My solace, as the salt surf of the seas
Clothes the sharp crags with beauty." Then her mood
Would veer to madness, like a windy change
That brings up thunder, and she rais'd her voice,
Crying, "And yet they are not, they who were,
And never more shall be! accursed dreams!"
And, suddenly becoming motionless,
The bright hue from her cheeks and forehead pass'd,
And full of awful resignation, fixing
Her large undazzled orbs upon the sun,
She shrieked, "Strike, God, thou canst not harm me more!"
*From "The Victorian Anthology." Houghton, Mifflin Company.
FROM THE PLEA OF CORNELIA
ENGLISH VERSION BY E. D. A. MORSHEAD
Guard, Paullus, guard the pledges of our love-
My very dust that ingrained wish can move!
Father thou art, and mother must thou be,
Unto those little ones bereft of me.
Weep they, give two-fold kisses, thine and mine,
Solace their hearts, and both our loves combine;
And if thou needst must weep, go, weep apart –
Let not our children, folded to. thine heart,
Between thy kisses feel the teardrops start.
Enough for love, be nightlong thoughts of me,
And phantom forms that murmur I am she.
Or if thou speakest to mine effigy,
Speak soft, and pause and dream of a reply.
Yet if a presence new our halls behold,
And a new bride my wonted place shall hold
My children, speak her fair, who pleased your sire,
And let your gentleness disarm her ire:
Nor speak in praise of me- your loyal part
Will turn to gall and wormwood in her heart.
But, if your father hold my worth so high,
That lifelong love can people vacancy,
And solitude seem only love gone by,
Tend ye his loneliness, his thoughts engage,
And bar the avenues of pain to age!
I died before my time-add my lost years
Unto your youth, be to his heart compeers;
So shall he face, content, life's slow decline,
Glad in my children's love, as once in mine.
THE ABSENT SOLDIER SON
BY SIDNEY DOBELL
Lord, I am weeping. As Thou wilt, O Lord,
Do with him as Thou wilt; but O my God,
Let him come back to die! Let not the fowls
O' the air defile the body of my child,
My own fair child, that when he was a babe,
I lift up in my arms and gave to Thee!
Let not his garment, Lord, be vilely parted,
Nor the fine linen which these hands have spun
Fall to the stranger's lot! Shall the wild bird,
That would have pilfered of the ox, this year
Disdain the pens and stalls? Shall her blind young
That on the fleck and moult of brutish beasts
Had been too happy, sleep in cloth of gold
Whereof each thread is to this beating heart
As a peculiar darling? Lo, the flies
Hum o'er him! lo, a feather from the crow
Falls in his parted lips! Lo, his dead eyes
See not the raven! Lo, the worm, the
Creeps from his festering corse? My God! my God!
O Lord, Thou doest well. I am content.
If Thou have need of him he shall not stay.
But as one calleth to a servant, saying
"At such a time be with me," so, O Lord,
Call him to Thee! O, bid him not in haste
Straight whence he standeth. Let him lay aside
The soiled tools of labor. Let him wash
His hands of blood. Let him array himself
Meet for his Lord, pure from the sweat and fume
Of corporal travail! Lord, if he must die,
Let him die here. O, take him where Thou gavest!
THE MOTHER'S HOPE
BY LAMAN BLANCHARD
Is there, when the winds are singing
In the happy summer-time,―
When the raptured air is ringing
With Earth's music heavenward springing,
Forest chirp, and village chime,
Is there, of the sounds that float
Unsighingly, a single note
Half so sweet and clear and wild
As the laughter of a child?
Listen! and be now delighted:
Morn hath touched her golden strings; Earth and Sky their vows have plighted;
Life and light are reunited
Amid countless carollings;
Yet, delicious as they are,
There's a sound that's sweeter far,-
One that makes the heart rejoice
More than all,-the human voice!
Organ finer, deeper, clearer,
Though it be a stranger's tone,—
Than the winds or waters dearer,
More enchanting to the hearer,
For it answereth to his own.
But, of all its witching words,
Sweeter than the song of birds,
Those are sweetest, bubbling wild
Through the laughter of a child.
Harmonies from time-touched towers,
Haunted strains from rivulets,
Hum of bees among the flowers,
Rustling leaves, and silver showers,—
These, ere long, the ear forgets;
But in mine there is a sound
Ringing on the whole year round,—
Heart-deep laughter that I heard
Ere my child could speak a word.
Ah! 'twas heard by ear far purer,
Fondlier formed to catch the strain,—
Ear of one whose love is surer,—
Hers, the mother, the endurer
Of the deepest share of pain;
Hers the deepest bliss to treasure
Memories of that cry of pleasure,
Hers to hoard, a lifetime after,
Echoes of that infant laughter.
'Tis a mother's large affection
Hears with a mysterious sense,-
Breathings that evade detection,
Whisper faint, and fine inflection,
Thrill in her with power intense.
Childhood's honeyed words untaught
Hiveth she in loving thought,-
Tones that never thence depart;
For she listens with her heart.
When first thou camest, gentle, shy, and fond,
My eldest-born, first hope, and dearest treasure,
My heart received thee with a joy beyond
All that it yet had felt of earthly pleasure;
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