Chapter 14

"God heard my prayer in that evil day; He led my feet in their homeward way,

"From false mirage and dried-up well, And the hot sand storms of a land of hell,

"Till I saw at last through the coast-hill's gap, A city held in its stony lap,

"The mosques and the domes of scorched Muscat, And my heart leaped up with joy thereat;

"For there was a ship at anchor lying, A Christian flag at its mast-head flying,

"And sweetest of sounds to my homesick ear Was my native tongue in the sailor's cheer.

"Now the Lord be thanked, I am back again, Where earth has springs, and the skies have rain,

"And the well I promised by Oman's Sea, I am digging for him in Amesbury."

His kindred wept, and his neighbors said "The poor old captain is out of his head."

But from morn to noon, and from noon to night, He toiled at his task with main and might;

And when at last, from the loosened earth, Under his spade the stream gushed forth,

And fast as he climbed to his deep well's brim, The water he dug for followed him,

He shouted for joy: "I have kept my word, And here is the well I promised the Lord!"

The long years came and the long years went, And he sat by his roadside well content;

He watched the travellers, heat-oppressed, Pause by the way to drink and rest,

And the sweltering horses dip, as they drank, Their nostrils deep in the cool, sweet tank,

And grateful at heart, his memory went Back to that waterless Orient,

And the blessed answer of prayer, which came To the earth of iron and sky of flame.

And when a wayfarer weary and hot, Kept to the mid road, pausing not

For the well's refreshing, he shook his head; "He don't know the value of water," he said;

"Had he prayed for a drop, as I have done, In the desert circle of sand and sun,

"He would drink and rest, and go home to tell That God's best gift is the wayside well!"

AN OUTDOOR RECEPTION.

The substance of these lines, hastily pencilled several years ago, I find among such of my unprinted scraps as have escaped the waste-basket and the fire. In transcribing it I have made some changes, additions, and omissions.

On these green banks, where falls too soon The shade of Autumn's afternoon, The south wind blowing soft and sweet, The water gliding at nay feet, The distant northern range uplit By the slant sunshine over it, With changes of the mountain mist From tender blush to amethyst, The valley's stretch of shade and gleam Fair as in Mirza's Bagdad dream, With glad young faces smiling near And merry voices in my ear, I sit, methinks, as Hafiz might In Iran's Garden of Delight. For Persian roses blushing red, Aster and gentian bloom instead; For Shiraz wine, this mountain air; For feast, the blueberries which I share With one who proffers with stained hands Her gleanings from yon pasture lands, Wild fruit that art and culture spoil, The harvest of an untilled soil; And with her one whose tender eyes Reflect the change of April skies, Midway 'twixt child and maiden yet, Fresh as Spring's earliest violet; And one whose look and voice and ways Make where she goes idyllic days; And one whose sweet, still countenance Seems dreamful of a child's romance; And others, welcome as are these, Like and unlike, varieties Of pearls on nature's chaplet strung, And all are fair, for all are young. Gathered from seaside cities old, From midland prairie, lake, and wold, From the great wheat-fields, which might feed The hunger of a world at need, In healthful change of rest and play Their school-vacations glide away.

No critics these: they only see An old and kindly friend in me, In whose amused, indulgent look Their innocent mirth has no rebuke. They scarce can know my rugged rhymes, The harsher songs of evil times, Nor graver themes in minor keys Of life's and death's solemnities; But haply, as they bear in mind Some verse of lighter, happier kind,-- Hints of the boyhood of the man, Youth viewed from life's meridian, Half seriously and half in play My pleasant interviewers pay Their visit, with no fell intent Of taking notes and punishment.

As yonder solitary pine Is ringed below with flower and vine, More favored than that lonely tree, The bloom of girlhood circles me. In such an atmosphere of youth I half forget my age's truth; The shadow of my life's long date Runs backward on the dial-plate, Until it seems a step might span The gulf between the boy and man.

