“He told me of his English home; I knew it well before: Mine eyes had seen its trees, or ere my shadow crossed the door; The very sun-dial on the green, I knew its face again; And the small summer parlour with its jasmine-wreathed pane. “And thou! all thou hadst been to him, he told me; bade me seek Thy face, and to thy broken heart dear words of comfort speak: Oh, mother of the blessed dead, weep not; sweet thoughts of thee, Like ministering angels at the last, the joyous soul set free! “Oh, mother of the dead, weep not as if that far-off grave Possessed thy spirit’s best beloved--‘thy beautiful, thy brave;’ The gifted, living soul lies not beneath that Eastern sod, All thou hast cherished liveth still, and calleth thee to God!” A FOREST SCENE IN THE DAYS OF WICKLIFFE. A little child she read a book Beside an open door; And, as she read page after page, She wonder’d more and more. Her little finger carefully Went pointing out the place;-- Her golden locks hung drooping down, And shadow’d half her face. The open book lay on her knee, Her eyes on it were bent; And as she read page after page, The colour came and went. She sate upon a mossy stone An open door beside; And round, for miles on every hand, Stretch’d out a forest wide. The summer sun shone on the trees, The deer lay in the shade; And overhead the singing birds Their pleasant clamour made. There was no garden round the house. And it was low and small,-- The forest sward grew to the door; The lichens on the wall. There was no garden round about, Yet flowers were growing free, The cowslip and the daffodil, Upon the forest-lea. The butterfly went flitting by, The bees were in the flowers; But the little child sate steadfastly, As she had sate for hours. “Why sit you here, my little maid?” An aged pilgrim spake; The little child look’d upward from her book, Like one but just awake. Back fell her locks of golden hair, And solemn was her look, And thus she answer’d, witlessly, “Oh, sir, I read this book!” “And what is there within that book To win a child like thee?-- Up! join thy mates, the merry birds, And frolic with the bee!” “Nay, sir, I cannot leave this book, I love it more than play;-- I’ve read all legends, but this one Ne’er saw I till this day. “And there is something in this book That makes all care be gone,-- And yet I weep, I know not why, As I go reading on!” “Who art thou, child, that thou shouldst read A book with mickle heed?-- Books are for clerks--the King himself Hath much ado to read!” “My father is a forrester-- A bowman keen and good; He keeps the deer within their bound, And worketh in the wood.