The yeoman and the yeoman's son,

With knitted brows and sturdy dint, Renewed the polish of each gun,

Re-oiled the lock, reset the flint; And oft the maid and matron there, While kneeling in the firelight glare, Long poured, with half-suspended breath,

The lead into the moulds of death.

The hands by Heaven made silken soft To soothe the brow of love or pain,

Alas! are dulled and soiled too oft

By some unhallowed earthly stain ; But under the celestial bound No nobler picture can be found Than woman, brave in word and deed, Thus serving in her nation's need: Her love is with her country now, Her hand is on its aching brow.

THE BRAVE AT HOME.

I.

The maid who binds her warrior's sash With smile that well her pain dissembles,

And every maid, with simple art, Wears on her breast, like her own heart,

A bud whose depths are all perfume;
While every garment's gentle stir
Is breathing rose and lavender.

There, veiled in all the sweets that are Blown from the violet's purple bosom,

The scent of lilacs from afar,

Touched with the sweet shrub's spicy blossom, Walked Esther; and the rustic ranks Stood on

each side like flowery

banks, To let her pass,-a blooming aisle, Made brighter by her summer smile: On her father's arm she seemed to be The last green bough of that haughty tree.

The pastor came; his snowy locks Hallowed his brow of thought and

care;

And, calmly as shepherds lead their flocks,

He led into the house of prayer. Forgive the student Edgar there If his enchanted eyes would roam, And if his thoughts soared not beyond,

And if his heart glowed warmly fond

Beneath his hopes' terrestrial dome. To him the maiden seemed to stand,

Veiled in the glory of the morn, At the bar of the heavenly bourn, A guide to the golden holy land. When came the service' low response, Hers seemed an angel's answering tongue;

When with the singing choir she sung, O'er all the rest her sweet notes rung,

As if a silver bell were swung 'Mid bells of iron and of bronze.

The pastor rose:
strong;
The psalm was warrior David's song;
The text, a few short words of might,—
"The Lord of hosts shall arm the
right!"

He spoke of wrongs too long endured,
Of sacred rights to be secured ;
Then from his patriot tongue of
flame

The startling words for Freedom

came.

The stirring sentences he spake
Compelled the heart to glow or quake,
And, rising on his theme's broad wing,
And grasping in his nervous hand
The imaginary battle-brand,
In face of death he dared to fling
Defiance to a tyrant king.

Even as he spoke, his frame, renewed
In eloquence of attitude,
Rose, as it seemed, a shoulder higher;
Then swept his kindling glance of fire
From startled pew to breathless choir;
When suddenly his mantle wide
His hands impatient flung aside,
And, lo! he met their wondering eyes
Complete in all a warrior's guise.12

A moment there was awful pause,When Berkley cried, "Cease, traitor cease!

God's temple is the house of peace!" The other shouted, "Nay, not so, When God is with our righteous

cause:

His holiest places then are ours,

His temples are our forts and towers That frown upon the tyrant foe: In this the dawn of Freedom's day There is a time to fight and pray!"

And now before the open door

The warrior-priest had ordered soThe enlisting trumpet's sudden soar Rang through the chapel, o'er and o'er, Its long reverberating blow,

So loud and clear, it seemed the ear
Of dusty death must wake and hear.
And there the startling drum and fife
Fired the living with fiercer life;
While overhead, with wild increase,
Forgetting its ancient toll of peace,
The great bell swung as ne'er before:
It seemed as it would never cease;
And every word its ardor flung
From off its jubilant iron tongue
Was,
"WAR! WAR! WAR!"

"Who dares"-this was the patriot's

Gliding along the garden-walks,
Gathering blossoms from the stalks,
He saw the heiress of Berkley Hall,
And fancied he heard the rise and fall
Of the melody he knew must be
Flooding her lips incessantly:
For song was native to her tongue
As to a runnel valeward flung,
As wind to a cloud, as mist to a fall,
As dew to the rose, and as sunshine
to all.

His full heart ached with love's sweet pain,

Like a sealed fountain, charged with rain,

That longs to sing in the summer air, Yet faints in its cavern of despair.

From plot to bower, from vase to vase,
Down to the very garden-base,
He watched her gliding, fawnlike
расе;

store

Lightly up the vine-like stair,

Light of heart and light of foot, Flitted the maiden into the bower. Never in enchanted air

Held a vine so fair a flower

Or tree so sweet a fruit.

She sat; the flickering sun and shade
Like wingéd sprites about her played:
The wren peered in with curious eye,
The bluebird carolled closely by,
The robin from her nest above
Looked, and resumed her task of love.

The maiden's lap was full of flowers, Culled from the lavish garden-bowers. 'Mid these her fingers gayly played Entwining happy shade with shade, And, as she wrought the flowers among,

Her sweet thoughts rippled into song.

I.

The blue-eyed lady of the morn, While she wreathes her flowers of light,

Knows for whom those flowers are
bright,

By whom they shall be worn:
She knows the golden locks of Day
Shall bear that flashing wreath away.

II.

father's door.

Around this tree a stair-way led
Into the branches overhead,

And there, 'mid spreading antlerboughs,

A little room was fitted well, Where a votaress might make her

VOWS

Secure within her flowery cell.

Such a one there stands to-day
In a poet's garden far away,
Where on many an afternoon,
His great soul full of marvellous tune,
Cloistered among flowers and leaves,
He sings, and all the world receives.

hue

May be crushed and tarnished soon, And the battle-heat of noon Waste their precious dew, Yet she knows when Day is through He shall wear his wreath anew.

III.

Would I knew some hero now!
He should wear the wreath I make.
Not for mine, but Freedom's sake,
I would deck his brow:
Should his arm victorious prove,
He should wear the wreath of love.