My young friends smile, as if some jay On bleak December's leafless spray Essayed to sing the songs of May. Well, let them smile, and live to know, When their brown locks are flecked with snow, 'T is tedious to be always sage And pose the dignity of age, While so much of our early lives On memory's playground still survives, And owns, as at the present hour, The spell of youth's magnetic power.

But though I feel, with Solomon, 'T is pleasant to behold the sun, I would not if I could repeat A life which still is good and sweet; I keep in age, as in my prime, A not uncheerful step with time, And, grateful for all blessings sent, I go the common way, content To make no new experiment. On easy terms with law and fate, For what must be I calmly wait, And trust the path I cannot see,-- That God is good sufficeth me. And when at last on life's strange play The curtain falls, I only pray That hope may lose itself in truth, And age in Heaven's immortal youth, And all our loves and longing prove The foretaste of diviner love.

The day is done. Its afterglow Along the west is burning low. My visitors, like birds, have flown; I hear their voices, fainter grown, And dimly through the dusk I see Their 'kerchiefs wave good-night to me,-- Light hearts of girlhood, knowing nought Of all the cheer their coming brought; And, in their going, unaware Of silent-following feet of prayer Heaven make their budding promise good With flowers of gracious womanhood!

R. S. S., AT DEER ISLAND ON THE MERRIMAC.

Make, for he loved thee well, our Merrimac, From wave and shore a low and long lament For him, whose last look sought thee, as he went The unknown way from which no step comes back. And ye, O ancient pine-trees, at whose feet He watched in life the sunset's reddening glow, Let the soft south wind through your needles blow A fitting requiem tenderly and sweet! No fonder lover of all lovely things Shall walk where once he walked, no smile more glad Greet friends than his who friends in all men had, Whose pleasant memory, to that Island clings, Where a dear mourner in the home he left Of love's sweet solace cannot be bereft.

BURNING DRIFT-WOOD

Before my drift-wood fire I sit, And see, with every waif I burn, Old dreams and fancies coloring it, And folly's unlaid ghosts return.

O ships of mine, whose swift keels cleft The enchanted sea on which they sailed, Are these poor fragments only left Of vain desires and hopes that failed?

Did I not watch from them the light Of sunset on my towers in Spain, And see, far off, uploom in sight The Fortunate Isles I might not gain?

Did sudden lift of fog reveal Arcadia's vales of song and spring, And did I pass, with grazing keel, The rocks whereon the sirens sing?

Have I not drifted hard upon The unmapped regions lost to man, The cloud-pitched tents of Prester John, The palace domes of Kubla Khan?

Did land winds blow from jasmine flowers, Where Youth the ageless Fountain fills? Did Love make sign from rose blown bowers, And gold from Eldorado's hills?

Alas! the gallant ships, that sailed On blind Adventure's errand sent, Howe'er they laid their courses, failed To reach the haven of Content.

And of my ventures, those alone Which Love had freighted, safely sped, Seeking a good beyond my own, By clear-eyed Duty piloted.

O mariners, hoping still to meet The luck Arabian voyagers met, And find in Bagdad's moonlit street, Haroun al Raschid walking yet,

Take with you, on your Sea of Dreams, The fair, fond fancies dear to youth. I turn from all that only seems, And seek the sober grounds of truth.

What matter that it is not May, That birds have flown, and trees are bare, That darker grows the shortening day, And colder blows the wintry air!

The wrecks of passion and desire, The castles I no more rebuild, May fitly feed my drift-wood fire, And warm the hands that age has chilled.

Whatever perished with my ships, I only know the best remains; A song of praise is on my lips For losses which are now my gains.

Heap high my hearth! No worth is lost; No wisdom with the folly dies. Burn on, poor shreds, your holocaust Shall be my evening sacrifice.

