With the sad news, that he had joined a troop He left me thus, he could not gather heart To take a farewell of me; for he feared That I should follow with my babes, and sink "This tale did Margaret tell with many tears: And, when she ended, I had little power To give her comfort, and was glad to take Such words of hope from her own mouth as served And well remember, o'er that fence she looked, "I roved o'er many a hill and many a dale, With my accustomed load; in heat and cold, Through many a wood and many an open ground, In sunshine and in shade, in wet and fair, Drooping or blithe of heart, as might befall; My best companions now the driving winds, And now the 'trotting brooks' and whispering trees, And now the music of my own sad steps, With many a short-lived thought that passed between, And disappeared. "I journeyed back this way, When, in the warmth of midsummer, the wheat Was yellow; and the soft and bladed grass, Springing afresh, had o'er the hay-field spread Its tender verdure. At the door arrived, I found that she was absent. In the shade, Where now we sit, I waited her return. Her cottage, then a cheerful object, worę Its customary look, only, it seemed, The honeysuckle, crowding round the porch, Its pride of neatness. Daisy-flowers and thrift The cumbrous bind-weed, with its wreaths and bells, Had twined about her two small rows of peas, "Ere this an hour Was wasted. Back I turned my restless steps: A stranger passed; and, guessing whom I sought, He said that she was used to ramble far. The sun was sinking in the west; and now Then, like a blast that dies away self-stilled, The voice was silent. From the bench I rose; eight; I turned, and saw her distant a few steps. - her figure, too, Her face was pale and thin, Was changed. As she unlocked the door, she said, 'It grieves me you have waited here so long, But, in good truth, I 've wandered much of late; And, sometimes, to my shame I speak, have need Of my best prayers to bring me back again.' While on the board she spread our evening meal, She told me - interrupting not the work Which gave employment to her listless hands To a kind master on a distant farm Now happily apprenticed. I perceive You look at me, and you have cause; to-day And so I waste my time: for I am changed; Have flowed as if my body were not such More easy; and I hope,' said she, 'that God Your very soul to see her. "It would have grieved Sir, I feel "T is long and tedious; but my spirit clings A human being destined to awake To human life, or something very near For whom she suffered. Yes, it would have grieved Her eyelids drooped, her eyes downward were cast; breast was seen, While by the fire We sat together, sighs came on my ear, I knew not how, and hardly whence they came. "Ere my departure, to her care I gave, In God's good love, and seek his help by prayer "I returned, And took my rounds along this road again |