MMWWWftftiWtKMaiMWiJiJSi . 
 
 WHITTIER'S 
 
 SNOW-BOU 
 
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 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 WHITTIEE'S 
 
 SNOW-BOUND, AMONG THE HILLS, 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS. 
 
 WITH BIOGRAPHY AND NOTES 
 
 BY 
 
 MARGAKET HILL McCARTEE, 
 
 Former Teacher of English and American Litera- 
 ture, Topeka High School. 
 
 CRANE & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS 
 
 TOPEKA, KANSAS 
 
 1904 
 
75 
 
 'A/ 
 
 LIBRARY cf CONGRESS 
 Two Copies fieceiveu 
 
 DEC 10 IS04 
 
 f, Copyrtgnt Entry , 
 
 CUSS-^ XXc. NOJ 
 COHY y 
 
 Copyright 1904, 
 
 By Crane & Company, 
 
 Topeka, Kansas. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAOB. 
 
 Introduction 5 
 
 Sketch of John Greenleaf Whittier 7 
 
 Snow-Bound 15 
 
 Among the Hills 44 
 
 The Prayer of Agassiz 63 
 
 How the Robin Came 67 
 
 Telling the Bees 70 
 
 Songs of Labor 73 
 
INTEODTJCTION TO SNOW-BOUND. 
 
 This poem has been classed by Stedman with The 
 Cotter s Saturday Night and The Deserted Village. It 
 is considered the best description of a l^orthern winter 
 and a "New England country home yet put into literature. 
 In it the writer, looking back upon a household of whom 
 only two survived, called up the tender memories and 
 home-sweet pictures of his boyhood. It is this touch of 
 love, of blood-kin s;)Tnpathy, that makes the poem appeal 
 to all home-loving hearts, and keeps it a classic. The 
 main characteristic of its style is simplicity, but the poem 
 abounds in touches of beauty. In lines 179-211, with 
 the sadness of a lonely heart for whom no hearth-fire 
 brightens, no near ties of kin remain except the bond of 
 brotherhood for one brother alone, there is mingled with 
 the sadness the hope of a trustful spirit: 
 
 " Love will dream and Faith will trust, 
 (Since He who knows our need is just), 
 That eomehow, somewhere, meet we must." 
 
 And again in lines 425-427 : 
 
 "What chance can reach the wealth I hold? 
 What chance can mar the pearl and gold 
 Thy love hath left in trust with me? " - 
 
 Perhaps the most beautiful passage in the poem is the 
 broad sympathy expressed, beginning with line 561: 
 
 " Where *er her troubled path may be, 
 The Lord*g swept pity with her go\ " 
 (5) 
 
6 THE CRAIsE CLASSICS 
 
 In form the composition is simple also. An introduc- 
 tory picture, a clear view of what being snow-hound meant 
 to the isolated household, a photographic portraiture of the 
 household, the breaking of the icy bounds, and the bitter- 
 sweet reflection, out of which the bitterness soon vanishes, 
 and only tenderness remains. These are the '' parts of 
 the whole," and the reader at the close feels also 
 
 " The grateful sense 
 Of sweetness near, he knows not \Al)eiice. 
 And, pausing, takes with forehead be re 
 Tha benediction of the air." 
 
SKETCH OF JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIEE. 
 
 1807-1892. 
 
 T. 
 
 " He worshipped as his fathers did, 
 And kept the faith of childish days, 
 
 And, howsoe'er he strayed or slid, 
 He loved the good old ways." 
 
 Fourscore and five years of the nineteenth century are 
 represented in the life of John Greenleaf Whittier. The 
 nation was but little more than thirty years old when he 
 was born. When he came to the end of his earthly way 
 it was more than a hundred years old. In its first cen- 
 tury of existence he played his part. Doubtless few people 
 comprehended, in the days of his quiet, uneventful life, 
 how much his mind was doing in the shaping of history. 
 But in the perspective he looms up great and strong — a 
 force to be reckoned with in the development of events. 
 
 iSTew England is not the only locality of the United 
 States that is rich in historic treasure, nor can it now claim 
 itself to be the center of literary life. For history and 
 literature, with ^' the star of empire,'^ have taken their 
 way lueshvard. This fact, however, rohs ]N'ew Englaild 
 of none of its glory, and historic old Massachusetts can 
 claim no more worthy child than the little Quaker boy 
 whose life began in the plain farm-house near Haverhill, 
 on December 17, 1807. 
 
 His parents were Friends, and in this faith they reared 
 their children. Little need be said of them, except that 
 like their children they lived simply and sincerely, in com- 
 
 (7) 
 
8 ' THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 fort that came to be modest luxiirv. There were four 
 children: John and Matthew, and Mary and Elizabeth. 
 The poet long outlived his parents and sisters ; his brother's 
 death occurred some nine years before his own. 
 
 In " Snow-Bound " the portrayal of the family life is 
 touchingly well drawn. Of education Whittier had little. 
 Above the common school which in the second and third 
 decades of the century could not have offered many ad- 
 vantages, he had two years of academic training in the 
 Haverhill institution. College life, and all that it stands 
 for in mental discipline and good-fellowship and oppor- 
 tunity, were never vouchsafed to him. 
 
 The first writer to inspire Whittier to poetic writing was 
 Burns. In the plain surroundings of his home, with the 
 monotonous routine of farm life, and the discouragement 
 given to literary effort by the early members of the Quaker 
 Church, the young man had little outlet for the spirit of 
 poetry striving within him. His first efforts were sent 
 to the weekly newspapers. It was not until 1831 that he 
 brought out a modest little volume of poems. 
 
 By the death of his father, in 1830, Wliittier was called 
 to care for the support of his mother and sisters. Not be- 
 ing strong enough to follow the life of a farmer, he de- 
 voted himself to editorial and literary production. Among 
 his earliest friends in this work were William Lloyd Gar- 
 rison and George D. Prentice. 
 
 Whittier was called to the State Legislature of Massa- 
 chusetts for the term of 1835-1836, and his promise for 
 public service in office was most fair, had not the trend 
 of events turned him to an unpopular line of thought. He 
 early became an intense partisan on the question of slavery. 
 
SKETCH OF JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER \f 
 
 To be of anti-slavery opinion meant for him the renuncia- 
 tion of a possible seat in Congress, with the honor and 
 usefulness thereunto pertaining; and it meant also the 
 loss of local popularity. It meant the jeer of the mob 
 instead of the plaudits of the crowd. x\nd the poet-poli- 
 tician deliberately gave up the honor, the opportunity, and 
 the pleasure, and took for his portion the ridicule, the 
 narrow sphere, the quiet life. But the power he re- 
 linquished gave place in time to an unconquerable force. 
 The unpopular opinion, it became an honor to hold, and 
 the cro^vn of ignoininy a wreath of unfading laurels round 
 his brow. 
 
 ^ In the fight that made public opinion against slavery, 
 the poet was a leader. His service as secretary of the 
 American Anti-Slavery Society, of Philadelpha, and his 
 editorials for newspapers of the same persuasion, were his 
 last public work. 
 
 In 1840 he retired to private life on account of frail 
 health. But for fifty-two years longer he lived to put 
 forth his best literary efforts, and to become the household 
 idol of American homes. 
 
 He was never married. Why, it is not recorded. In 
 his writings he gives here and there glimpses of a romance 
 that must remain untold. It may be he refers to him- 
 self when he says in the poem, In School Days: 
 
 " Still memory to a gray-haired man 
 
 That sweet child face is showing. 
 Dear girl! the grasses on her grave 
 
 Have forty years been growing." 
 
10 THE CKANE CLASSICS. 
 
 But his poem, Memories^ turns us to the living: 
 
 " Years have passed on, and left their trace 
 
 Of graver care and deeper thought; 
 And unto me the calm, cold face 
 Of manhood, and to thee the grace 
 
 Of woman's pensive beauty brought. 
 ]More wide, perchance, for blame than praise, 
 
 The school-boy's humble name has blown; 
 Thine in the green and quiet ways 
 
 Of unobtrusive goodness known." 
 
 For half a century and a little more Whittier lived in 
 retirement, sometimes at Amesbury, sometimes at Dan- 
 vers. With the coming of old age the sweetness of a 
 Christian spirit ripened in him: 
 
 "And that which should accompany old age, 
 As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends," 
 
 all were his. And when at last his tale of years was told, 
 Avhen he had outlived all ties of blood-relationship, wdth 
 no wife nor child to mourn for him, he passed away, the 
 American people whose he w^as, gave saintly burial to him. 
 His memory is enshrined in the loving hearts of thousands 
 who never saw him. He lives as all such live who love 
 their fellow-men, and who lift up strong and fearless 
 hands in their behalf. 
 
 II. 
 
 *' Freedom ! if to me belong 
 Nor mighty Milton's gift divine, 
 
 Nor Marvell's wit and graceful song, 
 
 Still with a love as deep and strong 
 As theirs, I lay, like them, my best gifts on tliy shrine." 
 
 AVhittier is essentially the household poet. He was not 
 the polished linguist Longfellow could claim himself to 
 
SKETCH OF JOH:^^ GREENLEAF WllITTIER 11 
 
 be. He had not the reach and vigor of Lowell. He was 
 cast in a mold altogether unlike Holmes. He was not in 
 the truest sense scientific, nor diplomatic, nor scholarly.' 
 But beauty and sympathy and truth were attributes he 
 sought to glorify. And inasmuch as these appeal to the 
 common mind and heart and enter into and make up the 
 strength and hope of the common life, it is Whittier who 
 has crept into the unfilled niche in the common home. 
 
 His style is simplicity itself. He never attempts 
 flights from which he must drop unceremoniously. A 
 rippling, even-tenored song is his. 
 
 And yet when he assailed a wrong, something of the old 
 Hebrew fire blazed forth in him, — a righteous wrath 
 that would be stayed only by righting evil. His table of 
 contents runs after the fashion of the events that most im- 
 pressed his life. It opens with the age of legend. Fol- 
 lowing this is the colonial period. Mary Garvin, Abraham 
 Davenport, Shipper Ireson's Ride,, and The Prophecy of 
 Samuel S email, tell of E'ew England before the Kevolu- 
 tionary days. 
 
 In his early life the poet had access to few books. These 
 he read and re-read till they became his own mental pos- 
 session. Among them was the Bible. And all through 
 his writings there appears the fine old Scripture phrase that 
 beautifies and strengthens them and makes them appeal 
 so powerfully to the people of a Christian civilization, 
 whether they worship 
 
 "At Jerusalem's court or on Gerezim's Hill." 
 
 Whittier's love of freedom is shown in his poems on 
 Quaker persecution as well as on slavery. Among these 
 
12 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 Cassandra Soutluvick stands out prominentlv. One may 
 not read his Massachusetts to Virginia without feeling- 
 even at this far-distant date some thrill of the challenge it 
 holds. 
 
 "The voice of Massachusetts! Of her free sons and daughters, — 
 Deep calling unto deep aloud, — the sound of many waters! 
 Against the burden of that voice what tyrant power shall stand? 
 IS^o fetters in the Bay State! No slave upon her land." 
 
 Always The Burial of Barber and Le Marais du Cygne 
 will appeal to the children of Kansas, whose early history 
 they commemorate. 
 
 xifter the war, when measures of battle had given way 
 to the songs of peace, Whittier wrote some of his best 
 verses. Among them are the longer poems of Snow- 
 Bound and Among the Hills. The shorter productions 
 touched the whole range of the writer's experience — the 
 song of hope, the hymn of praise, the pastoral scene, the 
 legend, the voice of labor, and Miscellany, not easily re- 
 corded. 
 
 But through them all, the sweetness of spirit, the ve- 
 hemence of the power of good over evil, and the tender 
 sympathy for the erring, are the distinguishing marks. It 
 is on these that Whittier's claim to permanence rests. His 
 pen was a power to be feared as the sword of a general. 
 So he helped to shape the whole story of the Civil War. 
 
 Year by year the ballad and lyric rhyme and song in- 
 spire to just and noble living, respect for honest labor, and 
 trust in the eternal goodness that rules the world. 
 
 " The words he spake, the thoughts he penned, 
 
 Are mortal as his hand and brain. 
 But if he served his Master's end. 
 
 He has not lived in vain." 
 
SKETCH OF JOHN GBEENLEAF WHITTIER 13 
 
 III. 
 
 Whittier has been called 
 
 The Quaker Poet, 
 
 The iSTational Poet of America, 
 
 The Wood-thrush of Amesburj, 
 
 The Hebrew Poet of The Il^ineteenth Century. 
 For Biographical Writings, see — 
 
 Fable for Critics — J. R. Lowell. 
 
 Poets' Homes — P. H. Stoddard. 
 
 Biography — W. S. Kennedy, F. H. Underwood. 
 For Works of Reference, see — 
 
 American Literature — E. P. Whipple. 
 
 Poets of America — E. C. Stedman. 
 
 Whittier — R. H. Stoddard, Scribner's Monthly, 
 August, 1879. 
 
 Whittier — J. S. Thayer, l^orth American Review, 
 July, 1854. 
 
 Chats About Books and Novelists — M. W. Hazel- 
 tine. 
 Anti-Slavery Men and Women : 
 
 Wendell Phillips, Lucy Stone, Chas. B. Storrs, Fred 
 
 Douglass, Charles Sumner, Lydia Maria Child, the 
 
 Beechers, W. L. Garrison. 
 Poems on Whittier: 
 
 Whittier's Birthday (seventieth and eightieth), O. 
 W. Holmes. 
 
 The Three Silences of Molinas — H. W. Longfellow. 
 
 Ad Vigilen — E. C. Stedman. 
 
 Whittier — A Sonnet — Paul Hamilton Hayne. 
 
SNOW-BOUND. 
 
 A WINTER IDYL. 
 
 The sun that brief December day 
 
 Rose cheerless over hills of gray, 
 
 And, darkly circled, gave at noon 
 
 A sadder light than v^aning moon. 
 
 Slow tracing down the thickening sky 
 
 Its mute and ominous prophecy, 
 
 A portent seeming less than threat, 
 
 It sank from sight before it set. 
 
 A chill no coat, however stout. 
 
 Of homespun stuff could quite shut out, 
 
 A hard, dull bitterness of cold, 
 
 That checked, mid-vein, the circling race 
 
 Of life-blood in the sharpened face. 
 
 The coming of the snow-storm told. 
 
 The wind blew east; we heard the roar 
 
 Of Ocean on his wintry shore. 
 
 And felt the strong pulse throbbing there 
 
 Beat with low rhythm our inland air. 
 
 Meanwhile we did our nightly chores, — 
 Brought in the wood from out of doors. 
 Littered the stalls, and from the mows 
 Raked down the herd's-grass for the cows : 
 Heard the horse whinnying for his corn; 
 And, sharply clashing horn on horn. 
 Impatient down the stanchion rows 
 
 (16) 
 
 10 
 
 20 
 
 25 
 
16 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 The cattle shake their walnut bows ; 
 
 While, peering from his early perch 
 
 Upon the scaffold's pole of birch, 
 
 The cock his crested helmet bent 
 
 And do^Ti his querulous challenge sent. ^^ 
 
 Unwarmed by any sunset light 
 , The gray day darkened into night, 
 
 A night made hoary with the swarm 
 
 And whirl-dance of the blinding storm, 
 
 As zigzag wavering to and fro ^^ 
 
 Crossed and recrossed the winged snow : 
 
 And ere the early bedtime came 
 
 The white drift piled the window-frame, 
 
 And through the glass the clothes-line posts 
 <^ Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts. '^^ 
 
 So all night long the storm roared on : 
 
 The morning broke without a sun ; 
 
 In tiny spherule traced with lines 
 
 Of UTature's geometric signs. 
 
