Swept through and through by swal-
lows,

By maple orchards, belts of pine
And larches climbing darkly
The mountain slopes, and, over all,
The great peaks rising starkly.

You should have seen that long hillrange

With gaps of brightness riven, How through each pass and hollow streamed

The purpling lights of heaven,

Rivers of gold-mist flowing down
From far celestial fountains,
The great sun flaming through the rifts
Beyond the wall of mountains!

We paused at last where home-bound

COWS

Brought down the pasture's treasure, And in the barn the rhythmic flails Beat out a harvest measure.

We heard the night-hawk's sullen plunge,

The crow his tree-mates calling: The shadows lengthening down the slopes

About our feet were falling.

And through them smote the level sur In broken lines of splendor, Touched the gray rocks and made the green

Of the shorn grass more tender.

The maples bending o'er the gate,
Their arch of leaves just tinted
With yellow warmth, the golden glow
Of coming autumn hinted.

Keen white between the farm-house showed,

And smiled on porch and trellis, The fair democracy of flowers That equals cot and palace.

And weaving garlands for her dog,
'Twixt chidings and caresses,

A human flower of childhood shook
The sunshine from her tresses.

On either hand we saw the signs
Of fancy and of shrewdness,
Where taste had wound its arms of
vines

Round thrift's uncomely rudeness.

The sun-brown farmer in his frock
Shook hands, and called to Mary:
Bare-armed, as Juno might, she came,
White-aproned from her dairy.

Her air, her smile, her motions, told
Of womanly completeness;
A music as of household songs

Was in her voice of sweetness.

Not beautiful in curve and line,
But something more and better,
The secret charm eluding art,

Its spirit, not its letter;

An inborn grace that nothing lacked
Of culture or appliance,
The warmth of genial courtesy,
The calm of self-reliance.

Before her queenly womanhood
How dared our hostess utter
The paltry errand of her need

To buy her fresh-churned butter?

She led the way with housewife pride, Her goodly store disclosing

Full tenderly the golden balls
With practised hands disposing.

Then, while along the western hills
We watched the changeful glory
Of sunset, on our homeward way,
I heard her simple story.

The early crickets sang; the stream Plashed through my friend's narration:

Her rustic patois of the hills

Lost in my free translation.

"More wise," she said, "than those who swarm

Our hills in middle summer, She came, when June's first roses blow, To greet the early comer.

"From school and ball and rout she came,

The city's fair, pale daughter, To drink the wine of mountain air Beside the Bearcamp Water.

403

"No mood is mine to seek a wife, Or daughter for my mother: Who loves you loses in that love All power to love another!

"I dare your pity or your scorn, With pride your own exceeding; I fling my heart into your lap

Without a word of pleading.'

"She looked up in his face of pain
So archly, yet so tender:
And if I lend you mine,' she said,
'Will you forgive the lender?

"Nor frock nor tan can hide the man;

And see you not, my farmer, How weak and fond a woman waits Behind this silken armor?

"I love you: on that love alone,
And not my worth, presuming,
Will you not trust for summer fruit
The tree in May-day blooming?'

"Alone the hangbird overhead,

His hair-swung cradle straining, Looked down to see love's miracle, The giving that is gaining.

"And so the farmer found a wife,

His mother found a daughter: There looks no happier home than hers On pleasant Bearcamp Water.

"Flowers spring to blossom where she walks

The careful ways of duty;
Our hard, stiff lines of life with her
Are flowing curves of beauty.

"Our homes are cheerier for her sake, Our door-yards brighter blooming, And all about the social air

Is sweeter for her coming.

"Unspoken homilies of peace
Her daily life is preaching;
The still refreshment of the dew
Is her unconscious teaching.
"And never tenderer hand than hers
Unknits the brow of ailing :
Her garments to the sick man's ear
Have music in their trailing.

"Through her his civic service shows
A purer-toned ambition;
No double consciousness divides
The man and politician.

"In party's doubtful ways he trusts
Her instincts to determine;
At the loud polls, the thought of her

Recalls Christ's Mountain Sermon. "He owns her logic of the heart, And wisdom of unreason, Supplying, while he doubts and weighs, The needed word in season.

"He sees with pride her richer thought,

Her fancy's freer ranges;
And love thus deepened to respect

Is proof against all changes.

