256

That mamma, I regret to see,
Inclines to take your part,-
As if a dual monarchy

Should rule her gentle heart!

But when the years of youth have sped,
The bearded man, I trow,
Will quite forget he ever said

He'd be his mamma's beau.

Renounce your treason, little son,
Leave mamma's heart to me;
For there will come another one
To claim your loyalty.

And when that other comes to you,
God grant her love may shine,
Through all your life, as fair and true
As mamma's does through mine!

THE BELL-FLOWER TREE

WHEN brother Bill and I were boys,
How often in the summer we
Would seek the shade your branches made,
O fair and gracious bell-flower tree!
Amid the clover bloom we sat

And looked upon the Holyoke range,
While Fido lay a space away,
Thinking our silence very strange.

The woodchuck in the pasture-lot,
Beside his furtive hole elate,
Heard, off beyond the pickerel pond,
The redwing-blackbird chide her mate.
The bumblebee went bustling round,
Pursuing labors never done-
With drone and sting, the greedy thing
Begrudged the sweets we lay upon!

THE BELL-FLOWER TREE

Our eyes looked always at the hills-
The Holyoke hills that seemed to stand
Between us boys and pictured joys
Of conquest in a further land!
Ah, how we coveted the time

When we should leave this prosy place
And work our wills beyond those hills,
And meet creation face to face!

You must have heard our childish talk-
Perhaps our prattle gave you pain;
For then, old friend, you seemed to bend
Your kindly arms about us twain.
It might have been the wind that sighed,
And yet I thought I heard you say:
"Seek not the ills beyond those hills-

Oh, stay with me, my children, stay!"

See, I've come back; the boy you knew
Is wiser, older, sadder grown;
I come once more, just as of yore-
I come, but see! I come alone!
The memory of a brother's love,
Of blighted hopes, I bring with me,
And here I lay my heart to-day-
A weary heart, O bell-flower tree!

So let me nestle in your shade

As though I were a boy again,

And pray extend your arms, old friend,
And love me as you used to then.
Sing softly as you used to sing,

And maybe I shall seem to be

A little boy and feel the joy

Of thy repose, O bell-flower tree!

257

FAIRY AND CHILD

Он, listen, little Dear-My-Soul,
To the fairy voices calling,

For the moon is high in the misty sky
And the honey dew is falling;

To the midnight feast in the clover bloom
The bluebells are a-ringing,

And it's "Come away to the land of fay"
That the katydid is singing.

Oh, slumber, little Dear-My-Soul,
And hand in hand we 'll wander-
Hand in hand to the beautiful land
Of Balow, away off yonder;
Or we 'll sail along in a lily leaf
Into the white moon's halo-
Over a stream of mist and dream
Into the land of Balow.

Or, you shall have two beautiful wings-
Two gossamer wings and airy,

And all the while shall the old moon smile
And think you a little fairy;

And you shall dance in the velvet sky,

And the silvery stars shall twinkle

And dream sweet dreams as over their beams Your footfalls softly tinkle.

THE GRANDSIRE

I LOVED him so; his voice had grown
Into my heart, and now to hear
The pretty song he had sung so long
Die on the lips to me so dear!

HUSHABY, SWEET MY OWN

He a child with golden curls,

And I with head as white as snow

I knelt down there and made this pray'r: "God, let me be the first to go!"

How often I recall it now:

My darling tossing on his bed, I sitting there in mute despair,

Smoothing the curls that crowned his head. They did not speak to me of death

A feeling here had told me so; What could I say or do but pray That I might be the first to go?

Yet, thinking of him standing there
Out yonder as the years go by,
Waiting for me to come, I see

"T was better he should wait, not I. For when I walk the vale of death,

Above the wail of Jordan's flow

Shall rise a song that shall make me strong-
The call of the child that was first to go.

HUSHABY, SWEET MY OWN

(LULLABY: BY THE SEA)

FAIR is the castle upon the hill-
Hushaby, sweet my own!

The night is fair, and the waves are still,
And the wind is singing to you and to me
In this lowly home beside the sea—
Hushaby, sweet my own!

On yonder hill is store of wealth

Hushaby, sweet my own!

And revellers drink to a little one's health;

259

But you and I bide night and day
For the other love that has sailed away-
Hushaby, sweet my own!

See not, dear eyes, the forms that creep
Ghostlike, O my own!

Out of the mists of the murmuring deep;
Oh, see them not and make no cry
Till the angels of death have passed us by-
Hushaby, sweet my own!

Ah, little they reck of you and me-
Hushaby, sweet my own!

In our lonely home beside the sea;
They seek the castle up on the hill,
And there they will do their ghostly will-
Hushaby, O my own!

Here by the sea a mother croons
"Hushaby, sweet my own!"

In yonder castle a mother swoons
While the angels go down to the misty deep,
Bearing a little one fast asleep-

Hushaby, sweet my own!

CHILD AND MOTHER

O MOTHER-MY-LOVE, if you 'll give me your hand, And go where I ask you to wander,

I will lead you away to a beautiful land—

The Dreamland that's waiting out yonder. We'll walk in a sweet-posie garden out there Where moonlight and starlight are streaming And the flowers and the birds are filling the air With the fragrance and music of dreaming.