MARGARET.

O sweet pale Margaret,
O rare pale Margaret,

What lit your eyes with tearful
power,
Like moonlight on a falling shower?
Who lent you, love, your mortal dower

Of pensive thought and aspect pale,
Your melancholy sweet and frail
As perfume of the cuckoo-flower?
From the westward winding flood,
From the evening-lighted wood,

From all things outward you have won

A tearful grace, as though you stood

Between the rainbow and the sun.
The very smile before you speak,
That dimples your transparent cheek,
Encircles all the heart, and feedeth

The senses with a still delight

Of dainty sorrow without sound,
Like the tender amber round,
Which the moon around her spreadeth,
Moving through a fleecy night.

You love, remaining peaceful,

To hear the murmur of the strife
But enter not the toil of life.

Your spirit is the calméd sea,

Laid by the tumult of the fight.

You are the evening star, alway

Remaining betwixt dark and bright:

Lull'd echoes of laborious day

Come to you, gleams of mellow light
Float by you on the verge of night.

What can it matter, Margaret,

What songs below the waning stars,

The lion-heart, Plantagenet,

Sang, looking through his prison bars?
Exquisite Margaret, who can tell

The last wild thought of Chatelet,
Just ere the falling axe did part
The burning brain from the true heart,
Even in her sight he loved so well?

A fairy shield your Genius made,

And gave you on your natal day.
Your sorrow, only sorrow's shade,
Keeps real sorrow far away.
You move not in such solitudes,
You are not less divine,

But more human in your moods,

Than your twin-sister, Adeline,
Your hair is darker, and your eyes

Touched with a somewhat darker hue,
And less aërially blue,

But ever trembling through the dew
Of dainty-woful sympathies.

O sweet pale Margaret,

O rare pale Margaret,

Come down, come down, and hear me speak:
Tie up the ringlets on your cheek:
The sun is just about to set,
The arching lines are tall and shady,
And faint, rainy lights are seen,
Moving in the heavy beech.
Rise from the feast of sorrow, lady,
Where all day long you sit between
Joy and woe, and whisper each.

Or only look across the lawn,

Look out below your bower eaves,

Look down, and let your blue eyes dawn

Upon me through the jasmine leaves.

MY HUSBAND.

A surging crowd, a woman's piteous cry,
A mocking laugh and lightly uttered jest,
Are all that reach me as they hurry by.

But the full meaning I have rightly guessedAnother tenant for the prison cell,

A woman, too! the pity of it all!

What has she done? Alas! I cannot tell;
They'll tell me later when I chance to call.

*

I find the woman sitting in her cell,

Wringing her hands, and shedding bitter tears, Her thin, pale cheeks their tale of sorrow tell;

Her bony form, too, bent, but not with years. . Her eyes meet mine, but ere my tongue can speak She falls upon her knees upon the floor, Crying, "Oh! God forgive me, I was weak But he will die, and I could beg no more.

;

"Why have you torn me from him? Let me go!
You will not leave him there to die alone,
While I, his lawful wife, am here? Oh! no:
Let me go to him, if you are not stone.
I tell you he is dying, sir, for bread—

A big strong man, sir, murdered in his prime! I could not beg the food; I stole instead;

Stole, sir, to save his life! Was that a crime?

"For fifteen years we've labored side by side;
For fifteen years his faithful wife I've been ;
And many a time, sir, we've been sorely tried,
For many a bitter trouble we have seen.
Our children died of hunger, one by one;

We could not feed them as they should be fed. They died! We tried to say, 'Thy will be done,' But 'tisn't easy when your hopes are dead.

"And many a time we said we'd have no more,

But when we saw some neighbor's baby-boy,

And watched his childish gambols round our door, And marked the mother's pride, the father's joyWhy, we were human, sir, and thought, alas!

That Heaven perchance might let the next one stay But one by one they withered like the grass, And one by one they died and passed away.

"And all the years we've struggled, he and I,
To keep our sorrows hid from mortal eyes.
'Cheer up, dear, things will brighten by and by ;
The world is hard but God is good and wise.'
That's what he always said when things went wrong,
When work was scarce, and food was hard to get-
'Cheer up, dear, he would say; 'it won't be long;
Let's trust in God, He's never failed us yet!'

"And we have waited-sometimes waited long-
And we have prayed for help, and help has come.
But every winter something has gone wrong,
And every year we've been without a home.
The little treasures we would fain have kept-
The playthings of our dear ones dead and gone—
Were sold for food! How bitterly we wept,

They only guess who such a grief have known.

"And then this illness came and struck him down,
And he grew weak and weaker every day;
While I have done odd jobs about the town

To earn him food, and help and pay the way.
But he grew worse! And then the doctor came,
And ordered med'cine, nourishment, and wine.
Oh! he meant well, sir; he was not to blame;
He did his duty—and then I did mine!

"For two days I had neither bite nor sup.

Oh how I suffered; but he never knew. And every hour more bitter grew my cup,

For every hour still worse and worse he grew. Then work ran short. I begged, and begged in vain. 'Cheer up my lass,' he said, 'the times will mend!

We've trusted God before; let's trust again;

We need not fear while we have such a friend!'

"But every day the fiercer grew our need, And hunger gnawed us like a savage beast.

My frenzied brain conceived the desperate deed [least. Of theft! Was't crime? "Twould save his life at God knows that I could see no other way.

Had I not begged and prayed-and both in vain? I did not think of what the world might sayIf that would save him, I could bear the stain!

"I stood outside a fashionable shop,

And watched the tide of wealth go rolling in;
And as I gazed, I saw a carriage stop-

My soul burned with the fever of my sin!
A lady stepped out, clad in silks so grand,
And holding in her dainty clasp a purse;
I darted forward, snatched it from her hand
And fled, like one who flees before a curse.

"But I was weak and faint, and swifter feet

Than mine were following, and soon ran me down. Policemen came and dragged me through the street; And I am now the by-word of the town.

And he is dying there, while I am here,

And cannot soothe or raise his fevered head.

For God's sake, take me to him!

Never fear,

I'll come back here again-when he is dead!

"Do with me what you will when he is gone;
I care not then what punishment you give.
But do not let him perish there alone;

Do with me what you will, but let him live!
Oh! save his life, sir, and I'll be your slave,
And God will send His blessings on your head.
Don't let them put him in a pauper's grave,
And treat him like dog when he is dead!