TAULER, the preacher, walked, one autumn day,
     Without the walls of Strasburg, by the Rhine,
     Pondering the solemn Miracle of Life;
     As one who, wandering in a starless night,
     Feels momently the jar of unseen waves,
     And hears the thunder of an unknown sea,
     Breaking along an unimagined shore.

     And as he walked he prayed. Even the same
     Old prayer with which, for half a score of years,
     Morning, and noon, and evening, lip and heart
     Had groaned: "Have pity upon me, Lord!
     Thou seest, while teaching others, I am blind.
     Send me a man who can direct my steps!"

     Then, as he mused, he heard along his path
     A sound as of an old man's staff among
     The dry, dead linden-leaves; and, looking up,
     He saw a stranger, weak, and poor, and old.

     "Peace be unto thee, father!" Tauler said,
     "God give thee a good day!" The old man raised
     Slowly his calm blue eyes. "I thank thee, son;
     But all my days are good, and none are ill."

     Wondering thereat, the preacher spake again,
     "God give thee happy life." The old man smiled,
     "I never am unhappy."

                               Tauler laid
     His hand upon the stranger's coarse gray sleeve
     "Tell me, O father, what thy strange words mean.
     Surely man's days are evil, and his life
     Sad as the grave it leads to."  "Nay, my son,
     Our times are in God's hands, and all our days
     Are as our needs; for shadow as for sun,
     For cold as heat, for want as wealth, alike
     Our thanks are due, since that is best which is;
     And that which is not, sharing not His life,
     Is evil only as devoid of good.
     And for the happiness of which I spake,
     I find it in submission to his will,
     And calm trust in the holy Trinity
     Of Knowledge, Goodness, and Almighty Power."

     Silently wondering, for a little space,
     Stood the great preacher; then he spake as one
     Who, suddenly grappling with a haunting thought
     Which long has followed, whispering through the dark
     Strange terrors, drags it, shrieking, into light
     "What if God's will consign thee hence to Hell?"

     "Then," said the stranger, cheerily, "be it so.
     What Hell may be I know not; this I know,—
     I cannot lose the presence of the Lord.
     One arm, Humility, takes hold upon
     His dear Humanity; the other, Love,
     Clasps his Divinity. So where I go
     He goes; and better fire-walled Hell with Him
     Than golden-gated Paradise without."

     Tears sprang in Tauler's eyes. A sudden light,
     Like the first ray which fell on chaos, clove
     Apart the shadow wherein he had walked
     Darkly at noon. And, as the strange old man
     Went his slow way, until his silver hair
     Set like the white moon where the hills of vine
     Slope to the Rhine, he bowed his head and said
     "My prayer is answered. God hath sent the man
     Long sought, to teach me, by his simple trust,
     Wisdom the weary schoolmen never knew."

     So, entering with a changed and cheerful step
     The city gates, he saw, far down the street,
     A mighty shadow break the light of noon,
     Which tracing backward till its airy lines
     Hardened to stony plinths, he raised his eyes
     O'er broad facade and lofty pediment,
     O'er architrave and frieze and sainted niche,
     Up the stone lace-work chiselled by the wise
     Erwin of Steinbach, dizzily up to where
     In the noon-brightness the great Minster's tower,
     Jewelled with sunbeams on its mural crown,
     Rose like a visible prayer. "Behold!" he said,
     "The stranger's faith made plain before mine eyes.
     As yonder tower outstretches to the earth
     The dark triangle of its shade alone
     When the clear day is shining on its top,
     So, darkness in the pathway of Man's life
     Is but the shadow of God's providence,
     By the great Sun of Wisdom cast thereon;
     And what is dark below is light in Heaven."

     1853.

     O strong, upwelling prayers of faith,
     From inmost founts of life ye start,—
     The spirit's pulse, the vital breath
     Of soul and heart!

     From pastoral toil, from traffic's din,
     Alone, in crowds, at home, abroad,
     Unheard of man, ye enter in
     The ear of God.

     Ye brook no forced and measured tasks,
     Nor weary rote, nor formal chains;
     The simple heart, that freely asks
     In love, obtains.

     For man the living temple is
     The mercy-seat and cherubim,
     And all the holy mysteries,
     He bears with him.

     And most avails the prayer of love,
     Which, wordless, shapes itself in needs,
     And wearies Heaven for naught above
     Our common needs.

