4
POE MS
BY
MRS. SEBA SMITH.  
THE
SINLESS CHIILD,
AND
OTHIER POEMS,
BY
ELIZABETH OAK~ES SMIITH.
EDITED BY
JOHN KEESE.
W~liEY & PUTNAM, NEW YORK.
W, D. TICKNOR, BOSTON.
M I)CCC XLIII. 
EAnte.e(l according to Act of Congress, in the year eighteen hundred
and forty three, by JoiN KEIESE, in thie Clerk's office of the District
Court of the Southern District of New  York
D. Murphy, Printer, 384 Pearl Street. 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
-' I gay unto you, that in heaven their angels do always bel(old the
fl  of mily Father, which is in heaven,"-XItkchew, xviii. 10().
1* 
:i
All 
TO THE READER.
BOTIH the English reviews and our own
periodicals, have made themselves so merry over
the existing literary fashion of one friend editing
the works of another, who still lives to write;
that there can be no impertinence in the collector
of these poems, "defining his position," while
giving them to the public.
The three volumes, of a similar description, edited by him, were so cordially noticed
by the press, that no stimulus was wanting in
the farther indulgence of his taste in collecting
American Poetry, the more especially, as the 
TO THE READER.
demi-professional character of Publisher, in
which he was best known perhaps, seemed to
oppose no bar to the courteous reception of his
editorial labours among the literary fraternity.
And why, indeed, it may be observed in
passing, should not a bookseller aimr at being
something more than the mechanical salesman
of printed paper! Are his pursuits, of all others,
the most hostile to literary culture? Is he presumed to exercise neither judgment nor taste in
furthering the ends of trade; presumed to buy
and sell only according to the existing demands
of the literary marlke; while even the enterprise
of the haberdasher is denied him, in anticipating
the call for an article and introducing it to "the
season."
Surely, in this country, at least, no pursuit
is thus conducted; for while on the one side, the
producer is constantly obliged to act as his own
vi.ii 
TO THE READER.
factor; on the other, whether it be the staple
of cotton, or the fabrication of pin-heads, every
intelligent dealer makes himself, more or less
familiar with the processes of nature or of art,
in the production of the article. In fact, whether
the "operation," be in wheat or tobacco, in books
or burlaps, it is this exercise of his own intelligence, which alone gives soul to enterprise, and
distinguishes the energy of the operator from
that of a mill-horse or steam-engine.
Now, after this formal, but he trusts, not
presuming preamble, the writer is somewhat discomfitted at being compelled to acknowledge,
that with regard to the publication of the present
volume, he cannot claim the exercise of one particle of that literary discernment which he has
been trying to persuade the reader is the gift of
every successful publisher. The author of these
admirable poems has, indeed, been long known
ix 
TO THE READER.
to him as one of the most successful contributors
to the popular magazines of the day. A woman
whose varied powers have been proved in almost
every department of periodical writing; a grace
ful, thinking, and vigorous essayist; a vivid narrator, whose humour, sentiment, and singularly
felicitous descriptive powers, betrayed even in
her most hurried effusions, a mastery of the
whole gamut of thought, feeling, and expression. But as a poet, the author of the " Sinless
Child," was scarcely known to him at the time lihe
embodied, with others, the verses which appeared
in one of his previous volumes;* and it was
through his professional avocations only, that he
was introduced to the rare work of genius which
gives its title to the present volume.
The "Sinless Child," was first published in
the Southern Literary Messenger, some eighteen
*The Poets of America, edited by John Keese, vol. 2.
x 
TO THE READER.
months since. The manner in which it was
received by the public is familiar to those who
keep an eye upon the new developements of
literary power, which are constantly appearing
in our brief-lived, but thriving growth of national
periodicals.  The writer of this, cannot claim to
have been among the first to welcome the advent
of a fresh and original poem, whose inspiration
seems drawn from the purest well-springs of
thought and fancy; nay, as already hinted, he
admits that it was only the frequent demand for
the work at his publishing office, under the presumption that it had already assumed the form of
a book, which induced him, in the first instance,
to procure a copy, and make a personal examination of its beauties. He does claim, however,
that in the many months which have passed
away since that first perusal, no effort has been
spared, upon his part, to have it brought before
xi 
TO THE READER.
the public in a fitting shape. The hesitation and
diffidence of the party chiefly interested in such
a step, will be appreciated and understood by
those who, living by their daily literary toil, and
often giving their name to the public, with some
hasty effusion, designed to meet the immediate
call upon their pen, still preserve a hiigh intellectual standard within their own minds, and distrust their best productions when put forth as the
consummate effort of their literary powers.