 In starry flake and pellicle *^ 
 
 All day the hoary meteor fell; 
 
 And, when the second morning shone. 
 
 We looked upon a world unknown, 
 
 On nothing we could call our own. 
 
 Around the glistening wonder bent '^^ 
 
 The blue walls of the firmament, 
 
 ]^o cloud above, no earth below, — 
 
 A universe of sky and snow ! 
 
 The old familiar sights of ours 
 
 Took marvelous shapes ; strange domes and towers ^^ 
 
, SNOW-BOUND 17 
 
 Rose up where sty or corn-crib stood, 
 
 Or garden-wall or belt of wood ; 
 
 A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed, 
 
 A fenceless drift what once was road; 
 
 The bridle-post an old man sat ^^ 
 
 With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat ; 
 
 The w^ell-curb had a Chinese roof; 
 
 And even the -long sweep, high aloof, 
 
 In its slant splendor, seemed to tell 
 
 Of Pisa's leaning miracle. ^^ 
 
 A prompt, decisive man, no breath 
 Our father wasted : ^' Boys, a path ! " 
 Well pleased, (for when did farmer boy 
 Count such a summons less than joy?) 
 Our buskins on our feet we drew ; ^^ 
 
 With mittened hands, and caps drawn low, 
 To guard our necks and ears from snow, 
 We cut the solid whiteness through ; 
 And, where the drift was deepest, made 
 A tunnel walled and overlaid '^^ 
 
 With dazzling crystal : we had read 
 Of rare Aladdin's Avondrous cave. 
 And to our own his name we gave. 
 With many a wish the luck were ours 
 To test his lamp's supernal powers. ^^ 
 
 We reached the barn with merry din. 
 And roused the prisoned brutes within. 
 The old horse thrust his long head out. 
 And grave with wonder gazed about ; 
 The cock his lusty greeting said, ^^ 
 
 2— 
 
18 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 And forth his speckled harem led; 
 
 The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked, 
 
 And mild reproach of hunger looked; 
 
 The horned patriarch of the sheep, 
 
 Like Egypt's Amun roused from sleep, ^ 
 
 Shook his sage head with gesture mute, 
 
 And emphasized with stamp of foot. 
 
 All day the gusty north-wind bore 
 
 The loosening drift its breath before; 
 
 Low circling round its southern zone, ^' 
 
 The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone. 
 
 'No church-bell lent its Christian tone 
 
 To the savage air, no social smoke 
 
 Curled over woods of snow-hung oak. 
 
 A solitude made more intense ^^^ 
 
 By dreary-voiced elements, 
 
 The shrieking of the mindless wind, 
 
 The moaning tree-boughs swaying blind. 
 
 And on the glass the unmeaning beat 
 
 Of ghostly finger-tips of sleet. ^^^ 
 
 Beyond the circle of our hearth 
 
 No welcome sound of toil or mirth 
 
 Unbound the spell, and testified 
 
 Of human life and thought outside. 
 
 We minded that the sharpest ear ^^^ 
 
 The buried brooklet could not hear. 
 
 The music of whose liquid lip 
 
 Had been to us companionship. 
 
 And, in our lonely life, had grown 
 
 To have an almost human tone. no 
 
SNOW-BOUND 
 
 19 
 
 As night drew on, and, from the crest 
 Of wooded knolls that ridged the west, 
 The sun, a snow-blown traveller, sank 
 From sight beneath the smothering bank, 
 We piled with care our nightly stack 
 Of wood against the chimney-back, — 
 The oaken log, green, huge, and thick, 
 And on its top the stout back-stick ; 
 The knotty forestick laid apart, 
 And filled between with curious art 
 The ragged brush ; then, hovering near, 
 We watched the first red blaze appear, 
 Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam 
 On whitewashed wall and sagging beam, 
 Until the old, rude-furnished room 
 Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom ; 
 AVhile radiant with a mimic flame 
 Outside the sparkling drift became. 
 And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree 
 Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free. 
 The crane and pendent trammels showed, 
 The Turk's heads on the andirons glowed ; 
 While childish fancy, prompt to tell 
 The meaning of the miracle, 
 Whispered the old rhyme : '' Under the tree, 
 When fire outdoors hums merrily, 
 There the ivitches are making tea." 
 
 The moon above the eastern wood 
 Shone at its full; the hill-range stood 
 Transfigured in the silver flood. 
 
 125 
 
 130 
 
 145 
 
20 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 Its blown snows flashing cold and keen, 
 
 Dead white, save where some sharp ravine 
 
 Took shadow, or the sombre green 
 
 Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black 
 
 Against the whiteness of their back. ^^^ 
 
 For such a world and such a night 
 
 Most fitting that unwarming light, 
 
 Wliicli only seemed where'er it fell 
 
 To make the coldness visible. 
 
 Shut in from all the world without, ^^^ 
 
 We sat the clean-winged hearth about, 
 
 Content to let the north-wind roar 
 
 In baffled rage at pane and door. 
 
 While the red logs before us beat 
 
 The frost-line back with tropic heat; . ^^^ 
 
 And ever, when a louder blast 
 
 Shook beam and rafter as it passed, 
 
 The merrier up its roaring draught 
 
 The great throat of the chimney laughed. 
 
 The house-dog on his paws outspread ^^^ 
 
 Laid to the fire his drowsy head. 
 
 The cat's dark silhouette on the w^all 
 
 A couchant tiger's seemed to fall; 
 
 And, for the winter fireside meet. 
 
 Between the andirons' straddling feet, ^''^ 
 
 The mug of cider simmered slow. 
 
 The apples sputtered in a row. 
 
 And, close at hand, the basket stood 
 
 With nuts from brown October's wood. 
 
S]S^OW- BOUND 21 
 
 AVhat matter how the night behaved ? ^^^ 
 
 What matter how tlie north-wind raved ? 
 
 niow high, blow low, not all its snow 
 
 Conld quench our hearth-iire's ruddy glow. 
 
 O Time and Change! — with hair as gray 
 
 As 'was my sire's that winter day, ^^^ 
 
 JIow strange it seems, with so much gone 
 
 Of life and love, to still live on ! 
 
 Ah, brother ! only I and thou 
 
 .\re left of all that circle now, — 
 
 The dear home faces whereu])on ^^^ 
 
 Tliat fitful firelight paled and shone. 
 
 Henceforward, listen as we will, 
 
 The voices of that hearth are still ; 
 
 Took where we may, tlie wide eartli o'er, 
 
 Those lighted faces smile no more. ^•*'- 
 
 We tread the paths their feet have worn, 
 
 We sit beneath their orchard trees. 
 
 We hear, like them, the hum of bees 
 And rustle of the bladed corn ; 
 We turn the pages that they read, -^''^ 
 
 Their written words w^e linger o'er. 
 But in the sun they cast no shade, 
 'No voice is heard, no sign is made, 
 
 ^0 step is on the conscious floor ! 
 A"et Love will dream and Faith will trust ^***^ 
 
 (Since He wdio knows our need is just) 
 That somehow^, somewhere, meet we must. 
 Alas for him who never sees 
 The stars shine through his cypress-trees ! 
 Who, hopeless, lays his dead away, 
 
 205 
 
22 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 N^or looks to see the breaking day 
 Across the mournful marbles play ! 
 ^Yl\o hath not learned, in hours of faith, 
 
 The truth to flesh and sense unknown, 
 That Life is ever lord of Death, 
 
 And Love can never lose its own ! 
 
 We sped the time with stories old, 
 AVrought puzzles out, and riddles told, 
 Or stammered from our school-book lore 
 " The chief of Gambia's golden shore." 
 How often since, Avhen all the land 
 Was clay in Slavery's shaping hand, 
 As if a far-blown trumpet stirred 
 The languorous, sin-sick air, I heard 
 '^ Does not the voice of reason cry. 
 
 Claim the first right uiliicli Nature gave. 
 From the red scourge of bondage fly, 
 
 Nor deign to live a hardened slaver^ 
 Our father rode again his ride 
 On Memphremagog's wooded side ; 
 Sat down again to moose and samp 
 In trapper's hut and Indian camp ; 
 Lived o'er the old idyllic ease 
 Beneath St. Francois' hemlock trees ; 
 Again for him the moonlight shone ^^^ 
 
 On !N'orman cap and bodiced zone ; 
 Again he heard the violin play 
 A\'hlch led the village dance away, 
 And mingled in its merry whirl 
 The grandam anrl the laughing girl. 235 
 
 220 
 
 225 
 
s:^row- BOUND 
 
 23 
 
 Or, nearer home, our steps he led 
 Where Salisbury's level marshes spread 
 
 Mile-wide as flies the laden bee; ^ 
 Where merry mowers, hale and strong, 
 Swept, scythe on scythe, their swaths along 
 
 The low green prairies of the sea. 
 We shared the fishing off Boar's Head, 
 And round the rocky Isles of Shoals 
 The hake-broil on the driftwood coals ; 
 The chowder on the sand-beach made, 
 Dipped by the hungry, steaming hot, 
 With spoons of clam-shell from the pot. 
 We heard the talcs of witchcraft old. 
 And dream and sign and marvel told 
 To sleepy listeners as they lay 
 Stretched idly on the salted hay. 
 Adrift along the winding shores. 
 
 When favoring breezes deigned to blow 
 The square sail of the gundalow. 
 And idle lay the useless oars. 
 
 Our mother, while she, turned her wheel 
 Or run the new-knit stocking-hccl. 
 Told how the Indian hordes came down 
 At midnight on Cocheco town, 
 And ho^v her own great-uncle bore 
 His cruel scalp-mark to fourscore. 
 Eecalling, in her fitting phrase, 
 So rich and picturesque and free 
 (The common unrhj^ned poetry 
 Of simple life and country ways). 
 
 240 
 
 245 
 
 250 
 
 255 
 
 265 
 
270 
 
 24 THE CRAI^E CLASSICS 
 
 The story of her early days, — 
 She made us welcome to her home ; 
 Old hearths grew wide to give us room ; 
 We stole with her a frightened look 
 At the gray wizard's conjuring-book. 
 The fame whereof went far and wide 
 Through all the simple country-side ; 
 * We heard the hawks at twilight play, 
 The boat-horn on Piscataqua, 
 
 The loon's weird laughter far away ; ^^^ 
 
 We fished her little trout-brook, kne^v 
 AVhat flowers in wood and meadow grew, 
 What sunny hillsides autumn-brown 
 She climbed to shake the ripe nuts down, 
 Saw where in sheltered cove and bay ^^^ 
 
 The ducks' black squadron anchored lay, 
 And heard the wild geese calling loud 
 Beneath the gray [NTovember cloud. 
 Then, haply, with a look more grave. 
 And soberer tone, some tale she gave ^^^ 
 
 From painful Sewel's ancient tome. 
 Beloved in every Quaker home, 
 Of faith fire-winged by martyrdom. 
 Or Chalkley's Journal, old and quaint, — 
 Gentlest of skippers, rare sea-saint ! — ^^^ 
 
 Who, when the dreary calms prevailed, 
 And water-butt and bread-cask^ failed. 
 And cruel, hungry eyes pursued 
 His portly presence, mad for food, 
 With dark hints muttered under breath ^^^ 
 
 Of casting lots for life or death, 
 
SITOW-BOUXD 25 
 
 Offered, if Heaven withheld supplies, 
 
 To be himself the sacrifice. 
 
 Then, suddenly, as if to save 
 
 The good man from his living grave, 
 
 A ripple on the water grew, 
 
 A school of porpoise flashed in view. 
 
 ^^ Take, eat," he said, ^^ and be content ; 
 
 These fishes in my stead are sent 
 
 By Him who gave the tangled ram 
 
 To spare the child of Abraham." 
 
 Our uncle, innocent of books. 
 
 Was rich in lore of fields and brooks, 
 
 The ancient teachers never dumb 
 
 Of N'ature's unhoused lyceum. 
 
 In moons and tides and weather wise, 
 
 He read the clouds as ]>rophecies. 
 
 And foul or fair could well divine. 
 
 By many an occult hint and sign, 
 
 Holding the cunning-warded keys 
 
 To all the woodcraft mysteries ; 
 
 Himself to !N'ature's heart so near 
 
 That all her voices in his ear 
 
 Of beast or bird had meanings clear, 
 
 Like Apollonius of old, 
 
 Who knew the tales the sparrows told. 
 
 Or Hermes, who interpreted 
 
 ^Vhat the sage cranes of ^N'ilus said ; 
 
 A simple, guileless, childlike man. 
 
 Content to live where life began; 
 
 Strong only on his native grounds, 
 
 3or. 
 
 315 
 
 320 
 
 325 
 
26 THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 The little world of sights and sounds 
 
 "Whose girdle was the parish bounds, 
 
 Whereof his fondly partial pride 
 
 The common features magnified, ^^^ 
 
 As Surrey hills to mountains grew 
 
 In White of Selborne's loving view, — 
 
 He told how teal and loon he shot, 
 
 And how the eagle's eggs he got, 
 
 The feats on pond and river done, ^^^ 
 
 The prodigies of rod and gun ; 
 
 Till, warming with the tales he told, 
 
 Forgotten was the outside cold, 
 
 The bitter wind unheeded blew, 
 
 Erom ripening corn the pigeons flew, ^^^ 
 
 Tlie partridge drummed i' the wood, the mink 
 
 Went fishing down the river-briuk. 
 
 In fields with bean or clover gay. 
 
 The woodchuck, like a hermit gray. 
 
 Peered from the doorway of his cell ; "^^ 
 
 The muskrat plied the mason's trade. 
 And tier by tier his mud-walls laid ; 
 And from the shagbark overhead 
 
 The grizzled squirrel dropped his shell. 
 
 'Next, the dear aunt, whose smile of cheer ^^^ 
 
 And voice in dreams I see and hear, — 
 
 The sweetest woman ever Fate 
 
 Perverse denied a household mate, 
 
 A^Tio, lonely, homeless, not the less 
 
 Pound peace in love's unselfishness, ^^^ 
 
 And welcome Avhereso'er she went. 
 
SI^OW- BOUND 
 
 27 
 
 A calm and gracious element, 
 Whose presence seemed the sweet income 
 And womanly atmosphere of home, 
 Called up her girlhood memories, 
 The huskings and the apple-bees. 
 The sleigh-rides and the summer sails, 
 Weaving through all the poor details 
 And homespun warp of circumstance 
 A golden woof -thread of romance. 
 For well she kept her genial mood 
 And simple faith of maidenhood ; 
 Before her still a cloud-land lay, 
 The mirage loomed across her way; 
 The morning dew, that dried so soon 
 With others, glistened at her noon ; 
 Through years of toil and soil and care, 
 From glossy tress to thin gray hair, 
 All unprofaned she held apart 
 The virgin fancies of the heart. 
 Be shame to him of woman born 
 Who had for such but thought of scorn. 
 
 Tliere, too, our elder sister plied 
 Her evening task the stand beside : 
 A full, rich nature, free to trust. 
 Truthful, and almost sternly just. 
 Impulsive, earnest, prompt to act. 
 And make her generous thought a fact, 
 Keeping with many a light disguise 
 The secret of self-=^acrifice. 
 O heart sore-tried ! thou hast the best 
 
 360 
 
 3G5 
 
 370 
 
 375 
 
 380 
 
 385 
 
390 
 
 28 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 That Heaven itself could give thee, — rest, 
 Kest from all bitter thoughts and things ! 
 How many a poor one's blessing went 
 With thee below^ the low green tent 
 AM lose curtain never outward swings ! 
 