     Which brings to God's all-perfect will
     That trust of His undoubting child
     Whereby all seeming good and ill
     Are reconciled.

     And, seeking not for special signs
     Of favor, is content to fall
     Within the providence which shines
     And rains on all.

     Alone, the Thebaid hermit leaned
     At noontime o'er the sacred word.
     Was it an angel or a fiend
     Whose voice be heard?

     It broke the desert's hush of awe,
     A human utterance, sweet and mild;
     And, looking up, the hermit saw
     A little child.

     A child, with wonder-widened eyes,
     O'erawed and troubled by the sight
     Of hot, red sands, and brazen skies,
     And anchorite.

     "What dost thou here, poor man? No shade
     Of cool, green palms, nor grass, nor well,
     Nor corn, nor vines." The hermit said
     "With God I dwell.

     "Alone with Him in this great calm,
     I live not by the outward sense;
     My Nile his love, my sheltering palm
     His providence."

     The child gazed round him. "Does God live
     Here only?—where the desert's rim
     Is green with corn, at morn and eve,
     We pray to Him.

     "My brother tills beside the Nile
     His little field; beneath the leaves
     My sisters sit and spin, the while
     My mother weaves.

     "And when the millet's ripe heads fall,
     And all the bean-field hangs in pod,
     My mother smiles, and, says that all
     Are gifts from God."

     Adown the hermit's wasted cheeks
     Glistened the flow of human tears;
     "Dear Lord!" he said, "Thy angel speaks,
     Thy servant hears."

     Within his arms the child he took,
     And thought of home and life with men;
     And all his pilgrim feet forsook
     Returned again.

     The palmy shadows cool and long,
     The eyes that smiled through lavish locks,
     Home's cradle-hymn and harvest-song,
     And bleat of flocks.

     "O child!" he said, "thou teachest me
     There is no place where God is not;
     That love will make, where'er it be,
     A holy spot."

     He rose from off the desert sand,
     And, leaning on his staff of thorn,
     Went with the young child hand in hand,
     Like night with morn.

     They crossed the desert's burning line,
     And heard the palm-tree's rustling fan,
     The Nile-bird's cry, the low of kine,
     And voice of man.

     Unquestioning, his childish guide
     He followed, as the small hand led
     To where a woman, gentle-eyed,
     Her distaff fed.

     She rose, she clasped her truant boy,
     She thanked the stranger with her eyes;
     The hermit gazed in doubt and joy
     And dumb surprise.

     And lo!—with sudden warmth and light
     A tender memory thrilled his frame;
     New-born, the world-lost anchorite
     A man became.

     "O sister of El Zara's race,
     Behold me!—had we not one mother?"
     She gazed into the stranger's face
     "Thou art my brother!"

     "And when to share our evening meal,
     She calls the stranger at the door,
     She says God fills the hands that deal
     Food to the poor."

     "O kin of blood! Thy life of use
     And patient trust is more than mine;
     And wiser than the gray recluse
     This child of thine.

     "For, taught of him whom God hath sent,
     That toil is praise, and love is prayer,
     I come, life's cares and pains content
     With thee to share."

     Even as his foot the threshold crossed,
     The hermit's better life began;
     Its holiest saint the Thebaid lost,
     And found a man!

     1854.

     Maud Muller on a summer's day,
     Raked the meadow sweet with hay.

     Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
     Of simple beauty and rustic-health.

     Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee
     The mock-bird echoed from his tree.

     But when she glanced to the far-off town,
     White from its hill-slope looking down,

     The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
     And a nameless longing filled her breast,—

     A wish, that she hardly dared to own,
     For something better than she had known.

     The Judge rode slowly down the lane,
     Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.

     He drew his bridle in the shade
     Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid,

     And asked a draught from the spring that flowed
     Through the meadow across the road.

     She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up,
     And filled for him her small tin cup,

     And blushed as she gave it, looking down
     On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown.

     "Thanks!" said the Judge; "a sweeter draught
     From a fairer hand was never quaffed."

     He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees,
     Of the singing birds and the humming bees;

     Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether
     The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.

     And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown,
     And her graceful ankles bare and brown;

     And listened, while a pleased surprise
     Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes.

     At last, like one who for delay
     Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.

     Maud Muller looked and sighed: "Ah me!
     That I the Judge's bride might be!

     "He would dress me up in silks so fine,
     And praise and toast me at his wine.

