NARRATIVE AND LEGENDARY POEMS BY JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER CONTENTS: MABEL MARTIN: A HARVEST IDYL PROEM I. THE RIVER VALLEY II. THE HUSKING III. THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER IV. THE CHAMPION V. IN THE SHADOW VI. THE BETROTHAL THE PROPHECY OF SAMUEL SEWALLTHE RED RIVER VOYAGEURTHE PREACHERTHE TRUCE OF PISCATAQUAMY PLAYMATECOBBLER KEEZAR'S VISIONAMY WENTWORTHTHE COUNTESS MABEL MARTIN. A HARVEST IDYL. Susanna Martin, an aged woman of Amesbury, Mass. , was tried and executedfor the alleged crime of witchcraft. Her home was in what is now knownas Pleasant Valley on the Merrimac, a little above the old Ferry way, where, tradition says, an attempt was made to assassinate Sir EdmundAndros on his way to Falmouth (afterward Portland) and Pemaquid, whichwas frustrated by a warning timely given. Goody Martin was the onlywoman hanged on the north side of the Merrimac during the dreadfuldelusion. The aged wife of Judge Bradbury who lived on the other side ofthe Powow River was imprisoned and would have been put to death but forthe collapse of the hideous persecution. The substance of the poem which follows was published under the name ofThe Witch's Daughter, in The National Era in 1857. In 1875 my publishersdesired to issue it with illustrations, and I then enlarged it andotherwise altered it to its present form. The principal addition was inthe verses which constitute Part I. PROEM. I CALL the old time back: I bring my layin tender memory of the summer dayWhen, where our native river lapsed away, We dreamed it over, while the thrushes madeSongs of their own, and the great pine-trees laidOn warm noonlights the masses of their shade. And she was with us, living o'er againHer life in ours, despite of years and pain, --The Autumn's brightness after latter rain. Beautiful in her holy peace as oneWho stands, at evening, when the work is done, Glorified in the setting of the sun! Her memory makes our common landscape seemFairer than any of which painters dream;Lights the brown hills and sings in every stream; For she whose speech was always truth's pure goldHeard, not unpleased, its simple legends told, And loved with us the beautiful and old. I. THE RIVER VALLEY. Across the level tableland, A grassy, rarely trodden way, With thinnest skirt of birchen spray And stunted growth of cedar, leadsTo where you see the dull plain fallSheer off, steep-slanted, ploughed by all The seasons' rainfalls. On its brinkThe over-leaning harebells swing, With roots half bare the pine-trees cling; And, through the shadow looking west, You see the wavering river flowAlong a vale, that far below Holds to the sun, the sheltering hillsAnd glimmering water-line between, Broad fields of corn and meadows green, And fruit-bent orchards grouped aroundThe low brown roofs and painted eaves, And chimney-tops half hid in leaves. No warmer valley hides behindYon wind-scourged sand-dunes, cold and bleak;No fairer river comes to seek The wave-sung welcome of the sea, Or mark the northmost border lineOf sun-loved growths of nut and vine. Here, ground-fast in their native fields, Untempted by the city's gain, The quiet farmer folk remain Who bear the pleasant name of Friends, And keep their fathers' gentle waysAnd simple speech of Bible days; In whose neat homesteads woman holdsWith modest ease her equal place, And wears upon her tranquil face The look of one who, merging notHer self-hood in another's will, Is love's and duty's handmaid still. Pass with me down the path that windsThrough birches to the open land, Where, close upon the river strand You mark a cellar, vine o'errun, Above whose wall of loosened stonesThe sumach lifts its reddening cones, And the black nightshade's berries shine, And broad, unsightly burdocks foldThe household ruin, century-old. Here, in the dim colonial timeOf sterner lives and gloomier faith, A woman lived, tradition saith, Who wrought her neighbors foul annoy, And witched and plagued the country-side, Till at the hangman's hand she died. Sit with me while the westering dayFalls slantwise down the quiet vale, And, haply ere yon loitering sail, That rounds the upper headland, fallsBelow Deer Island's pines, or seesBehind it Hawkswood's belt of trees Rise black against the sinking sun, My idyl of its days of old, The valley's legend, shall be told. II. THE HUSKING. It was the pleasant harvest-time, When cellar-bins are closely stowed, And garrets bend beneath their load, And the old swallow-haunted barns, --Brown-gabled, long, and full of seamsThrough which the rooted sunlight streams, And winds blow freshly in, to shakeThe red plumes of the roosted cocks, And the loose hay-mow's scented locks, Are filled with summer's ripened stores, Its odorous grass and barley sheaves, From their low scaffolds to their eaves. On Esek Harden's oaken floor, With many an autumn threshing worn, Lay the heaped ears of unhusked corn. And thither came young men and maids, Beneath a moon that, large and low, Lit that sweet eve of long ago. They took their places; some by chance, And others by a merry voiceOr sweet smile guided to their choice. How pleasantly the rising moon, Between the shadow of the mows, Looked on them through the great elm-boughs! On sturdy boyhood, sun-embrowned, On girlhood with its solid curvesOf healthful strength and painless nerves! And jests went round, and laughs that madeThe house-dog answer with his howl, And kept astir the barn-yard fowl; And quaint old songs their fathers sungIn Derby dales and Yorkshire moors, Ere Norman William trod their shores; And tales, whose merry license shookThe fat sides of the Saxon thane, Forgetful of the hovering Dane, -- Rude plays to Celt and Cimbri known, The charms and riddles that beguiledOn Oxus' banks the young world's child, -- That primal picture-speech whereinHave youth and maid the story told, So new in each, so dateless old, Recalling pastoral Ruth in herWho waited, blushing and demure, The red-ear's kiss of forfeiture. But still the sweetest voice was muteThat river-valley ever heardFrom lips of maid or throat of bird; For Mabel Martin sat apart, And let the hay-mow's shadow fallUpon the loveliest face of all. She sat apart, as one forbid, Who knew that none would condescendTo own the Witch-wife's child a friend. The seasons scarce had gone their round, Since curious thousands thronged to seeHer mother at the gallows-tree; And mocked the prison-palsied limbsThat faltered on the fatal stairs, And wan lip trembling with its prayers! Few questioned of the sorrowing child, Or, when they saw the mother die;Dreamed of the daughter's agony. They went up to their homes that day, As men and Christians justifiedGod willed it, and the wretch had died! Dear God and Father of us all, Forgive our faith in cruel lies, --Forgive the blindness that denies! Forgive thy creature when he takes, For the all-perfect love Thou art, Some grim creation of his heart. Cast down our idols, overturnOur bloody altars; let us seeThyself in Thy humanity! Young Mabel from her mother's graveCrept to her desolate hearth-stone, And wrestled with her fate alone; With love, and anger, and despair, The phantoms of disordered sense, The awful doubts of Providence! Oh, dreary broke the winter days, And dreary fell the winter nightsWhen, one by one, the neighboring lights Went out, and human sounds grew still, And all the phantom-peopled darkClosed round her hearth-fire's dying spark. And summer days were sad and long, And sad the uncompanioned eves, And sadder sunset-tinted leaves, And Indian Summer's airs of balm;She scarcely felt the soft caress, The beauty died of loneliness! The school-boys jeered her as they passed, And, when she sought the house of prayer, Her mother's curse pursued her there. And still o'er many a neighboring doorShe saw the horseshoe's curved charm, To guard against her mother's harm! That mother, poor and sick and lame, Who daily, by the old arm-chair, Folded her withered hands in prayer;-- Who turned, in Salem's dreary jail, Her worn old Bible o'er and o'er, When her dim eyes could read no more! Sore tried and pained, the poor girl keptHer faith, and trusted that her way, So dark, would somewhere meet the