 As one who held herself a part 
 Of all she saw, and let her heart 
 
 Against the household bosom lean. 
 Upon the motley-braided mat ^^^ 
 
 Our youngest and our dearest sat, 
 Lifting her large, sweet, asking eyes, 
 Xow bathed within the fadeless green 
 And holy peace of Paradise. 
 Oh, looking from some heavenly hill, ^^^ 
 
 Or from the shade of saintly pahns. 
 
 Or silver reach of river calms. 
 Do those large eyes behold me still ? 
 With me one little year ago: — 
 The chill weight of the winter snow ^^^ 
 
 For months upon her grave has lain ; 
 And now, Avhen 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, 
 A^et following me where'er I went 
 With dark eyes full of love's content. 
 The birds are glad ; the brier-rose fills ^^^ 
 
 The air with sweetness; all the hills 
 
420 
 
 SNOW-BOtTN^D 29 
 
 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. 
 
 And yet, dear heart ! remembering thee. 
 
 Am I not richer than of old ? 
 Safe in thy immortality, 
 
 What change can reach the wealth I hold ? 
 
 What chance can mar the pearl and gold 
 Thy love hath left in trust with me? 
 And while in life's afternoon, 
 
 Where cool and long the shadows grow, 
 I walk to meet the night that soon 
 
 Shall shape and shadow overflow, 
 I cannot feel that thou art far. 
 Since near at need the angels are; 
 
 425 
 
 430 
 
 435 
 
 And when the sunset gates unbar, 
 Shall I not see thee waiting stand. 
 
 And, white against the evening star. 
 The welcome of thy beckoning hand ? 
 
 Brisk wielder of the birch and rule. 
 
 The master of the district school 
 
 Held at the fire his favored place ; ^^^ 
 
 Its warm glow lit a laughing face 
 
 Fresh-hued and fair, where scarce appeared 
 
 The uncertain prophecy of beard. 
 
 He teased the mitten-blinded cat, 
 
 Played cross-pins on my uncle's hat, ^"^^ 
 
 Sang songs, and told us what befalls 
 
450 
 
 460 
 
 30 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 In classic Dartmouth's college halls. 
 
 Born the wild Northern hills among, 
 
 From whence his yeoman father wrung 
 
 By patient toil subsistence scant, 
 
 ISTot competence and yet not want, 
 
 He early gained the power to pay 
 
 His cheerful, self-reliant way; 
 
 Could doff at ease his scholar's gown 
 
 To peddle wares from town to town ; 
 
 Or through the long vacation's reach 
 
 In lonely lowland districts teach, 
 
 Where all the droll experience found 
 
 At stranger hearths in boarding roimd. 
 
 The moonlit skater's keen delight, 
 
 The sleigh-drive through the frosty night. 
 
 The rustic party, with its rough 
 
 Accompaniment of blind-man's-buff. 
 
 And whirling plate, and forfeits paid. 
 
 His winter task a pastime made. 
 
 Happy the snow-locked homes wherein 
 
 He tuned his merry violin. 
 
 Or played the athlete in the barn, 
 
 Or held the good dame's winding yarn. 
 
 Or mirth-provoking versions told ^"^ 
 
 Of classic legends rare and old. 
 
 Wherein the scenes of Greece and Rome 
 
 Had all the commonplace of home. 
 
 And little seemed at best the odds 
 
 'Twixt Yankee peddlers and old gods ; ^"^^ 
 
 Where Pindus-born Arachthus took 
 
 The guise of any grist-mill brook, 
 
 465 
 
485 
 
 490 
 
 SNOW -BOUND " 31 
 
 And dread Olympus at his will 
 
 Became a huclvleberry hill. 
 
 A careless boy that night he seemed; '^^^ 
 
 But at his desk he had the look 
 And air of one who wisely schemed, 
 
 And hostage from the future took 
 
 In trained thought and lore of book. 
 Large-brained, clear-eyed, — of such as he 
 Shall freedom's young apostles be, 
 Who, following in War's bloody trail, 
 Shall every lingering wrong assail; 
 All chains from limb and spirit strike, 
 Uplift the black and white alike; 
 Scatter before their swift advance 
 The darkness and the ignorance, 
 The pride, the lust, the squalid sloth. 
 Which nurtured Treason's monstrous growth. 
 Made murder pastime, and the hell 
 Of prison-torture possible; 
 The cruel lie of caste refute, 
 Old forms remould, and substitute 
 For Slavery's lash the freeman's will. 
 For blind routine, wise-handed skill ; 
 A school-house plant on every hill, 
 Stretching in radiate nerve-lines thence 
 The quick Avires of intelligence ; 
 Till IsTorth and South together brought 
 Shall own the same electric thought, 
 In peace a common flag salute, 
 And, side by side in labor's free 
 
32 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 And unresentful rivalry, 
 
 Harvest the fields wherein they fought. 
 
 Another guest that winter night ^'^^ 
 
 Flashed back from lustrous eyes the light. 
 
 Unmarked by time, and yet not young, 
 
 The honeyed music of her tongue 
 
 And words of meekness scarcely told 
 
 A nature passionate and bold, ^^^ 
 
 Strong, self -concentred, spurning guide. 
 
 Its milder features dwarfed beside 
 
 Her unbent will's majestic pride. 
 
 She sat among us, at the best, 
 
 A not unfeared, half -welcome guest, ^^^ 
 
 Rebuking with her cultured phrase 
 
 Our homeliness of words and ways. 
 
 A certain pard-like, treacherous grace 
 
 Swayed the lithe limbs and dropped the lash, 
 
 Lent the white teeth their dazzling flash ; ^^^ 
 
 And under low brows, black with night, 
 
 Rayed out at times a dangerous light ; 
 
 The sharp heat-lightnings of her face 
 
 Presaging ill to him whom Fate 
 
 Condemned to share her love or hate. ^^^ 
 
 A woman tropical, intense 
 
 Tn thought and act, in soul and sense, 
 
 She blended in a like degree 
 
 The vixen and the devotee. 
 
 Revealing with each freak or feint ~ ^^'^ 
 
 The temper of Petruchio's Kate, 
 
 The raptures of Siena's saint- 
 
SNOW-BOUND 
 
 33 
 
 Her tapering hand and rounded wrist 
 
 Had facile power to form a fist ; 
 
 The warm J dark languish of her eyes ^"^'^ 
 
 Was never safe from wrath's surprise. 
 
 Brows saintly calm and lips devout 
 
 Knew every change of scowl and pout ; 
 
 And the sweet voice had notes more high 
 
 And shrill for social battle-cry. *^** 
 
 Since then what old cathedral town 
 
 Has missed her pilgrim staff and gown, 
 
 What convent-gate has held its lock 
 
 Against the challenge of her knock ! 
 
 Through Smyrna's plague-hushed thoroughfares, ^^^ 
 
 Up sea-set Malta's rocky stairs, 
 
 Gray olive slopes of hills that hem 
 
 Thy tombs and shrines, Jerusalem, 
 
 Or startling on her desert throne 
 
 The crazy Queen of Lebanon ^^*^ 
 
 With claims fantastic as her own, 
 
 Her tireless feet have held their way ; 
 
 And still, unrestful, bowed, and gray. 
 
 She watches under Eastern skies. 
 
 With hope each day renewed and fresh, ^^^ 
 
 The Lord's quick coming in the flesh, 
 ^^llereof she dreams and prophesies ! 
 Where'er her troubled path may be. 
 
 The Lord's sweet pity with her go ! 
 The outward wayward life, we see, ^^^ 
 
 The hidden springs we may not know. 
 'Not is it given iis to discern 
 
 What threads the fatal sisters spun, 
 
 —3 
 
ISO 
 
 34 TILE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 Throngli what ancestral years has run 
 The sorrow with the woman born, 
 What forged her crnel chain of mood^^, 
 What set her feet in solitudes. 
 
 And held the love within her mute, 
 AVhat mingled madness in the blood, 
 
 A lifelong discord and annoy, 
 
 Water of tears with oil of joy, 
 And hid within the folded bud 
 
 Perversities of flower and fruit. 
 It is not ours to separate 
 The tangled skein of will and fate, 
 To show what metes and bounds should stand 
 Upon the soul's debatable land, 
 And between choice and Providence 
 Divide the circle of events; 
 
 But He who knows our frame is just, 
 Merciful and compassionate. 
 And full of sweet assurances 
 And hope for all the language is. 
 
 That He remembereth we are dusl ! 
 
 At last the great logs, crumbling low, ^^^ 
 
 Sent out a dull and duller glow^, 
 
 The bull's-eye watch that hung in view, 
 
 Ticking its weary circuit through, 
 
 Pointed with mutely warning sign 
 
 Its black hand to the hour of nine. ^^^ 
 
 That sigTi the pleasant circle broke : 
 
 ^Ey uncle ceased his pipe to smoke, 
 
 Knocked from its bowl the refuse gray, 
 
 585 
 
SNOW-BOUND 35 
 
 605 
 
 610 
 
 And laid it tenderly away, 
 Then roused himself to safely cover 
 The dull red brand with ashes over. 
 And while, with care, our mother laid 
 The work aside, her steps she stayed 
 One moment, seeking to express 
 Her grateful sense of happiness 
 For food and shelter, warmth and health, 
 And love's contentment more than wealth, 
 With simple wishes (not the weak. 
 Vain prayers which no fulfillment seek. 
 But such as warm the generous heart, 
 O'er-prompt to do with Heaven its part) 
 That none might lack, that bitter night, 
 For bread and clothing, warmth and light. 
 
 Within our beds a%vhile we heard 
 
 The wind that round the gables roared, ®^^ 
 
 W^ith now and then a ruder shock, 
 
 ^^Tiich made our very bedsteads rock. 
 
 We heard the loosened clapboards tost, 
 
 The board-nails snapping in the frost ; 
 
 And on us, through the implastered wall ®*^ 
 
 Felt the lightsifted snow-flakes fall ; 
 
 But sleep stole on, as sleep will do 
 
 ^Vhen hearts are light and life is new ; 
 
 Faint and more faint the murmurs grew. 
 
 Till in the summer-land of dreams ^^s 
 
 They softened to the sound of streams. 
 
 Low stir of leaves, and dip of oars, 
 
 And lapsing waves on quiet shores. 
 
640 
 
 36 THE CRAXE CLASSICS 
 
 Xext morn we wakened with the shont 
 • Of merry voices high and clear ; 
 And saw the teamsters drawing near 
 To hreak the drifted highways ont. 
 Down the long hillside treading slow 
 We saw the half-buried oxen go, 
 Shaking the snow from heads uptost, 
 Their straining nostrils white with frost. 
 Before our door the straggling train 
 Drew np, an added team to gain. 
 The elders threshed their hands a-cold, 
 
 Passed, with the cider-mng, their jokes 
 
 From lip to lip; the younger folks 
 Down the loose snow-hanks, wrestling, rolled, 
 Then toiled again the cavalcade 
 
 O'er windy hill, through clogged ravine, 
 
 And woodland paths that wound between ^'^^ 
 
 Low-drooping pine-boughs winter-weighed. 
 From every barn a team afoot, 
 At every house a new recruit, 
 Where, drawn by iSTature's subtlest law. 
 Haply the watchful young men saw 
 Sweet doorway pictures of the curls 
 And curious eyes of merry girls. 
 Lifting their hands in mock defence 
 Against the snow-balls' compliments. 
 And reading in each missive tost 
 The charm which Fden never lost. 
 
 We heard once more the sleigh-bells' sound ; 
 And, following where the teamsters led, 
 
 656 
 
SNOW-BOUND 
 
 The wise old Doctor went liis round, 
 Just pausing at our door to sav, 
 In the brief autocratic way 
 Of one who, prompt at Duty's call, 
 Was free to urge her claim on all, 
 
 That some poor neighbor sick abed 
 xVt night our mother's aid would need ; 
 For, one in generous thought and deed, 
 
 What mattered in the sufferer's sight 
 
 The Quaker matron's inward light, 
 The Doctor's mail of Calvin's creed ? 
 All hearts confess the saints elect 
 
 Who, twain in faith, in love agree, 
 And melt not in an acid sect 
 
 The Christian pearl of charity ! 
 
 So days went on : a week had passed 
 
 Since the great world was heard from last. 
 
 The Almanac we studied o'er. 
 
 Read and reread our little store 
 
 Of books and pamphlets, scarce a score ; 
 
 One harmless novel, mostly hid 
 
 From younger eyes, a book forbid, 
 
 And poetry, (or good or bad, 
 
 A single book was all we had,) 
 
 Where Ellwood's meek, drab-skirted Muse, 
 A stranger to the heathen ISTine, 
 Sang, with a somewhat nasal whine, 
 
 The wars of David and the Jev/s. 
 
 At last the floundering carrier bore 
 
 The village paper to our door. 
 
 37 
 
 660 
 
 665 
 
 680 
 
 685 
 
38 THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 Lo ! broadening outward as we read, 
 To warmer zones the horizon spread ; 
 In panoramic length imrolled 
 We saw the marvel that it told. 
 Before us passed the painted Creeks, 
 
 And daft McGregor on his raids 
 
 In Costa Eica's everglades. 
 And up Taygetus winding slow 
 Rode Ypsilanti's Mainote Greeks, 
 A Turk's head at each saddle-bow ! 
 Welcome to us its week-old news. 
 Its corner for the rustic Muse, 
 
 Its monthly gauge of snow and rain. 
 Its record, mingling in a breath 
 The wedding-bell and dirge of death ; 
 Jest, anecdote, and love-lorn tale. 
 The latest culprit sent to jail; 
 Its hue-and-cry of stolen and lost. 
 Its vendue sales and goods at cost, 
 
 And traffic calling loud for gain. 
 We felt the stir of hall and street, 
 The pulse of life that round us beat ; 
 The chill embargo of the snow 
 Was melted in the genial glow ; 
 Wide swung again our ice-locked door, 
 x\nd all the world was ours once more ! 
 
 Clasp, Angel of the backward look 
 And folded wings of ashen gray 
 And voice of echoes far away. 
 
 The brazen covers of thy book ; 
 
SNOW-BOUND 
 
 39 
 
 730 
 
 The weird palimpsest old and vast, 
 Wherein thou hid'st the spectral past ; 
 Where, closely mingling, pale and glow 
 The characters of joy and woe ; 
 The monographs of ontlived years. 
 Or smile-illumed or dim with tears, 
 
 Green hills of life that slope to death, > 
 And haunts of 'home, whose vistaed trees 
 Shade off to mournful cypresses 
 
 With the white amaranths underneath. 
 Even while I look, T can but heed 
 
 The restless sands' incessant fall. 
 Importunate hours that hours succeed, 
 Each clamorous with its own sharp need. 
 
 And duty keeping pace with all. 
 Shut down and clasp the heavy lids: 
 I hear again the voice that bids '^^^ 
 
 The dreamer leave his dream midway 
 For larger hopes and graver fears : 
 Life greatens in these later years, 
 The century's aloe flowers to-day ! 
 