     "My father should wear a broadcloth coat;
     My brother should sail a painted boat.

     "I'd dress my mother so grand and gay,
     And the baby should have a new toy each day.

     "And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor,
     And all should bless me who left our door."

     The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill,
     And saw Maud Muller standing still.

     A form more fair, a face more sweet,
     Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet.

     "And her modest answer and graceful air
     Show her wise and good as she is fair.

     "Would she were mine, and I to-day,
     Like her, a harvester of hay;

     "No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs,
     Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,

     "But low of cattle and song of birds,
     And health and quiet and loving words."

     But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold,
     And his mother, vain of her rank and gold.

     So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on,
     And Maud was left in the field alone.

     But the lawyers smiled that afternoon,
     When he hummed in court an old love-tune;

     And the young girl mused beside the well
     Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.

     He wedded a wife of richest dower,
     Who lived for fashion, as he for power.

     Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow,
     He watched a picture come and go;

     And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes
     Looked out in their innocent surprise.

     Oft, when the wine in his glass was red,
     He longed for the wayside well instead;

     And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms
     To dream of meadows and clover-blooms.

     And the proud man sighed, with a secret pain,
     "Ah, that I were free again!

     "Free as when I rode that day,
     Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay."

     She wedded a man unlearned and poor,
     And many children played round her door.

     But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain,
     Left their traces on heart and brain.

     And oft, when the summer sun shone hot
     On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot,

     And she heard the little spring brook fall
     Over the roadside, through the wall,

     In the shade of the apple-tree again
     She saw a rider draw his rein.

     And, gazing down with timid grace,
     She felt his pleased eyes read her face.

     Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
     Stretched away into stately halls;

     The weary wheel to a spinnet turned,
     The tallow candle an astral burned,

     And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
     Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,

     A manly form at her side she saw,
     And joy was duty and love was law.

     Then she took up her burden of life again,
     Saying only, "It might have been."

     Alas for maiden, alas for Judge,
     For rich repiner and household drudge!

     God pity them both! and pity us all,
     Who vainly the dreams of youth recall.

     For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
     The saddest are these: "It might have been!"

     Ah, well! for us all some sweet hope lies
     Deeply buried from human eyes;

     And, in the hereafter, angels may
     Roll the stone from its grave away!

     1854.

     FROM the heart of Waumbek Methna, from the
     lake that never fails,
     Falls the Saco in the green lap of Conway's
     intervales;
     There, in wild and virgin freshness, its waters
     foam and flow,
     As when Darby Field first saw them, two hundred
     years ago.

     But, vexed in all its seaward course with bridges,
     dams, and mills,
     How changed is Saco's stream, how lost its freedom
     of the hills,
     Since travelled Jocelyn, factor Vines, and stately
     Champernoon
     Heard on its banks the gray wolf's howl, the trumpet
     of the loon!

     With smoking axle hot with speed, with steeds of
     fire and steam,
     Wide-waked To-day leaves Yesterday behind him
     like a dream.
     Still, from the hurrying train of Life, fly backward
     far and fast
     The milestones of the fathers, the landmarks of
     the past.

     But human hearts remain unchanged: the sorrow
     and the sin,
     The loves and hopes and fears of old, are to our
     own akin;

     And if, in tales our fathers told, the songs our
     mothers sung,
     Tradition wears a snowy beard, Romance is always
     young.

     O sharp-lined man of traffic, on Saco's banks today!
     O mill-girl watching late and long the shuttle's
     restless play!
     Let, for the once, a listening ear the working hand
     beguile,
     And lend my old Provincial tale, as suits, a tear or
     smile!

              . . . . . . . . . . . . .

     The evening gun had sounded from gray Fort
     Mary's walls;
     Through the forest, like a wild beast, roared and
     plunged the Saco's' falls.

     And westward on the sea-wind, that damp and
     gusty grew,
     Over cedars darkening inland the smokes of Spurwink
     blew.

     On the hearth of Farmer Garvin, blazed the crackling
     walnut log;
     Right and left sat dame and goodman, and between
     them lay the dog,

     Head on paws, and tail slow wagging, and beside
     him on her mat,
     Sitting drowsy in the firelight, winked and purred
     the mottled cat.

     "Twenty years!" said Goodman Garvin, speaking
     sadly, under breath,
     And his gray head slowly shaking, as one who
     speaks of death.