It is with honest and heartfelt gratification
therefore, that the writer of these remarks has
availed himnself of the high privilege of superintending the present volume, nor does he fear
that the act of introducing it to the public, under
his ow?t name, requires farther explanation or
apology, with those who love pure poetry and
respect womanly feeling.
J. K.
xii  
THE editor ought, perhaps, to content himself with
giving the foregoing account of his incidental connection
with the work now before the reader. It may be thought,
however, that his share in bringing it before the public,
were incomplete, without subjoining a more particular
notice of the author and her productions.
In several attempts he has made to prepare this, he
has never been able to succeed to his own satisfaction;
on the one hand, the earnestness with which he would
claim for her a foremost rank among the writers of the
country, might be attributed to the zeal of personal
friendship-while, on the other, appreciating the rare
merit of these poems, as he does, he could not, with
proper respect for his own opinions, speak in cold and
measured words, of productions so rich in exquisite fancy
and high moral beauty. He has, therefore, ventured to
adopt here, the notices of two skilful writers, whose
names, at least, will go far to authenticate his own
judgment. 
PRE F ACE.
THE  following lively sketch of the author of " THE
SINLESS CHTLD," (who is a native of Portland, Mass.)
appeared sometime since in, The Family Companion;"
when the varied literary powers of Mrs. Smith had, as
yet, but partially developed themselves. It is interesting
as a piece of literary biography, while highly characteristic
of the racy writer from whose quaint, but fervid pen it
originates. Mr. Neal, never too ready to praise, was one
of the first, it is said, to hail the early promise of his gifted
townswoman.
ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH,
B3Y JOHN NEAL.
MRS.  SEBA,  or properly speaking,  Mrs.
Elizabeth, is the wife of Mr. Seba Smith.  Of
the husband, as the only true and genuine, or 
PREFACE.
as the Yankees have it, gin-or-wine, Jack
Downing, and the unquestionable originator of
that character, most of our people know something already. But, although multitudes may
have heard of Mr. Seba Smith-if not by his
own name, at least by that of Major Downingit is the few, only-the very few-that have
heard of Mr. Seba Smith's wife.  And yet, no
woman of our day, better deserves a more delicate and becoming notoriety.
Modest, pretty, loving and gentle, given
to poetry-sincere  and beautiful  poetry-and
writing very agreeable prose, too, at a pinch
-witness her little roguish stories about Uncle
Zeke, and others-always picturing what she
sees with uncommon sprightliness and truth,
one would'nt much wonder, perhaps, to find the
character of Major Downing himself, the joint
product of husband and wife. We have heard
xvi 
PREFACE.
such things whispered heretofore,  and are not
quite sure that we havn't vouched for their truth,
on being taxed ourself with the authorship of
many a Yankee we never heard of. But, however that may be, it is quite impossible that such
a woman as the wife,  should  associate long
wzith such a mnan as the husband, both writing
for their livelihood-and  both  in  prose  and
poetry-witihout  intermiin,gling  thoughits  and
hopes, and fancies, withiout helping and profiting  one anothler; nor without  influerncing and
tempering  each 1he style of the  other.
The husband  of the pleasanl-t tempered,
industrious and highLly  gifted womian we are
now  to deal with, was a graduate of Bowdoin
College, some twenty years ago.   Being a sort
of a Boothl Bay proprietor, he couldn't affoibrd to
stay at home  and take root on the sea shore;
but started Southl-worked, his passage, for
2*
xvii 
PREFACE.
aught we know, as most Yankees do, when they
travel-rested for a timne at Baltimore-found
seeking a fortune, a poor business to follow for
life-returned to New England, as all Yankees
do, before they die, or afterwards-set himself
down in Portland, somewhere down eastbecame the editor of the Argus, a clever political paper, (though always on the wrong side,)
and after a while married Miss Elizabeth Prince
-then about fifteen or sixteen-then, as if that
were not enough, set up a daily paper, called
the Portland Courier, which grew and flourished,
as all newspapers do, till it is high time thley
were paid for-and  then went to the dogsas all newspapers do at last. In the Courier,
first appeared the Jack Downing letters, which
were afterwards collected, and republished by
Lilly, Wait & Co.-with great advantage to the
public-and none at all to the author-the pub
xviii
0 
PREFACE.
