all the rulers the land possessed,Wisest and boldest was he and best.He scoffed at witchcraft; the priest he metAs man meets man; his feet he setBeyond his dark age, standing upright,Soul-free, with his face to the morning light.He read the warrant: "These conveyFrom our precincts; at every town on the wayGive each ten lashes." "God judge the brute!I tread his order under my foot!"Cut loose these poor ones and let them go;Come what will of it, all men shall knowNo warrant is good, though backed by the Crown,For whipping women in Salisbury town!"The hearts of the villagers, half releasedFrom creed of terror and rule of priest,By a primal instinct owned the rightOf human pity in law's despite.For ruth and chivalry only slept,His Saxon manhood the yeoman kept;Quicker or slower, the same blood ranIn the Cavalier and the Puritan.The Quakers sank on their knees in praiseAnd thanks. A last, low sunset blazeFlashed out from under a cloud, and shedA golden glory on each bowed head.The tale is one of an evil time,When souls were fettered and thought was crime,And heresy's whisper above its breathMeant shameful scourging and bonds and death!What marvel, that hunted and sorely tried,Even woman rebuked and prophesied,And soft words rarely answered backThe grim persuasion of whip and rack.If her cry from the whipping-post and jailPierced sharp as the Kenite's driven nail,O woman, at ease in these happier days,Forbear to judge of thy sister's ways!How much thy beautiful life may oweTo her faith and courage thou canst not know,Nor how from the paths of thy calm retreatShe smoothed the thorns with her bleeding feet.1883.
A TALE for Roman guides to tellTo careless, sight-worn travellers still,Who pause beside the narrow cellOf Gregory on the Caelian Hill.One day before the monk's door cameA beggar, stretching empty palms,Fainting and fast-sick, in the nameOf the Most Holy asking alms.And the monk answered, "All I haveIn this poor cell of mine I give,The silver cup my mother gave;In Christ's name take thou it, and live."Years passed; and, called at last to bearThe pastoral crook and keys of Rome,The poor monk, in Saint Peter's chair,Sat the crowned lord of Christendom."Prepare a feast," Saint Gregory cried,"And let twelve beggars sit thereat."The beggars came, and one beside,An unknown stranger, with them sat."I asked thee not," the Pontiff spake,"O stranger; but if need be thine,I bid thee welcome, for the sakeOf Him who is thy Lord and mine."A grave, calm face the stranger raised,Like His who on Gennesaret trod,Or His on whom the Chaldeans gazed,Whose form was as the Son of God."Know'st thou," he said, "thy gift of old?"And in the hand he lifted upThe Pontiff marvelled to beholdOnce more his mother's silver cup."Thy prayers and alms have risen, and bloomSweetly among the flowers of heaven.I am The Wonderful, through whomWhate'er thou askest shall be given."He spake and vanished. Gregory fellWith his twelve guests in mute accordProne on their faces, knowing wellTheir eyes of flesh had seen the Lord.The old-time legend is not vain;Nor vain thy art, Verona's Paul,Telling it o'er and o'er againOn gray Vicenza's frescoed wall.Still wheresoever pity sharesIts bread with sorrow, want, and sin,And love the beggar's feast prepares,The uninvited Guest comes in.Unheard, because our ears are dull,Unseen, because our eyes are dim,He walks our earth, The Wonderful,And all good deeds are done to Him.1883.
A NOTELESS stream, the Birchbrook runsBeneath its leaning trees;That low, soft ripple is its own,That dull roar is the sea's.Of human signs it sees aloneThe distant church spire's tip,And, ghost-like, on a blank of gray,The white sail of a ship.No more a toiler at the wheel,It wanders at its will;Nor dam nor pond is left to tellWhere once was Birchbrook mill.The timbers of that mill have fedLong since a farmer's fires;His doorsteps are the stones that groundThe harvest of his sires.Man trespassed here; but Nature lostNo right of her domain;She waited, and she brought the oldWild beauty back again.By day the sunlight through the leavesFalls on its moist, green sod,And wakes the violet bloom of springAnd autumn's golden-rod.Its birches whisper to the wind,The swallow dips her wingsIn the cool spray, and on its banksThe gray song-sparrow sings.But from it, when the dark night falls,The school-girl shrinks with dread;The farmer, home-bound from his fields,Goes by with quickened tread.They dare not pause to hear the grindOf shadowy stone on stone;The plashing of a water-wheelWhere wheel there now is none.Has not a cry of pain been heardAbove the clattering mill?The pawing of an unseen horse,Who waits his mistress still?Yet never to the listener's eyeHas sight confirmed the sound;A wavering birch line marks aloneThe vacant pasture ground.No ghostly arms fling up to heavenThe agony of prayer;No spectral steed impatient shakesHis white mane on the air.The meaning of that common dreadNo tongue has fitly told;The secret of the dark surmiseThe brook and birches hold.What nameless horror of the pastBroods here forevermore?What ghost his unforgiven sinIs grinding o'er and o'er?Does, then, immortal memory playThe actor's tragic part,Rehearsals of a mortal lifeAnd unveiled human heart?God's pity spare a guilty soulThat drama of its ill,And let the scenic curtain fallOn Birchbrook's haunted mill1884.