 Yet, haply, in some lull of life, '^^^ 
 
 Some Truce of God which breaks its strife, 
 The worldling's eyes shall gather dew, 
 
 Dreaming in throngful city ways 
 Of winter joys his boyhood knew ; 
 
 And dear and early friends — the few ''*■"' 
 
 AVho yet remain — shall pause to view 
 
 These Flemish pictures of old days ; 
 Sit with me by the homestead hearth, 
 
750 
 
 40 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 And stretch the hands of memory forth 
 . To warm them at the wood-fire's blaze ; 
 And thanks nntraced to lips unknown 
 Shall greet me like the odors blown 
 From unseen meadows newly mown^ 
 Or lilies floating in some pond, 
 Wood-fringed, the wayside gaze beyond ; 
 The traveller owns the grateful sense 
 Of sweetness near, he knows not whence, 
 And, pausing, takes with forehead bare 
 The benediction of the air. 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Line 6. Explain " mute and ominous prophecy." 
 
 10. Of what material was the '^ homespun" clothing made? 
 
 46. What is a " hoary meteor " ? How long did the storm con- 
 tinue? 
 
 54-65. Contrast with first three stanzas of Lowell's " First Snoiv- 
 FalL" 
 
 65. The Leaning Tower of Pisa, Italy, is a beautiful white marble 
 bell-tower. The remarkable thing about it is its inclination from 
 a perpendicular line. It is 180 feet high and 14 feet out of plumb. 
 It was built in the 12th century, by a German artist, Wilhelm of 
 Innsbruck. The cause of the deflection is supposed to be due to the 
 character of the soil in which the foundation rests. 
 
 77. The story of Aladdin and his lamp may be found in The 
 Arabian Nights' Entertainments, of which there are many editions. 
 
 90. EgypVs Amiin, or Ammon, was a deity represented in the form 
 of a ram. 
 
 97-99. Whittier's early home was out of sight of any other 
 farm-house. 
 
 136. The crane and pendent trammels showed. From the iron 
 crane fastened to the chimney- jamb, hooks were hung, on which to 
 hang pots to be swung oyer the fire for cooking. 
 
SNOW-BOUND 41 
 
 156, Clean-wingrd. The dust brushed off with a turkey-wing 
 brush, 
 
 181, 182, This poem was written in 1865, Its author lived for 
 twenty-seven years, 
 
 183. Matthew Whittier died m 1883. 
 
 215 and 220-223 are from Sarah Wentworth-Morton's poem, The 
 African Chief. It was published in The American Preceptor, a school 
 text used in Whittier's boyhood. 
 
 224. The elder Whittier when a young man had traveled across 
 the wilderness to Canada, and had passed some time in the French 
 Canadian villages. 
 
 226, Samp — coarse hominy. 
 
 256. Whittier's mother's home had been in Somersworth, N. H., 
 where the Indians had made their savage inroads in an early day, 
 
 270, The gray wizard's conjuring -hook. Bantam, the sorcerer, 
 whose book Whittier had in his possession. It was a copy of Cor- 
 nelius Agrippa's Magic, printed in 1651. The full title of the book 
 is, Three Books of Occult Philosophy : by Henry Cornelius Agrippa; 
 Knight, Doctor of Both Laics, Counsellor to Caesar's Sacred Majesty, 
 and Judge of the Prerogative Court. 
 
 286. William Sewel was the historian of the Quakers. 
 
 289. Thomas Chalkley was a Quaker preacher of English parent- 
 age. He lived in Philadelphia. His own account of the incident 
 referred to him, as published in his Journal, is as follows: 
 
 " To stop their murmuring, I told them they should not need to 
 cast lots, which was usual in such cases, which of us should die first, 
 for I would freely offer up my life to do them good. One said, 
 'God bless you! I will not eat any of you.' Another said, 'He 
 would die before he would eat any of me;' and so said several. I can 
 truly say, on that occasion, at that time, my life was not dear to 
 me, and that I was serious and ingenuous in my proposition; and 
 as I was leaning over the side of the vessel, thoughtfully consider- 
 ing my proposal to the company, and looking in my mind to Him 
 that made me, a very large dolphin came up towards the top or sur- 
 face of the water, and looked me in the face; and I called the people 
 to put a hook into the sea, and take him, for here is one come to 
 redeem me (I said to them). And they put a hook into the sea, 
 and the fish readily took it, and they caught him. He was longer 
 than myeelf. T think he was about six feet long, and the largest 
 that ever I saw. This rdainly showed us that we ought not to dis- 
 trust the providence of the Almighty, The people were quieted by 
 
42 THE CRATvTE CLASSICS 
 
 this act of Providence, and murmured no more. We caught enough 
 to eat plentifully of, till we got into the capes of Delaware." 
 
 306. See Genesis, xxii: 13. 
 - 307. Our Uncle. Moses Whittier. Whittier says the uncle was 
 more than half a believer in witchcraft. 
 
 310. What is Nature's unhoused lyceumf 
 
 320. A philosopher belonging to the first century, A. D., believed 
 to have talked with birds and animals. 
 
 322. Hermes, an Egyptian who revived mathematics and art 
 among the people of the Nile. 
 
 332. Gilbert White wrote the Natural History of Selhorne, Eng- 
 land. It was a minute description of a small locality, but so de- 
 lightfully written that it still remains a classic. 
 
 350. Aunt Mercy Hussey. One of those helpful women who live 
 for others. 
 
 378. Mary Whittier. 
 
 396. Elizabeth Whittier. 
 
 404. She died in 1864; Mary died in 1860. 
 
 439. George Haskell, of Harvard, Mass.; was a student of Dart- 
 mouth College. Later became a physician. He moved to Illinois, 
 and helped to found Shurtleff College. Afterward, in New Jersey, 
 he aided in founding an industrial school. 
 
 476. Pindus is a chain of mountains running north and south 
 through Greece. Arachthus is a river whose source is in these 
 mountains. 
 
 478. Olympus. The mountain Avhereon the gods of Grecian my- 
 thology dwelt. 
 
 485-509. Notice the beauty of this prophecy. 
 
 510. Another guest. Harriet Livermore. daughter of Judge 
 Livermore, of New Hampshire. Whittier says of her that she was 
 " a young woman of fine natural ability, enthusiastic, eccentric, with 
 slight control over a violent temper;" that she nas " ready to exhort 
 in prayer-meetings and dance in a ball-room." She was a Seventh- 
 Day Adventist; and spent the most of her long life traveling over 
 Europe and Asia, proclaiming this belief. In her last years she 
 was found wandering Avith a tribe of Arabs in Syria, to whom in 
 her madness she became a prophetess. 
 
SNOW-BOUND 4t3 
 
 536. See Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew. 
 
 537. Saint Catharine of Siena, who made a vow of silence for 
 three years. 
 
 555. Lady Hester Stanhope, who lived on Mount Lebanon. A 
 woman as singular as Harriet Livermore, who lived with her for 
 some time. 
 
 568. Fatal Sisters. -Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos, the three 
 fates, of Greek mythology. Clotho spun the thread of life; Lachesis 
 twisted it; and Atropos cut it with her shears. 
 
 585-589. See Psalms, ciii:14. 
 
 659. Doctor Weld, of Haverhill, who lived to be ninety-six. 
 
 676. The almanac was the only annual in the Whittier home 
 then. There was one weekly newspaper and a very few books. 
 
 683. Thomas Ellwood was a Quaker in England, a friend of John 
 Milton, and the one who suggested Paradise Regained. He himself 
 wrote an epic poem entitled Davideis, the life of King David. 
 
 693. Referring to the removal of the Creek Indians from Georgia 
 to the region west of the Mississippi. 
 
 694. Sir Gregor McGregor, a " daft " Scotchman, made an at- 
 tempt to settle a colony in Costa Rica in 1822. 
 
 697. Taygetus is a mountain in Greece. Near it is the district 
 of Maina, a locality of bad repute owing to the robbers who in- 
 habit it. Ypsilanti, a Greek patriot, gathered his cavalry from this 
 region for the struggle in which Greece threw off the Turkish rule. 
 
 719. Palimpsest. A parchment twice written on, the first writ- 
 ing having been erased, 
 
 740. The Truce of God was an order of the Church in the year 
 1040, by which barons were forbidden to attack one another between 
 sunset of Wednesday and sunrise the following Monday, or vipon any 
 church feast day or fast day, or to attack any laborer in the field. 
 
 747. Flemish art was characterized by homely interiors. 
 
44 THE CKAJN^E CLASSICS 
 
 AMOKG THE HILLS. 
 
 PRELUDE. 
 
 [This poem contains a complete picture of farm-life as it is and 
 has been, and farm-life as it may and should be. 
 
 There are many exquisite word-pictures of New Hampshire scenery 
 in the poem. 
 
 The poem with its prelude presents a series of contrasts. Let the 
 pupil hunt them out.] 
 
 Along the roadside, like the flowers of gold 
 
 That tawnj Incas for their gardens wrought, 
 
 Heavy with sunshine droops the golden-rod, 
 
 And the red pennons of the cardinal-flowers 
 
 Hang motionless upon their upright staves, ^ 
 
 The sky is hot and hazy, and the wind, 
 
 Wing-weary with its long flight from the south, 
 
 Unf elt ; yet, closely scanned, yon maple leaf 
 
 With faintest motion, as one stirs in dreams. 
 
 Confesses it. The locust by the wall ' ^ 
 
 Stabs the noon-silence with his sharp alarm. 
 
 A single hay-cart down the dusty road 
 
 Creaks slowly, with its driver fast asleep 
 
 On the load's top. Against the neighboring hill, 
 
 Huddled along the stone wall's shady side, ^^ 
 
 The sheep show white, as if a snow drift still 
 
 Defied the dog-star. Through the open door 
 
 A drowsy smell of flowers — gray heliotrope, 
 
 And white sweet clover, and shv mignonette — 
 
 Comes faintly in, and silent chorus lends -'^ 
 
 To the pervading symphony of peace. 
 
AMONG THE HILLS 45 
 
 ^o time is this for hands long over-worn 
 
 To task their strength : and (nnto Him be praise 
 
 AVho giveth quietness !) the stress and strain 
 
 Of years that did the work of eentnries '^ 
 
 Have ceased, and Ave can draw onr ])roath once more 
 
 Freely and fnll. So, as yon harvesters 
 
 Make glad their nooning underneath tlie elms 
 
 With tale and riddle and old snatch of song, 
 
 I lay aside grave themes, and idly turn ^^ 
 
 The leaves of memory's sketch-book, dreaming o'er 
 
 Old summer pictures of the quiet hills, 
 
 And human life, as quiet, at their feet. 
 
 And yet not idly all. A farmer's son, 
 
 Proud of field-lore and harvest craft; and feeling "^ 
 
 All their fine possibilities, how rich 
 
 And restful even poverty and toil 
 
 Become when beauty, harmony, and love 
 
 Sit at their hundjle hearth as angels sat 
 
 At evening in the patriarch's tent, when man ^^ 
 
 ]\Iakes labor noble, and his farmer's frock 
 
 The symbol of a Christian chivalry. 
 
 Tender and just and generous to her 
 
 Who clothes with grace all duty; still, T know 
 
 Too well the picture has another side. "^^ 
 
 How wearily the grind of toil goes on 
 
 Where love is wanting, how the eye and ear 
 
 And heart are starved amidst the plenitude 
 
 Of nature, and how hard and colorless 
 
 Is life without an atmosphere. I look ^^ 
 
 Across the lapse of half a century. 
 
46 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 And call to mind old homesteads, where no flower 
 Told that tlie Rpring had come, but evil weeds, 
 Nightshade and rough-leaved bnrdock, in the place 
 Of the sweet doorway greeting of the rose 
 And honeysnckle, where the house walls seemed 
 Blistering in sun, without a tree or vine 
 To cast the tremulous shadow of its leaves 
 Across the curtainless windows from whose panes 
 Fluttered the signal rags of shif tlessness ; 
 Within, the cluttered kitchen floor, unwashed 
 (Broom-clean I think thev called it) ; the best room 
 Stifling with cellar damp, shut from the air 
 In hot midsummer, bookless, pictureless 
 Save the inevitable sampler hung 
 Over the fireplace, or a mourning piece, 
 A green-haired woman, peonj-cheeked, beneath 
 Impossible willows ; the wide-throated hearth 
 Bristling with faded pine-boughs half concealing 
 The piled-up rubbish at the chimney's back ; 
 iVnd, in sad keeping with all things about them, 
 Shrill, querulous women, sour and sullen men, 
 Untidy, loveless, old before their time. 
 With scarce a human interest save their oavu 
 - Monotonous round of small economies, 
 Or the poor scandal of the neighborhood ; 
 Blind to the beauty every^^here revealed. 
 Treading the-May-flowers with regardless feet ; 
 For them the song-sparrow and the bobolink 
 Sang not, nor winds made music in the leaves ; 
 For them in vain October's holocaust 
 Burned, gold and crimson, over all the hills, 
 
 55 
 
 65 
 
 80 
 
AMONG THE HILL8 47 
 
 The sacramental mystery of the woods. 
 Church-goers, fearful of the unseen Powers, 
 P)Ut grumbling over pulpit-tax and pew-rent, 
 Saving, as shrewd economists, their souls 
 And winter pork w^ith the least possible outlay 
 Of salt and sanctity; in daily life 
 Showing as little actual comprehension 
 Of Christian charity and love and duty, 
 As if the Sermon on the Mount had been 
 Outdated like a last year's almanac : 
 Rich in broad woodlands and in half-tilled fields. 
 And yet so pinched and bare and comfortless. 
 The veriest straggler limping on his rounds. 
 The sun and air his sole inheritance. 
 Laughed at poverty that paid its taxes, 
 And hugged his rags in self-complacency ! 
 
 90 
 
 95 
 
 'Not such should be the homesteads of a land 
 Where w^hoso wisely wills and acts may dwell 
 As king and lawgiver, in broad-acred state. 
 With beauty, art, taste, culture, books, to make 
 His hour of leisure richer than a life 
 Of fourscore to the barons of old time ; 
 Our yeoman should be equal to his home, 
 Set in the fair, green valleys, purple walled, 
 A man to match his mountains, not to creep 
 Dwarfed and abased below them. I would fain 
 In this light way (of which I needs must own 
 With the knife-grinder of whom Canning sings, 
 '^ Story, God bless you ! I have none to tell you ! ") 
 Invite the eye to see and heart to feel 
 
 105 
 
 no 
 
115 
 
 120 
 
 48 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 The beautv and the joy within their reach, — 
 
 Home, and home loves, and the beatitudes 
 
 Of natnre free to alL Haply in years 
 
 That wait to take the places of our own. 
 
 Heard where some breezy balcony looks down 
 
 On happy hom.es, or where the lake in the moon 
 
 Sleeps dreaming of the mountains, fair as Euth, 
 
 In the old Hebrew pastoral, at the feet 
 
 Of Boaz, even this simple lay of mine 
 
 May seem the burden of a prophecy. 
 
 Finding its late fulfillment in a change 
 
 Slow as the oak's growth, lifting manhood up 
 
 Through broader culture, finer manners, love, ^^^ 
 
 And reverence, to the level of the hills. 
 
 O Golden Age, whose light is of the deL^YT\, 
 
 And not of sunset, forward, not behind. 
 
 Flood the new heavens and earth, and with thee bring 
 
 All the old virtues, whatsoever things ^^^ 
 
 Are pure and honest and of good repute, 
 
 But add thereto whatever bard has sung 
 
 Or seer has told of when in trance and dream 
 
 They saw^ the Happy Isles of prophecy ! 
 
 Let Justice hold her scale, and Truth divide ^■^'"^ 
 
 Between the right and wrong ; but give the heart 
 
 The freedom of its fair inheritance ; 
 
 Let the poor prisoner, cramped and starved so long. 
 