lishers having failed in the midst of their most
promising enterprises, and poor Smith getting
hardly a bone to pick, where he ought to have
realized hundreds,  not to say thousands.   It
were absurd, now, to gainsay the truth and
originality-and the homely strength of these
delineations. The numberless imitators, and followers afar off-to say nothing of two or three,
who, profiting, by his over-sights and mistakes,
outstripped their master, and wrote even better,
and truer, and much droller Yainkee than Smith
himself did, before he knocked  off the  first
time-have  settled that question.   That they
were hugely overrated, nobody qualified to
judge, would ever think of denying. But, that
they were new and happy, significant, and well
managed, and truthful enough to give the author
a high character in the world of invention, it
were alike false and foolish to say now, what
xix 
PREFACE.
ever the jaded public and the conscientious
newspaper people, who have been certifying
counterfeits for a half a dozen years, may think
proper  to believe.   And  the  man  who  was
capable of making  a series of local  papers,
relating for a long while to the nobodies of a state
legislature, attractive to the great reading world
of America-a man who had sufficient dramatic
power to individualize and  embody the Yankliee
character, and give it not only  a'local hlabitation and a name,' but to persuade people afar off,
as Smith has done, that the Major  was a real
personage, a bit of honiest New England flesh
and  blood-we   harve  heard,  on  respectable
authlority, of thile Major's health being inquired
after by a gentlemanly planter, who  had  met
him  at Washington, as he himself declared on
hearing it intimated by the party he inquired of,
that hlie had always lookled upon the worthy
xx 
PREFACE.
Major, as a sort of ideal personage-a man
equal to all this, richly deserves to rank with De
Foe, and Bunyan. There must be not only truth
but originality and straight forward lusty strength
in such portraitures. Well, and so after a time,
the husband-Seba Smith-or Major Jack Downing-for they are not only inseparable now, but
identical-Smith answering to the name of Major
Downing in public, and paying the Major's bills
at sight-poor fellow! took it into his head to
bait a trap with his own fingers-in other words,
to dabble with Eastern lands.-Thie result was
just what such a man, if he had a tithe of the
shrewdness people credit him for as Major Jack,
ought to have foreseen. He was ruined-lock,
stock and barrel-horse, foot and dragoonssinker and line; gave up his paper-or sold
out, which —in a losing concern, where neutrality is sure to be trampled under foot, like a
xxi 
PREFACE.
squeezed orange after the juice has been wrung
out of it-amounts pretty much  to the same
thing. Thence to New Yorkli went lie, bag and
baggage-three children and a wife, the most
delightful baggage on earth, under tolerable circumstances.  There, husband and wife, having
entered into copartnhership for another termthough the first was forever-are trying to slpport themselves by their pen; he writing Powhattan-a metrical romance of singular beauty
and simplicity, and as true as truth itself; and
she Uncle Zeke, and other prose trifles, with
some exquisite pages of womanly poetry, for
the Ladies' Companion, and the Southern
Literary Messenger.
And now, one word of Mrs. Smith herself.
She is still young, not over thirty or thirty-two;
and twenty years from to-day, if she lives, will
be spoken of as the beautiful Mrs. Smith. It
xxii 
PREFACE.
cannot be otherwise. Phrenologically speaking,
her head is a picture, though the frontal developments are too large for a woman. With a fine
complexion, clear, pleasant eyes, and very attractive manners, good health, one husband, and but
three or four children, we believe —what on earth
should prevent her being always beautiful, and
always young?
If she but keeps her heart cool and freshher eyes'unsullied by a tear,' that she would
have been sorry for at sixteen-loving children,
and the plays of children, as she does, and full
of child-like sympathy-your truest milk of
roses, after all-the dew of perpetual youth, the
sunshine of the heart, must be upon her forever.
If the aged wax young by sleeping with the
newly born- why not by playing with themn.
And  now  to the moral-that  our countrywomen may be encouraged. When Miss
xxiii 
PREFACE.
Elizabeth Prince-a mere child-married Mr.
Seba Smith, who had been writing for the newspapers of the day, nobody knows how long, had
she been asked if she ever hoped to equal her
husband, or to contribute, in any way, to his
reputation as a literary man, she would have
laughed in your face. And long after that, years
after she had begun to hazard little scraps of
prose and poetry for her husband's newspaper,
which he carefully corrected for her, if she had
been questioned, she would have acknowledged,
that so far from dreaming of what has since
occurred, she would as soon think of enlisting
for a drummer boy, or of digging clams at the
halves, either at Cape Elizabeth, or Booth Bay,
as of earning a dollar by the pen. Yet such has
been her willingness and her energy; such her
steadfast determination to do all that might
become a woman, for the help of her husband,
xxiv 
PREFACE.
who has had every thing to struggle with since
he removed to New York, and for the support
of her little family, that she is now a regular,
and we hope well paid, contributor to some of
our cleverest and most popular Journals, and
has won for herself a most desirable reputation.