day. And still her weary wheel went roundDay after day, with no reliefSmall leisure have the poor for grief. IV. THE CHAMPION. So in the shadow Mabel sits;Untouched by mirth she sees and hears, Her smile is sadder than her tears. But cruel eyes have found her out, And cruel lips repeat her name, And taunt her with her mother's shame. She answered not with railing words, But drew her apron o'er her face, And, sobbing, glided from the place. And only pausing at the door, Her sad eyes met the troubled gazeOf one who, in her better days, Had been her warm and steady friend, Ere yet her mother's doom had madeEven Esek Harden half afraid. He felt that mute appeal of tears, And, starting, with an angry frown, Hushed all the wicked murmurs down. "Good neighbors mine, " he sternly said, "This passes harmless mirth or jest;I brook no insult to my guest. "She is indeed her mother's child;But God's sweet pity ministersUnto no whiter soul than hers. "Let Goody Martin rest in peace;I never knew her harm a fly, And witch or not, God knows--not I. "I know who swore her life away;And as God lives, I'd not condemnAn Indian dog on word of them. " The broadest lands in all the town, The skill to guide, the power to awe, Were Harden's; and his word was law. None dared withstand him to his face, But one sly maiden spake aside"The little witch is evil-eyed! "Her mother only killed a cow, Or witched a churn or dairy-pan;But she, forsooth, must charm a man!" V. IN THE SHADOW. Poor Mabel, homeward turning, passedThe nameless terrors of the wood, And saw, as if a ghost pursued, Her shadow gliding in the moon;The soft breath of the west-wind gaveA chill as from her mother's grave. How dreary seemed the silent house!Wide in the moonbeams' ghastly glareIts windows had a dead man's stare! And, like a gaunt and spectral hand, The tremulous shadow of a birchReached out and touched the door's low porch, As if to lift its latch; hard by, A sudden warning call she beard, The night-cry of a boding bird. She leaned against the door; her face, So fair, so young, so full of pain, White in the moonlight's silver rain. The river, on its pebbled rim, Made music such as childhood knew;The door-yard tree was whispered through By voices such as childhood's earHad heard in moonlights long ago;And through the willow-boughs below. She saw the rippled waters shine;Beyond, in waves of shade and light, The hills rolled off into the night. She saw and heard, but over allA sense of some transforming spell, The shadow of her sick heart fell. And still across the wooded spaceThe harvest lights of Harden shone, And song and jest and laugh went on. And he, so gentle, true, and strong, Of men the bravest and the best, Had he, too, scorned her with the rest? She strove to drown her sense of wrong, And, in her old and simple way, To teach her bitter heart to pray. Poor child! the prayer, begun in faith, Grew to a low, despairing cryOf utter misery: "Let me die! "Oh! take me from the scornful eyes, And hide me where the cruel speechAnd mocking finger may not reach! "I dare not breathe my mother's nameA daughter's right I dare not craveTo weep above her unblest grave! "Let me not live until my heart, With few to pity, and with noneTo love me, hardens into stone. "O God! have mercy on Thy child, Whose faith in Thee grows weak and small, And take me ere I lose it all!" A shadow on the moonlight fell, And murmuring wind and wave becameA voice whose burden was her name. VI. THE BETROTHAL. Had then God heard her? Had He sentHis angel down? In flesh and blood, Before her Esek Harden stood! He laid his hand upon her arm"Dear Mabel, this no more shall be;Who scoffs at you must scoff at me. "You know rough Esek Harden well;And if he seems no suitor gay, And if his hair is touched with gray, "The maiden grown shall never findHis heart less warm than when she smiled, Upon his knees, a little child!" Her tears of grief were tears of joy, As, folded in his strong embrace, She looked in Esek Harden's face. "O truest friend of all'" she said, "God bless you for your kindly thought, And make me worthy of my lot!" He led her forth, and, blent in one, Beside their happy pathway ranThe shadows of the maid and man. He led her through his dewy fields, To where the swinging lanterns glowed, And through the doors the huskers showed. "Good friends and neighbors!" Esek said, "I'm weary of this lonely life;In Mabel see my chosen wife! "She greets you kindly, one and all;The past is past, and all offenceFalls harmless from her innocence. "Henceforth she stands no more alone;You know what Esek Harden is;--He brooks no wrong to him or his. "Now let the merriest tales be told, And let the sweetest songs be sungThat ever made the old heart young! "For now the lost has found a home;And a lone hearth shall brighter burn, As all the household joys return!" Oh, pleasantly the harvest-moon, Between the shadow of the mows, Looked on them through the great elm--boughs! On Mabel's curls of golden hair, On Esek's shaggy strength it fell;And the wind whispered, "It is well!" THE PROPHECY OF SAMUEL SEWALL. The prose version of this prophecy is to be found in Sewall's The NewHeaven upon the New Earth, 1697, quoted in Joshua Coffin's History ofNewbury. Judge Sewall's father, Henry Sewall, was one of the pioneersof Newbury. UP and down the village streetsStrange are the forms my fancy meets, For the thoughts and things of to-day are hid, And through the veil of a closed lidThe ancient worthies I see againI hear the tap of the elder's cane, And his awful periwig I see, And the silver buckles of shoe and knee. Stately and slow, with thoughtful air, His black cap hiding his whitened hair, Walks the Judge of the great Assize, Samuel Sewall the good and wise. His face with lines of firmness wrought, He wears the look of a man unbought, Who swears to his hurt and changes not;Yet, touched and softened neverthelessWith the grace of Christian gentleness, The face that a child would climb to kiss!True and tender and brave and just, That man might honor and woman trust. Touching and sad, a tale is told, Like a penitent hymn of the Psalmist old, Of the fast which the good man lifelong kept toWith a haunting sorrow that never slept, As the circling year brought round the timeOf an error that left the sting of crime, When he sat on the bench of the witchcraft courts, With the laws of Moses and Hale's Reports, And spake, in the name of both, the wordThat gave the witch's neck to the cord, And piled the oaken planks that pressedThe feeble life from the warlock's breast!All the day long, from dawn to dawn, His door was bolted, his curtain drawn;No foot on his silent threshold trod, No eye looked on him save that of God, As he baffled the ghosts of the dead with charmsOf penitent tears, and prayers, and psalms, And, with precious proofs from the sacred wordOf the boundless pity and love of the Lord, His faith confirmed and his trust renewedThat the sin of his ignorance, sorely rued, Might be washed away in the mingled floodOf his human sorrow and Christ's dear blood! Green forever the memory beOf the Judge of the old Theocracy, Whom even his errors glorified, Like a far-seen, sunlit mountain-sideBy the cloudy shadows which o'er it glide IHonor and praise to the PuritanWho the halting step of his age outran, And, seeing the infinite worth of manIn the priceless gift the Father gave, In the infinite love that stooped to save, Dared not brand his brother a slave"Who doth such wrong, " he was wont to say, In his own quaint, picture-loving way, "Flings up to Heaven a hand-grenadeWhich God shall cast down upon his head!" Widely as heaven and hell, contrastThat brave old jurist of the pastAnd the cunning trickster and knave of courtsWho the holy features of Truth distorts, Ruling as right the will of the strong, Poverty, crime, and weakness wrong;Wide-eared to power, to the wronged and weakDeaf as Egypt's gods of leek;Scoffing aside at party's nodOrder of nature and law of God;For whose dabbled ermine respect were waste, Reverence folly, and awe misplaced;Justice of whom 't were vain to seekAs from Koordish robber or Syrian Sheik!Oh, leave the wretch to his bribes and sins;Let him rot in the web of lies he spins!To the saintly soul of the early day, To the Christian judge, let us turn and say"Praise and thanks for an honest man!