 At ISTature's table feast his ear and eye 
 
 With joy and wonder; let all harmonies ^ '^ 
 
 Of sound, form, color, motion, wait upon 
 
 The princely guest, whether in soft attire 
 
AMONG THE HILLS 49 
 
 Of leisiu'o clud, or the cdniNt^ frock of loil. 
 
 And, Iciidiiia- life to ihc dead form of faitli, 
 
 (iivc liiniiaii nature rcNcrcnce for the sake ^■^'* 
 
 Of One wJio ]»oi'e it, niakinii' it divine 
 
 AVith the ineffahle tenderness of (Jod; 
 
 Let common need, the hi'otherliood of prayer. 
 
 The heirship of an unknown destiny, 
 
 The unsohed mystery round ahout ns, make ^^'^ 
 
 A man more precious than tlie i»ohl of Ophir. 
 
 Sacred, inviolate, nnto whom all things 
 
 Should minister, as outward types and signs 
 
 Of the eternal beauty which fulfills 
 
 The one great purpose of creation, Love, ^''^ 
 
 Tlie sole necessity of Earth and Heaven ! 
 
 a:\iong the hills. 
 
 For weeks the clouds had raked the hills 
 
 And vexed the vales with raining, 
 And all the woods were sad with mist. 
 
 And all the brooks complaining. 
 
 At last, a sudden night-storm tore 
 
 The mountain-veils asunder, 
 And swept the valleys clean l^efore 
 
 The besom of the thunder. 
 
 Through Sandwich Xotch the west-wind sang 
 
 Good morrow to the cotter ; , 
 And once again Chocorua's horn 
 
 Of shadow pierced the water. 
 4— 
 
 IGO 
 
 1G5 
 
5'0 THE CEAXE CLASSICS 
 
 Above his broad lake Ossipee^ 
 Once more the sunshine wearing, 
 
 Stooped, tracing on that silver shield 
 His grim armorial bearing. 
 
 Clear drawn against the hard bine sky 
 The peaks had winter's keenness ; 
 
 And, close on antnmn's frost, the vales 
 Tlad more than June's fresh greenness. 
 
 Again the sodden forest floors 
 
 With golden lights were checkered, 
 
 Once more rejoicing leaves in wind 
 And sunshine danced and flickered. 
 
 It was as if the summer's late 
 
 Atoning for its sadness 
 Had borrowed every season's charm, 
 
 To end its days in gladness. 
 
 I call to mind those banded vales 
 
 Of shadoAv and of shining, 
 Through which, my hostess at my side. 
 
 I drove in day's declining. 
 
 AVe held our sideling way above 
 The river's whitening shallows. 
 
 By homesteads old, with wide-flung barns 
 Swept through and through by SAvallows, ■ — 
 
 V^y maple orchards, belts of pine 
 
 And larches climbing darkly 
 The mountain slopes, and, over all. 
 
 The great peaks rising starkly. 
 
 180 
 
AA[ON(^ THE HILLS 
 
 51 
 
 You should have seen that km^' hill-range 
 With gaps of hrightness riven, — 
 
 How through each pass and hollow streamed 
 The purpling lights of heaven, — 
 
 Ivivers of gold-mist flowing down 
 From far celestial fountains, — 
 
 Hie great sun flaming through the rifts 
 Beyond the wall of mountains ! 
 
 AVe paused at last where home-bound cows 
 Brought down the pasture's treasure, 
 
 And in the barn the rhythmic flails 
 l^eat out a harvest measur(\ 
 
 We heard the night-hawk's sullen plunge, 
 The crow his tree-mates calling : 
 
 The shadows lengthening down the slopes 
 About our feet were falling. 
 
 And through them smote the level sun 
 
 In broken lines of splendor, 
 Touched the gray rocks and made the green 
 
 Of the shorn grass more tender. 
 
 The maples bending o'er the gate, 
 Their arch of leaves just tinted 
 
 With yellow warmth, the golden glow 
 Of coming autumn hinted. 
 
 Keen white between the farm-house showed. 
 And smiled on porch and trellis 
 
 The fair democracy of flowers 
 That equals cot and palace. 
 
 210 
 
230 
 
 THE CRAXE CLASSICS 
 
 And weavl]ii>' onrlands iV)i' her dog, 
 
 'Twixt cliidinos and caresses, 
 A liuinaii liower of childhood shoo^v 
 
 The sunshine ivom her tresses. 
 
 On either hand we saw the signs 
 
 Of fancy and of shrewdness, 
 Where taste had wound its arms of vines 
 
 Round thrift's uncomely rudeness. 
 
 The sun-hrown farmer iil his frock 
 
 Shook hands, and called to Mary : 
 Bare-armed, as Juno might, she came, ^^^ 
 
 AATiite-aproned, from her dairy. 
 
 Tier air, her smile, her motions, told 
 
 Of womanly completeness ; 
 A music as of household songs 
 
 Was in her voice of sweetness. ^'"^'^ 
 
 ^ot beautiful in curve and line 
 
 But something more and better, 
 The secret charm eluding art, 
 
 Its spirit, nof its letter ; — 
 
 An inborn grace that nothing lacked -*^ 
 
 Of culture or appliance, — 
 The warmth of genial courtes)', 
 
 The calm of self-reliance. 
 
 Before her queenly womanhood 
 
 How dared our hostess utter 250 
 
 The paltry errand of her need 
 
 To buy her fresh-churned butter ? 
 
AMO^^G THE HILLS 58 
 
 She led the way Avith housewife pride, 
 
 Her goodly store disclosing, 
 Full tenderly the golden balls - 255 
 
 A\'ith practised hands disposing. 
 
 Then, while along the western hills 
 
 We watched the changeful glory 
 Of sunset, on our homeward way, 
 
 I heard her simple story. ^eo 
 
 The early crickets sang ; the stream 
 
 Plashed through my friend's narration: 
 
 Her rustic patois of the hills 
 Lost in "my free translation. 
 
 '''' More wise," she said, ^^ than those who swarm ^^^ 
 
 Our hills in middle summer. 
 She came, when June's first roses blow^. 
 
 To greet the early comer. 
 
 'Trom school and ball and rout she came. 
 
 The city's fair, pale daughter, -'^ 
 
 To drink the wine of mountain air 
 Beside the Bearcamp Water. 
 
 ^^ Her step grew firmer on the hills 
 
 That watch our homesteads over ; 
 On cheek and lip, from summer fields, ~'^ 
 
 She caught the bloom of clover. 
 
 " For health comes sparkling in the streams 
 
 From cool Chocorua stealing: 
 There 's iron in our ^Northern winds ; 
 
 Our pines are trees of healing. ^^*^ 
 
64 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 ^^ She sat beneath the broad-armed elms 
 That skirt the mowing-meadow, 
 
 And watched the gentle west-wind weave 
 The grass with shine and shadow. 
 
 " Beside her, from the summer heat 
 To share her grateful screening, 
 
 With forehead bared, the farmer stood, 
 Upon his pitchfork leaning. 
 
 " Framed in its damp, dark locks, his face 
 Had nothing mean or common, — 
 
 Strong, manly, true, the tenderness 
 And pride beloved of woman. 
 
 " She looked up, glowing with the health 
 The country air had brought her, 
 
 And, laughing, said : ' You lack a wife, 
 Your mother lacks a daughter. 
 
 2S5 
 
 295 
 
 'te^ 
 
 ^^ ^ To mend your frock and bake your bread 
 
 You do not need a lady : 
 Be' sure among these brown old homes 
 
 Is some one waiting ready, — 
 
 '^ ' Some fair, sweet girl, with skilful hand 
 And cheerful heart for treasure, 
 
 Who never played with ivory keys, - 
 Or danced the polka's measure.' 
 
 '' He bent his black brows to a frown, 
 He set his white teeth tightly. 
 
 ' 'T is well,' he said, ^ for one like you 
 To choose for me so lightly. 
 
AMONG THE HILLS 55 
 
 510 
 
 315 
 
 " ' You think, because my life is rude, 
 
 I take no note of sweetness : 
 I tell you love lias naught to do 
 
 With meetness or unmeetness. 
 
 '^ ^ Itself its best excuse, it asks 
 
 'No leave of pride or fashion 
 When silken zone or homespun frock 
 
 It stirs with throbs of passion. 
 
 '^ ' You think me deaf and blind : you bring 
 
 Your winning graces hither 
 As free as if from cradle-time 
 
 We two had played together. ^^^ 
 
 " ' You tempt me with your laughing eyes, 
 
 Your cheek of sundown's blushes, 
 A motion as of waving grain, 
 
 A music as of thrushes. 
 
 ^^ ' The plaything of your summer sport, ^^^ 
 
 The spells you weave around me 
 You cannot at your will undo, 
 
 Not leave me as you found me. 
 
 ^^ ' You go as lightly as you came. 
 Your life is well without me ; 
 
 What care you that these hills will close 
 Like prison-walls about me ? 
 
 ^^ ' No mood is mine to seek a wife. 
 Or daughter for my mother: 
 
 Who loves you loses in that love 
 All power to love another ! 
 
 330 
 
56 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 '^ ' I dare jour pity or your scorn, 
 
 With pride your own exceeding; 
 I fling my heart into your lap 
 
 Without a word of pleading.' ^^^ 
 
 '^ She looked up in his face of pain. 
 
 So archly, yet so tender: 
 ^And if I lend you mine/ she said, 
 
 ' Will you forgive the lender ? 
 
 '^ ' ^N'or frock nor tan can hide the man ; ^^^ 
 
 And see you not, my farmer. 
 Plow weak and fond a woman waits 
 
 Behind this silken armor ? 
 
 ^' ^ I love you : on that love alone. 
 
 And not my worth, presuming, ^^^ 
 
 Will you not trust for summer fruit 
 
 The tree in May-day blooming ? ' 
 
 '^ Alone the hangbird overhead. 
 
 His hair-sw^ung cradle straining, 
 Looked down to see love's miracle, — ^^^ 
 
 The giving that is gaining. 
 
 "■ And so the farmer found a wife. 
 
 His mother found a daughter : 
 There looks no happier home than hers 
 
 On pleasant Bearcamp Water. 
 
 ^^ Flowers spring to blossom where she walks 
 
 The careful ways of duty ; 
 Our hard, stiff lines of life with her 
 
 Are flowing curves of beauty. 
 
 360 
 
AMONG THE HILLS 
 
 '' Our homes are cheerier for lier sake, 
 Our door-yards brighter blooming, 
 
 And all about the social air 
 Is sweeter for her coming. 
 
 " Unspoken homilies of peace 
 Her daily life is preaching ; 
 
 The still refreshment of the dew 
 Is her unconscious teaching. 
 
 ^' And never tenderer hand than hers 
 Unknits the brow of ailing ; 
 
 Her garments to the sick man's ear 
 Have music in their trailing. 
 
 '^ And when, in ]:>leasant harvest moons, 
 The youthful buskers gather. 
 
 Or sleigh-drives on the mountain ways 
 Defy the winter weather, — 
 
 ^' In sugar-camps, when south and warm 
 The winds of March are blowing. 
 
 And sweetly from its thawing veins 
 The maple's blood is flowing, — 
 
 " In summer, where some lilied pond 
 
 Its virgin zone is baring. 
 Or where the ruddy autumn fire 
 
 Lights up the apple-paring, — 
 
 ^' The coarseness of a ruder time 
 
 Her finer mirth displaces, 
 A subtler sense of pleasure fills 
 
 Each rustic sport she graces. 
 
 57 
 
 365 
 
 380 
 
 385 
 
 390 
 
58 THE. CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 '' Her presence lends its warmth and liealth 
 
 To all who come before it. 
 If woman lost us Eden, such » 
 
 As she alone restore it. 
 
 " For larpjer life and wiser aims 
 
 The farmer is her debtor ; 
 Who holds to his another's heart 
 
 Must needs be worse or better. 
 
 " Through her his civic service shows 
 
 A purer-toned ambition ; 
 'No double consciousness divides 
 
 The man and politician. 
 
 " In party's doubtful ways he trusts 
 
 Her instincts to determine ; 
 At the loud polls, the thought of her 
 
 Recalls Christ's Mountain Sermon. 
 
 ^' He owns her logic of the heart, 
 
 And wisdom of unreason, 
 Supplying, while he doubts and weighs, 
 
 The needed word in season. 
 
 " He sees with pride her richer thought, 
 
 Her fancy's freer ranges; 
 And love thus deepened to respect 
 
 Is proof against all changes. 
 
 ^^ And if she walks at ease in ways 
 
 His feet are slow to travel, 
 And if she reads with cultured eyes 
 
 What his may scarce unravel, 
 
 S95 
 
 410 
 
 415 
 
 420 
 
AMONG THE HILLS 
 
 ^^ Still clearer, for her keener sight 
 
 Of beauty and of wonder, 
 He learns the meaning of the hills 
 
 He dwelt from childhood under. 
 
 ^^ And higher, warmed with summer lights, 
 Or winter-crowned and hoary, 
 
 The rigid horizon lifts for him 
 Its inner veils of glory. 
 
 '^ He has his own free, bookless lore, 
 The lessons nature taught him, 
 
 The wisdom which the woods and hills 
 And toiling men have brought him : 
 
 " The steady force of will whereby 
 Her flexile grace seems sweeter ; 
 
 The sturdy counterpoise which makes 
 Her woman's life completer : 
 
 " A latent fire of soul which lacks 
 
 Ko breath of love to fan it ; 
 And wit, that, like his native brooks. 
 
 Plays over solid granite. 
 
 " How dwarfed against his manliness 
 
 She sees the poor pretension, 
 The wants, the aims, the follies, born 
 
 Of fashion and convention ! 
 
 ^' How life behind its accidents 
 
 * Stands strong and self-sustaining. 
 The human fact transcending all 
 The losing and the gaining. 
 
 59 
 
 430 
 
 435 
 
 445 
 
60 THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 '^And so, in grateful interchange 
 
 Of teacher and of hearer, 
 Their lives their true distinctness keep 
 
 While daily drawing nearer. 
 
 '^ And if the husband or the wife 
 
 In home's strong light discovers 
 Such slight defaults as failed to meet 
 
 The blinded eyes of lovers, 
 
 <^ Why need we care to ask ? — who dreams 
 
 Without their thorns of roses, 
 Or wonders that the truest steel 
 
 The readiest spark discloses ? 
 
 '^ For still in mutual sufferance lies 
 
 The secret of true living: 
 Love scarce is love that never knows 
 
 The sweetness of forgiving. 
 
 '^ We send the Squire to General Court, 
 
 He takes his young wife thither ; 
 Xo prouder man election day 
 
 Eides through the sweet June weather. 
 
 ^^ He sees w^ith eyes of manly trust 
 
 All hearts to her inclining ; 
 N^ot less for him his household light 
 
 That others share its shining." 
 
 Thus, while my hostess spake, there grew 
 
 Before me, warmer tinted 
 And outlined with a tenderer grace, '^^^ 
 
 The picture that she hinted. 
 
 470 
 
AMO:^Q THE HILLS 61 
 
 The sunset smouldered as we drove 
 . Beneath the deep hill-shadows. 
 Below us wreaths of white loo- walke<l 
 
 Like ohosts the haunted iU(^adows. ^^^ 
 
 Soundino- the summer night, the stars 
 Dro])ped down their golden plummets; 
 
 The pale arc of the i^orthern lights 
 Rose o'er the mountain summits, — 
 
 Until, at last, beneath its bridge, ^^^ 
 
 We heard the Bearcamp flowing, 
 And saw across the mapled lawn 
 
 The welcome home-lights glowing ; — 
 
 And, musing on the tale T heard, 
 
 'T were well, thought T, if often ^^o 
 
 To rugged farm-life came the gift 
 
 To harmonize and soften ; — 
 
 If more and more we found the troth 
 
 Of fact and fancy plighted, 
 And culture's charm and labor's strength *^^ 
 
 In rural homes united, — 
 
 The simple life, the homely hearth, 
 
 With beauty's sphere surrounding, 
 And blessing toil where toil abounds 
 
 With graces more abounding. ^^^ 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Line 2. The Incas were the kings of Peru in the ancient days. 
 Preseott says that at Yueay their gardens reproduced plant-life in 
 silver and gold. 
 
