102

THE FRIEND'S BURIAL.

Yet all about the softening air

Of new-born sweetness tells,
And the ungathered May-flowers wear

The tints of ocean shells.

The old, assuring miracle

Is fresh as heretofore;
And earth takes up its parable

Of life from death once more.

Here organ swell and church-bell toll
Methinks but discord were:
The prayerful silence of the soul

Is best befitting her.

No sound should break the quietude

Alike of earth and sky;

O wandering wind in Seabrook wood,
Breathe but a half-heard sigh!

Sing softly, spring-bird, for her sake,
And thou not distant sea,
Lapse lightly as if Jesus spake,
And thou wert Galilee!

For all her quiet life flowed on
As meadow streamlets flow,
Where fresher green reveals alone
The noiseless ways they go.

THE FRIEND'S BURIAL.

From her loved place of prayer

I see

The plain-robed mourners pass,
With slow feet treading reverently
The graveyard's springing grass.

Make room, O mourning ones, for me,
Where, like the friends of Paul,
That you no more her face shall see
You sorrow most of all.

Her path shall brighten more and more
Unto the perfect day;

She cannot fail of peace who bore
Such peace with her away.

O sweet, calm face that seemed to wear
The look of sins forgiven!

O voice of prayer that seemed to bear
Our own needs up to heaven.

How reverent in our midst she stood,
Or knelt in grateful praise!
What grace of Christian womanhood
Was in her household ways!

For still her holy living meant

No duty left undone;

The heavenly and the human blent

Their kindred loves in one.

103

104

THE FRIEND'S BURIAL.

And if her life small leisure found
For feasting ear and eye,

And pleasure, on her daily round,
She passed unpausing by,—

Yet with her went a secret sense
Of all things sweet and fair,
And beauty's gracious providence
Refreshed her unaware.

She kept her line of rectitude

With love's unconscious ease;
Her kindly instincts understood
All gentle courtesies.

An inborn charm of graciousness
Made sweet her smile and tone,
And glorified her farm-wife dress
With beauty not its own.

The dear Lord's best interpreters
Are humble human souls;
The Gospel of a life like hers

Is more than books or scrolls.

From scheme and creed the light goes out,

The saintly fact survives;

The blessed Master none can doubt

Revealed in holy lives.

JOHN G. WHITTIER.

IF WE KNEW.

105

IF WE KNEW.

IF we knew the woe and heart-ache
Waiting for us down the road,

If our lips could taste the wormwood,
If our backs could feel the load,
Would we waste the day in wishing
For a time that ne'er can be?
Would we wait in such impatience
For our ships to come from sea?

If we knew the baby fingers

Pressed against the window-pane, Would be cold and stiff to-morrow

Never trouble us again—

Would the bright eyes of our darling

Catch the frown upon our brow? Would the print of rosy fingers

Vex us then as they do now?

Ah, these little ice-cold fingers,

How they point our memories back

To the hasty words and actions

Strewn along our backward track!—

106

IF WE KNEW.

How those little hands remind us,
As in snowy grace they lie,
Not to scatter thorns-but roses-

For our reaping by and by.

Strange we never prize the music

Till the sweet-voiced bird has flown;
Strange that we should slight the violets
Till the lovely flowers are gone;
Strange that Summer skies and sunshine.
Never seem one-half so fair,

As when Winter's snowy pinions
Shake the white down in the air!

Lips from which the seal of silence.
None but God can roll away,
Never blossomed in such beauty
As adorns the mouth to-day;
And sweet words that freight our memory
With their beautiful perfume,

Come to us in sweeter accents

Through the portals of the tomb.

Let us gather up the sunbeams
Lying all around our path;
Let us keep the wheat and roses,
Casting out the thorns and chaff;