--Glory to God for the Puritan!" I see, far southward, this quiet day, The hills of Newbury rolling away, With the many tints of the season gay, Dreamily blending in autumn mistCrimson, and gold, and amethyst. Long and low, with dwarf trees crowned, Plum Island lies, like a whale aground, A stone's toss over the narrow sound. Inland, as far as the eye can go, The hills curve round like a bended bow;A silver arrow from out them sprung, I see the shine of the Quasycung;And, round and round, over valley and hill, Old roads winding, as old roads will, Here to a ferry, and there to a mill;And glimpses of chimneys and gabled eaves, Through green elm arches and maple leaves, --Old homesteads sacred to all that canGladden or sadden the heart of man, Over whose thresholds of oak and stoneLife and Death have come and goneThere pictured tiles in the fireplace show, Great beams sag from the ceiling low, The dresser glitters with polished wares, The long clock ticks on the foot-worn stairs, And the low, broad chimney shows the crackBy the earthquake made a century back. Up from their midst springs the village spireWith the crest of its cock in the sun afire;Beyond are orchards and planting lands, And great salt marshes and glimmering sands, And, where north and south the coast-lines run, The blink of the sea in breeze and sun! I see it all like a chart unrolled, But my thoughts are full of the past and old, I hear the tales of my boyhood told;And the shadows and shapes of early daysFlit dimly by in the veiling haze, With measured movement and rhythmic chimeWeaving like shuttles my web of rhyme. I think of the old man wise and goodWho once on yon misty hillsides stood, (A poet who never measured rhyme, A seer unknown to his dull-eared time, )And, propped on his staff of age, looked down, With his boyhood's love, on his native town, Where, written, as if on its hills and plains, His burden of prophecy yet remains, For the voices of wood, and wave, and windTo read in the ear of the musing mind:-- "As long as Plum Island, to guard the coastAs God appointed, shall keep its post;As long as a salmon shall haunt the deepOf Merrimac River, or sturgeon leap;As long as pickerel swift and slim, Or red-backed perch, in Crane Pond swim;As long as the annual sea-fowl knowTheir time to come and their time to go;As long as cattle shall roam at willThe green, grass meadows by Turkey Hill;As long as sheep shall look from the sideOf Oldtown Hill on marishes wide, And Parker River, and salt-sea tide;As long as a wandering pigeon shall searchThe fields below from his white-oak perch, When the barley-harvest is ripe and shorn, And the dry husks fall from the standing corn;As long as Nature shall not grow old, Nor drop her work from her doting hold, And her care for the Indian corn forget, And the yellow rows in pairs to set;--So long shall Christians here be born, Grow up and ripen as God's sweet corn!--By the beak of bird, by the breath of frost, Shall never a holy ear be lost, But, husked by Death in the Planter's sight, Be sown again in the fields of light!" The Island still is purple with plums, Up the river the salmon comes, The sturgeon leaps, and the wild-fowl feedsOn hillside berries and marish seeds, --All the beautiful signs remain, From spring-time sowing to autumn rainThe good man's vision returns again!And let us hope, as well we can, That the Silent Angel who garners manMay find some grain as of old lie foundIn the human cornfield ripe and sound, And the Lord of the Harvest deign to ownThe precious seed by the fathers sown!1859. THE RED RIPER VOYAGEUR. OUT and in the river is windingThe links of its long, red chain, Through belts of dusky pine-landAnd gusty leagues of plain. Only, at times, a smoke-wreathWith the drifting cloud-rack joins, --The smoke of the hunting-lodgesOf the wild Assiniboins. Drearily blows the north-windFrom the land of ice and snow;The eyes that look are weary, And heavy the hands that row. And with one foot on the water, And one upon the shore, The Angel of Shadow gives warningThat day shall be no more. Is it the clang of wild-geese?Is it the Indian's yell, That lends to the voice of the north-windThe tones of a far-off bell? The voyageur smiles as he listensTo the sound that grows apace;Well he knows the vesper ringingOf the bells of St. Boniface. The bells of the Roman Mission, That call from their turrets twain, To the boatman on the river, To the hunter on the plain! Even so in our mortal journeyThe bitter north-winds blow, And thus upon life's Red RiverOur hearts, as oarsmen, row. And when the Angel of ShadowRests his feet on wave and shore, And our eyes grow dim with watchingAnd our hearts faint at the oar, Happy is he who hearethThe signal of his releaseIn the bells of the Holy City, The chimes of eternal peace!1859 THE PREACHER. George Whitefield, the celebrated preacher, died at Newburyport in 1770, and was buried under the church which has since borne his name. ITS windows flashing to the sky, Beneath a thousand roofs of brown, Far down the vale, my friend and IBeheld the old and quiet town;The ghostly sails that out at seaFlapped their white wings of mystery;The beaches glimmering in the sun, And the low wooded capes that runInto the sea-mist north and south;The sand-bluffs at the river's mouth;The swinging chain-bridge, and, afar, The foam-line of the harbor-bar. Over the woods and meadow-landsA crimson-tinted shadow lay, Of clouds through which the setting dayFlung a slant glory far away. It glittered on the wet sea-sands, It flamed upon the city's panes, Smote the white sails of ships that woreOutward or in, and glided o'erThe steeples with their veering vanes! Awhile my friend with rapid searchO'erran the landscape. "Yonder spireOver gray roofs, a shaft of fire;What is it, pray?"--"The Whitefield Church!Walled about by its basement stones, There rest the marvellous prophet's bones. "Then as our homeward way we walked, Of the great preacher's life we talked;And through the mystery of our themeThe outward glory seemed to stream, And Nature's self interpretedThe doubtful record of the dead;And every level beam that smoteThe sails upon the dark afloatA symbol of the light became, Which touched the shadows of our blame, With tongues of Pentecostal flame. Over the roofs of the pioneersGathers the moss of a hundred years;On man and his works has passed the changeWhich needs must be in a century's range. The land lies open and warm in the sun, Anvils clamor and mill-wheels run, --Flocks on the hillsides, herds on the plain, The wilderness gladdened with fruit and grain!But the living faith of the settlers oldA dead profession their children hold;To the lust of office and greed of tradeA stepping-stone is the altar made. The church, to place and power the door, Rebukes the sin of the world no more, Nor sees its Lord in the homeless poor. Everywhere is the grasping hand, And eager adding of land to land;And earth, which seemed to the fathers meantBut as a pilgrim's wayside tent, --A nightly shelter to fold awayWhen the Lord should call at the break of day, --Solid and steadfast seems to be, And Time has forgotten Eternity! But fresh and green from the rotting rootsOf primal forests the young growth shoots;From the death of the old the new proceeds, And the life of truth from the rot of creedsOn the ladder of God, which upward leads, The steps of progress are human needs. For His judgments still are a mighty deep, And the eyes of His providence never sleepWhen the night is darkest He gives the morn;When the famine is sorest, the wine and corn! In the church of the wilderness Edwards wrought, Shaping his creed at the forge of thought;And with Thor's own hammer welded and bentThe iron links of his argument, Which strove to grasp in its mighty spanThe purpose of God and the fate of manYet faithful still, in his daily roundTo the weak, and the poor, and sin-sick found, The schoolman's lore and the casuist's artDrew warmth and life from his fervent heart. Had he not seen in the solitudesOf his deep and dark Northampton woodsA vision of love about