Far more than all I dared to dream, Unsought before my door I see; On wings of fire and steeds of steam The world's great wonders come to me,

And holier signs, unmarked before, Of Love to seek and Power to save,-- The righting of the wronged and poor, The man evolving from the slave;

And life, no longer chance or fate, Safe in the gracious Fatherhood. I fold o'er-wearied hands and wait, In full assurance of the good.

And well the waiting time must be, Though brief or long its granted days, If Faith and Hope and Charity Sit by my evening hearth-fire's blaze.

And with them, friends whom Heaven has spared, Whose love my heart has comforted, And, sharing all my joys, has shared My tender memories of the dead,--

Dear souls who left us lonely here, Bound on their last, long voyage, to whom We, day by day, are drawing near, Where every bark has sailing room!

I know the solemn monotone Of waters calling unto me I know from whence the airs have blown That whisper of the Eternal Sea.

As low my fires of drift-wood burn, I hear that sea's deep sounds increase, And, fair in sunset light, discern Its mirage-lifted Isles of Peace.

O. W. HOLMES ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIRTH-DAY.

Climbing a path which leads back never more We heard behind his footsteps and his cheer; Now, face to face, we greet him standing here Upon the lonely summit of Fourscore Welcome to us, o'er whom the lengthened day Is closing and the shadows colder grow, His genial presence, like an afterglow, Following the one just vanishing away. Long be it ere the table shall be set For the last breakfast of the Autocrat, And love repeat with smiles and tears thereat His own sweet songs that time shall not forget. Waiting with us the call to come up higher, Life is not less, the heavens are only higher!

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.

From purest wells of English undefiled None deeper drank than he, the New World's child, Who in the language of their farm-fields spoke The wit and wisdom of New England folk, Shaming a monstrous wrong. The world-wide laugh Provoked thereby might well have shaken half The walls of Slavery down, ere yet the ball And mine of battle overthrew them all.

HAVERHILL. 1640-1890.

Read at the Celebration of the Two Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the City, July 2, 1890.

O river winding to the sea! We call the old time back to thee; From forest paths and water-ways The century-woven veil we raise.

The voices of to-day are dumb, Unheard its sounds that go and come; We listen, through long-lapsing years, To footsteps of the pioneers.

Gone steepled town and cultured plain, The wilderness returns again, The drear, untrodden solitude, The gloom and mystery of the wood!

Once more the bear and panther prowl, The wolf repeats his hungry howl, And, peering through his leafy screen, The Indian's copper face is seen.

We see, their rude-built huts beside, Grave men and women anxious-eyed, And wistful youth remembering still Dear homes in England's Haverhill.

We summon forth to mortal view Dark Passaquo and Saggahew,-- Wild chiefs, who owned the mighty sway Of wizard Passaconaway.

Weird memories of the border town, By old tradition handed down, In chance and change before us pass Like pictures in a magic glass,--

The terrors of the midnight raid, The-death-concealing ambuscade, The winter march, through deserts wild, Of captive mother, wife, and child.

Ah! bleeding hands alone subdued And tamed the savage habitude Of forests hiding beasts of prey, And human shapes as fierce as they.

Slow from the plough the woods withdrew, Slowly each year the corn-lands grew; Nor fire, nor frost, nor foe could kill The Saxon energy of will.

And never in the hamlet's bound Was lack of sturdy manhood found, And never failed the kindred good Of brave and helpful womanhood.

That hamlet now a city is, Its log-built huts are palaces; The wood-path of the settler's cow Is Traffic's crowded highway now.

And far and wide it stretches still, Along its southward sloping hill, And overlooks on either hand A rich and many-watered land.

And, gladdening all the landscape, fair As Pison was to Eden's pair, Our river to its valley brings The blessing of its mountain springs.

And Nature holds with narrowing space, From mart and crowd, her old-time grace, And guards with fondly jealous arms The wild growths of outlying farms.

Her sunsets on Kenoza fall, Her autumn leaves by Saltonstall; No lavished gold can richer make Her opulence of hill and lake.

Wise was the choice which led out sires To kindle here their household fires, And share the large content of all Whose lines in pleasant places fall.