"And if she walks at ease in ways His feet are slow to travel,

And if she reads with cultured eyes
What his may scarce unravel,

"Still clearer, for her keener sight
Of beauty and of wonder,
He learns the meaning of the hills
He dwelt from childhood under.

"And higher, warmed with summer lights,

Or winter-crowned and hoary,
The ridged horizon lifts for him
Its inner veils of glory.

"He has his own free, bookless lore,
The lessons nature taught him,
The wisdom which the woods and hills
And toiling men have brought him:

"The steady force of will whereby

Her flexile grace seems sweeter; The sturdy counterpoise which makes Her woman's life completer:

"A latent fire of soul which lacks

No breath of love to fan it ;
And wit, that, like his native brooks,
Plays over solid granite.

"How dwarfed against his manliness
She sees the poor pretension,
The wants, the aims, the follies, born
Of fashion and convention!

"How life behind its accidents

Stands strong and self-sustaining,
The human fact transcending all
The losing and the gaining.

"And so, in grateful interchange
Of teacher and of hearer,
Their lives their true distinctness keep
While daily drawing nearer.

66 And if the husband or the wife
In home's strong light discovers
Such slight defaults as failed to meet
The blinded eyes of lovers,

"Why need we care to ask? -
dreams

Without their thorns of roses, Ur wonders that the truest steel The readiest spark discloses ?

who

"For still in mutual sufferance lies

405

The secret of true living: Love scarce is love that never knows The sweetness of forgiving.

"We send the Squire to General Court, He takes his young wife thither; No prouder man election day

Rides through the sweet June weather.

"He sees with eyes of manly trust
All hearts to her inclining;
Not less for him his household light
That others share its shining.'

Thus, while my hostess spake, there grew

Before me, warmer tinted
And outlined with a tenderer grace
The picture that she hinted.

The sunset smouldered as we drove
Beneath the deep hill-shadows.
Below us wreaths of white fog walked
Like ghosts the haunted meadows.

Sounding the summer night, the stars Dropped down their golden plumThe pale arc of the Northern lights Rose o'er the mountain summits,

mets;

Until, at last, beneath its bridge,
We heard the Bearcamp flowing,
And saw across the mapled lawn
The welcome home-lights glow-
ing; -

And, musing on the tale I heard,
'T were well, thought I, if often
To rugged farm-life came the gift
To harmonize and soften ;-

If more and more we found the troth
Of fact and fancy plighted,
And culture's charm and labor's
strength

In rural homes united,

The simple life, the homely hearth, With beauty's sphere surrounding, And blessing toil where toil abounds With graces more abounding.

THE CLEAR VISION.

I DID but dream. I never knew
What charms our sternest season

wore.

Was never yet the sky so blue,

Was never earth so white before. Till now I never saw the glow Of sunset on yon hills of snow, And never learned the bough's designs Of beauty in its leafless lines.

Did ever such a morning break

As that my eastern windows see? · Did ever such a moonlight take Weird photographs of shrub and

tree?

Rang ever bells so wild and fleet
The music of the winter street?
Was ever yet a sound by half
So merry as yon school-boy's laugh?

O Earth! with gladness overfraught,
No added charm thy face hath found;
Within my heart the change is wrought,

My footsteps make enchanted ground. From couch of pain and curtained room Forth to thy light and air I come, To find in all that meets my eyes The freshness of a glad surprise.

Fair seem these winter days, and soon Shall blow the warm west winds of spring

To set the unbound rills in tune,

And hither urge the bluebird's wing. The vales shall laugh in flowers, the woods

Grow misty green with leafing buds,
And violets and wind-flowers sway
Against the throbbing heart of May.

Break forth, my lips, in praise, and own
The wiser love severely kind;
Since, richer for its chastening grown,
I see, whereas I once was blind.
The world, O Father! hath not wronged
With loss the life by thee prolonged;

From west to east sailed slow!

Jarl Thorkell of Thevera

At Yule-time made his vow;
On Rykdal's holy Doom-stone
He slew to Frey his cow.

To bounteous Frey he slew her:
To Skuld, the younger Norn,
Who watches over birth and death,
He gave her calf unborn.
And his little gold-haired daughter
Took up the sprinkling-rod,
And smeared with blood the temple
And the wide lips of the god.

Hoarse below, the winter water

Ground its ice-blocks o'er and o'er; Jets of foam, like ghosts of dead waves, Rose and fell along the shore.