him fall?Not the blinding splendor which fell on Saul, But the tenderer glory that rests on themWho walk in the New Jerusalem, Where never the sun nor moon are known, But the Lord and His love are the light aloneAnd watching the sweet, still countenanceOf the wife of his bosom rapt in trance, Had he not treasured each broken wordOf the mystical wonder seen and heard;And loved the beautiful dreamer moreThat thus to the desert of earth she boreClusters of Eshcol from Canaan's shore? As the barley-winnower, holding with painAloft in waiting his chaff and grain, Joyfully welcomes the far-off breezeSounding the pine-tree's slender keys, So he who had waited long to hearThe sound of the Spirit drawing near, Like that which the son of Iddo heardWhen the feet of angels the myrtles stirred, Felt the answer of prayer, at last, As over his church the afflatus passed, Breaking its sleep as breezes breakTo sun-bright ripples a stagnant lake. At first a tremor of silent fear, The creep of the flesh at danger near, A vague foreboding and discontent, Over the hearts of the people went. All nature warned in sounds and signsThe wind in the tops of the forest pinesIn the name of the Highest called to prayer, As the muezzin calls from the minaret stair. Through ceiled chambers of secret sinSudden and strong the light shone in;A guilty sense of his neighbor's needsStartled the man of title-deeds;The trembling hand of the worldling shookThe dust of years from the Holy Book;And the psalms of David, forgotten long, Took the place of the scoffer's song. The impulse spread like the outward courseOf waters moved by a central force;The tide of spiritual life rolled downFrom inland mountains to seaboard town. Prepared and ready the altar standsWaiting the prophet's outstretched handsAnd prayer availing, to downward callThe fiery answer in view of all. Hearts are like wax in the furnace; whoShall mould, and shape, and cast them anew?Lo! by the Merrimac Whitefield standsIn the temple that never was made by hands, --Curtains of azure, and crystal wall, And dome of the sunshine over all--A homeless pilgrim, with dubious nameBlown about on the winds of fame;Now as an angel of blessing classed, And now as a mad enthusiast. Called in his youth to sound and gaugeThe moral lapse of his race and age, And, sharp as truth, the contrast drawOf human frailty and perfect law;Possessed by the one dread thought that lentIts goad to his fiery temperament, Up and down the world he went, A John the Baptist crying, Repent! No perfect whole can our nature make;Here or there the circle will break;The orb of life as it takes the lightOn one side leaves the other in night. Never was saint so good and greatAs to give no chance at St. Peter's gateFor the plea of the Devil's advocate. So, incomplete by his being's law, The marvellous preacher had his flaw;With step unequal, and lame with faults, His shade on the path of History halts. Wisely and well said the Eastern bardFear is easy, but love is hard, --Easy to glow with the Santon's rage, And walk on the Meccan pilgrimage;But he is greatest and best who canWorship Allah by loving man. Thus he, --to whom, in the painful stressOf zeal on fire from its own excess, Heaven seemed so vast and earth so smallThat man was nothing, since God was all, --Forgot, as the best at times have done, That the love of the Lord and of man are one. Little to him whose feet unshodThe thorny path of the desert trod, Careless of pain, so it led to God, Seemed the hunger-pang and the poor man's wrong, The weak ones trodden beneath the strong. Should the worm be chooser?--the clay withstandThe shaping will of the potter's hand? In the Indian fable Arjoon hearsThe scorn of a god rebuke his fears"Spare thy pity!" Krishna saith;"Not in thy sword is the power of death!All is illusion, --loss but seems;Pleasure and pain are only dreams;Who deems he slayeth doth not kill;Who counts as slain is living still. Strike, nor fear thy blow is crime;Nothing dies but the cheats of time;Slain or slayer, small the oddsTo each, immortal as Indra's gods!" So by Savannah's banks of shade, The stones of his mission the preacher laidOn the heart of the negro crushed and rent, And made of his blood the wall's cement;Bade the slave-ship speed from coast to coast, Fanned by the wings of the Holy Ghost;And begged, for the love of Christ, the goldCoined from the hearts in its groaning hold. What could it matter, more or lessOf stripes, and hunger, and weariness?Living or dying, bond or free, What was time to eternity? Alas for the preacher's cherished schemes!Mission and church are now but dreams;Nor prayer nor fasting availed the planTo honor God through the wrong of man. Of all his labors no trace remainsSave the bondman lifting his hands in chains. The woof he wove in the righteous warpOf freedom-loving Oglethorpe, Clothes with curses the goodly land, Changes its greenness and bloom to sand;And a century's lapse reveals once moreThe slave-ship stealing to Georgia's shore. Father of Light! how blind is heWho sprinkles the altar he rears to TheeWith the blood and tears of humanity! He erred: shall we count His gifts as naught?Was the work of God in him unwrought?The servant may through his deafness err, And blind may be God's messenger;But the Errand is sure they go upon, --The word is spoken, the deed is done. Was the Hebrew temple less fair and goodThat Solomon bowed to gods of wood?For his tempted heart and wandering feet, Were the songs of David less pure and sweet?So in light and shadow the preacher went, God's erring and human instrument;And the hearts of the people where he passedSwayed as the reeds sway in the blast, Under the spell of a voice which tookIn its compass the flow of Siloa's brook, And the mystical chime of the bells of goldOn the ephod's hem of the priest of old, --Now the roll of thunder, and now the aweOf the trumpet heard in the Mount of Law. A solemn fear on the listening crowdFell like the shadow of a cloud. The sailor reeling from out the shipsWhose masts stood thick in the river-slipsFelt the jest and the curse die on his lips. Listened the fisherman rude and hard, The calker rough from the builder's yard;The man of the market left his load, The teamster leaned on his bending goad, The maiden, and youth beside her, feltTheir hearts in a closer union melt, And saw the flowers of their love in bloomDown the endless vistas of life to come. Old age sat feebly brushing awayFrom his ears the scanty locks of gray;And careless boyhood, living the freeUnconscious life of bird and tree, Suddenly wakened to a senseOf sin and its guilty consequence. It was as if an angel's voiceCalled the listeners up for their final choice;As if a strong hand rent apartThe veils of sense from soul and heart, Showing in light ineffableThe joys of heaven and woes of hellAll about in the misty airThe hills seemed kneeling in silent prayer;The rustle of leaves, the moaning sedge, The water's lap on its gravelled edge, The wailing pines, and, far and faint, The wood-dove's note of sad complaint, --To the solemn voice of the preacher lentAn undertone as of low lament;And the note of the sea from its sand coast, On the easterly wind, now heard, now lost, Seemed the murmurous sound of the judgment host. Yet wise men doubted, and good men wept, As that storm of passion above them swept, And, comet-like, adding flame to flame, The priests of the new Evangel came, --Davenport, flashing upon the crowd, Charged like summer's electric cloud, Now holding the listener still as deathWith terrible warnings under breath, Now shouting for joy, as if he viewedThe vision of Heaven's beatitude!And Celtic Tennant, his long coat boundLike a monk's with leathern girdle round, Wild with the toss of unshorn hair, And wringing of hands, and, eyes aglare, Groaning under the world's despair!Grave pastors, grieving their flocks to lose, Prophesied to the empty pewsThat gourds would wither, and mushrooms die, And noisiest fountains run soonest dry, Like the spring that gushed in Newbury Street, Under the tramp of the earthquake's feet, A silver shaft in the air and light, For a single day, then lost in night, Leaving only, its place to tell, Sandy fissure and sulphurous smell. With zeal wing-clipped and white-heat cool, Moved by the spirit in grooves of rule, No longer harried, and cropped, and fleeced, Flogged by sheriff and cursed by priest, But by wiser counsels left at easeTo settle quietly on his lees, And, self-concentred, to count as doneThe work which his fathers well begun, In silent protest of letting alone, The Quaker kept the way of his own, --A non-conductor among the wires, With coat of asbestos proof to fires. And quite unable to mend his paceTo catch the falling manna of grace, He hugged the closer his little storeOf faith, and silently prayed for more. And vague of creed and barren of rite, But holding, as in his Master's sight, Act and thought to the inner light, The round of his simple duties walked, And strove to live what the others talked. And who shall marvel if evil wentStep by step with the good intent, And with love and meekness, side by side, Lust of the flesh and spiritual pride?