"How thrills once more the lengthening chain Of memory, at the thought of thee! Old hopes which long in dust have lain, Old dreams, come thronging back again, And boyhood lives again in me; I feel its glow upon my cheek, Its fulness of the heart is mine, As when I leaned to hear thee speak, Or raised my doubtful eye to thine. I hear again thy low replies, I feel thy hand within my own, And timidly again uprise The fringèd lids of hazel eyes, With soft brown tresses overblown. Ah! memories of sweet summer eves, Of moonlit wave and willowy way, Of stars and flowers and dewy leaves, And smiles and tones more dear than they." It is very tender, very beautiful and touching, and, doubtless, it left on him "an impress Time has worn not out." And we doubt if even yet, when the shadows of age are gathering very deeply around the gentle poet, that memory has faded. "Not yet has Time's dull footstep worn To common dust that path of flowers." We cannot but wonder who the favored "Playmate" of the poet was, and we sympathize with him when he asks,-- "I wonder if she thinks of them, And how the old time seems,-- If ever the pines of Ramoth wood Are sounding in her dreams. "I see her face, I hear her voice: Does she remember mine? And what to her is now the boy Who fed her father's kine?" And we feel an intense interest in knowing whether or not she cares, when he tells her,-- "The winds so sweet with birch and fern, A sweeter memory blow; And there in spring the veeries sing The song of long ago. "And still the pines of Ramoth wood Are moaning like the sea,-- The moaning of the sea of change Between myself and thee!" Mr. Whittier has never married, and his favorite sister long presided over his home in Amesbury, where his mother and the dear aunt also came after the father's death. It was the bitterest loss of his life when this beautiful sister died, and he has written nothing more touching than his tribute to her in "Snowbound":-- "With me one little year ago, The chill weight of the winter snow For months upon her grave has lain; And now, when summer south winds blow And brier and harebell bloom again, I tread the pleasant paths we trod, I see the violet-sprinkled sod Whereon she leaned, too frail and weak The hillside flowers she loved to seek, Yet following me where'er she went With dark eyes full of love's content. The birds are glad; the brier-rose fills The air with sweetness; all the hills Stretch green to June's unclouded sky; But still I wait with ear and eye For something gone which should be nigh, A loss in all familiar things, In flower that blooms, and bird that sings. * * * * *