     The goodwife dropped her needles: "It is twenty
     years to-day,
     Since the Indians fell on Saco, and stole our child
     away."

     Then they sank into the silence, for each knew
     the other's thought,
     Of a great and common sorrow, and words were,
     needed not.

     "Who knocks?" cried Goodman Garvin. The
     door was open thrown;
     On two strangers, man and maiden, cloaked and
     furred, the fire-light shone.

     One with courteous gesture lifted the bear-skin
     from his head;
     "Lives here Elkanah Garvin?"  "I am he," the
     goodman said.

     "Sit ye down, and dry and warm ye, for the night
     is chill with rain."
     And the goodwife drew the settle, and stirred the
     fire amain.

     The maid unclasped her cloak-hood, the firelight
     glistened fair
     In her large, moist eyes, and over soft folds of
     dark brown hair.

     Dame Garvin looked upon her: "It is Mary's self
     I see!"
     "Dear heart!" she cried, "now tell me, has my
     child come back to me?"

     "My name indeed is Mary," said the stranger sobbing
     wild;
     "Will you be to me a mother? I am Mary Garvin's child!"

     "She sleeps by wooded Simcoe, but on her dying
     day
     She bade my father take me to her kinsfolk far
     away.

     "And when the priest besought her to do me no
     such wrong,
     She said, 'May God forgive me! I have closed
     my heart too long.'

     "'When I hid me from my father, and shut out
     my mother's call,
     I sinned against those dear ones, and the Father
     of us all.

     "'Christ's love rebukes no home-love, breaks no
     tie of kin apart;
     Better heresy in doctrine, than heresy of heart.

     "'Tell me not the Church must censure: she who
     wept the Cross beside
     Never made her own flesh strangers, nor the claims
     of blood denied;

     "'And if she who wronged her parents, with her
     child atones to them,
     Earthly daughter, Heavenly Mother! thou at least
     wilt not condemn!'

     "So, upon her death-bed lying, my blessed mother
     spake;
     As we come to do her bidding, So receive us for her
     sake."

     "God be praised!" said Goodwife Garvin, "He taketh,
     and He gives;
     He woundeth, but He healeth; in her child our
     daughter lives!"

     "Amen!" the old man answered, as he brushed a
     tear away,
     And, kneeling by his hearthstone, said, with reverence,
     "Let us pray."

     All its Oriental symbols, and its Hebrew pararphrase,
     Warm with earnest life and feeling, rose his prayer
     of love and praise.

     But he started at beholding, as he rose from off
     his knee,
     The stranger cross his forehead with the sign of
     Papistrie.

     "What is this?" cried Farmer Garvin. "Is an English
     Christian's home
     A chapel or a mass-house, that you make the sign
     of Rome?"

     Then the young girl knelt beside him, kissed his
     trembling hand, and cried:
     Oh, forbear to chide my father; in that faith my
     mother died!

     "On her wooden cross at Simcoe the dews and
     sunshine fall,
     As they fall on Spurwink's graveyard; and the
     dear God watches all!"

     The old man stroked the fair head that rested on
     his knee;
     "Your words, dear child," he answered, "are God's
     rebuke to me.

     "Creed and rite perchance may differ, yet our
     faith and hope be one.
     Let me be your father's father, let him be to me
     a son."

     When the horn, on Sabbath morning, through the
     still and frosty air,
     From Spurwink, Pool, and Black Point, called to
     sermon and to prayer,

     To the goodly house of worship, where, in order
     due and fit,
     As by public vote directed, classed and ranked the
     people sit;

     Mistress first and goodwife after, clerkly squire
     before the clown,
     "From the brave coat, lace-embroidered, to the gray
     frock, shading down;"

     From the pulpit read the preacher, "Goodman
     Garvin and his wife
     Fain would thank the Lord, whose kindness has
     followed them through life,

     "For the great and crowning mercy, that their
     daughter, from the wild,
     Where she rests (they hope in God's peace), has
     sent to them her child;

     "And the prayers of all God's people they ask,
     that they may prove
     Not unworthy, through their weakness, of such
     special proof of love."

     As the preacher prayed, uprising, the aged couple
     stood,
     And the fair Canadian also, in her modest maiden-
     hood.

     Thought the elders, grave and doubting, "She is
     Papist born and bred;"
     Thought the young men, "'T is an angel in Mary
     Garvin's stead!"

