In vain I turned, in weary quest,

Old pages, where (God give them rest!)
The poor creed-mongers dreamed and guessed.

And still I prayed, "Lord, let me see
How Three are One, and One is Three;
Read the dark riddle unto me!”

Then something whispered, "Dost thou pray
For what thou hast? This very day
The Holy Three have crossed thy way.

"Did not the gifts of sun and air To good and ill alike declare

The all-compassionate Father's care?

"In the white soul, that stooped to raise

The lost one from her evil ways,

Thou saw'st the Christ, whom angels praise!

“A bodiless Divinity,

The still small Voice that spake to thee
Was the Holy Spirit's mystery!

"Oh, blind of sight, of faith how small!
Father, and Son, and Holy Call ;-
This day thou hast denied them all!

"Revealed in love and sacrifice,
The Holiest passed before thine eyes,
One and the same, in threefold guise.

"The equal Father in rain and sun, His Christ in the good to evil done,

His Voice in thy soul;-and the Three are One!"

I shut my grave Aquinas fast ;
The monkish gloss of ages past,
The schoolman's creed aside I cast.

THE OLD BURYING-GROUND.

And my heart answered, "Lord, I see
How Three are One, and One is Three;
Thy riddle hath been read to me!"

361

THE OLD BURYING-GROUND.

OUR vales are sweet with fern and rose,
Our hills are maple-crowned;
But not from them our fathers chose
The village burying-ground.

The dreariest spot in all the land
To Death they set apart;
With scanty grace from Nature's hand,
And none from that of Art.

A winding wall of mossy stone,
Frost-flung and broken, lines
A lonesome acre thinly grown
With grass and wandering vines.

Without the wall a birch-tree shows
Its drooped and tasselled head;
Within, a stag-horned sumach grows,
Fern-leafed, with spikes of red.

There, sheep that graze the neighboring plain Like white ghosts come and go,

The farm-horse drags his fetlock chain,

The cow-bell tinkles slow.

Low moans the river from its bed,

The distant pines reply;

Like mourners shrinking from the dead,

They stand apart and sigh.

Unshaded smites the summer sun,
Unchecked the winter blast;
The school-girl learns the place to shun,
With glances backward cast.

For thus our fathers testified--
That he might read who ran-
The emptiness of human pride,
The nothingness of man.

They dared not plant the grave with flowers,
Nor dress the funeral sod,

Where, with a love as deep as ours,

They left their dead with God.

The hard and thorny path they kept
From beauty turned aside;
Nor missed they over those who slept
The grace to life denied.

Yet still the wilding flowers would blow,
The golden leaves would fall,
The seasons come, the seasons go,
And God be good to all.

Above the graves the blackberry hung
In bloom and green its wreath,
And harebells swung as if they rung
The chimes of peace beneath.

The beauty Nature loves to share,
The gifts she hath for all,
The common light, the common air,
O'ercrept the graveyard's wall.

It knew the glow of eventide,
The sunrise and the noon,
And glorified and sanctified
It slept beneath the moon.

THE OLD BURYING-GROUND.

With flowers or snow-flakes for its sod,

Around the seasons ran,

And evermore the love of God
Rebuked the fear of man.

We dwell with fears on either hand,
Within a daily strife,

And spectral problems waiting stand
Before the gates of life.

The doubts we vainly seek to solve,
The truths we know, are one;
The known and nameless stars revolve
Around the Central Sun.

And if we reap as we have sown,
And take the dole we deal,
The law of pain is love alone,
The wounding is to heal.

363

Unharmed from change to change we glide,

We fall as in our dreams;

The far-off terror at our side
A smiling angel seems.

Secure on God's all-tender heart
Alike rest great and small
Why fear to lose our little part,
When he is pledged for all?

O fearful heart and troubled brain!
Take hope and strength from this,-~-
That Nature never hints in vain,

Nor prophesies amiss.

Her wild birds sing the same sweet stave,
Her lights and airs are given

Alike to playground and the grave;
And over both is Heaven.

THE PIPES AT LUCKNOW.

PIPES of the misty moorlands,
Voice of the glens and hills;
The droning of the torrents,
The treble of the rills!

Not the braes of broom and heather,
Nor the mountains dark with rain,
Nor maiden bower, nor border tower,
Have heard your sweetest strain !

Dear to the Lowland reaper,
And plaided mountaineer,
To the cottage and the castle
The Scottish pipes are dear;-
Sweet sounds the ancient pibroch
O'er mountain, loch, and glade;
But the sweetest of all music
The Pipes at Lucknow played.

Day by day the Indian tiger

Louder yelled, and nearer crept; Round and round the jungle-serpent Near and nearer circles swept. Pray for rescue, wives and mothers,Pray to-day!" the soldier said "To-morrow, death's between us

66

And the wrong and shame we dread."

Oh! they listened, looked, and waited,
Till their hope became despair;
And the sobs of low bewailing

Filled the pauses of their prayer.
Then up spake a Scottish maiden.
With her ear unto the ground:
"Dinna ye hear it ?—dinna ye hear it?
The pipes o' Havelock sound!”