She was a child but the other day; with.no
sense of her own strength; and after she became a woman, her countenance you could not
see for her veil, and her wings were hidden by
her shawl. But the rains beat upon her husband, upon her little ones; and the winds blew,
and the floods came, and lo! the veil and the
shawl disappeared like the mists of summer;
and the highest nature of woman broke forth
like sunshine, and her wings were moulted, and
her feet planted upon a rock, sure and steadfast.
She no longer trembles when you look into her
heart, or try to read her eyes; neither shawl or
3
XXV 
PREFACE.
veil is wanted now.  The woman is no longer
ashamed or anxious to hide herself when called
to by her Heavenly Father. She feels her own
worth, and looks ouit, unswerving and self-dependent, upon the storms about her. What the
girl and bride were unequal to, the wife and the
mother delights to grapple witlh.
xxvi
9: 
As a pendant of this vivacious ske'cli of Mr. Neal,
the following brief, but beautiful, analysis of Mrs. Smith's
genius and  character,  by H. T. TUCKE:MAN,  is subjoined.  It formed one of a series of Literary Portraits,
which appeared recently ill Graham's magazine, and is
characterised by the delicacy of perception and refinement of expression which distinguish Mr. Tuckerman's
critical essays:
Mrs. Smith has long been a frequent and
admired contributor to our literary periodicals,
but the efforts upon which her reputation chiefly
depends, are comparatively recent. "The Sinless
Child," a poem in seven cantos, was published
during the present year. It is designed to illustrate the spiritual agency of Life and Nature
upon the soul of childhood. The abstract theory
developed,  partakes largely of  Wordsworth's 
PREFACE.
philosophy, but in its details, the story displays
a fancifulness and glow wholly distinct from the
bard of Rydal Mount. Eva is the heroine of
this sweet tale:
-,, She turned the wheel,
Or toiled in humble guise,
Her buoyant heart was all abroad
Beneath the pleasant skies.
She sang all day from joy of heart,
For joy that in her dwelt,
That unconfined the soul went forth  Such blessedness she felt."
We refrain from entering more fully into
the merits of this production, because it is about
to be given to the public in a more permanent
form. In point of elevated moral design and
delicate beauty of imagery, we regard it as one
of the most happy efforts of the American muse.
Within a few weeks, a prose tale, intended to
xxvil 
PREFACE.
illustrate the times of Tecumseh, has appeared
from her pen. This work has been widely commended for graphic descriptions of scenery and
graceful simplicity of style.
Among the women of genius which this
country has produced, there is none to whom we
revert with more pride and kindly interest than
the subject of this article.  Rare endowments
of mind, however brilliant, depend so much for
their value upon the moral qualities with which
they are united, that, abstractly considered, it
is often difficult to decide whether they are a
bane or a blessing. We may wonder at an intellectual phenomenon as we do at the extraordinary displays of nature, but it is only when a
gifted mind is linked with noble sentiments and
pure affections, that we can cordially hail it as a
glorious boon. If this is trie of men, how much
more does it apply to women. What mental
3*
xxix 
PREFACE.
power or grace can atone for the absence of
tenderness and truth in woman? What extent
of attainment in a female mind can ever compensate for the lack of those sympathetic qualities
in which consists the charm of the sex?
We make these inquiries, in order to fix the
attention of our readers upon the truly feminine
character of Mrs. Smith's genius. This we
consider its peculiar distinction.   There is a
delicacy of conception, a simple grace of language, and an exaltation of sentiment about her
writings, not only admirable in themselves, but
beautifully appropriate to her character and mission as a woman. In a literary point of view,
undoubtedly many of her productions bear the
marks of haste. A higher finish and more careful
revision would render the fruits of her pen more
tasteful and permanent in their influence. But
these defects are ascribable to circumstances
xxX 
PREFACE.
rather than to want of perception or power. She
has often written from the' spur of necessity. Her
nature is one, which, in a more prosperous condition of things, would find its whole delight in
expatiating amid the genialities of nature and
society.  She has resorted to the pen, rather as
duty than a pleasure. We do not mean to say,
that in any event she would not have written.A mind of this order must, at times, "wreak
itself upon expression." Mrs. Smith sympathizes
too readily with the beautiful, not sometimes
cordially to utter hymns in its praise. Human
life presses with too deep a meaning upon her
heart, not to leave results which crave utterance.