62 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 17. The dog-star prevails in the midsummer heat, from the latter 
 part of July to September. 
 
 1-21. A perfect picture of a heat-burdened land. 
 
 65. Sampler. A piece of cloth on Mliich various embroidery 
 stitches Avere worked; a pattern for young fingers to copy. 
 
 66. Mourning pieces Mere crude attempts at memorial of a de- 
 parted loved one. 
 
 81-83. A beautiful figure. 
 
 110. Canning, who later was premier of England, wrot<^ a humor- 
 ous poem entitled The Needy Knife-Grinder, a burlesque on a poem 
 of Southey's, meant to ridicule the Jacohinfi, a political party in 
 England and France about 1797. 
 
 12]. See Ruth, iii. 
 
 134. The Happy Isles, or Fortunate Isles, were imaginary islands 
 in the West, according to Greek mythology, set in a warm sea, where 
 the sun's declining rays kept them always delightful. Here at last 
 came the favorites of the gods to dAvell in endless bliss. See Long- 
 fellow's BuUdincj of the Ship : 
 
 "Ah! if our souls but poise and swing 
 
 Like the compass in its brazen ring, 
 
 Ever level and ever true 
 
 To the toil and the task we have to do. 
 
 We shall sail securely and safely reach 
 
 The Fortunate Isles, on whose sliining beach 
 
 The sights we see and the sounds we hear 
 
 Will be those of joy and not of fear." 
 
 165. Sandwich Notch, Chocorua mountain, Ossipce lake and 
 r>earcamp river are all geographical features of Xew Hampshire, 
 just at the beginning of the White monntain region. A mountain in 
 lliis locality is named for 'Whittier. 
 
 207. Flails are still used in remote places in New England. 
 
 237-248. An ideal of womanhood is presented in these three 
 stanzas. 
 
 263. J*>ilois. Dialect of the illiterate classes. 
 
 361-376. Another ideal picture of womanliness. 
 
 465. The term General Court is given to the State Legislature in 
 New Hampshire and ]Nrassachusetts. 
 
THE PRAYER OF AGASSIZ 63 
 
 THE PEAYER OF AGASSIZ. 
 
 On the isle of Penikese, 
 
 Ringed about by sapphire seas, 
 
 Fanned by breezes salt and cool, 
 
 Stood the Master with his school. 
 
 Over sails that not in vain ^ 
 
 Wooed the west-wind's steady strain. 
 
 Line of coast that low and far 
 
 Stretched its nndnlatinjo- bar, 
 
 Wings aslant across the rim 
 
 Of the waves they stooped to skim, ^^ 
 
 Rock and isle and glistening l)ay, 
 
 Fell the beantiful white day. 
 
 Said the Master to the yontli : 
 
 " We have come in search of trnlli, 
 
 Trying Avitli uncertain key ^^ 
 
 Door by door of mystery ; 
 
 We are reaching, through His laAvs, 
 
 To the garment-hem of Cause, 
 
 Him, the endless, unbegun. 
 
 The IJnnamable, the One ^^ 
 
 Light of all our light the Source, 
 
 Life of life, and *Force of force. 
 
 As with fingers of the blind. 
 
 We are groping here to find 
 
 What the hieroglyphics mean ^^ 
 
 Of the Unseen in the seen, 
 
64 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 What tlie Tlioiight which imderlies 
 
 Nature's masking and -disgnise, 
 
 What it i^ that hides beneath 
 
 J31ight and bloom and birtb ayd death. "" 
 
 ]]v past efforts unavailing, 
 
 Doubt and error, loss and failing, 
 
 Of our weakness made aware, 
 
 On the threshold of our task 
 
 Let us light and guidance ask, ^^' 
 
 Let us pause in silent prayer ! " 
 
 Then the Master in his place 
 
 Bowed his head a little space. 
 
 And the leaves by soft airs stirred, 
 
 Lapse of wave and cry of bird, "^^ 
 
 Left the solemn hush unbroken 
 
 Of that wordless prayer unspoken, 
 
 While its wish, on earth unsaid. 
 
 Rose to heaven interpreted. 
 
 As, in life's best hours, we hear ^^ 
 
 By the spirit's finer ear 
 
 His low voice within us, thus 
 
 The All-Father heareth us ; 
 
 And His holy ear we pain 
 
 With our noisy w^ords and vain. ^^ 
 
 Not for Him our violence 
 
 Storming at the gates of sense. 
 
 His the primal language, his 
 
 The eternal silences ! 
 
 Even the careless heart was moved, ^^ 
 
 And the doubting gave assent, 
 
60 
 
 THE PRAYER OF AGASSIZ 65 
 
 With a gesture reverent, 
 To the Master well-beloved. 
 As thin mists are glorified 
 Bj the light they cannot hide, 
 All who gazed npon him saw, 
 Through its veil of tender awe; 
 How his face was still uplit 
 By the old sweet look of it. 
 Hopeful, ti'ustful, full of cheer. 
 And the love that casts out fear. 
 AVho the secret ma.y declare 
 Of that brief, unuttered prayer ? 
 Did the shade before him come 
 Of th' inevitable doom. 
 Of the end of earth so near, 
 And Eternitv's new year ? 
 
 Tn the lap of sheltering seas 
 
 Rests the isle of Penikese ; 
 
 But the lord of the domain "^^ 
 
 Comes not to his own again : 
 
 Where the eyes that follow fail, 
 
 On a vaster sea his sail 
 
 Drifts beyond our beck and hail. 
 
 Other lips within its bound 
 
 Shall the laws of life expound ; 
 
 Other eyes from rock and shell 
 
 Read the world's old riddles well : 
 
 But when breezes light and bland 
 
 Blow from Simmier's blossomed land, 
 
 When the air is glad with wings, 
 
 80 
 
 85 
 
80 
 
 95 
 
 100 
 
 66 THE CKAI^E OLASSICS 
 
 And the blithe song-sparrow sings, 
 Many an eye with his still face 
 Shall the living ones displace;, 
 Man^'- an ear the word shall seek 
 He alone could fitly speak. 
 And one name forevermore 
 Shall be uttered o'er and o'er 
 By the waves that kiss the shore, 
 By the curlew's whistle sent 
 Down the cool, sea-scented air ; 
 In all voices known to her, 
 !N"ature owns her worshipper, 
 Half in triumph, half lament. 
 Thither Love shall tearful turn, 
 Friendship pause uncovered there, 
 And the wisest reverence learn 
 From the Master's silent prayer. 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Line 1. Penikese Island, in Buzzard's Bay, wa.s given to Agassiz 
 by John Anderson for the use of a summer school of natural his- 
 tory. The school was opened in a large barn. INIrs. Agassiz in her" 
 biography of her husband, says : 
 
 "Agassiz had arranged no programme of exercises, trusting to the 
 interest of the occasion to suggest what might best be said or done. 
 But, as he looked upon his pupils gathered there to study nature 
 Avith him, by an impulse as natural as it was unpremeditated he 
 called upon them to join in silently asking God's blessing on their 
 work together. The pause was broken by the first words of an ad- 
 dress no less fervent than its unspoken prelude." 
 
 Agassiz died in December, 1873, The school was opened the sum- 
 mer before. 
 
 45-54. These lines suggest Whittier's Quaker belief regarding 
 silent worship. 
 
 Notice the harmony of sound and the use of many liquid letters in 
 this poem. 
 
HOW THE KOBm CAME 
 
 67 
 
 HOW THE ROBIK CAME. 
 
 AN ALGONQUIN LEGEND. 
 
 Happy young friends, sit by me, 
 Under May's blown apple-tree. 
 While these home-birds in and out 
 Through the blossoms flit about. 
 Hear a story, strange and old. 
 By the wild red Indians told, 
 How the robin came to be : 
 Once a great chief left his son, — 
 Well-beloved, his only one, — 
 When the boy was well-nigh grown. 
 In the trial-lodge alone. 
 Left for tortures long and slow 
 Youths like him must undergo. 
 Who their pride of manhood test. 
 Lacking wf.ter, food, and rest. 
 
 Seven days the fast he kept. 
 
 Seven nights he never slept. 
 
 Then the young boy, wrung with pain. 
 
 Weak from nature's overstrain. 
 
 Faltering, moaned a low complaint : 
 
 " Spare, me, father, for I faint ! " 
 
 But the chieftain, haughty-eyed, 
 
 Hid his pity in his pride. 
 
 " You shall be a hunter good. 
 
 Knowing Lever lack of food : 
 
 10 
 
 15 
 
 20 
 
 25 
 
68 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 You shall be a Avarrior great, 
 Wise as fox and strong as boar; 
 Many scalps your belt shall wear, 
 If with patient heart you wait 
 T3ravely till yonr task is done. 
 Better you should starving die 
 Than that boy and squaw should cry 
 Shame upon your father's son !" 
 
 When next morn the sun's first rays 
 
 Glistened on the hemlock sprays, 
 
 Straight that lodge the old chief sought, 
 
 And boiled samp and moose meat brought. 
 
 " Rise and eat, my son ! " he said. 
 
 Lo, he found the poor boy dead ! 
 
 As with grief his grave they made, 
 
 And his bow beside him laid, 
 
 Pipe, and knife, and wampum-braid. 
 
 On the lodge-top overhead, 
 
 Preening smooth its breast of red 
 
 And the brown coat that it wore, 
 
 Sat a bird, unknown before. 
 
 And as if with human tongue, 
 
 '' Mourn me not," it said, or sung : 
 
 " I, a bird, am still your son. 
 
 Happier than if hunter fleet, 
 
 Or a brave, before your feet 
 
 Laying scalps in battle won. 
 
 Priend of man, my song shall cheer 
 
 Lodge and corn-land ; hovering near. 
 
 To each wigwam T shall bring 
 
 35 
 
 40 
 
 50 
 
 55 
 
HOW THE KOBIX ('A.ME 69 
 
 Tidings of the coming spring; 
 
 Every child my voice shall know 
 
 In the moon of melting snow, 
 
 When the maple's red bud swells, 
 
 And the wind-flower lifts its bells. ^^ 
 
 As their fond companion 
 
 Men shall henceforth own your son, 
 
 And my song shall testify 
 
 That of human kin am I." 
 
 Thus the Indian legend saith 
 How, at first, the robin came 
 With a sweeter life and death. 
 Bird for boy, and still the same. 
 If my young friends doubt that this 
 Is the robin's genesis, 
 ^ot in vain is still the myth 
 If a truth be found therewith : 
 Unto gentleness belong 
 Gifts unknown to pride and wrong ; 
 Happier far than hate is praise, — 
 He who sings than he who slays. 
 
 65 
 
 70 
 
 75 
 
70 THE CTJATiTE CLASSICS 
 
 TELLmG THE BEES. 
 
 [It was once a custom in rural regions of New England when a 
 death occurred in the family, to tell the bees at once and drape their 
 hives in mourning. This was done to prevent their swarming and 
 leaving their hives for new homes.] 
 
 Here is the place ; right over the hill 
 
 Runs the path I took; 
 You can see the gap in the old wall still. 
 
 And the stepping-stones in the shallow brook. 
 
 There is the house, with the gate red-barred, ^ 
 
 And the poplars tall ; 
 And the barn's brown length, and the cattle-yard, 
 
 And the white horns tossing above the wall. 
 
 There are the beehives ranged in the sun ; 
 
 And down by the brink ^^ 
 
 Of the brook are her poor flowers, weed o'errun. 
 
 Pansy and daffodil, rose and pink. 
 
 A year has gone, as the tortoise goes, 
 
 Heavy and slow ; 
 And the same rose blows, and the same sun glows, ^^ 
 
 And the same brook sings of a year ago. 
 
 There 's the same sweet clover-smell in the breeze ; 
 
 And the June sun warm 
 Tangles his wings of fire in the trees. 
 
 Setting, as then, over Fernside farm. 20 
 
TELLING THE BEES 71 
 
 I mind me how with a lover's care 
 
 From my Sunday coat 
 I brushed off the burrs, and smoothed my hair, 
 
 And cooled at the brookside my brow and throat. 
 
 Since we parted, a month had passed, — 25 
 
 To love, a year ; 
 Down through the beeches I looked at last 
 
 On the little red gate and the well-sweep near. 
 
 I can see it all now, — the slantwise rain 
 
 Of light through the leaves, 3o 
 
 The sundown's blaze on her window-pane, 
 
 The bloom of her roses under the eaves. 
 
 Just the same as a month before, — 
 
 The house and the trees. 
 The barn's browm gable, the vine by the door, — ^'' 
 
 ]i^othing changed but the hive of bees. 
 
 Before them, under the garden wall, 
 
 Forward and back. 
 Went drearily singing the chore-girl small. 
 
 Draping each hive with a shred of black. ^^ 
 
 Trembling, I listened: the summer sun 
 
 Had the chill of snow ; 
 For I knew she was telling the bees of one 
 
 Gone on the journey we all must go I 
 
 Then I said to myself, '' My Mary weeps ^*"'' 
 
 For the dead to-day : 
 Haply her blind grandsire sleeps 
 
 The fret and the pain of his age away." 
 
72 THE CRANE CLxiSSICS 
 
 But her dog whined low ; on the doorway sill, 
 
 With his cane to his chin, ^^ 
 
 The old man sat ; and the chore-girl still 
 Sung to the bees stealing out and in. 
 
 And the song she was singing ever since 
 
 In my ear sounds on : — 
 " Stay at home, pretty bees, fly not hence ! *^ 
 
 Mistress Mary is dead and gone ! '' 
 
SOXGS OF LABOR 73 
 
 SO^s^GS OF LABOR. 
 
 [These poems were first printed in magazines in 1845 and 1S4G. 
 Some of the forms of labor here written of have since ceased to ex- 
 ist; iniprovements and new inventions have displaced them. The 
 poems were published in a volume in 1850. The Dedication was 
 written for this volume.] 
 