     ROBERT RAWLIN!—Frosts were falling
     When the ranger's horn was calling
     Through the woods to Canada.

     Gone the winter's sleet and snowing,
     Gone the spring-time's bud and blowing,
     Gone the summer's harvest mowing,
     And again the fields are gray.
     Yet away, he's away!
     Faint and fainter hope is growing
     In the hearts that mourn his stay.

     Where the lion, crouching high on
     Abraham's rock with teeth of iron,
     Glares o'er wood and wave away,
     Faintly thence, as pines far sighing,
     Or as thunder spent and dying,
     Come the challenge and replying,
     Come the sounds of flight and fray.
     Well-a-day! Hope and pray!
     Some are living, some are lying
     In their red graves far away.

     Straggling rangers, worn with dangers,
     Homeward faring, weary strangers
     Pass the farm-gate on their way;
     Tidings of the dead and living,
     Forest march and ambush, giving,
     Till the maidens leave their weaving,
     And the lads forget their play.
     "Still away, still away!"
     Sighs a sad one, sick with grieving,
     "Why does Robert still delay!"

     Nowhere fairer, sweeter, rarer,
     Does the golden-locked fruit bearer
     Through his painted woodlands stray,
     Than where hillside oaks and beeches
     Overlook the long, blue reaches,
     Silver coves and pebbled beaches,
     And green isles of Casco Bay;
     Nowhere day, for delay,
     With a tenderer look beseeches,
     "Let me with my charmed earth stay."

     On the grain-lands of the mainlands
     Stands the serried corn like train-bands,
     Plume and pennon rustling gay;
     Out at sea, the islands wooded,
     Silver birches, golden-hooded,
     Set with maples, crimson-blooded,
     White sea-foam and sand-hills gray,
     Stretch away, far away.
     Dim and dreamy, over-brooded
     By the hazy autumn day.

     Gayly chattering to the clattering
     Of the brown nuts downward pattering,
     Leap the squirrels, red and gray.
     On the grass-land, on the fallow,
     Drop the apples, red and yellow;
     Drop the russet pears and mellow,
     Drop the red leaves all the day.
     And away, swift away,
     Sun and cloud, o'er hill and hollow
     Chasing, weave their web of play.

     "Martha Mason, Martha Mason,
     Prithee tell us of the reason
     Why you mope at home to-day
     Surely smiling is not sinning;
     Leave, your quilling, leave your spinning;
     What is all your store of linen,
     If your heart is never gay?
     Come away, come away!
     Never yet did sad beginning
     Make the task of life a play."

     Overbending, till she's blending
     With the flaxen skein she's tending
     Pale brown tresses smoothed away
     From her face of patient sorrow,
     Sits she, seeking but to borrow,
     From the trembling hope of morrow,
     Solace for the weary day.
     "Go your way, laugh and play;
     Unto Him who heeds the sparrow
     And the lily, let me pray."

     "With our rally, rings the valley,—
     Join us!" cried the blue-eyed Nelly;
     "Join us!" cried the laughing May,
     "To the beach we all are going,
     And, to save the task of rowing,
     West by north the wind is blowing,
     Blowing briskly down the bay
     Come away, come away!
     Time and tide are swiftly flowing,
     Let us take them while we may!

     "Never tell us that you'll fail us,
     Where the purple beach-plum mellows
     On the bluffs so wild and gray.
     Hasten, for the oars are falling;
     Hark, our merry mates are calling;
     Time it is that we were all in,
     Singing tideward down the bay!"
     "Nay, nay, let me stay;
     Sore and sad for Robert Rawlin
     Is my heart," she said, "to-day."

     "Vain your calling for Rob Rawlin
     Some red squaw his moose-meat's broiling,
     Or some French lass, singing gay;
     Just forget as he's forgetting;
     What avails a life of fretting?
     If some stars must needs be setting,
     Others rise as good as they."
     "Cease, I pray; go your way!"
     Martha cries, her eyelids wetting;
     "Foul and false the words you say!"

     "Martha Mason, hear to reason!—
     Prithee, put a kinder face on!"
     "Cease to vex me," did she say;
     "Better at his side be lying,
     With the mournful pine-trees sighing,
     And the wild birds o'er us crying,
     Than to doubt like mine a prey;
     While away, far away,
     Turns my heart, forever trying
     Some new hope for each new day.

