OH, cold was the bridegroom, All frozen with pride; He first slew her lover, Then made her his bride. Beneath a green willow, And under a stone, The buried her lover, And left her alone. With naught but the bridegroom's Her body they buried Beside the church-wall; Her ghost with the bridegroom Sat up in the hall:— TWINS. I saw two beautiful children The same in voice and size, In the self-same silvery tune, They whirled, and danced, and dallied The beautiful vales amid, Till under the same thick leaves and flowers Their future course was hid. -The Twins. A HELEN HUNT JACKSON. MERICA has been the birth-place of a number of female poets that have given to their country some of the sweetest songs in the English tongue. Women who have been revered and loved for the words of cheer and inspiration they gave to mankind, yet I doubt if any among them have ever received the same measure of love, the same amount of reverence, or have called forth the same feeling of kinship as Helen Hunt Jackson. Nor is this to be wondered at, for no other writer has ever touched so closely upon kindred themes; has ever so nearly reached the heart and the sensibilities. The Carey sisters probably came the nearest to this in their writings, and May Riley Smith has the faculty of clothing every-day events with a pathetic grace that voices the sentiments of her readers as they could not themselves; but while these laternamed have succeeded but in part in expressing and giving utterance to the only half-acknowledged tenderness within us, which we may feel but cannot speak, Helen Hunt has laid bare the whole recesses of the heart. Hers was a wonderful insight into human nature. Such intuition must have been heaven-born. Her songs are songs of faith, made perfect through suffering So strong her faith that others' faith must seem weak in comparison, and if one were for a moment led to doubt the existence of a God, that doubt must take flight in a half-hour with Helen Hunt. This trust and love which predominated in her, and which pervaded all she wrote, or thought, or did, was the underlying cause of her mastery over human hearts. She had suffered, and by her sufferings was made strong. Who shall say she was not a chosen vessel to carry the Master's message to other fainting hearts? Mrs. Jackson was born in Amherst, Mass., October 15th, 1830. She was a daughter of the wellknown Professor Nathan W. Fiske, of Amherst College. She was graduated from the Ipswich Female Seminary, Massachusetts, and from the Messrs. Abbott's school of New York City. Her first husband, Major Edward B. Hunt, U. S. A., lost his life in 1863 by the premature explosion of a submarine battery he had invented. Two children, boys, were born to Major and Mrs. Hunt, one living less than a year, the other dying two years after the father's death had occurred. It was during this season of grief, the crucible to her as yet, untried soul, that faith gained the mastery, and, at the end of a year of bitter mental conflict, she came forth purified by her trial, ready to give to the world the benefit of her experience for which she had paid so dearly. She 66 had written but little previous to that time, but now her pen became her solace, and from then on until her death, August 12th, 1885, she wrote unceasingly. Her published works are "Verses " (Boston, 1871); "Bits of Travel" (1872); "Bits of Talk About Home Matters" (1873); "The Story of Boon" (Boston, 1874); "Bits of Talk in Verse and Prose," for young folks, (Boston, 1876); “Mercy Philbrick's Choice (Boston, 1876); "Hetty's Strange History" (Boston, 1877); Bits of Travel at Home" (Boston, 1878); "Nelly's Silver-mine: A Story of Colorado Life" (Boston, 1876); "Letters from a Cat" (Boston, 1878); "Mammy Tittleback and Her Family: A True Story of Seventeen Cats" (Boston, 1881); "A Century of Dishonor" (New York, 1881); "The Training of Children" (New York, 1882); "Ramona" (Boston, 1884); "The Hunter Cats of Connorloa" (Boston, 1884); "Zeph: A Post-humous Story" (Boston, 1885); "Glimpses of Three Coasts" (Boston, 1886); "Sonnets and Lyrics" (Boston, 1886); "Between Whiles" (Boston, 1887); "The Procession of Flowers in Colorado" (Boston, 1887); with Kinney, Abbott, "Condition and Needs of the Mission Indians of California," published by the United States government, (Washington, 1883). In 1883 Mrs. Hunt was appointed special commissioner to look into the condition of the Mission Indians of California. In 1875 she was married to William S. Jackson, a banker of Colorado Springs. The years passed in Colorado were happy ones. Her chosen resting place on the summit of Cheyenne mountain, four miles from her home, has never been a lonely one, for it has been the mecca of hundreds of tourists, until the path leading to her grave has become well worn from the footsteps of those who have gone to pay their tribute to her who was poet, sister and friend to the whole world. MY LEGACY. J. W. THEY told me I was heir. I turned in haste, Of gold, or if the titles of fair lands I journeyed many roads; I knocked at gates; I met, and said, “A heritage awaits Of news? Some message sent to me whereby Some asked me in; naught lay beyond their door; But said that men were just behind who bore And so the morn, the noon, the day were spent, At last one cried, whose face I could not see, "Poor child, what evil ones have hindered thee, Till this whole day is wasted? Hath no man told thee that thou art joint heir The one named Christ I sought for many days, I heard men name his name in many ways, I saw his temples plainly. But they who named him most gave me no sign And when at last I stood before his face, Save subtle air of joy which filled the place; In solemn silence I received my share, Kneeling before my brother and "joint heir." My share! No deed of house or spreading lands, Foxes have holes, and birds in nests are fed- My share! The right like him to know all pain In bitter tears; the right with him to keep My share! To-day men call it grief and death; I thank our Father with my every breath And through my tears I call to each, "Joint heir A WILD ROSE OF SEPTEMBER. O WILD red rose, what wind has stayed O wild red rose! Two faces glow O sweet wild rose! O strong south wind! The sunny roadside asks no reasons Why we such secret summer find, Forgetting calendars and seasons. Alas! red rose, thy petals wilt; Our loving hands tend thee in vain; Our thoughtless touch seems like a guilt; Ah! could we make thee live again. Yet joy, wild rose! Be glad, south wind! Immortal wind! immortal rose! Ye shall live on, in two hearts shrined, With secrets which no words disclose. ABSENCE. THE shortest absence brings to every thought LAST WORDS. DEAR hearts, whose love has been so sweet to know, Am lingering while I haste, and in this rain Those are the words that I shall joy to hear. |