 I. DEDICATION. 
 I WOULD the gift I offer here 
 
 Might graces from thy favor take, 
 And, seen through Friendship's atmosphere. 
 On softened lines and coloring, wear 
 The unaccustomed light of beauty, for thy sake. ^ 
 
 Few leaves of Fancy's spring remain : 
 
 But what I have I give to thee. 
 The o'er-sunned bloom of summer's plain, 
 And paler flowers, the latter rain 
 Calls from the westering slope of life's autumnal lea. ^^ 
 
 Above the fallen groves of green, 
 
 AVliere youth's enchanted forest stood, 
 Dry root and mossed trunk between, 
 A sober after-growth is seen. 
 As springs the pine where falls the gay-leafed maple 
 wood ! ^^ 
 
 Yet birds will sing, and breezes play 
 Their leaf -harps in the sombre tree ; 
 And throudi the bleak and wintrv dav 
 
74 THE CRANE CLASSICS • '' , 
 
 It keeps its steady green alway, • — 
 So, even my after-thouglits may have a cliarm for thee. ^^ 
 
 Art's perfect forms no moral need, 
 And beauty is its own excuse ; 
 But for the dull and flowerless weed 
 Some healing virtue still must plead, 
 And the rough ore must find its honors in its use. '^'^ 
 
 So haply these, my simple lays 
 
 Of homely toil, may serve to show 
 The orchard bloom ajid tasselled maize 
 That skirt and gladden duty's ways, 
 The unsung beauty hid life's common things below. ^^ 
 
 Haply from them the toiler, bent 
 
 Above his forge or plough, may gain 
 A manlier spirit of content, 
 And fee] that life is wisest spent 
 Wiere the strong working hand makes strong the working 
 brain. ^^ 
 
 The doom which to the guilty pair 
 
 Without the walls of Eden came. 
 Transforming sinless ease to care 
 And rugged toil, no more shall bear 
 The burden of old crime, or mark of primal shame. '*^ 
 
 A blessing now, a curse no more ; 
 
 Since He, whose name we breathe with awe, 
 The coarse mechanic vesture wore, 
 A [K>or man toiling with the poor. 
 In labor, as in prayer, fulfilling the same la^. ** 
 
SO^sGS or LABOR 
 II. THE SHOEMAKERS. 
 Ho ! workers of tlie old time styled 
 
 The Gentle Craft of Leather ! 
 Young brothers of the ancient guild, 
 
 Stand forth once more together ! 
 Call out again your long array, 
 In the olden merry manner ! 
 Once more, on gay St. Crispin's day, 
 Fling out your blazoned banner ! 
 
 Eap, rap ! upon the well-worn stone 
 
 How falls the polished hammer ! 
 Kap, rap ! the measured sound has grown 
 
 A quick and merry clamor. 
 Now shape the sole ! now deftly (iurl 
 
 The glossy vamp around it, 
 ~ And bless the while the bright-eyed girl 
 
 Whose gentle fingers bound it ! 
 
 For you, along the Spanish main 
 
 A hundred keels are ploughing; 
 For you, the Indian on the plain 
 
 His lasso-coil is throwing; 
 For you, deep glens with hemlock dark 
 
 The woodman's fire is lighting; 
 For you, upon the oak's gray bark, 
 
 The woodman's axe is smiting. 
 
 For you, from Carolina's pine 
 The rosin-gum is stealing; 
 
 For you, the dark-eyed Florentine 
 Her silken skein is reeling; 
 
 50 
 
 55 
 
 60 
 
 6S 
 
 70 
 
80 
 
 76 ' THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 For jou, tlie clizzj goatlierd roams 
 
 His rugged Alpine ledges ; 
 For you, round all lier shepherd homes, 
 
 Bloom England's thorny hedges. 
 
 The foremost still, hy day or nighf, 
 
 On moated moimd or heather, 
 Where'er the need of trampled right 
 
 Brought toiling men together; 
 Where the free burghers from the wall 
 
 Defied the mail-clad master, 
 Than yours, at Freedom's trumpet-call, 
 
 'No craftsman rallied faster. *^ 
 
 Let foplings sneer, let fools deride. 
 
 Ye heed no idle scorner; 
 Free hands and hearts are still your pride, 
 
 And duty done, your honor. 
 Ye dare to trust, for honest fame. 
 
 The jury Time empanels, 
 And lea^e to truth each noble name 
 
 Which glorifies your annals. 
 
 90 
 
 95 
 
 Thy songs, Hans Sachs, are living yet. 
 
 In strong and hearty German ; 
 And Bloomfield's lay, and Gifford's wit. 
 
 And patriot fame of Sherman ; 
 Still from his book, a mystic seer, ^ 
 
 The soul of Behmen teaches, 
 And England's priestcraft shakes to hear '^^^ 
 
 Of Fox's leathern breeches. 
 
SONGS OF LABOR 
 
 The foot is yours; where'er it falls, 
 
 It treads yonr well-wrought leather 
 On earthen floor, in marble halls, 
 
 On carpet, or on heather. 
 Still there the sweetest charm is found 
 
 Of matron grace or vestal's. 
 As Hebe's foot bore nectar round 
 
 Among the old celestials ! 
 
 Kap, rap ! your stout and rough brogan, 
 
 With footsteps slow and weary. 
 May wander where the sky's blue span 
 
 Shuts down upon the prairie. 
 'On Beauty's foot your slip])ers glance. 
 
 By Saratoga's fountains. 
 Or twinkle down the summer dance 
 
 Beneath the Crystal Mountains ! 
 
 The red brick to the mason's hand. 
 The brown earth to the tiller's, 
 The shoe in yours shall wealth command, 
 
 Like fairy Cinderella's 1 
 As they who shunned the household maid 
 
 Beheld the crown upon her, 
 So all shall see your toil repaid 
 
 With hearth and home and honor. 
 
 Then let the toast be freely quaffed. 
 In water cool and brimming, — 
 
 " All honor to the good old Craft, 
 Its merry men and women ! " 
 
 77 
 
 105 
 
 110 
 
 115 
 
 120 
 
 125 
 
135 
 
 140 
 
 78 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 Call out again your long arraj^, 
 In the old time's pleasant manner : 
 
 Once more, on gay St. Crispin's day, 
 Fling out his blazoned banner! 
 
 III. THE FISHERMEX. 
 
 Hurrah ! the seaward breezes 
 
 Sweep down the bay amain ; 
 Heave up, my lads, the anchor ! 
 
 Run up the sail again ! 
 Leave to the lubber landsmen 
 
 The rail-car and the steed ; 
 •The stars of heaven shall guide us, 
 
 The breath of heaven shall speed. 
 
 From the hilltop looks the steej)le, 
 
 And the lighthouse from the sand ; 
 And the scattered pines are waving 
 
 Their farewell from the land. ^*^ 
 
 One glance, my lads, behind us. 
 
 For the homes we leave one sigh. 
 Ere we take the change and chances 
 
 Of the ocean and the sky. 
 
 IsTow, brothers, for the icebergs ^^^ 
 
 Of frozen Labrador, 
 Floating spectral in the moonshine, 
 
 Along the low, black shore ! 
 Where like snow the gannet's feathers 
 
 On Brador's rocks are shed, ^^^ 
 
 And the noisy murr are flying. 
 
 Like black scuds, overhead; 
 
SOICaS OF LABOR 79 
 
 ^^Hiere in mist the rock is hiding, 
 
 And the sharp reef lurks below, 
 And the white squall smites in summer, ^^^ 
 
 And the autumn tempest blow ; 
 AVhere through gray and rolling vapor, 
 
 From evening unto morn, 
 A thousand boats are hailing, 
 
 Horn answering unto horn. ^^^ 
 
 Hurrah ! for the Ked Island, 
 
 With the white cross on its crown ! 
 Hurrah! for Meccatina, 
 
 And its mountains bare and brown ! 
 Where the Caribou's tall antlers ^~^ 
 
 O'er the dwarf -wood freely toss. 
 And the footstep of the Mickmack 
 
 Has no sound upon the moss. 
 
 There we'll drop our lines, and gather 
 
 Old Ocean's treasures in, '^'^^ 
 
 Where'er the mottled mackerel 
 
 Turns up a steel-dark fin. 
 The sea 's our field of harvest. 
 
 Its scaly tribes our grain ; 
 We'll reap the teeming waters ^^® 
 
 As at home they reap the plain ! 
 
 Our wet hands spread the carpet. 
 
 And light the hearth of home ; 
 From our fish, as in the old time, 
 
 The silver coin shall come. ^^^ 
 
 As the demon fled the chamber 
 
190 
 
 80 THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 Where the fish of Tobit lay, 
 So ours from all our dwellings 
 Shall frighten Want away. 
 
 Tliongh the mist upon our jackets 
 
 In the bitter air congeals, 
 And our lines wind stiff and slowly 
 
 From off the frozen reels ; 
 Though the fog be dark around us, 
 
 And the storm blow high and loud, 
 We will whistle down the wild wind. 
 
 And laugh beneath the cloud ! 
 
 In the darkness as in daylight, 
 
 On the water as on land, 
 God's eye is looking on us, 
 
 And beneath us is His hand ! 
 Death will find us soon or later. 
 
 On the deck or in the cot ; 
 And we cannot meet him better 
 
 Than in working out our lot. ^^^ 
 
 Hurrah ! hurrah ! the west-wind 
 
 Comes freshening down the bay. 
 The rising sails are filling ; 
 
 Give way, my lads, give way ! 
 Leave the coward landsman clinging ^^^ 
 
 To the dull earth, like a weed ; 
 The stars of heaven shall guide us. 
 
 The breath of heaven shall speed ! 
 
 200 
 
SONGS OF LABOR 
 
 ly. THE LU^IBERMEX. 
 
 Wildly round our woodland quarters 
 
 Sad- voiced Autumn grieves ; 
 Thickly down these swelling waters 
 
 Float his fallen leaves. 
 Through the tall and naked timber, 
 
 Column-like and old, 
 Gleam the sunsets of November, 
 
 From their skies of gold. 
 
 O'er us, to the southland heading, 
 
 Screams the gray wild goose; 
 On the night-frost sounds the treading 
 
 Of the brindled moose. 
 i^Toiseless creeping, while Ave're sleeping, 
 
 Frost his task-work plies ; 
 Soon, his icy bridges heaping, 
 
 Shall our log-piles rise. 
 
 When, with sounds of smothered thunder. 
 
 On some night of rain, 
 Lake and river break asunder 
 
 Winter's weakened chain, 
 Down the wild March flood shall bear them 
 
 To the saw-mill's wheel, 
 Or where Steam, the slave, shall tear them 
 
 With his teeth of steel. 
 
 Be it starlight, be it moonlight. 
 
 In these vales below, 
 AMien the earliest beams of sunlight 
 
 Streak the mountain's snow, 
 
 81 
 
 21: 
 
 220 
 
 2S0 
 
 235 
 
 240 
 
82 THE CPvAXE CLASSICS 
 
 Crisps the hoar-frost, keen and early, 
 
 To our hurrying feet, 
 And the forest echoes clearly 
 
 All onr blows repeat. 
 
 ^Vh^ere the crystal Amhijejis 
 
 Stretches hroad and clear, 
 And Millnoket's pine-black ridges 
 
 Hide the browsing deer ; 
 Where, through lakes and wide morasses. 
 
 Or through rocky walls, 
 Swift and strong, Penobscot passes 
 
 White with foamy falls ; 
 
 Where, through clouds, are glimpses given 
 
 Of Katahdin's sides, — 
 Eock and forest piled to heaven, 
 
 Torn and ploughed by slides ! 
 Far below, the Indian trapping, 
 
 In the sunshine warm ; 
 Far above, the snow-cloud wrapping 
 
 Half the peak in storm ! 
 
 260 
 
 Where are mossy carpets better 
 
 Than the Persian weaves, 
 And than Eastern jDcrfumes sweeter 
 
 Seem the fading leaves ; ^^^ 
 
 And a music wild and solemn. 
 
 Prom the pine-tree's height. 
 Rolls its vast and sea-like volume 
 
 On the wind of night ; 
 
SONGS OF LABOR S3 
 
 Make we here our camp of winter ; ^ " ^ 
 
 And, through sleet and suoav, 
 Pitchy knot and h*oeclien s^plintv^r 
 
 On our liearth shall i^low. 
 Here, with mirth to lighten duty, 
 
 We shall lack alone ^'^ 
 
 Woman's smile and girlhood's beauty, 
 
 Childhood's lisping tone. 
 
 But their hearth is brighter burning 
 
 For our toil to-day ; 
 And the welcome of returning ^^^ 
 
 Shall our loss repay, 
 AMien, like seamen from the waters. 
 
 From the woods we come, 
 Greeting sisters, wi^■es, and djuighters, 
 
 Angels of our home ! 
 
 'Not for us the measured ringing 
 
 From the village spire, 
 Not for us the Sabbath singing 
 
 Of the sweet-voiced choir ; 
 Ours the old, majestic temple. 
 
 Where God's brightness shines 
 Down the dome so grand and ample, 
 
 Propped by lofty pines ! 
 
 Through each branch-enwoven skylight, 
 
 Speaks He in the breeze, 
 As of old beneath the twilight 
 
 Of lost Eden's trees ! 
 For His ear, the inward feeling 
 
 285 
 
 295 
 
84 THE OEANE CLASSICS 
 
 Xeeds no outward tongue ; 
 He can see the spirit kneeling ^^® 
 
 While the axe is swnn<i\ 
 
 Heeding truth alone^ and turning 
 
 From the false and dim, 
 Lamp of toil or altar burning 
 
 Are alike to Him. ^''^ 
 
 Strike, then, comrades ! Trade is waiting 
 
 On our rugged toil ; 
 Far ships waiting for the freighting 
 
 Of our woodland spoil ! 
 
 Ships, whose traffic links these highlands, •^'^' 
 
 Bleak and cold, of ours, 
 With the citron-planted islands . 
 
 Of a clime of flowers ; 
 To our frosts the tribute bringing 
 
 Of eternal heats; ^'^ 
 
 In our lap of winter flinging 
 
 Tropic fruits and sweets. - 
 
 Cheerlj, on the axe of labor, 
 
 Let the sunbeams dance, 
 Better than the flash of sabre ^'^ 
 
 Or the gleam of lance I 
 Strike! With every blow is given 
 
 Freer sun and sky, 
 And the long-hid earth to heaven 
 
 Looks, with wondering eye ! "-'"^ 
 
 Loud behind us grow the murmurs 
 Of the age to come ; 
 
840 
 
 SONGS OF LABOR 86 
 
 Clang of smiths, and tread of farmers, 
 
 Bearing harvest home ! 
 Here her virgin lap with treasures ^^^ 
 
 Shall the green earth fill ; 
 Waving wheat and golden maize-ears 
 
 Crown each beechen hill. 
 
 Keep who will the city's alleys, 
 
 Take the smooth-shorn plain ; ^^^ 
 
 Give to us the cedarn valleys, 
 
 Eocks and hills of Maine ! 
 In our N^orthland, wild and woody. 
 
 Let us still have part ; 
 Rugged nurse and mother sturdy, 
 
 Hold us to thy heart ! 
 
 Oh, our free hearts beat the warmer 
 
 For thy breath of snow ; 
 And our tread is all the firmer 
 
 For thy rocks below. 
 Freedom, hand in hand with labor, 
 
 Walketh strong and brave ; 
 On the forehead of his neighbor 
 
 'No man writeth Slave ! 
 
 Lo, the day breaks ! old Katahdin's 
 
 Pine-trees show its fires, 
 ^Vhile from these dim forest gardens 
 
 Rise their blackened spires. 
 Up, my comrades ! up and doing ! 
 
 Manhood's rugged play 
 Still renewing, bravely hewing 
 
 Through the world our way ! 
 
 350 
 
 355 
 
360 
 
 370 
 
 86 THE CEANE CLASSICS 
 
 V. THE SHIP-BUILDERS. 
 
 The sky is ruddy in the east, 
 
 The earth is gray below, 
 And, spectral in the river-mist. 
 
 The ship's white timbers show. 
 Then let the sounds of measured stroke 
 
 And grating saw begin ; 
 The broad-axe to the gnarled oak, 
 
 The mallet to the pin ! 
 
 Hark ! roars the bellows, blast on blast. 
 
 The sooty smithy jars. 
 And fire-sparks, rising far and fast. 
 
 Are fading with the stars. 
 All day for us the smith shall stand 
 
 Beside that flashing forge ; 
 All day for us his heavy hand 
 
 The groaning anvil scourge. 
 
