Whereat their stupid tongues, to And down the hollow from a ferny tease my pain, Do draw it o'er again and o'er again. They hurt my heart with griefs I cannot name: Always the same, the same. Nature hath no surprise, No ambuscade of beauty, 'gainst mine eyes From brake, or lurking dell, or deep defile; No humors, frolic forms,- this mile, that mile; No rich reserves or happy-valley hopes Beyond the bends of roads, the distant slopes. Her fancy fails, her wild is all run tame: Ever the same, the same. Oh! might I through these tears But glimpse some hill my Georgia high uprears, Where white the quartz, and pink the pebbles shine, The hickory heavenward strives, the muscadine Swings o'er the slope; the oak's farfalling shade Darkens the dog-wood in the bottom glade, nook Bright leaps a living brook! BETRAYAL. THE sun has kissed the violet sea, O Sea! wouldst thou not better be And turned the violet to a rose. Mere violet still? Who knows? Well hides the violet in the wood: The sun has burnt the rose-red sea: LUCY LARCOM. HANNAH BINDING SHOES. POOR lone Hannah, Sitting at the window, binding shoes, Faded, wrinkled, Sitting, stitching, in a mournful muse. Bright-eyed beauty once was she, When the bloom was on the tree: Spring and winter, Fair young Hannah, Hannah's at the window, binding | Ben, the sunburnt fisher, gayly woos: shoes. Hale and clever, For a willing heart and hand he sues. May-day skies are all aglow, And the waves are laughing so! Twenty seasons,Never one has brought her any news. Still her dim eyes silently Chase the white sails o'er the sea: Hopeless, faithful, Hannah's at the window, binding Doubtless she had her romantic With a voice to quiet its hourly And a wife will follow by faith, not sight, In the chosen footprint, at any hap. In the comfort of home who is glad der than she ? Yet, stirred by no murmur of "might have been," Her heart as a carolling bird soars free, With the song of each nest she has glanced within. Having the whole, she covets no part: Hers is the bliss of all blessèd things. The tears that unto her eyelids start, Are those which a generous pity brings; Or the sympathy of heroic faith With a holy purpose, achieved or lost. To stifle the truth is to stop her breath, For she rates a lie at its deadly cost. Her friends are good women and faithful men, Who seek for the true, and uphold the right; And who shall proclaim her the weaker, when And was meekly thankful, though" men demur. Her very presence puts sin to flight? And dreads she never the coming years ?" Gossip, what are the years to her? She reads the hereafter by the here: A beautiful Now, and a better To Be: In life is all sweetness, in death no fear, You waste your pity on such as she. HAND IN HAND WITH ANGELS. HAND in hand with angels, Through the world we go; Brighter eyes are on us Than we blind ones know; Tenderer voices cheer us Than we deaf will own; Hand in hand with angels, Hand in hand with angels; Hand in hand with angels: Bid them seek the sky! Weaker is your soaring, When they cease to fly. Hand in hand with angels; With a firmer grasp. |