Read at the unveiling of the bust of Elizabeth Fry at the Friends' School, Providence, R. I.
A. D. 1209.
AMIDST Thuringia's wooded hills she dwelt,A high-born princess, servant of the poor,Sweetening with gracious words the food she dealtTo starving throngs at Wartburg's blazoned door.A blinded zealot held her soul in chains,Cramped the sweet nature that he could not kill,Scarred her fair body with his penance-pains,And gauged her conscience by his narrow will.God gave her gifts of beauty and of grace,With fast and vigil she denied them all;Unquestioning, with sad, pathetic face,She followed meekly at her stern guide's call.So drooped and died her home-blown rose of blissIn the chill rigor of a disciplineThat turned her fond lips from her children's kiss,And made her joy of motherhood a sin.To their sad level by compassion led,One with the low and vile herself she made,While thankless misery mocked the hand that fed,And laughed to scorn her piteous masquerade.But still, with patience that outwearied hate,She gave her all while yet she had to give;And then her empty hands, importunate,In prayer she lifted that the poor might live.Sore pressed by grief, and wrongs more hard to bear,And dwarfed and stifled by a harsh control,She kept life fragrant with good deeds and prayer,And fresh and pure the white flower of her soul.Death found her busy at her task: one wordAlone she uttered as she paused to die,"Silence!"—then listened even as one who heardWith song and wing the angels drawing nigh!Now Fra Angelico's roses fill her hands,And, on Murillo's canvas, Want and PainKneel at her feet. Her marble image standsWorshipped and crowned in Marburg's holy fane.Yea, wheresoe'er her Church its cross uprears,Wide as the world her story still is told;In manhood's reverence, woman's prayers and tears,She lives again whose grave is centuries old.And still, despite the weakness or the blameOf blind submission to the blind, she hathA tender place in hearts of every name,And more than Rome owns Saint Elizabeth!
A. D. 1780.Slow ages passed: and lo! another came,An English matron, in whose simple faithNor priestly rule nor ritual had claim,A plain, uncanonized Elizabeth.No sackcloth robe, nor ashen-sprinkled hair,Nor wasting fast, nor scourge, nor vigil long,Marred her calm presence. God had made her fair,And she could do His goodly work no wrong.Their yoke is easy and their burden lightWhose sole confessor is the Christ of God;Her quiet trust and faith transcending sightSmoothed to her feet the difficult paths she trod.And there she walked, as duty bade her go,Safe and unsullied as a cloistered nun,Shamed with her plainness Fashion's gaudy show,And overcame the world she did not shun.In Earlham's bowers, in Plashet's liberal hall,In the great city's restless crowd and din,Her ear was open to the Master's call,And knew the summons of His voice within.Tender as mother, beautiful as wife,Amidst the throngs of prisoned crime she stoodIn modest raiment faultless as her life,The type of England's worthiest womanhood.To melt the hearts that harshness turned to stoneThe sweet persuasion of her lips sufficed,And guilt, which only hate and fear had known,Saw in her own the pitying love of Christ.So wheresoe'er the guiding Spirit wentShe followed, finding every prison cellIt opened for her sacred as a tentPitched by Gennesaret or by Jacob's well.And Pride and Fashion felt her strong appeal,And priest and ruler marvelled as they sawHow hand in hand went wisdom with her zeal,And woman's pity kept the bounds of law.She rests in God's peace; but her memory stirsThe air of earth as with an angel's wings,And warms and moves the hearts of men like hers,The sainted daughter of Hungarian kings.United now, the Briton and the Hun,Each, in her own time, faithful unto death,Live sister souls! in name and spirit one,Thuringia's saint and our Elizabeth!1885.
As Islam's Prophet, when his last day drewNigh to its close, besought all men to sayWhom he had wronged, to whom he then should payA debt forgotten, or for pardon sue,And, through the silence of his weeping friends,A strange voice cried: "Thou owest me a debt,""Allah be praised!" he answered. "Even yetHe gives me power to make to thee amends.O friend! I thank thee for thy timely word."So runs the tale. Its lesson all may heed,For all have sinned in thought, or word, or deed,Or, like the Prophet, through neglect have erred.All need forgiveness, all have debts to payEre the night cometh, while it still is day.1885.