To breathe such thoughts is as natural as for the
glad bird to utter its song, or the unfettered
stream to leap up to the sunshine. Still, friendship and nature, society and literature, would
amply fill such a mind, were it indulged with
xxxi 
PREFACE.
the leisure and freedom from care, which fortune
bestows. For the sake of poetry and the promotion of elevated views of life, we cannot mourn
the destiny which made such a woman known to
fame. We doubt not, that many of her sweet
fancies and holy aspirations, winged by the
periodical press over our broad land, have
carried comfort to the desponding and bright
glimpses to the perverted. We hope, that not
a few of her sex have hailed these manifestations in language of what is highest in their
own souls. For ourselves, we are happy to
recognize in this lady, one who has given worthy
utterance to sentiments of faith and duty, to the
sense of the beautiful and the capacity of progress, which are the redeeming traits of human
nature.
x,txl'i 
To the foregoing sketch of the author and analysis
of her genius, the following discriminating notice of the
Poem itself, seems a fitting accompaniment. It appeared
originally in the Boston Notion, upon the first publication
of the, The Sinless Child."
The whole poem breathes the very air of
purity, and is instinct with the life and soul of
poetry. It is one of those productions which,
without dazzling by brilliant points of expression or imagery, still wins upon the heart by the
pure force of the sentiment embodied, and the
naturalness and beauty of the language in which
it is clothed. The object of thie writer appears
to be the exhibition of a pure and gentle being,
whose mind and affections are so harmoniously
developed and so beautifully blended, that every
thing she sees takes the hue of her thoughts, and
all outward nature moulds itself into accordance
with her feelings; until thle child, in her com 
PREFACE.
muinings with nature, is supposed to see through
the crust of creation, and to become cognizant
of the spirit and moral meaning it contains.
It is a production, which, not only, in the
current language of newspaper critics, does
credit to the talents of its author, but it is an
unconscious eulogy on the purity of her mind,
for it is a work which demands more in its composition than mere imagination or intellect could
furnish. The poem strongly suggests to the
mind the beautiful lines of Woordsworth, in which
he sets platonism to sweeter music than it has
found since the time of its founder:
'The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come,
From God, who is our home."
xxxiv 
THE
SINLESS CHILD.  
THE SINLESS CHILD.
INSCRIPTION.
SWEET EVA! shall I send thee forth,
To other hearts to speak?
With all thy timidness and love,
Companionship to seek?
Send thee with all thy abstract ways,
Thy more than earthly toneAn exile, dearest, send thee forth,
Thou, who art all mine own!
4 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Thou art my spirit's cherished dream,
Its pure ideal birth;
And thou hast nestled in my heart,
With love that's not of earth.
Alas! for I have failed, methinks,
Thy mystic life to trace;
Thy holiness of thought and soul,
Thy wild enchanting grace.
With thee I've wandered, cherished one,
At twilight's dreamy hour
To learn the language of the bird,
The mystery of the flower;
And gloomy must that sorrow be,
Which thou could'st not dispel,
As thoughtfully we loitered on
By stream or sheltered dell.
38 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Thou fond Ideal! vital made,
The trusting, earnest, true;
Who fostered, sacred, undefiled
My hearts pure, youthful dew;
Thou woman-soul, all tender, meek,
Thou wilt not leave me now
To bear alone the weary thoughts
That stamp an aching brow!
Yet go! I may not say farewell,
For thou wilt not forsake,
Thou'it linger, Eva, wilt thou not,
All hallowed thoughts to wake?
Then go; and speak to kindred hearts
In purity and truth;
And win the spirit back again,
To Love, and Peace, and Youth.
39 
PART I.
EVA, a simple cottage maiden, given to the world in
the widowhood of one parenit, and the angelic existence
of the other, like a bud developed amid the sad sweet
sunshine of autumn, when its sister-flowers are all sleep
ing, is found from her birth to be as meek and gentle
as are those pale flowers that look imploringly upon us,
blooming as they do apart from the season destined for
their existence, and when those that should hold tender
companionship with them have ceased to be. She is gifted
with the power of interpreting the beautiful mysteries of
our earth. The.delicate pencilling found upon the petals
of the flowers, she finds full of gentle wisdom, as well as
beauty. The song of the bird is not merely the gushing
forth of a nature too full of blessedness to be silent, but
she finds it responsive to the great harp of the universe,
whose every tone is wisdom and goodness. The humblest
plant, the simplest insect, is each alive with truth. More
than this, she beholds a divine agency in all things, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
carrying on the great purposes of love and wisdom by the
aid of innumerable happy spirits, each delighting in the
part assigned it. She sees the world, not merely with
mortal eyes, but looks within to the pure internal life, of
which the outward is but a type. Her mother, endowed
with ordinary perceptions, fails to understand the high
spiritual character of her daughter, but feels daily the
truthfulness and purity of her life. The neighbors, too,
feel that Eva is unlike her sex only in greater truth and
elevation.