--That passionate longings and fancies vainSet the heart on fire and crazed the brain?That over the holy oraclesFolly sported with cap and bells?That goodly women and learned menMarvelling told with tongue and penHow unweaned children chirped like birdsTexts of Scripture and solemn words, Like the infant seers of the rocky glensIn the Puy de Dome of wild CevennesOr baby Lamas who pray and preachFrom Tartir cradles in Buddha's speech? In the war which Truth or Freedom wagesWith impious fraud and the wrong of ages, Hate and malice and self-love marThe notes of triumph with painful jar, And the helping angels turn asideTheir sorrowing faces the shame to bide. Never on custom's oiled groovesThe world to a higher level moves, But grates and grinds with friction hardOn granite boulder and flinty shard. The heart must bleed before it feels, The pool be troubled before it heals;Ever by losses the right must gain, Every good have its birth of pain;The active Virtues blush to findThe Vices wearing their badge behind, And Graces and Charities feel the fireWherein the sins of the age expire;The fiend still rends as of old he rentThe tortured body from which be went. But Time tests all. In the over-driftAnd flow of the Nile, with its annual gift, Who cares for the Hadji's relics sunk?Who thinks of the drowned-out Coptic monk?The tide that loosens the temple's stones, And scatters the sacred ibis-bones, Drives away from the valley-landThat Arab robber, the wandering sand, Moistens the fields that know no rain, Fringes the desert with belts of grain, And bread to the sower brings again. So the flood of emotion deep and strongTroubled the land as it swept along, But left a result of holier lives, Tenderer-mothers and worthier wives. The husband and father whose children fledAnd sad wife wept when his drunken treadFrightened peace from his roof-tree's shade, And a rock of offence his hearthstone made, In a strength that was not his own beganTo rise from the brute's to the plane of man. Old friends embraced, long held apartBy evil counsel and pride of heart;And penitence saw through misty tears, In the bow of hope on its cloud of fears, The promise of Heaven's eternal years, --The peace of God for the world's annoy, --Beauty for ashes, and oil of joyUnder the church of Federal Street, Under the tread of its Sabbath feet, Walled about by its basement stones, Lie the marvellous preacher's bones. No saintly honors to them are shown, No sign nor miracle have they known;But be who passes the ancient churchStops in the shade of its belfry-porch, And ponders the wonderful life of himWho lies at rest in that charnel dim. Long shall the traveller strain his eyeFrom the railroad car, as it plunges by, And the vanishing town behind him searchFor the slender spire of the Whitefield Church;And feel for one moment the ghosts of trade, And fashion, and folly, and pleasure laid, By the thought of that life of pure intent, That voice of warning yet eloquent, Of one on the errands of angels sent. And if where he labored the flood of sinLike a tide from the harbor-bar sets in, And over a life of tune and senseThe church-spires lift their vain defence, As if to scatter the bolts of GodWith the points of Calvin's thunder-rod, --Still, as the gem of its civic crown, Precious beyond the world's renown, His memory hallows the ancient town!1859. THE TRUCE OF PISCATAQUA. In the winter of 1675-76, the Eastern Indians, who had been making warupon the New Hampshire settlements, were so reduced in numbers byfighting and famine that they agreed to a peace with Major Waldron atDover, but the peace was broken in the fall of 1676. The famous chief, Squando, was the principal negotiator on the part of the savages. He hadtaken up the hatchet to revenge the brutal treatment of his child bydrunken white sailors, which caused its death. It not unfrequently happened during the Border wars that young whitechildren were adopted by their Indian captors, and so kindly treatedthat they were unwilling to leave the free, wild life of the woods; andin some instances they utterly refused to go back with their parents totheir old homes and civilization. RAZE these long blocks of brick and stone, These huge mill-monsters overgrown;Blot out the humbler piles as well, Where, moved like living shuttles, dwellThe weaving genii of the bell;Tear from the wild Cocheco's trackThe dams that hold its torrents back;And let the loud-rejoicing fallPlunge, roaring, down its rocky wall;And let the Indian's paddle playOn the unbridged Piscataqua!Wide over hill and valley spreadOnce more the forest, dusk and dread, With here and there a clearing cutFrom the walled shadows round it shut;Each with its farm-house builded rude, By English yeoman squared and hewed, And the grim, flankered block-house boundWith bristling palisades around. So, haply shall before thine eyesThe dusty veil of centuries rise, The old, strange scenery overlayThe tamer pictures of to-day, While, like the actors in a play, Pass in their ancient guise alongThe figures of my border songWhat time beside Cocheco's floodThe white man and the red man stood, With words of peace and brotherhood;When passed the sacred calumetFrom lip to lip with fire-draught wet, And, puffed in scorn, the peace-pipe's smokeThrough the gray beard of Waldron broke, And Squando's voice, in suppliant pleaFor mercy, struck the haughty keyOf one who held, in any fate, His native pride inviolate! "Let your ears be opened wide!He who speaks has never lied. Waldron of Piscataqua, Hear what Squando has to say! "Squando shuts his eyes and sees, Far off, Saco's hemlock-trees. In his wigwam, still as stone, Sits a woman all alone, "Wampum beads and birchen strandsDropping from her careless hands, Listening ever for the fleetPatter of a dead child's feet! "When the moon a year agoTold the flowers the time to blow, In that lonely wigwam smiledMenewee, our little child. "Ere that moon grew thin and old, He was lying still and cold;Sent before us, weak and small, When the Master did not call! "On his little grave I lay;Three times went and came the day, Thrice above me blazed the noon, Thrice upon me wept the moon. "In the third night-watch I heard, Far and low, a spirit-bird;Very mournful, very wild, Sang the totem of my child. "'Menewee, poor Menewee, Walks a path he cannot seeLet the white man's wigwam lightWith its blaze his steps aright. "'All-uncalled, he dares not showEmpty hands to ManitoBetter gifts he cannot bearThan the scalps his slayers wear. ' "All the while the totem sang, Lightning blazed and thunder rang;And a black cloud, reaching high, Pulled the white moon from the sky. "I, the medicine-man, whose earAll that spirits bear can hear, --I, whose eyes are wide to seeAll the things that are to be, -- "Well I knew the dreadful signsIn the whispers of the pines, In the river roaring loud, In the mutter of the cloud. "At the breaking of the day, From the grave I passed away;Flowers bloomed round me, birds sang glad, But my heart was hot and mad. "There is rust on Squando's knife, From the warm, red springs of life;On the funeral hemlock-treesMany a scalp the totem sees. "Blood for blood! But evermoreSquando's heart is sad and sore;And his poor squaw waits at homeFor the feet