AGAINST the wooded hills it stands,Ghost of a dead home, staring throughIts broken lights on wasted landsWhere old-time harvests grew.Unploughed, unsown, by scythe unshorn,The poor, forsaken farm-fields lie,Once rich and rife with golden cornAnd pale green breadths of rye.Of healthful herb and flower bereft,The garden plot no housewife keeps;Through weeds and tangle only left,The snake, its tenant, creeps.A lilac spray, still blossom-clad,Sways slow before the empty rooms;Beside the roofless porch a sadPathetic red rose blooms.His track, in mould and dust of drouth,On floor and hearth the squirrel leaves,And in the fireless chimney's mouthHis web the spider weaves.The leaning barn, about to fall,Resounds no more on husking eves;No cattle low in yard or stall,No thresher beats his sheaves.So sad, so drear! It seems almostSome haunting Presence makes its sign;That down yon shadowy lane some ghostMight drive his spectral kine!O home so desolate and lorn!Did all thy memories die with thee?Were any wed, were any born,Beneath this low roof-tree?Whose axe the wall of forest broke,And let the waiting sunshine through?What goodwife sent the earliest smokeUp the great chimney flue?Did rustic lovers hither come?Did maidens, swaying back and forthIn rhythmic grace, at wheel and loom,Make light their toil with mirth?Did child feet patter on the stair?Did boyhood frolic in the snow?Did gray age, in her elbow chair,Knit, rocking to and fro?The murmuring brook, the sighing breeze,The pine's slow whisper, cannot tell;Low mounds beneath the hemlock-treesKeep the home secrets well.Cease, mother-land, to fondly boastOf sons far off who strive and thrive,Forgetful that each swarming hostMust leave an emptier hive.O wanderers from ancestral soil,Leave noisome mill and chaffering store:Gird up your loins for sturdier toil,And build the home once more!Come back to bayberry-scented slopes,And fragrant fern, and ground-nut vine;Breathe airs blown over holt and copseSweet with black birch and pine.What matter if the gains are smallThat life's essential wants supply?Your homestead's title gives you allThat idle wealth can buy.All that the many-dollared crave,The brick-walled slaves of 'Change and mart,Lawns, trees, fresh air, and flowers, you have,More dear for lack of art.Your own sole masters, freedom-willed,With none to bid you go or stay,Till the old fields your fathers tilled,As manly men as they!With skill that spares your toiling hands,And chemic aid that science brings,Reclaim the waste and outworn lands,And reign thereon as kings1886.
HAPPY young friends, sit by me,Under May's blown apple-tree,While these home-birds in and outThrough the blossoms flit about.Hear a story, strange and old,By the wild red Indians told,How the robin came to be:Once a great chief left his son,—Well-beloved, his only one,—When the boy was well-nigh grown,In the trial-lodge alone.Left for tortures long and slowYouths like him must undergo,Who their pride of manhood test,Lacking water, food, and rest.Seven days the fast he kept,Seven nights he never slept.Then the young boy, wrung with pain,Weak from nature's overstrain,Faltering, moaned a low complaint"Spare me, father, for I faint!"But the chieftain, haughty-eyed,Hid his pity in his pride."You shall be a hunter good,Knowing never lack of food;You shall be a warrior great,Wise as fox and strong as bear;Many scalps your belt shall wear,If with patient heart you waitBravely till your task is done.Better you should starving dieThan that boy and squaw should cryShame upon your father's son!"When next morn the sun's first raysGlistened on the hemlock sprays,Straight that lodge the old chief sought,And boiled sainp and moose meat brought."Rise and eat, my son!" he said.Lo, he found the poor boy dead!As with grief his grave they made,And his bow beside him laid,Pipe, and knife, and wampum-braid,On the lodge-top overhead,Preening smooth its breast of redAnd the brown coat that it wore,Sat a bird, unknown before.And as if with human tongue,"Mourn me not," it said, or sung;"I, a bird, am still your son,Happier than if hunter fleet,Or a brave, before your feetLaying scalps in battle won.Friend of man, my song shall cheerLodge and corn-land; hovering near,To each wigwam I shall bringTidings of the corning spring;Every child my voice shall knowIn the moon of melting snow,When the maple's red bud swells,And the wind-flower lifts its bells.As their fond companionMen shall henceforth own your son,And my song shall testifyThat of human kin am I."Thus the Indian legend saithHow, at first, the robin cameWith a sweeter life from death,Bird for boy, and still the same.If my young friends doubt that thisIs the robin's genesis,Not in vain is still the mythIf a truth be found therewithUnto gentleness belongGifts unknown to pride and wrong;Happier far than hate is praise,—He who sings than he who slays.