Whilom ago, in lowly life,
Young Eva lived and smiled,
A fair-haired girl, of wondrous truth,
And blameless from a child.
Gentle she was, and fill of love,
With voice exceeding sweet,
And eyes of dove-like tenderness,
Where joy and sadness meet.
4*
a
41
w
El 
THE SINLESS CIIILD.
No Father's lip her brow had kissed,
Or breathed for her a prayer;
The widowed breast on which she slept,
Was full of doubt and care;
And oft was Eva's little cheek
Heaved by her mother's sighAnd oft the widow shrunk in fear
From her sweet baby's eye,
For she would lift her pillowed head
To look within her face,
With something of reproachfulness,
As well as infant grace,A trembling lip, an earnest eye,
Half smiling, half in tears,
As she would seek to comprehend
The secret of her fears.
k
42 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Her ways were gentle while a babe,
With calm and tranquil eye,
That turned instinctively to seek
The blueness of the sky.
A holy smile was on her lip
Whenever sleep was there,
She slept, as sleeps the blossom, hushed
Amid the silent air.
And ere she left with tottling steps
The low-roofed cottage door,
The beetle and the cricket loved
The young child on the floor,
And every insect dwelt'secure
Where little Eva played;
And piped for her its blithest song
When she in greenwood strayed;
43
i 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
With wing of gauze and mailed coat
They gathered round her feet,
Rejoiced, as are all gladsome things,
A truthful soul to greet.
They taught her infant lips to sing
With them a hymn of praise,
The song that in the woods is heard,
Through the long summer days.
And everywhere the child was traced
By snatches of wild song,
That marked her feet along the vale,
Or hill-side, fleet and strong.
She knew the haunts of'every bird  Where bloomed the sheltered flower,
So sheltered, that the searching frost
Might scarcely find its bower.
44 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
No loneliness did Eva know,
Though playmates she had none;
Such sweet companionship was hers,
She could not be alone;
For everything in earth or sky
Caressed the little child,
The joyous bird upon the wing,
The blossom in the wild:
Much dwelt she on the green hill-side,
And under forest tree;
Beside the running, babbling brook,
WThere lithe trout sported freeShe saw them dart, like stringed gems,
WThere the tangled roots were deep,
And learned that peace and love alone
A joyous heart may keep.
45
or 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The opening bud, that lightly swung
Upon the dewy air,
Moved in its very sportiveness
Beneath angelic care;
For pearly fingers gently oped
. Each curved and painted leaf,
And where the canker-worm had been
Looked on with angel-grief.
She loved all simple flowers that sprung
In grove or sun-lit dell,
And of each streak and varied hue,
A.e-l:ing deep would tell;
For her a language was impressed
On every leaf that grew,
And lines revealing brighter worlds
That seraph fingers drew.
46 
THR SINLESS CHILD.
Each tiny leaf became a scroll
Inscribed with holy truth,
A lesson that around the heart
Should keep the dew of youth;
Bright missals from angelic throngs
In every by-way left,
How were the earth of glory shorn,
Were it of flowers bereft!
They tremble on the Alpine height;
The fissutred rock they press;
The desert wild, with heat and sand,
Shares too, their blessedness,
And wheresoe'er the weary heart
Turns in its dim despair,
The meek-eyed blossom upward looks
Inviting it to prayer.
47 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The widow's cot was rude and low,
The sloping roof moss-grown;
And it would seem its quietude
To every bird were known,
The winding vine its tendrils wove
Round roof and oaken door,
And by the flickering light, the leaves
Were painted on the floor.
No noxious reptile ever there
A kindred being sought,
The good and beautiful alone
Delighted in the spot.
The very winds were hushed to peace
Within the quiet dell,
Or murmured through the rustling bough
Like breathings of a shell.
48
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The gay bird sang from sheltering tree,
Gay blossoms clustered round,
And one small brook came dancing by,
With a sweet tinkling sound,
It stained the far-off meadow green
It leaped a rocky dell
Then resting by the cottage door,
In liquid music fell.
Upon its breast white lilies slept,
Of pure and wax-like hue,
And brilliant flowers upon the marge
Luxuriantly grew.
