(Accursed was that anger, it was fierce, That wrath, for it was cruel); or of strife And jealousy and cowardice, with lies Mocking a father’s misery; deeds of blood, Pollutions, sicknesses, and sudden deaths. These many things against me many times, The ploughers have ploughed deep upon my back, And made deep furrows; blessed be His name Who hath delivered Jacob out of all, And left within his spirit hope of good. Come near to me, my sons: your father goes, The hour of his departure draweth nigh. Ah me! this eager rivalry of life, This cruel conflict for pre-eminence, This keen supplanting of the dearest kin, Quick seizure and fast unrelaxing hold Of vantage-place; the stony hard resolve, The chase, the competition, and the craft Which seems to be the poison of our life, And yet is the condition of our life! To have done things on which the eye with shame Looks back, the closed hand clutching still the prize!— Alas! what of all these things shall I say? Take me away unto Thy sleep, O God! I thank Thee it is over, yet I think It was a work appointed me of Thee. How is it? I have striven all my days To do my duty to my house and hearth, And to the purpose of my father’s race, Yet is my heart therewith not satisfied. _JACOB’S WIVES._ These are the words of Jacob’s wives, the words Which Leah spake and Rachel to his ears, When, in the shade at eventide, he sat By the tent door, a palm-tree overhead, A spring beside him, and the sheep around. And Rachel spake and said, The nightfall comes— Night, which all day I wait for, and for thee. And Leah also spake, The day is done; My lord with toil is weary and would rest. And Rachel said, Come, O my Jacob, come; And we will think we sit beside the well, As in that day, the long long years agone, When first I met thee with my father’s flock. And Leah said, Come, Israel, unto me; And thou shalt reap an harvest of fair sons, E’en as before I bare thee goodly babes; For when was Leah fruitless to my lord? And Rachel said, Ah come! as then thou cam’st, Come once again to set thy seal of love; As then, down bending, when the sheep had drunk, Then settedst it, my shepherd—O sweet seal!— Upon the unwitting, half-foretasting lips, Which, shy and trembling, thirsted yet for thine As cattle thirsted never for the spring. And Leah answered, Are not these their names— As Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah—four? Like four young saplings by the water’s brim, Where straining rivers through the great plain wind— Four saplings soon to rise to goodly trees— Four trees whose growth shall cast an huger shade Than ever yet on river-side was seen.