     "When the shadows veil the meadows,
     And the sunset's golden ladders
     Sink from twilight's walls of gray,—
     From the window of my dreaming,
     I can see his sickle gleaming,
     Cheery-voiced, can hear him teaming
     Down the locust-shaded way;
     But away, swift away,
     Fades the fond, delusive seeming,
     And I kneel again to pray.

     "When the growing dawn is showing,
     And the barn-yard cock is crowing,
     And the horned moon pales away
     From a dream of him awaking,
     Every sound my heart is making
     Seems a footstep of his taking;
     Then I hush the thought, and say,
     'Nay, nay, he's away!'
     Ah! my heart, my heart is breaking
     For the dear one far away."

     Look up, Martha! worn and swarthy,
     Glows a face of manhood worthy
     "Robert!"  "Martha!" all they say.
     O'er went wheel and reel together,
     Little cared the owner whither;
     Heart of lead is heart of feather,
     Noon of night is noon of day!
     Come away, come away!
     When such lovers meet each other,
     Why should prying idlers stay?

     Quench the timber's fallen embers,
     Quench the red leaves in December's
     Hoary rime and chilly spray.
     But the hearth shall kindle clearer,
     Household welcomes sound sincerer,
     Heart to loving heart draw nearer,
     When the bridal bells shall say:
     "Hope and pray, trust alway;
     Life is sweeter, love is dearer,
     For the trial and delay!"

     1856.

     FROM the hills of home forth looking, far beneath
     the tent-like span
     Of the sky, I see the white gleam of the headland
     of Cape Ann.
     Well I know its coves and beaches to the ebb-tide
     glimmering down,
     And the white-walled hamlet children of its ancient
     fishing town.

     Long has passed the summer morning, and its
     memory waxes old,
     When along yon breezy headlands with a pleasant
     friend I strolled.
     Ah! the autumn sun is shining, and the ocean
     wind blows cool,
     And the golden-rod and aster bloom around thy
     grave, Rantoul!

     With the memory of that morning by the summer
     sea I blend
     A wild and wondrous story, by the younger Mather
     penned,
     In that quaint Magnalia Christi, with all strange
     and marvellous things,
     Heaped up huge and undigested, like the chaos
     Ovid sings.

     Dear to me these far, faint glimpses of the dual
     life of old,
     Inward, grand with awe and reverence; outward,
     mean and coarse and cold;
     Gleams of mystic beauty playing over dull and
     vulgar clay,
     Golden-threaded fancies weaving in a web of
     hodden gray.

     The great eventful Present hides the Past; but
     through the din
     Of its loud life hints and echoes from the life
     behind steal in;
     And the lore of homeland fireside, and the legendary
     rhyme,
     Make the task of duty lighter which the true man
     owes his time.

     So, with something of the feeling which the Covenanter
     knew,
     When with pious chisel wandering Scotland's
     moorland graveyards through,
     From the graves of old traditions I part the black-
     berry-vines,
     Wipe the moss from off the headstones, and retouch
     the faded lines.

     Where the sea-waves back and forward, hoarse
     with rolling pebbles, ran,
     The garrison-house stood watching on the gray
     rocks of Cape Ann;
     On its windy site uplifting gabled roof and palisade,
     And rough walls of unhewn timber with the moonlight
     overlaid.

     On his slow round walked the sentry, south and
     eastward looking forth
     O'er a rude and broken coast-line, white with
     breakers stretching north,—
     Wood and rock and gleaming sand-drift, jagged
     capes, with bush and tree,
     Leaning inland from the smiting of the wild and
     gusty sea.

     Before the deep-mouthed chimney, dimly lit by
     dying brands,
     Twenty soldiers sat and waited, with their muskets
     in their hands;
     On the rough-hewn oaken table the venison haunch
     was shared,
     And the pewter tankard circled slowly round from
     beard to beard.

     Long they sat and talked together,—talked of
     wizards Satan-sold;
     Of all ghostly sights and noises,—signs and wonders
     manifold;
     Of the spectre-ship of Salem, with the dead men
     in her shrouds,
     Sailing sheer above the water, in the loom of morning
     clouds;

     Of the marvellous valley hidden in the depths of
     Gloucester woods,
     Full of plants that love the summer,—blooms of
     warmer latitudes;
     Where the Arctic birch is braided by the tropic's
     flowery vines,
     And the white magnolia-blossoms star the twilight
     of the pines!

