"I cannot ride Vindictive, as any man might see, And I will not ride Vindictive, with this baby on my knee; He's kill'd a boy, he 's kill'd' a man, and why must he kill me?" 15 "Unless you ride Vindictive, Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorrée, Unless you ride Vindictive to-day at Coulterlee, And land him safe across the brook, and win the blank for me, It's you may keep your baby, for you'll get no keep from me." 'That husbands could be cruel," said Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorree, "That husbands could be cruel, I have known for seasons three; But oh! to ride Vindictive while a baby cries for me, 19 And be kill'd across a fence at last for all the world to see!" 23 She master'd young Vindictive-Oh! the gallant lass was she! And kept him straight and won the race as near as near could be; But he kill'd her at the brook against a pollard willow tree; Oh! he kill'd her at the brook, the brute, for all the world to see, And no one but the baby cried for poor 1874. Lorraine, Lorrèe. 28 Charles Kingsley. TELLING THE BEES HERE is the place; right over the hill You can see the gap in the old wall still, There is the house, with the gates red-barred, And the poplars tall; And the barn's brown length, and the cattleyard, And the white horns tossing above the wall. 8 There are the beehives ranged in the sun; Of the brook are her poor flowers, weed- Pansy and daffodil, rose and pink. A year has gone, as the tortoise goes, And the same rose blows, and the same sun glows, And the same brook sings of a year ago. 12 16 There's the same sweet clover-smell in the breeze; And the June sun warm Tangles his wings of fire in the trees, Setting, as then, over Fernside farm. I mind me how with a lover's care 20 I brushed off the burrs, and smoothed my hair, And cooled at the brookside my brow and throat. Since we parted, a month had passed, To love, a year; Down through the beeches I looked at last near. I can see it all now, the slantwise rain 24 28 The sundown's blaze on her window-pane, The bloom of her roses under the eaves. 32 Just the same as a month before, The house and the trees, The barn's brown gable, that vine by the door, Nothing changed but the hives of the bees. 36 Before them, under the garden wall, Forward and back, Went drearily singing the chore-girl small, Draping each hive with a shred of black. 40 Trembling, I listened: the summer sun Had the chill of snow; For I knew she was telling the bees of one Then I said to myself, "My Mary weeps Haply her blind old grandsire sleeps The fret and pain of his age away." But her dog whined low; on the doorway sill, With his cane to his chin, The old man sat; and the chore-girl still Sung to the bees stealing out and in. And the song she was singing ever since "Stay at home, pretty bees, fly not hence! 44 48 52 1858. John Greenleaf Whittier. 56 IN THE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL EMMIE OUR doctor had call'd in another, I never had seen him before, But he sent a chill to my heart when I saw him come in at the door, Fresh from the surgery-schools of France and of other lands Harsh red hair, big voice, big chest, big merciless hands! Wonderful cures he had done, O yes, but they said too of him He was happier using the knife than in trying to save the limb, And that I can well believe, for he look'd so coarse and so red, I could think he was one of those who would break their jests on the dead, And mangle the living dog that had loved him and fawn'd at his knee Drench'd with the hellish oorali-that ever such things should be! Here was a boy-I am sure that some of our children would die But for the voice of Love, and the smile, and the comforting eye 30 Here was a boy in the ward, every bone seem'd out of its place Caught in a mill and crush'd-it was all but a hopeless case: And he handled him gently enough; but his voice and his face were not kind, And it was but a hopeless case, he had seen it and made up his mind, And he said to me roughly "The lad will need little more of your care.” |