that never come! "Waldron of Cocheco, hear!Squando speaks, who laughs at fear;Take the captives he has ta'en;Let the land have peace again!" As the words died on his tongue, Wide apart his warriors swung;Parted, at the sign he gave, Right and left, like Egypt's wave. And, like Israel passing freeThrough the prophet-charmed sea, Captive mother, wife, and childThrough the dusky terror filed. One alone, a little maid, Middleway her steps delayed, Glancing, with quick, troubled sight, Round about from red to white. Then his hand the Indian laidOn the little maiden's head, Lightly from her forehead fairSmoothing back her yellow hair. "Gift or favor ask I none;What I have is all my ownNever yet the birds have sung, Squando hath a beggar's tongue. ' "Yet for her who waits at home, For the dead who cannot come, Let the little Gold-hair beIn the place of Menewee! "Mishanock, my little star!Come to Saco's pines afar;Where the sad one waits at home, Wequashim, my moonlight, come!" "What!" quoth Waldron, "leave a childChristian-born to heathens wild?As God lives, from Satan's handI will pluck her as a brand!" "Hear me, white man!" Squando cried;"Let the little one decide. Wequashim, my moonlight, say, Wilt thou go with me, or stay?" Slowly, sadly, half afraid, Half regretfully, the maidOwned the ties of blood and race, --Turned from Squando's pleading face. Not a word the Indian spoke, But his wampum chain he broke, And the beaded wonder hungOn that neck so fair and young. Silence-shod, as phantoms seemIn the marches of a dream, Single-filed, the grim arrayThrough the pine-trees wound away. Doubting, trembling, sore amazed, Through her tears the young child gazed. "God preserve her!" Waldron said;"Satan hath bewitched the maid!" Years went and came. At close of daySinging came a child from play, Tossing from her loose-locked headGold in sunshine, brown in shade. Pride was in the mother's look, But her head she gravely shook, And with lips that fondly smiledFeigned to chide her truant child. Unabashed, the maid began"Up and down the brook I ran, Where, beneath the bank so steep, Lie the spotted trout asleep. "'Chip!' went squirrel on the wall, After me I heard him call, And the cat-bird on the treeTried his best to mimic me. "Where the hemlocks grew so darkThat I stopped to look and hark, On a log, with feather-hat, By the path, an Indian sat. "Then I cried, and ran away;But he called, and bade me stay;And his voice was good and mildAs my mother's to her child. "And he took my wampum chain, Looked and looked it o'er again;Gave me berries, and, beside, On my neck a plaything tied. " Straight the mother stooped to seeWhat the Indian's gift might be. On the braid of wampum hung, Lo! a cross of silver swung. Well she knew its graven sign, Squando's bird and totem pine;And, a mirage of the brain, Flowed her childhood back again. Flashed the roof the sunshine through, Into space the walls outgrew;On the Indian's wigwam-mat, Blossom-crowned, again she sat. Cool she felt the west-wind blow, In her ear the pines sang low, And, like links from out a chain, Dropped the years of care and pain. From the outward toil and din, From the griefs that gnaw within, To the freedom of the woodsCalled the birds, and winds, and floods. Well, O painful minister!Watch thy flock, but blame not her, If her ear grew sharp to hearAll their voices whispering near. Blame her not, as to her soulAll the desert's glamour stole, That a tear for childhood's lossDropped upon the Indian's cross. When, that night, the Book was read, And she bowed her widowed head, And a prayer for each loved nameRose like incense from a flame, With a hope the creeds forbidIn her pitying bosom hid, To the listening ear of HeavenLo! the Indian's name was given. 1860. MY PLAYMATE. THE pines were dark on Ramoth hill, Their song was soft and low;The blossoms in the sweet May windWere falling like the snow. The blossoms drifted at our feet, The orchard birds sang clear;The sweetest and the saddest dayIt seemed of all the year. For, more to me than birds or flowers, My playmate left her home, And took with her the laughing spring, The music and the bloom. She kissed the lips of kith and kin, She laid her hand in mineWhat more could ask the bashful boyWho fed her father's kine? She left us in the bloom of MayThe constant years told o'erTheir seasons with as sweet May morns, But she came back no more. I walk, with noiseless feet, the roundOf uneventful years;Still o'er and o'er I sow the springAnd reap the autumn ears. She lives where all the golden yearHer summer roses blow;The dusky children of the sunBefore her come and go. There haply with her jewelled handsShe smooths her silken gown, --No more the homespun lap whereinI shook the walnuts down. The wild grapes wait us by the brook, The brown nuts on the hill, And still the May-day flowers make sweetThe woods of Follymill. The lilies blossom in the pond, The bird builds in the tree, The dark pines sing on Ramoth hillThe slow song of the sea. I wonder if she thinks of them, And how the old time seems, --If ever the pines of Ramoth woodAre sounding in her dreams. I see her face, I hear her voice;Does she remember mine?And what to her is now the boyWho fed her father's kine? What cares she that the orioles buildFor other eyes than ours, --That other hands with nuts are filled, And other laps with flowers? O playmate in the golden time!Our mossy seat is green, Its fringing violets blossom yet, The old trees o'er it lean. The winds so sweet with birch and fernA sweeter memory blow;And there in spring the veeries singThe song of long ago. And still the pines of Ramoth woodAre moaning like the sea, -- The moaning of the sea of changeBetween myself and thee!1860. COBBLER KEEZAR'S VISION. This ballad was written on the occasion of a Horticultural Festival. Cobbler Keezar was a noted character among the first settlers in thevalley of the Merrimac. THE beaver cut his timberWith patient teeth that day, The minks were fish-wards, and the crowsSurveyors of highway, -- When Keezar sat on the hillsideUpon his cobbler's form, With a pan of coals on either handTo keep his waxed-ends warm. And there, in the golden weather, He stitched and hammered and sung;In the brook he moistened his leather, In the pewter mug his tongue. Well knew the tough old TeutonWho brewed the stoutest ale, And he paid the goodwife's reckoningIn the coin of song and tale. The songs they still are singingWho dress the hills of vine, The tales that haunt the BrockenAnd whisper down the Rhine. Woodsy and wild and lonesome, The swift stream wound away, Through birches and scarlet maplesFlashing in foam and spray, -- Down on the sharp-horned ledgesPlunging in steep cascade, Tossing its white-maned watersAgainst the hemlock's shade. Woodsy and wild and lonesome, East and west and north and south;Only the village of fishersDown at the river's mouth; Only here and there a clearing, With its farm-house rude and new, And tree-stumps, swart as Indians, Where the scanty harvest grew. No shout of home-bound reapers, No vintage-song he heard, And on the green no dancing feetThe merry violin stirred. "Why should folk be glum, " said Keezar, "When Nature herself is glad, And the painted woods are laughingAt the faces so sour and sad?" Small heed had the careless cobblerWhat sorrow of heart was theirsWho travailed in pain with the births of God, And planted a state with prayers, -- Hunting of witches and warlocks, Smiting the heathen horde, --One hand on the mason's trowel, And one on the soldier's sword. But give him his ale and cider, Give him his pipe and song, Little he cared for Church or State, Or the balance of right and wrong. "T is work, work, work, " he muttered, --"And for rest a snuffle of psalms!"He smote on his leathern apronWith his brown and waxen palms. "Oh for the purple harvestsOf the days when I was youngFor the merry grape-stained maidens, And the pleasant songs they sung! "Oh for the breath of vineyards, Of apples and nuts and wineFor an oar to row and a breeze to blowDown the grand old river Rhine!" A tear in his blue eye glistened, And dropped on his beard so gray. "Old, old am I, " said Keezar, "And the Rhine flows far away!" But a