In paths where faith alone could see
The Master's steps supporting thee.
Thine was the seed-time; God alone
Beholds the end of what is sown;
Beyond our vision, weak and dim,
The harvest-time is hid with Him.
Yet, unforgotten where it lies,
That seed of generous sacrifice,
Though seeming on the desert cast,
Shall rise with bloom and fruit at last.
DRY the tears for holy Eva,
With the blessed angels leave her;
Of the form so soft and fair
Give to earth the tender care.
For the golden locks of Eva
Let the sunny south-land give her
Flowery pillow of repose,
Orange-bloom and budding rose.
In the better home of Eva
Let the shining ones receive her,
With the welcome-voicéd psalm,
Harp of gold and waving palm!
All is light and peace with Eva;
There the darkness cometh never;
Tears are wiped, and fetters fall,
And the Lord is all in all.
Weep no more for happy Eva,
Wrong and sin no more shall grieve her;
Care and pain and weariness
Lost in love so measureless.
Gentle Eva, loving Eva,
Child confessor, true believer,
Listener at the Master's knee,
"Suffer such to come to me."
O, for faith like thine, sweet Eva,
Lighting all the solemn river,
And the blessings of the poor
Wafting to the heavenly shore!
SEERESS of the misty Norland,
Daughter of the Vikings bold,
Welcome to the sunny Vineland,
Which thy fathers sought of old !
Soft as flow of Silja's waters,
When the moon of summer shines,
Strong as Winter from his mountains
Roaring through the sleeted pines.
Heart and ear, we long have listened
To thy saga, rune and song,
As a household joy and presence
We have known and loved thee long
By the mansion's marble mantel,
Round the log-walled cabin's hearth, Thy sweet thoughts and northern fancies Meet and mingle with our mirth.
And, o'er weary spirits keeping Sorrow's night-watch, long and chill,
Shine they like thy sun of summer
Over midnight vale and hill.
We alone to thee are strangers,
Thou our friend and teacher art;
Come, and know us as we know thee;
Let us meet thee heart to heart!
To our homes and household altars
We, in turn, thy steps would lead,
As thy loving hand has led us
O'er the threshold of the Swede.
"The spring comes slowly up this way."
"Trs the noon of the spring-time, yet never a bird In the wind-shaken elm or the maple is heard; For green meadow-grasses wide levels of snow, And blowing of drifts where the crocus should blow;
Where wind-flower and violet, amber and white, On south-sloping brook-sides should smile in the light,
O'er the cold winter-beds of their late-waking roots
The frosty flake eddies, the ice-crystal shoots;
And, longing for light, under wind-driven heaps,
Round the boles of the pine-wood the ground-laurel
Unkissed of the sunshine, unbaptized of showers, With buds scarcely swelled, which should burst into flowers!
We wait for thy coming, sweet wind of the south! For the touch of thy light wings, the kiss of thy mouth;
For the yearly evangel thou bearest from God,
Resurrection and life to the graves of the sod!
Up our long river-valley, for days, have not ceased
The wail and the shriek of the bitter northeast,-
Raw and chill, as if winnowed through ices and
snow,
All the way from the land of the wild Esquimau,-
Until all our dreams of the land of the blest,
Like that red hunter's, turn to the sunny southwest.
O, soul of the spring-time, its light and its breath,
Bring warmth to this coldness, bring life to this
death;
Renew the great miracle; let us behold
The stone from the mouth of the sepulchre rolled, And Nature, like Lazarus, rise, as of old!
Let our faith, which in darkness and coldness has lain,
Revive with the warmth and the brightness again,
And in blooming of flower and budding of tree
The symbols and types of our destiny see;
The life of the spring-time, the life of the whole,
And as sun to the sleeping earth love to the soul !
STANZAS FOR THE TIMES-1850.
THE evil days have come,-the poor
Are made a prey;
Bar up the hospitable door,
Put out the fire-lights, point no more
The wanderer's way.
For Pity now is crime; the chain
Which binds our States
Is melted at her hearth in twain,
Is rusted by her tears' soft rain :
Close up her gates.
Our Union, like a glacier stirred
By voice below,
Or bell of kine, or wing of bird,
A beggar's crust, a kindly word
May overthrow!
Poor, whispering tremblers !-yet we boast
Our blood and name
Bursting its century-bolted frost,
Each gray cairn on the Northman's coast
Cries out for shame!
O for the open firmament,
The prairie free,
The desert hillside, cavern-rent,
The Pawnee's lodge, the Arab's tent,
The Bushman's tree!
Than web of Persian loom most rare,
Or soft divan,
Better the rough rock, bleak and bare,
Or hollow tree, which man may share
With suffering man.
I hear a voice: "Thus saith the Law,
Let Love be dumb;
Clasping her liberal hands in awe,
Let sweet-lipped Charity withdraw
From hearth and home."
I hear another voice: "The poor
Are thine to feed;
Turn not the outcast from thy door,
Nor give to bonds and wrong once more
Whom God hath freed.'
Dear Lord! between that law and thee
No choice remains;
Yet not untrue to man's decree,
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