     But their voices sank yet lower, sank to husky
     tones of fear,
     As they spake of present tokens of the powers of
     evil near;
     Of a spectral host, defying stroke of steel and aim
     of gun;
     Never yet was ball to slay them in the mould of
     mortals run.

     Thrice, with plumes and flowing scalp-locks, from
     the midnight wood they came,—
     Thrice around the block-house marching, met, unharmed,
     its volleyed flame;
     Then, with mocking laugh and gesture, sunk in
     earth or lost in air,
     All the ghostly wonder vanished, and the moonlit
     sands lay bare.

     Midnight came; from out the forest moved a
     dusky mass that soon
     Grew to warriors, plumed and painted, grimly
     marching in the moon.
     "Ghosts or witches," said the captain, "thus I foil
     the Evil One!"
     And he rammed a silver button, from his doublet,
     down his gun.

     Once again the spectral horror moved the guarded
     wall about;
     Once again the levelled muskets through the palisades
     flashed out,
     With that deadly aim the squirrel on his tree-top
     might not shun,
     Nor the beach-bird seaward flying with his slant
     wing to the sun.

     Like the idle rain of summer sped the harmless
     shower of lead.
     With a laugh of fierce derision, once again the
     phantoms fled;
     Once again, without a shadow on the sands the
     moonlight lay,
     And the white smoke curling through it drifted
     slowly down the bay!

     "God preserve us!" said the captain; "never
     mortal foes were there;
     They have vanished with their leader, Prince and
     Power of the air!
     Lay aside your useless weapons; skill and prowess
     naught avail;
     They who do the Devil's service wear their master's
     coat of mail!"

     So the night grew near to cock-crow, when again
     a warning call
     Roused the score of weary soldiers watching round
     the dusky hall
     And they looked to flint and priming, and they
     longed for break of day;
     But the captain closed his Bible: "Let us cease
     from man, and pray!"

     To the men who went before us, all the unseen
     powers seemed near,
     And their steadfast strength of courage struck its
     roots in holy fear.
     Every hand forsook the musket, every head was
     bowed and bare,
     Every stout knee pressed the flag-stones, as the
     captain led in prayer.

     Ceased thereat the mystic marching of the spectres
     round the wall,
     But a sound abhorred, unearthly, smote the ears
     and hearts of all,—
     Howls of rage and shrieks of anguish! Never
     after mortal man
     Saw the ghostly leaguers marching round the
     block-house of Cape Ann.

     So to us who walk in summer through the cool and
     sea-blown town,
     From the childhood of its people comes the solemn
     legend down.
     Not in vain the ancient fiction, in whose moral
     lives the youth
     And the fitness and the freshness of an undecaying
     truth.

     Soon or late to all our dwellings come the spectres
     of the mind,
     Doubts and fears and dread forebodings, in the
     darkness undefined;
     Round us throng the grim projections of the heart
     and of the brain,
     And our pride of strength is weakness, and the
     cunning hand is vain.

     In the dark we cry like children; and no answer
     from on high
     Breaks the crystal spheres of silence, and no white
     wings downward fly;
     But the heavenly help we pray for comes to faith,
     and not to sight,
     And our prayers themselves drive backward all the
     spirits of the night!

     1857.

     TRITEMIUS of Herbipolis, one day,
     While kneeling at the altar's foot to pray,
     Alone with God, as was his pious choice,
     Heard from without a miserable voice,
     A sound which seemed of all sad things to tell,
     As of a lost soul crying out of hell.

     Thereat the Abbot paused; the chain whereby
     His thoughts went upward broken by that cry;
     And, looking from the casement, saw below
     A wretched woman, with gray hair a-flow,
     And withered hands held up to him, who cried
     For alms as one who might not be denied.

     She cried, "For the dear love of Him who gave
     His life for ours, my child from bondage save,—
     My beautiful, brave first-born, chained with slaves
     In the Moor's galley, where the sun-smit waves
     Lap the white walls of Tunis!"—"What I can
     I give," Tritemius said, "my prayers."—"O man
     Of God!" she cried, for grief had made her bold,
     "Mock me not thus; I ask not prayers, but gold.
     Words will not serve me, alms alone suffice;
     Even while I speak perchance my first-born dies."

     "Woman!" Tritemius answered, "from our door
     None go unfed, hence are we always poor;
     A single soldo is our only store.
     Thou hast our prayers;—what can we give thee
     more?"