cunning man was the cobbler;He could call the birds from the trees, Charm the black snake out of the ledges, And bring back the swarming bees. All the virtues of herbs and metals, All the lore of the woods, he knew, And the arts of the Old World mingleWith the marvels of the New. Well he knew the tricks of magic, And the lapstone on his kneeHad the gift of the Mormon's gogglesOr the stone of Doctor Dee. [11] For the mighty master AgrippaWrought it with spell and rhymeFrom a fragment of mystic moonstoneIn the tower of Nettesheim. To a cobbler MinnesingerThe marvellous stone gave he, --And he gave it, in turn, to Keezar, Who brought it over the sea. He held up that mystic lapstone, He held it up like a lens, And he counted the long years comingEy twenties and by tens. "One hundred years, " quoth Keezar, "And fifty have I toldNow open the new before me, And shut me out the old!" Like a cloud of mist, the blacknessRolled from the magic stone, And a marvellous picture mingledThe unknown and the known. Still ran the stream to the river, And river and ocean joined;And there were the bluffs and the blue sea-line, And cold north hills behind. But--the mighty forest was brokenBy many a steepled town, By many a white-walled farm-house, And many a garner brown. Turning a score of mill-wheels, The stream no more ran free;White sails on the winding river, White sails on the far-off sea. Below in the noisy villageThe flags were floating gay, And shone on a thousand facesThe light of a holiday. Swiftly the rival ploughmenTurned the brown earth from their shares;Here were the farmer's treasures, There were the craftsman's wares. Golden the goodwife's butter, Ruby her currant-wine;Grand were the strutting turkeys, Fat were the beeves and swine. Yellow and red were the apples, And the ripe pears russet-brown, And the peaches had stolen blushesFrom the girls who shook them down. And with blooms of hill and wildwood, That shame the toil of art, Mingled the gorgeous blossomsOf the garden's tropic heart. "What is it I see?" said Keezar"Am I here, or ant I there?Is it a fete at Bingen?Do I look on Frankfort fair? "But where are the clowns and puppets, And imps with horns and tail?And where are the Rhenish flagons?And where is the foaming ale? "Strange things, I know, will happen, --Strange things the Lord permits;But that droughty folk should be jollyPuzzles my poor old wits. "Here are smiling manly faces, And the maiden's step is gay;Nor sad by thinking, nor mad by drinking, Nor mopes, nor fools, are they. "Here's pleasure without regretting, And good without abuse, The holiday and the bridalOf beauty and of use. "Here's a priest and there is a Quaker, Do the cat and dog agree?Have they burned the stocks for ovenwood?Have they cut down the gallows-tree? "Would the old folk know their children?Would they own the graceless town, With never a ranter to worryAnd never a witch to drown?" Loud laughed the cobbler Keezar, Laughed like a school-boy gay;Tossing his arms above him, The lapstone rolled away. It rolled down the rugged hillside, It spun like a wheel bewitched, It plunged through the leaning willows, And into the river pitched. There, in the deep, dark water, The magic stone lies still, Under the leaning willowsIn the shadow of the hill. But oft the idle fisherSits on the shadowy bank, And his dreams make marvellous picturesWhere the wizard's lapstone sank. And still, in the summer twilights, When the river seems to runOut from the inner glory, Warm with the melted sun, The weary mill-girl lingersBeside the charmed stream, And the sky and the golden waterShape and color her dream. Air wave the sunset gardens, The rosy signals fly;Her homestead beckons from the cloud, And love goes sailing by. 1861. AMY WENTWORTH TO WILLIAM BRADFORD. As they who watch by sick-beds find reliefUnwittingly from the great stress of griefAnd anxious care, in fantasies outwroughtFrom the hearth's embers flickering low, or caughtFrom whispering wind, or tread of passing feet, Or vagrant memory calling up some sweetSnatch of old song or romance, whence or whyThey scarcely know or ask, --so, thou and I, Nursed in the faith that Truth alone is strongIn the endurance which outwearies Wrong, With meek persistence baffling brutal force, And trusting God against the universe, --We, doomed to watch a strife we may not shareWith other weapons than the patriot's prayer, Yet owning, with full hearts and moistened eyes, The awful beauty of self-sacrifice, And wrung by keenest sympathy for allWho give their loved ones for the living wall'Twixt law and treason, --in this evil dayMay haply find, through automatic playOf pen and pencil, solace to our pain, And hearten others with the strength we gain. I know it has been said our times requireNo play of art, nor dalliance with the lyre, No weak essay with Fancy's chloroformTo calm the hot, mad pulses of the storm, But the stern war-blast rather, such as setsThe battle's teeth of serried bayonets, And pictures grim as Vernet's. Yet with theseSome softer tints may blend, and milder keysRelieve the storm-stunned ear. Let us keep sweet, If so we may, our hearts, even while we eatThe bitter harvest of our own deviceAnd half a century's moral cowardice. As Nurnberg sang while Wittenberg defied, And Kranach painted by his Luther's side, And through the war-march of the PuritanThe silver stream of Marvell's music ran, So let the household melodies be sung, The pleasant pictures on the wall be hung--So let us hold against the hosts of nightAnd slavery all our vantage-ground of light. Let Treason boast its savagery, and shakeFrom its flag-folds its symbol rattlesnake, Nurse its fine arts, lay human skins in tan, And carve its pipe-bowls from the bones of man, And make the tale of Fijian banquets dullBy drinking whiskey from a loyal skull, --But let us guard, till this sad war shall cease, (God grant it soon!) the graceful arts of peaceNo foes are conquered who the victors teachTheir vandal manners and barbaric speech. And while, with hearts of thankfulness, we bearOf the great common burden our full share, Let none upbraid us that the waves enticeThy sea-dipped pencil, or some quaint device, Rhythmic, and sweet, beguiles my pen awayFrom the sharp strifes and sorrows of to-day. Thus, while the east-wind keen from LabradorSings it the leafless elms, and from the shoreOf the great sea comes the monotonous roarOf the long-breaking surf, and all the skyIs gray with cloud, home-bound and dull, I tryTo time a simple legend to the soundsOf winds in the woods, and waves on pebbled bounds, --A song for oars to chime with, such as mightBe sung by tired sea-painters, who at nightLook from their hemlock camps, by quiet coveOr beach, moon-lighted, on the waves they love. (So hast thou looked, when level sunset layOn the calm bosom of some Eastern bay, And all the spray-moist rocks and waves that rolledUp the white sand-slopes flashed with ruddy gold. )Something it has--a flavor of the sea, And the sea's freedom--which reminds of thee. Its faded picture, dimly smiling downFrom the blurred fresco of the ancient town, I have not touched with warmer tints in vain, If, in this dark, sad year, it steals one thoughtfrom pain. . . . . . . . . . . . . Her fingers shame the ivory keysThey dance so light along;The bloom upon her parted lipsIs sweeter than the song. O perfumed suitor, spare thy smiles!Her thoughts are not of thee;She better loves the salted wind, The voices of the sea. Her heart is like an outbound shipThat at its anchor swings;The murmur of the stranded shellIs in the song she sings. She sings, and, smiling, hears her praise, But dreams the while of oneWho watches from his sea-blown deckThe icebergs in the sun. She questions all the winds that blow, And every fog-wreath dim, And bids the sea-birds flying northBear messages to him. She speeds them with the thanks of menHe perilled life to save, And grateful prayers like holy oilTo smooth for him the wave. Brown Viking of the fishing-smack!Fair toast of all the town!