They were of rare and changeless birth,
Nor needed toil nor care;
And manv marvelled earth could yield
Aught so exceeding fair.
5
-4,
49
F, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Young Eva said, all noisome weeds
Would pass from earth away,
When virtue in the human heart
Held its predestined sway;
Exalted thoughts were alway hers,
Some deemed them strange and wild;
And hence in all the hamlets round,
Her name of SINLESS CHILD.
Her mother said that Eva's lips
Had never falsehood known;
No angry word had ever marred
The music of their tone.
And truth spake out in every line
Of her fair tranquil face,
Where Love and Peace, twin-dwelling pair,
Had found a resting place.
50
F, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
She felt the freedom and the light.
The pure in heart may knowWhose blessed privilege it is
To walk with God below;
To understand the hidden things
That others may not see,
To feel a life within the heart,
And love and mystery.
51 
PART II.
THE widow, accustomed to forms, and content withi
the faith in which she has been reared, a faith which is
habitual, rather than earnest and soul-requiring, leaves
Eva to learn the wants and tendencies of the soul, by
observing the harmony and beauty of the external world.
Even from infancy she seems to have penetrated the spiri.
tual through the material; to have beheld the heavenly,
not through a glass darldy, but face to face, by means of
that singleness and truth, that look within the veil. To the
pure in heart alone is the promise, ", They shall see God."
Untiring all the weary day
The widow toiled with care,
And scarcely cleared her furrowed brow
When came the hour of prayer;
The voices, that on every side,
The prisoned soul call forth,
And bid it in its freedom walk,
Rejoicing in the earth; 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Fall idly on a deafened ear,
A heart untaught to thrill
When music gusheth from the bird,
Or from the crystal rill
That moves unheeding by the flower
With its ministry of love,
That weeps not in the moonlight pale
Nor silent stars above.
Alas! that round the human soul
The cords of earth should bind,
That they should bind in darkness down
The light-discerning mindThat all its freshness, freedom, gone
Its destiny forgot,
It should, in gloomy discontent,
Bewail its bitter lot.
5*
53
rs
e 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
But Eva while she turned the wheel,
Or toiled in homely guise,
With buoyaniit heart was all abroad,
Beneath the pleasant skies;
And sang all (lay from joy of heart,
From joy that in her dwelt,
While unconfined her soul went forth  Such blessedness she felt.
All lowly and familiar things
In earth, or air, or sky,
A lesson brought to Eva's mind
Of import deep and high;
She learned, from blossom in the wild,
From bird upon the wing,
From silence and the midnight stars,
Truth dwelt in every thing,
54
v11 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The careless winds that round her played
Brought voices to her ear,
But Eva, pure in thought and soul,
Dreamed never once of fearThe whispered words of angel lips
She heard in forest wild,
And many a holy spell they wrought,
About the Sinless Child.
And much she loved the forest walk,
Where round the shadows fell,
The solitude of mountain height,
Or green and lovely dell;
The brook dispensing verdure round,
And singing on its way,
Now coyly hid in fringe of green,
Now sparkling in its play.
55
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
She early marked the butterfly,
That gay, mysterious thing,
That, bursting from its prison-house
Appeared on golden wing;
It had no voice to speak delight,
Yet on the floweret's breast,
She saw it mute and motionless,
In long, long rapture rest.
She said, that while the little shroud
Beneath the casement hung,
A kindly spirit lingered near,
As dimly there it swung;
That music sweet and low was heard
To hail its.perfect life,
And Eva felt that insect strange
With wondrous truth was rife.
56
t7L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
It crawled no more a sluggish thing
Upon the lowly earth;
A brief, brief sleep, and then she saw
A new and radiant birth,
And thus she learned without a doubt,
That man from death would rise,
As did the butterfly on wings,
To claim its native skies.
The rainbow, bending o'er the storm,
A beauteous language told;
For angels, twined with loving arms,
She plainly might behold,
And in their glorious robes they bent
To earth in wondrous love,
As they would lure the human soul
To brighter things above.
57
,.
E —- 
6 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The bird would leave the rocking branch
Upon her hand to sing,
And upward turn its fearless eye
And plume its glossy wing,
And Eva listened to its song,
Till all the sense concealed
In that deep gushing forth of joy,
Became to her revealed.
And when the bird would build its nest,
A spirit from above
Directed all the pretty work,
And filled its heart with love.
And she within the nest would peep
Its colored eggs to see,
But' never touch the dainty thing,
For a thoughtful child was she.