 From far-off hills, the panting team 
 
 For us is toiling near ; ^^^ 
 
 For us the raftsmen down the stream 
 
 Their island barges steer. 
 Rings out for us the axe-man's stroke 
 
 In forests old and still; 
 For us the century-circled oak ^^^ 
 
 Falls crashing down his hill. , 
 
 Up ! up ! in nobler toil than ours 
 
 1^0 craftsmen bear a part : 
 We make of N'ature's giant powers 
 
 The slaves of human Art. ^^^ 
 
SOA^GS OF LABOR 87 
 
 Lny rib to rib and Ijeam to beam, 
 
 And drive the treenails free ; 
 'Nor faithless joint nor ya^vning seam 
 
 Shall tempt the searching sea ! 
 
 Where'er the keel of our good ship 
 
 The sea's rough field shall plough ; 
 Where'er her tossing spars shall drip 
 
 With salt-spray caught below ; 
 That ship must heed her master's beck, 
 
 Her helm obey his hand, 
 And seamen tread her reeling deck 
 
 As if they trod the land. 
 
 Her oaken ribs the vulture-beak 
 
 Of I^orthern ice may peel ; 
 The sunken rock and coral peak 
 
 May grate along her keel ; 
 And know we well the painted shell 
 
 A¥e give to wind and wave, 
 Must float, the sailor's citadel. 
 
 Or sink, the sailor's grave ! 
 
 Ho ! strike away the bars and blocks, 
 
 And set the good ship free ! 
 Why lingers on these dusty rocks 
 
 The young bride of the sea ? 
 Look ! how she moves a down the grooves. 
 
 In graceful beauty now ! 
 How lowly on the breast she loves 
 
 Sinks down her virgin prow ! 
 
 300 
 
 3U5 
 
88 THE CKANE CLASSICS 
 
 God bless lier ! wlieresoe'er the breeze 
 
 Her snowy wing sliall fan, ^^^"^ 
 
 Aside the frozen Hebrides 
 
 Or sultry Hindostan ! 
 AVhere'er, in mart or on the main, 
 
 With peaceful flag unfurled, 
 She helps to wind the silken chain '*^*' 
 
 Of commerce round the world ! 
 
 Speed on the ship ! But let her bear 
 
 'No merchandise of sin, 
 i^o groaning cargo of despair 
 
 Her roomy hold within ; *25 
 
 No Lethean drug for Eastern lands, 
 
 Nov poison-draught for ours ; 
 But honest fruits of toiling hands 
 
 And !N"ature's sun and showers. 
 
 Be hers the Prairie's golden grain, *^^ 
 
 The Desert's golden sand. 
 The clustered fruits of sunny Spain, 
 
 The spice of Morning-land ! 
 Her pathway on the open main 
 
 May blessings folloAV free, *^.^ 
 
 And glad hearts welcome back again 
 
 Her white sails from the sea ! 
 
 VI. THE DROVERS. 
 
 TiiEOUGH heat and cold, and shower and sun. 
 
 Still onward cheerily driving! 
 There 's life alone in duty done, **^ 
 
 And rest alone in striving. 
 
SOIS^GS OF LABOR 
 
 89 
 
 But see 1 the day is closing cool, 
 
 The woods are dim before us ; 
 The white fog of the wayside pool 
 
 Is creeping slowly o'er \is. 
 
 The night is falling, comrades mine, 
 
 Our footsore beasts are weary, 
 And through yon elms the tavern sign 
 
 Looks out upon us cheery. 
 The landlord beckons from his door, 
 
 His beechen fire is glowing ; 
 These ample barns, with feed in store, 
 
 Are filled to overfiowing. 
 
 From many a valley frowned across 
 
 By brows of rugged mountains ; 
 From hillsides where, through spongy moss, 
 
 Gush out the river fountains ; 
 From quiet farm-fields, green and low, 
 
 And bright with blooming clover ; 
 From vales of corn the wandering crow 
 
 :N'o richer hovers over, — 
 
 Day after day our way has been 
 
 O'er many a hill and hollow; 
 By lake and stream, by wood and glen. 
 
 Our stately drove we follow. 
 Through dust-clouds rising thick and dun 
 
 As smoke of battle o'er us, 
 Their white horns glisten in the sun, 
 
 Like plumes and crests before us. 
 
 445 
 
 450 
 
 455 
 
 460 
 
 465 
 
90 THE CEA^^E CLASSICS 
 
 We see them sIoavIv climb the hill, 
 
 As slow behind it sinking; 
 Or, thronging close, from roadside rill, 
 
 Or sunny lakelet, drinking. 
 ISTow crowding in the narrow road, 
 
 In thick and struggling masses. 
 They glare upon the teamster's load. 
 
 Or rattling coach that passes. 
 
 Anon, with toss of horn and tail. 
 
 And paw of hoof, and bellow. 
 They leap some farmer's broken pale. 
 
 O'er meadow-close or fallow. 
 Forth comes the startled goodman ; forth 
 
 Wife, children, house-dog sally. 
 Till once more on their dusty path 
 
 The baffled truants rally. 
 
 We drive no starvelings, scraggy grown. 
 
 Loose-legged, and ribbed and bony. 
 Like those who grind their noses down 
 
 On pastures bare and stony, — 
 Lank oxen, rough as Indian dogs. 
 
 And cows too lean for shadows. 
 Disputing feebly with the frogs 
 
 The crop of saw-grass meadows ! 
 
 In our good drove, so sleek and fair, 
 
 'No bones of leanness rattle, 
 No tottering hide-bound ghosts are there. 
 
 Or Pharaoh's evil cattle. 
 Each stately beeve bespeaks the hand 
 
 470 
 
 485 
 
 495 
 
SONGS OF LABOR 91 
 
 That fed him iiiirepiiiiiig ; 
 The fatness of a goodly hind ^^^ 
 
 Tn each dnn hide i^ shining. 
 
 We've sought them Avhere, in warmest nooks, 
 
 The freshest feed is growing, 
 By sweetest springs and clearest brooks 
 
 Through honeysuckle flowing ; ^^^ 
 
 Wherever hillsides, sloping south, 
 
 Are bright with early grasses. 
 Or, tracking green the lowland's drouth, 
 
 The mountain streamlet passes. 
 
 But now the day is closing cool, ^'^^ 
 
 The woods are dim liefore us, 
 The white fog of the wayside pool 
 
 Is creeping slowly o'er us. 
 The cricket to the frog's bassoon 
 
 His shrillest time is kee])ing; ^^^ 
 
 The sickle of yon setting moon 
 
 The meadow-mist is reaping. 
 
 The night is falling, comrades mine. 
 
 Our footsore beasts are weary, 
 xind through yon elms the tavern sign 
 
 Looks out upon us cheery. 
 To-morrow, eastward with our charge 
 
 We '11 go to meet the dawning, 
 Ere yet the pines of Kearsarge 
 
 Have seen the sun of morning. 
 
 When snow-flakes o'er the frozen earth. 
 Instead of birds are flitting; 
 
 520 
 
 525 
 
530 
 
 540 
 
 92 THE CKAIs^E CLASSICS 
 
 "\ATien children throng the glowing hearth, 
 
 And quiet wives are knitting; 
 While in the firelight strong and clear 
 
 Young eyes of pleasure glisten, 
 To tales of all we see and hear 
 
 The ears of home shall listen. 
 
 By many a xS^orthern lake and hill, 
 
 From many a mountain pasture, 
 Shall fancy play the Drover still. 
 
 And speed the long night faster. 
 Then let us on through shower and sun. 
 
 And heat and cold, be driving ; 
 There 's life alone in duty done, 
 
 And rest alone in striving. 
 
 VII. THE HUSKEE.^. 
 
 It was late in mild October, and tlie long autumnal rain 
 Had left the summer harvest-fields all green with grass 
 
 again ; 
 The first sharp frost had fallen, leaving all the woodlands 
 
 gay 
 
 With the hues of summer's rainbow, or the meadow-flowers 
 of May. ^^^ 
 
 Through a thin, dry mist, that morning, the sun rose broad 
 
 and red, 
 At first a rayless disk of fire, he brightened as he sped ; 
 Yet, even his noontide glory fell chastened and subdued. 
 On the cornfields and the orchards, and softly pictured 
 
 wood. 
 
SO^^GS OF LABOK 93 
 
 And all that quiet afternoon, slow sloping to the night, ^'^'^'^ 
 He wove with golden shuttle the haze with yellow light; 
 Slanting through the painted beeches, he glorified the hill ; 
 And, beneath it, pond ;u]d meadow lay brighter, greener 
 still. 
 
 And shouting boys in Avoodland haunts caught glimpses of 
 
 that sky. 
 Flecked by the many-tinted leaves, and laughed, they 
 
 knew not wh}", °^^ 
 
 And school-girls gay with aster-flowers, beside tlie meadow 
 
 brooks. 
 Mingled the glow of autumn with the sunshine of sweet 
 
 looks. 
 
 From spire and barn looked westerly the ])atient weather- 
 cocks ; 
 
 But even the birches on the hill stood motionless as rocks. 
 
 N^o sonnd was in the woodlands, save the squirrel's drop- 
 ping shell, ^^'^ 
 
 And the yellow leaves among the bonghs, low rustling as 
 they fell. 
 
 The summer grains were harvested; the stubble-fields lay 
 
 Where Jnne winds rolled, in light and shade, tlie pale 
 
 green waves of rye; 
 But still, on gentle hill-slopes, in valleys fringed with wood, 
 Ungathered, bleaching in the sun, the henvy corn crop 
 
 stood. ^ '''" 
 
 Eent low, by autumn's wind and rain, through husks that, 
 dry and sere, 
 
94 THE CEANE CEASSTCS 
 
 TTiifolded from tlieir ripened charge, shone out the yellow 
 
 ear; 
 Beneath, the turnip lav concealed, in many a verdant fold, 
 And glistened in the slanting light tlio jrnmpkin's sphero- 
 
 of gold. 
 
 Tliere wrought the hnsy harvesters ; and many a creaking 
 
 warn ^ ' " 
 
 Bore slowly to the long barn-floor its load of hnsk and 
 
 grain ; 
 Till broad and red, as when he rose, the sun sank down, at 
 
 last, 
 And like a merry guest's farewell, the day in brightness 
 
 passed. 
 
 .Vnd lo ! as through tlie western pines, on meadow, stream, 
 
 and pond, 
 Flamed the red radiance of a sky, set all afire beyond, '^"'^ 
 Slowly o'er the eastern sea-bluffs a milder glory shone, 
 And the sunset and the moonrise were mingled into one ! 
 
 As thus into the quiet night the twilight lapsed away, 
 And deeper in the brightening moon the tranquil shadows 
 
 lay, 
 From many a brown old farm-house, and hamlet without 
 
 name, ^^^ 
 
 Their milking and their home-tasks done, the merry hnsk- 
 
 ers came. 
 
 Swung o'er the heaped-u]) harvest, from pitchforks in the 
 
 mow, 
 Shone dimly down the lanterns on the pleasant scene below ; 
 The growing pile of husks behind, the golden ears before, 
 
SOXGS OF LABOR 95 
 
 And laughing eyes and busy hands and brown cheeks glim- 
 mering o'er. ^'^^ 
 
 Half hidden, in a quiet nook, serene of look and heart, 
 'Talking their old times over, the old men sat a])art ; 
 While up and down the nnhnsked ])ile, or nestling in its 
 
 shade, 
 At hide-and-seek, with langh and shont, the happy children 
 
 played. 
 
 T^rged by the good host's daughter, a maiden yonng and 
 
 fair, " ^ " ' 590 
 
 Lifting to light her sweet bine eyes and jn-ide of soft 
 
 brown hair, 
 The master of the village school, sleek of hair and smooth 
 
 of tongue, 
 To the quaint tune of some old psalm, a husking-ballad 
 
 sung. 
 
 VIII. THE CORN- SONG. 
 
 Heap high the farmer's wintry hoard ! 
 
 Heap high the golden corn ! ^^^' 
 
 'No richer gift has Autumn poured 
 
 From out lie-r lavish horn ! 
 
 Let other lands, exulting, glean 
 
 The apple from the pine. 
 The orange from its glossy green, ^'^^ 
 
 The cluster from the vine ; 
 
 We better love the hardy gift 
 
 Our rugged vales bestow. 
 To cheer us when the storm shall drift 
 
 Our harvest-fields with snow. ^*^^ 
 
610 
 
 96 THE CRANE CLASSICS 
 
 Through vales of grass and meads of flowers 
 
 Our ploughs their furrows made, 
 While on the hills the sun and showers 
 
 Of changeful April played. 
 
 We dropped the seed o'er hill and plain 
 
 Beneath the sun of May, 
 And frightened from our sprouting grain 
 
 The robher crows away. 
 
 All through the long, bright days of June 
 
 Its leaves grew green and fair, ^^^ 
 
 And waved in hot midsummer's noon 
 Its soft and yellow hair. 
 
 And now, with Autumn's moonlit eves, 
 
 Its harvest-time has come, 
 We pluck away the frosted leaves, ^'^ 
 
 And bear the treasure home- 
 There, when the snows about us drift, 
 
 And winter winds are cold, 
 Fair hands the broken grain shall sift. 
 
 And knead its meal of gold. ®^® 
 
 Let vapid idlers loll in silk 
 
 Around their costly board: 
 Give us the bowl of samp and nulk. 
 
 By homespun beauty poured ! 
 
 Where'er the wide old ]?:itchen lienrth ^'-^^ 
 
 Sends up its smoky curls. 
 Who will not thank the kindly earth, 
 
 And bless our farmer "iris ! 
 
SOI^-GS OF LABOR 97 
 
 Then shame on all the proud and vain. 
 
 Whose folly laughs to scorn ®^*^ 
 
 The blessing of our hardy grain, 
 Our wealth of golden corn ! 
 
 Let earth withhold her goodly root, 
 
 Let mildew blight the rye, 
 Give to the worm the orchard's fruit, ^^^ 
 
 The wheat-field to the fly: 
 
 But let the good old crop adorn 
 
 The hills our fathers trod ; 
 Still let us, for His golden corn, 
 
 Send up our thanks to God ! ^^^ 
 
 Line 52. Saint Crispin's Day is October 25. The story goes that 
 in the third century Crispin and his brother Crispinian were both 
 preachers of the gospel while they followed shoemaking for a living. 
 They both were martyrs to the cause of Christ. 
 
 62. The northern coast of South America was called the Spanish 
 main when it first came into the possession of Spain. 
 
 72. Florence, Italy, was for a long time noted for the manufac- 
 ture of sewing-silk. When the industry Avas begun in North Hamp- 
 ton, Massachusetts, the name Florence was given to the manufactur- 
 ing village. 
 
 82. The author probably refers to the struggles of the manu- 
 facturing towns of Italy, and Germany and England to free them- 
 selves from the power of the barons. 
 
 94. Reference to Hans Sachs will be found in Longfellow's poem, 
 entitled Nuremlmrg. 
 
 96. Pvobert Bloomfield was an English poet and William Gifford 
 an English wit and satirist. Both were shoemakers by trade. Gif- 
 ford was the first editor of the Quarterly Review. 
 7— 
 
98 THE CKANE CLASSICS 
 
 97. Roger Sherman, once a shoemaker at New Milford, Connecti- 
 cut, was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. 
 
 99. Jacob Behmen was a German mystic of the 17th century. 
 
 101. George Fox was the founder of the Quaker Church. 
 
 117. Crystal Mountains. A name once given to the White moun- 
 tains on account of crystals found there that were supposed to be 
 diamonds. 
 
 Compare The Corn Song with Ellen Allerton's Walls of Corn. 
 
DEC 101904