More dear, as years on years advance, We prize the old inheritance, And feel, as far and wide we roam, That all we seek we leave at home.

Our palms are pines, our oranges Are apples on our orchard trees; Our thrushes are our nightingales, Our larks the blackbirds of our vales.

No incense which the Orient burns Is sweeter than our hillside ferns; What tropic splendor can outvie Our autumn woods, our sunset sky?

If, where the slow years came and went, And left not affluence, but content, Now flashes in our dazzled eyes The electric light of enterprise;

And if the old idyllic ease Seems lost in keen activities, And crowded workshops now replace The hearth's and farm-field's rustic grace;

No dull, mechanic round of toil Life's morning charm can quite despoil; And youth and beauty, hand in hand, Will always find enchanted land.

No task is ill where hand and brain And skill and strength have equal gain, And each shall each in honor hold, And simple manhood outweigh gold.

Earth shall be near to Heaven when all That severs man from man shall fall, For, here or there, salvation's plan Alone is love of God and man.

O dwellers by the Merrimac, The heirs of centuries at your back, Still reaping where you have not sown, A broader field is now your own.

Hold fast your Puritan heritage, But let the free thought of the age Its light and hope and sweetness add To the stern faith the fathers had.

Adrift on Time's returnless tide, As waves that follow waves, we glide. God grant we leave upon the shore Some waif of good it lacked before;

Some seed, or flower, or plant of worth, Some added beauty to the earth; Some larger hope, some thought to make The sad world happier for its sake.

As tenants of uncertain stay, So may we live our little day That only grateful hearts shall fill The homes we leave in Haverhill.

The singer of a farewell rhyme, Upon whose outmost verge of time The shades of night are falling down, I pray, God bless the good old town!

TO G. G. AN AUTOGRAPH.

The daughter of Daniel Gurteen, Esq., delegate from Haverhill, England, to the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary celebration of Haverhill, Massachusetts. The Rev. John Ward of the former place and many of his old parishioners were the pioneer settlers of the new town on the Merrimac.

Graceful in name and in thyself, our river None fairer saw in John Ward's pilgrim flock, Proof that upon their century-rooted stock The English roses bloom as fresh as ever.

Take the warm welcome of new friends with thee, And listening to thy home's familiar chime Dream that thou hearest, with it keeping time, The bells on Merrimac sound across the sea.

Think of our thrushes, when the lark sings clear, Of our sweet Mayflowers when the daisies bloom; And bear to our and thy ancestral home The kindly greeting of its children here.

Say that our love survives the severing strain; That the New England, with the Old, holds fast The proud, fond memories of a common past; Unbroken still the ties of blood remain!

INSCRIPTION

For the bass-relief by Preston Powers, carved upon the huge boulder in Denver Park, Col., and representing the Last Indian and the Last Bison.

The eagle, stooping from yon snow-blown peaks, For the wild hunter and the bison seeks, In the changed world below; and finds alone Their graven semblance in the eternal stone.

LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY.

Inscription on her Memorial Tablet in Christ Church at Hartford, Conn.

She sang alone, ere womanhood had known The gift of song which fills the air to-day Tender and sweet, a music all her own May fitly linger where she knelt to pray.

MILTON

Inscription on the Memorial Window in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, the gift of George W. Childs, of America.

The new world honors him whose lofty plea For England's freedom made her own more sure, Whose song, immortal as its theme, shall be Their common freehold while both worlds endure.

THE BIRTHDAY WREATH

December 17, 1891.

Blossom and greenness, making all The winter birthday tropical, And the plain Quaker parlors gay, Have gone from bracket, stand, and wall; We saw them fade, and droop, and fall, And laid them tenderly away.

White virgin lilies, mignonette, Blown rose, and pink, and violet, A breath of fragrance passing by; Visions of beauty and decay, Colors and shapes that could not stay, The fairest, sweetest, first to die.

