For my mother was dead, God rest her,
And I would be left alone.
The bride to her trust was unfaithful-
Her heart was harder than stone.
And her widowed sister, left childless,
Adopted me as her own.
So we dwelt in opposite houses-
We in a dwelling low,
And he in a brown stone mansion.
I toiled and my gain was slow.
My uncle rode in a carriage
As fine as there was in the row.
Once, in a useless anger,
With courage not mine before,
I bearded the crafty lion,
Demanding my own, no more.
He said the law gave me nothing,
And showed me out of his door.
VI. MY AUNT INVITES HER IN TO DINE.
This is the place, this is the hour,
And through the shine, or through the shower,
She promised she would come.
O, darling day, she is so sweet
I could kneel down and kiss her feet.
Her presence makes me dumb.
A thousand things that I would say,
And ponder when she is away,
Desert me when she's near-
When she is near-twice we have met!
Though but a month has passed as yet,
It seems almost a year.
O, now she comes, and here she stands,
And gives me hers in both my hands,
And blushes to her brow.
She eyes askance her simple gown,
And folds a Judas tatter down
She has not seen till now.
I said, "My love you made me wait,
I grew almost disconsolate
Thinking you would not come.
Ah, tell me what you have to do,
That makes your duty, sweet, for you
My rival in your home."
"My home!" she answered, "I have none.
For me, 'tis years since there was one,
And that was scarcely mine.
Father and mother both are dead;
I sell sweet flowers to earn my bread-
Their fragrance is my wine.
"Sometimes the house upon the farm,
Sometimes the city's friendly arm,
Shields me from rain and dew.
I did not know that it was late;
The minutes you have had to wait,
Are truly but a few."
A smile shone through her large dark eyes,
As sometimes, in the stormy skies,
The light puts through an arm,
Which, spreading glory far and wide,
Draws the broad curtain cloud aside,
Making the whole earth warm.
She took my arm; we walked away;
We saw, in parks, the fountains play;
My heart was all elate.
I scarcely noticed when I stood,
With my dear waif of womanhood,
Beside our lowly gate.
"You have no home," I gently said,
"But, till the day that we are wed,
And after if you will,
This home, my love, is mine and thine."
My aunt came out and bade us dine-
I see her smiling still.
My Blanche, reluctant, gave consent;
Then 'neath the humble roof we went,
And sat about the board.
I saw how sweet the whole surprise;
I saw her fond uplifted eyes,
Give thanks unto the Lord.
VII. THE PROPHECY.
There is a prophecy of our line,
Told by some great grand-dame of mine
I once attempted to divine.
'Tis that two children, then unborn,
Would know a wealthy wedding morn,
Or die in poverty forlorn.
These children would be of her name.
If to the bridal bans they came,
The house would gather strength and fame.
But if they came not, woe is me,
The line would ever cease to be,
The wealth would take its wings and flee.
If all the signs are coming true,
I am the child she pictured, who
The name should keep or hide from view.
In our domain of liberty,
Our heed is light of pedigree,
I care not for the prophecy.
For what to me our wealth or line?
I only wish to make her mine-
The maid my aunt asked in to dine.
VIII. HOW A POOR GIRL WAS MADE RICH.
All the day my toil was easy, for I knew that in the evening,
I could go home from my labor, and find Blanche at the door;
How could I dream the sunlight in my sky was so deceiving?
And I ceased in my believing 'twould be cloudy ever more.
When at last the twilight deepened, I entered our low dwelling,
And my darling rose to meet me, with the love-light in her eyes;
On that day her simple story to my aunt she had been telling,
And I saw her words were welling, fraught with ominous surprise.
For it seems my hated uncle, once had given him a daughter,
Who on a saddened morning had been stolen from the door,
And through the panting city the criers cried and sought her,
But in vain; they never brought her to his threshold any more.
Blanche was she, my uncle's daughter; no unwelcome truth was plainer;
For a small peculiar birth-mark was apparent on her arm.
Had I lost her? Was it possible ever more now to regain her?
Would he spurn me, and restrain her with his wily golden charm?
All that night my heart was bitter with unutterable anguish,
And I cried out in my slumber till with my words I woke:
"How long, O Lord, must poverty bow down its head and languish,
While wrong, with wealth to garnish it, makes strong the heavy yoke?"
IX. THE MISER.
'Tis said, that when he saw his child,
And saw the proof that she was his,
The first in many a year he smiled,
And pressed upon her brow a kiss.
In both his hands her hand he bound,
And led her gayly through his place.
He said the dead years circled round,
Hers was so like her mother's face.
He scarcely moves him from her side-
Her every hour with joy beguiles.
To make the gulf between us wide,
He acts the miser of her smiles.
He brings her presents rich and rare-
Wrought gold by cunning hands impearled,
Round opals that with scarlet glare,
The lightning of each mimic world.
X. SHE PASSED ME BY.
She bowed, and smiled, and passed me by,
She passed me by!
O love, O lava breath that burns,
'Tis hard indeed to think she spurns
Such worshippers as you and I.
She smiled, and bowed, with stately pride;
The bow the frosty smile belied.
She passed me by.
She bowed, and smiled, and passed me by,
She passed me by.
What more could any maiden do?
It did not prove she was untrue.
My heart is tired, I know not why.
I only know I weep and pray.
Love has its night as well as day.
She passed me by.
XI. MIND WITHOUT SOUL.
Some strange story I have read
Of a man without a soul.
Mind he had, though soul had fled;
Magic gave him gifts instead,
And the form of youth he stole.
Grows a rose-azalea white,
In my garden, near the way.
I who see it with delight,
Dream its soul of odor might,
In the past, have fled away.
Blanche (O, sweet, you are so fair,
So sweet, so fair, whate'er you do),
Twine no azalea in your hair,
Lest I think in my despair,
Heart and soul have left you too.
XII. A BROKEN SWORD.
Deep in the night I saw the sea,
And overhead, the round moon white;
Its steel cold gleam lay on the lea,
And seemed my sword of life and light,
Broke in that war death waged with me.
I heard the dip of golden oars;
Twelve angels stranded in a boat;