Now the weariest of all mothers,
The saddest two-years bride,

She scowls in the face of her husband,
And spurns her child aside.

"Rake out the red coals, goodman, For there the child shall lie,

Till the black witch comes to fetch her,
And both up chimney fly.

"It's never my own little daughter,
It's never my own," she said;
The witches have stolen my Anna,
And left me an imp instead.

"O, fair and sweet was my baby,
Blue eyes, and ringlets of gold;
But this is ugly and wrinkled,

Cross, and cunning, and old.

"I hate the touch of her fingers,
I hate the feel of her skin;
It's not the milk from my bosom,

But my blood, that she sucks in.

"My face grows sharp with the torment; Look! my arms are skin and bone!Rake open the red coals, goodman,

And the witch shall have her own.

"The paths to trouble are many, And never but one sure way Leads out to the light beyond it : My poor wife, let us pray." Then he said to the great All-Father, "Thy daughter is weak and blind; Let her sight come back, and clothe her Once more in her right mind. "Lead her out of this evil shadow,

Out of these fancies wild;

Let the holy love of the mother,

Turn again to her child.

"Make her lips like the lips of Mary,

Kissing her blessed Son;

Let her hands, like the hands of Jesus, Rest on her little one.

"Comfort the soul of thy handmaid,

Open her prison door,

And thine shall be all the glory
And praise forevermore."
Then into the face of its mother,

The baby looked up and smiled;
And the cloud of her soul was lifted,
And she knew her little child.
A beam of slant west sunshine
Made the wan face almost fair,

H

of late,

How he stops every day as he goes

by the gate,

Asking after my health. 'Tis a good

hearted lad,

lie,

Reuben Esmond comes too-I cannot tell why.

For I am a tedious and stupid old man,

656

I've told it to Reuben-well, ten times or

more

I, sitting just here, little Jo in the door, (Jo is poor Mary's child, she that came home to die,

God knew it was best, I couldn't see why.)

And Reuben and Josie, they sit very still, When I tell how I fought over Hazelton Hill; But the child turns away if I chance to look round,

And stares at the apple-blooms strewn on the ground.

Then she says I must move when the sun-
light is
gone,

She isn't afraid to be left there alone;
And Reuben springs up so cheerful and spry,
To help me in-doors-I do wonder why.

He don't go away-he isn't afraid

Of the dew on the grass or the deep-falling shade.

It must be very tedious for Josie to stay,
But she says she don't mind 't is the girl's

Never asks me if Josie is living or dead.
He don't seem to like her, I thought he did

once,

But perhaps the old soldier is only a dunce. He won't speak to Reuben when passing him by,

Nor stop at his call-I do wonder why.

Here's Reuben to-day. He looks round my

chair

In the doorway for Jo. The child isn't there, And the lad looks abashed. "I calledCaptain Brown,"

And here he stops short, looking awkwardly down,

"To ask you for Josie." The lad lifts his head, While his cheek, like a girl's, flushed all over red.

"I will love her and guard her until I shall die,

And she loves me, she says, I cannot tell why."

I have surely forgotten how Time never

stays,

How the wave of the year gulfs the drops of the days.

Little Jo seventeen! Ah, yes, I remember, Just seventeen years the eighteenth of No

vember.

Little Josie a bride. "Take her, Reuben, and be

Very tender and patient." More clearly I

see

Why Reuben should call every day going by, To ask for my welfare. Grandfather knows why.