--The skipper's jerkin ill beseemsThe lady's silken gown! But ne'er shall Amy Wentworth wearFor him the blush of shameWho dares to set his manly giftsAgainst her ancient name. The stream is brightest at its spring, And blood is not like wine;Nor honored less than he who heirsIs he who founds a line. Full lightly shall the prize be won, If love be Fortune's spur;And never maiden stoops to himWho lifts himself to her. Her home is brave in Jaffrey Street, With stately stairways wornBy feet of old Colonial knightsAnd ladies gentle-born. Still green about its ample porchThe English ivy twines, Trained back to show in English oakThe herald's carven signs. And on her, from the wainscot old, Ancestral faces frown, --And this has worn the soldier's sword, And that the judge's gown. But, strong of will and proud as they, She walks the gallery floorAs if she trod her sailor's deckBy stormy Labrador. The sweetbrier blooms on Kittery-side, And green are Elliot's bowers;Her garden is the pebbled beach, The mosses are her flowers. She looks across the harbor-barTo see the white gulls fly;His greeting from the Northern seaIs in their clanging cry. She hums a song, and dreams that he, As in its romance old, Shall homeward ride with silken sailsAnd masts of beaten gold! Oh, rank is good, and gold is fair, And high and low mate ill;But love has never known a lawBeyond its own sweet will!1862. THE COUNTESS. TO E. W. I inscribed this poem to Dr. Elias Weld of Haverhill, Massachusetts, to whose kindness I was much indebted in my boyhood. He was the onecultivated man in the neighborhood. His small but well-chosen librarywas placed at my disposal. He is the "wise old doctor" of Snow-Bound. Count Francois de Vipart with his cousin Joseph Rochemont de Poyen cameto the United States in the early part of the present century. They tookup their residence at Rocks Village on the Merrimac, where they bothmarried. The wife of Count Vipart was Mary Ingalls, who as my fatherremembered her was a very lovely young girl. Her wedding dress, asdescribed by a lady still living, was "pink satin with an overdress ofwhite lace, and white satin slippers. " She died in less than a yearafter her marriage. Her husband returned to his native country. He liesburied in the family tomb of the Viparts at Bordeaux. I KNOW not, Time and Space so intervene, Whether, still waiting with a trust serene, Thou bearest up thy fourscore years and ten, Or, called at last, art now Heaven's citizen;But, here or there, a pleasant thought of thee, Like an old friend, all day has been with me. The shy, still boy, for whom thy kindly handSmoothed his hard pathway to the wonder-landOf thought and fancy, in gray manhood yetKeeps green the memory of his early debt. To-day, when truth and falsehood speak their wordsThrough hot-lipped cannon and the teeth of swords, Listening with quickened heart and ear intentTo each sharp clause of that stern argument, I still can hear at times a softer noteOf the old pastoral music round me float, While through the hot gleam of our civil strifeLooms the green mirage of a simpler life. As, at his alien post, the sentinelDrops the old bucket in the homestead well, And hears old voices in the winds that tossAbove his head the live-oak's beard of moss, So, in our trial-time, and under skiesShadowed by swords like Islam's paradise, I wait and watch, and let my fancy strayTo milder scenes and youth's Arcadian day;And howsoe'er the pencil dipped in dreamsShades the brown woods or tints the sunset streams, The country doctor in the foreground seems, Whose ancient sulky down the village lanesDragged, like a war-car, captive ills and pains. I could not paint the scenery of my song, Mindless of one who looked thereon so long;Who, night and day, on duty's lonely round, Made friends o' the woods and rocks, and knew the soundOf each small brook, and what the hillside treesSaid to the winds that touched their leafy keys;Who saw so keenly and so well could paintThe village-folk, with all their humors quaint, The parson ambling on his wall-eyed roan. Grave and erect, with white hair backward blown;The tough old boatman, half amphibious grown;The muttering witch-wife of the gossip's tale, And the loud straggler levying his blackmail, --Old customs, habits, superstitions, fears, All that lies buried under fifty years. To thee, as is most fit, I bring my lay, And, grateful, own the debt I cannot pay. . . . . . . . . . . Over the wooded northern ridge, Between its houses brown, To the dark tunnel of the bridgeThe street comes straggling down. You catch a glimpse, through birch and pine, Of gable, roof, and porch, The tavern with its swinging sign, The sharp horn of the church. The river's steel-blue crescent curvesTo meet, in ebb and flow, The single broken wharf that servesFor sloop and gundelow. With salt sea-scents along its shoresThe heavy hay-boats crawl, The long antennae of their oarsIn lazy rise and fall. Along the gray abutment's wallThe idle shad-net dries;The toll-man in his cobbler's stallSits smoking with closed eyes. You hear the pier's low undertoneOf waves that chafe and gnaw;You start, --a skipper's horn is blownTo raise the creaking draw. At times a blacksmith's anvil soundsWith slow and sluggard beat, Or stage-coach on its dusty roundsFakes up the staring street. A place for idle eyes and ears, A cobwebbed nook of dreams;Left by the stream whose waves are yearsThe stranded village seems. And there, like other moss and rust, The native dweller clings, And keeps, in uninquiring trust, The old, dull round of things. The fisher drops his patient lines, The farmer sows his grain, Content to hear the murmuring pinesInstead of railroad-train. Go where, along the tangled steepThat slopes against the west, The hamlet's buried idlers sleepIn still profounder rest. Throw back the locust's flowery plume, The birch's pale-green scarf, And break the web of brier and bloomFrom name and epitaph. A simple muster-roll of death, Of pomp and romance shorn, The dry, old names that common breathHas cheapened and outworn. Yet pause by one low mound, and partThe wild vines o'er it laced, And read the words by rustic artUpon its headstone traced. Haply yon white-haired villagerOf fourscore years can sayWhat means the noble name of herWho sleeps with common clay. An exile from the Gascon landFound refuge here and rest, And loved, of all the village band, Its fairest and its best. He knelt with her on Sabbath morns, He worshipped through her eyes, And on the pride that doubts and scornsStole in her faith's surprise. Her simple daily life he sawBy homeliest duties tried, In all things by an untaught lawOf fitness justified. For her his rank aside he laid;He took the hue and toneOf lowly life and toil, and madeHer simple ways his own. Yet still, in gay and careless ease, To harvest-field or danceHe brought the gentle courtesies, The nameless grace of France. And she who taught him love not lessFrom him she loved in turnCaught in her sweet unconsciousnessWhat love is quick to learn. Each grew to each in pleased accord, Nor knew the gazing townIf she looked upward to her lordOr he to her looked down. How sweet, when summer's day was o'er, His violin's mirth and wail, The walk on pleasant Newbury's shore, The river's moonlit sail! Ah! life is brief, though love be long;The altar and the bier, The burial hymn and bridal song, Were both in one short year! Her rest is quiet on the hill, Beneath the locust's bloomFar off her lover sleeps as stillWithin his scutcheoned tomb. The Gascon lord, the village maid, In death still clasp their hands;The love that levels rank and gradeUnites their severed lands. What matter whose the hillside grave, Or whose the blazoned stone?Forever to her western waveShall whisper blue Garonne! O Love!--so hallowing every soilThat gives thy sweet flower room, Wherever, nursed by ease or toil, The human heart takes bloom!-- Plant of lost Eden, from the sodOf sinful earth unriven, White blossom of the trees of GodDropped down to us from heaven! This tangled waste of mound and stoneIs holy for thy sale;A sweetness which is all thy ownBreathes out from fern and brake. And while ancestral pride shall twineThe Gascon's tomb with flowers, Fall sweetly here, O song of mine, With summer's bloom and showers! And let the lines that severed seemUnite again in thee, As western wave and Gallic streamAre mingled in one sea!1863.