     "Give me," she said, "the silver candlesticks
     On either side of the great crucifix.
     God well may spare them on His errands sped,
     Or He can give you golden ones instead."

     Then spake Tritemius, "Even as thy word,
     Woman, so be it! Our most gracious Lord,
     Who loveth mercy more than sacrifice,
     Pardon me if a human soul I prize
     Above the gifts upon his altar piled!
     Take what thou askest, and redeem thy child."

     But his hand trembled as the holy alms
     He placed within the beggar's eager palms;
     And as she vanished down the linden shade,
     He bowed his head and for forgiveness prayed.
     So the day passed, and when the twilight came
     He woke to find the chapel all aflame,
     And, dumb with grateful wonder, to behold
     Upon the altar candlesticks of gold!

     1857.

     OF all the rides since, the birth of time,
     Told in story or sung in rhyme,—
     On Apuleius's Golden Ass,
     Or one-eyed Calendar's horse of brass;
     Witch astride of a human back,
     Islam's prophet on Al-Borak,—
     The strangest ride that ever was sped
     Was Ireson's, out from Marblehead!
     Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,
     Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart
     By the women of Marblehead!
     Body of turkey, head of owl,
     Wings a-droop like a rained-on fowl,
     Feathered and ruffled in every part,
     Skipper Ireson stood in the cart.
     Scores of women, old and young,
     Strong of muscle, and glib of tongue,
     Pushed and pulled up the rocky lane,
     Shouting and singing the shrill refrain
     "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt,
     Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt
     By the women o' Morble'ead!"

     Wrinkled scolds with hands on hips,
     Girls in bloom of cheek and lips,
     Wild-eyed, free-limbed, such as chase
     Bacchus round some antique vase,
     Brief of skirt, with ankles bare,
     Loose of kerchief and loose of hair,
     With conch-shells blowing and fish-horns' twang,
     Over and over the Manads sang
     "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt,
     Torr'd an' futherr'd an corr'd in a corrt
     By the women o' Morble'ead!"

     Small pity for him!—He sailed away
     From a leaking ship, in Chaleur Bay,—
     Sailed away from a sinking wreck,
     With his own town's-people on her deck!
     "Lay by! lay by!" they called to him.
     Back he answered, "Sink or swim!
     Brag of your catch of fish again!"
     And off he sailed through the fog and rain!
     Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,
     Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart
     By the women of Marblehead!

     Fathoms deep in dark Chaleur
     That wreck shall lie forevermore.
     Mother and sister, wife and maid,
     Looked from the rocks of Marblehead
     Over the moaning and rainy sea,—
     Looked for the coming that might not be!
     What did the winds and the sea-birds say
     Of the cruel captain who sailed away?—
     Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,
     Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart
     By the women of Marblehead!

     Through the street, on either side,
     Up flew windows, doors swung wide;
     Sharp-tongued spinsters, old wives gray,
     Treble lent the fish-horn's bray.
     Sea-worn grandsires, cripple-bound,
     Hulks of old sailors run aground,
     Shook head, and fist, and hat, and cane,
     And cracked with curses the hoarse refrain
     "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt,
     Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt
     By the women o''Morble'ead!"

     Sweetly along the Salem road
     Bloom of orchard and lilac showed.
     Little the wicked skipper knew
     Of the fields so green and the sky so blue.
     Riding there in his sorry trim,
     Like to Indian idol glum and grim,
     Scarcely he seemed the sound to hear
     Of voices shouting, far and near
     "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt,
     Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt
     By the women o' Morble'ead!"

     "Hear me, neighbors!" at last he cried,—
     "What to me is this noisy ride?
     What is the shame that clothes the skin
     To the nameless horror that lives within?
     Waking or sleeping, I see a wreck,
     And hear a cry from a reeling deck!
     Hate me and curse me,—I only dread
     The hand of God and the face of the dead!"
     Said old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,
     Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart
     By the women of Marblehead!

     Then the wife of the skipper lost at sea
     Said, "God has touched him! why should we?"
     Said an old wife mourning her only son,
     "Cut the rogue's tether and let him run!"
     So with soft relentings and rude excuse,
     Half scorn, half pity, they cut him loose,
     And gave him a cloak to hide him in,
     And left him alone with his shame and sin.
     Poor Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,
     Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart
     By the women of Marblehead!

     1857.