But still this rustic wreath of mine, Of acorned oak and needled pine, And lighter growths of forest lands, Woven and wound with careful pains, And tender thoughts, and prayers, remains, As when it dropped from love's dear hands.

And not unfitly garlanded, Is he, who, country-born and bred, Welcomes the sylvan ring which gives A feeling of old summer days, The wild delight of woodland ways, The glory of the autumn leaves.

And, if the flowery meed of song To other bards may well belong, Be his, who from the farm-field spoke A word for Freedom when her need Was not of dulcimer and reed. This Isthmian wreath of pine and oak.

THE WIND OF MARCH.

Up from the sea, the wild north wind is blowing Under the sky's gray arch; Smiling, I watch the shaken elm-boughs, knowing It is the wind of March.

Between the passing and the coming season, This stormy interlude Gives to our winter-wearied hearts a reason For trustful gratitude.

Welcome to waiting ears its harsh forewarning Of light and warmth to come, The longed-for joy of Nature's Easter morning, The earth arisen in bloom.

In the loud tumult winter's strength is breaking; I listen to the sound, As to a voice of resurrection, waking To life the dead, cold ground.

Between these gusts, to the soft lapse I hearken Of rivulets on their way; I see these tossed and naked tree-tops darken With the fresh leaves of May.

This roar of storm, this sky so gray and lowering Invite the airs of Spring, A warmer sunshine over fields of flowering, The bluebird's song and wing.

Closely behind, the Gulf's warm breezes follow This northern hurricane, And, borne thereon, the bobolink and swallow Shall visit us again.

And, in green wood-paths, in the kine-fed pasture And by the whispering rills, Shall flowers repeat the lesson of the Master, Taught on his Syrian hills.

Blow, then, wild wind! thy roar shall end in singing, Thy chill in blossoming; Come, like Bethesda's troubling angel, bringing The healing of the Spring.

BETWEEN THE GATES.

Between the gates of birth and death An old and saintly pilgrim passed, With look of one who witnesseth The long-sought goal at last.

O thou whose reverent feet have found The Master's footprints in thy way, And walked thereon as holy ground, A boon of thee I pray.

"My lack would borrow thy excess, My feeble faith the strength of thine; I need thy soul's white saintliness To hide the stains of mine.

"The grace and favor else denied May well be granted for thy sake." So, tempted, doubting, sorely tried, A younger pilgrim spake.

"Thy prayer, my son, transcends my gift; No power is mine," the sage replied, "The burden of a soul to lift Or stain of sin to hide.

"Howe'er the outward life may seem, For pardoning grace we all must pray; No man his brother can redeem Or a soul's ransom pay.

"Not always age is growth of good; Its years have losses with their gain; Against some evil youth withstood Weak hands may strive in vain.

"With deeper voice than any speech Of mortal lips from man to man, What earth's unwisdom may not teach The Spirit only can.

"Make thou that holy guide thine own, And following where it leads the way, The known shall lapse in the unknown As twilight into day.

"The best of earth shall still remain, And heaven's eternal years shall prove That life and death, and joy and pain, Are ministers of Love."

THE LAST EVE OF SUMMER.

Summer's last sun nigh unto setting shines Through yon columnar pines, And on the deepening shadows of the lawn Its golden lines are drawn.

Dreaming of long gone summer days like this, Feeling the wind's soft kiss, Grateful and glad that failing ear and sight Have still their old delight,

I sit alone, and watch the warm, sweet day Lapse tenderly away; And, wistful, with a feeling of forecast, I ask, "Is this the last?

"Will nevermore for me the seasons run Their round, and will the sun Of ardent summers yet to come forget For me to rise and set?"

Thou shouldst be here, or I should be with thee Wherever thou mayst be, Lips mute, hands clasped, in silences of speech Each answering unto each.

For this still hour, this sense of mystery far Beyond the evening star, No words outworn suffice on lip or scroll: The soul would fain with soul