Sleep, mother, sleep! in slumber blest, It joys my heart to see thee rest. Unfelt in sleep thy load of sorrow; Breathe free and thoughtless of to-morrow; And long, and light, thy slumbers last, In happy dreams forget the past. Sleep, mother, sleep! thy slumber’s blest; It joys my heart to see thee rest. Many’s the night she wak’d for me, To nurse my helpless infancy: While cradled on her patient arm, She hush’d me with a mother’s charm. Sleep, mother, sleep! thy slumber’s blest; It joys my heart to see thee rest. And be it mine to soothe thy age, With tender care thy grief assuage, This hope is left to poorest poor, And richest child can do no more. Sleep, mother, sleep! thy slumber’s blest; It joys my heart to see thee rest. _While MABEL is singing the second stanza, OWEN and ANDREW HOPE enter. Mr. HOPE stops short, and listens: he makes a sign to OWEN to stand still, and not to interrupt MABEL--while OWEN approaches her on tiptoe._ _Mr. H._ (_aside_) She taks my fancy back to dear Scotland, to my ain hame, and my ain mither, and my ain Kate. _Owen._ So Mabel! I thought you never sung for strangers? [_MABEL turns and sees Mr. HOPE--She rises and curtsies._ _Mr. H._ (_advancing softly_) I fear to disturb the mother, whose slumbers are so blest, and I’d fain hear that lullaby again. If the voice stop, the mother may miss it, and wake. _Mabel._ (_looking into the room in which her mother sleeps, then closing the door gently_) No, sir,--she’ll not miss my voice now, I thank you--she is quite sound asleep. _Owen._ This is Mr. Andrew Hope, Mabel--you might remember one of his name, a Serjeant Hope. _Mabel._ Ah! I mind--he that was sick with us, some time back. _Mr. H._ Ay, my brother that’s dead, and that your gude mither was so tender of, when sick, charged me to thank you all, and so from my soul I do. _Mabel._ ‘Twas little my poor mother could do, nor any of us for him, even then, though we could do more then than we could now, and I’m glad he chanced to be with us in our better days. _Mr. H._ And I’m sorry you ever fell upon worse days, for you deserve the best; and will have such again, I trust. All I can say is this--that gif your brother here gangs with me, he shall find a brother’s care through life fra’ me. _Owen._ I wouldn’t doubt you; and that you know, Mabel, would be a great point, to have a friend secure in the regiment, if I thought of going. _Mabel._ _If!_--Oh! what are you thinking of, Owen? What is it you’re talking of going? (_Turning towards the door of her mother’s room suddenly._) Take care, but she’d wake and hear you, and she’d never sleep easy again. _Owen._ And do you think so? _Mabel._ Do I think so? Am not I sure of it? and you too, Owen, if you’d take time to think and feel.