F
58
E 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Much Eva loved the twilight hour,
When shadows gather round
And softer sings the little bird,
And insect from the ground;
She felt that this within the heart
Must be the hour of prayer,
For earth in its deep quietude
Did own its Maker there.
The still moon in the saffron sky
Hung out her silver thread,
And the bannered clouds in gorgeous folds
A mantle round her spread.
The gentle stars came smiling out
Upon the brilliant sky,
That looked a meet and glorious dome,
For worship pure and high;
59
- 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And Eva lingered, though the gloom
Had deepened into shade;
And many thought that spirits came
To teach the Sinless Maid,
For oft her mother sought the child
Amid the forest glade,
And marvelled that in darksome glen,
So tranquilly she stayed.
For every jagged limb to her
A shadowy semblance hath,
Of spectres and distorted shapes,
That frown upon her path,
And mock her with their hideous eyes;
For when the soul is blind
To freedom,truth, and inward light,
Vague fears debase the mind:
60
:7 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
But Eva, like a dreamer waked,
Looked off upon the hill,
And murmured words of strange, sweet sound,
As if there lingered still
Ethereal forms with whom she talked,
Unseen by all beside;
And she, with earnest looks, besought
The vision to abide.
Oh Mother! Mother! do not speak,
Or all will pass away,
The spirits leave the green-hill side,
Where light the breezes play;
They sport no more by ringing brook,
With daisy dreaming by;
Nor float upon the fleecy cloud
That steals along the sky.
6
61
t'll
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
It grieves me much they never will
A human look abide,
But veil themselves in silver mist
By vale or mountain side.
I feel their presence round me still,
Though none to sight appear;
I feel the motion of their wings,
Their whispered language hear.
With silvery robe, and wings outspread,
They passed me even now;
And gems and starry diadems
Decked every radiant brow.
Intent were each on some kind work
Of pity or of love,
Dispensing from their healing wings
The blessings from above.
62
r 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
With downy pinion they enfold
The heart surcharged with wo,
And fan with balmy wing, the eye
Whence floods of soirow flow;
They bear, in golden censers up,
That sacred gift, a tear;
By which is registered the griefs,;
Hearts may have suffered here.
No inward pang, no yearning love
Is lost to human hearts,
No anguish that the spirit feels,
Whenl bright winged hope departs;
Though in the mystery of life
Discordant powers prevail;
That life itself be weariness.,
And sympathy may fail:
63 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Yet all becomes a discipline,
To lure us to the sky;
And angels bear the good it brings
With fostering care on high;
Though others, weary at the watchl,
May sink to toil-spent sleep,
And we are left in solitude,
And agony to weep:
Yet they with ministering zeal,
The cup of healing bring,
And bear our love and gratitude
Away, on heavenward wing;
And thus the inner life is wrought,
The blending earth and heaven;
The love more earnest in its glow,
Where much has been forgiven!
64 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
I would, dear Mother, thou could'st see
Within this darksome veil,
That hides the spirit-land from thee,
And makes our sunshine pale;
The toil of earth, its doubt and care;
Would trifles seem to thee;
Repose would rest upon thy soul,
And holy mystery.
Thou would'st behold protecting care
To shield thee on thy way,
And ministers to guard thy feet,
Lest erring, they should stray;
And order, sympathy and love,
Would open to thine eye,
From simplest creature of the earth
To seraph throned on high.
6*
65 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
E'en now I marked a radiant throng,
On soft wing sailing by,
To soothe with hope the trembling heart,
And cheer the dying eye;
They smiling passed the lesser sprites,
Each on his work intent;
And love and holy joy I saw
In every face were blent.
The tender violets bent in smiles
To the elves that sported nigh,
Tossing the drops of fragrant dew
To scent the evening sky.
They kissed the rose in love and mirth,
And its petals fairer grew,
A shower of pearly dust they brought,
And over the lily threw.
66 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
A host flew round the mowing field,
And they were showering down
The cooling spray on the early grass,
Like diamonds o'er it thrown;
They gemin'd each leaf and quivering spear
With pearls of liquid dew,
And bathed the stately forest tree,
Till its robe was fresh and new.
I saw a meek-eyed creature curve
The tulip's painted cup,
And bless with one soft kiss the urn,
Then fold its petals up.
A finger rocked the young bird's nest
As high on a branch it hung.
And the gleaming night-dew rattled down,
Where the old dry leaf was flung.
67 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Each and all, as its task is done,
Soars up with a joyous eye,
Bearing aloft some treasured gift  An offering ON HIGH.
They bear the breath of the odorous flower,
The sound of the bright-sea shell;
And thus they add to the holy joys
Of the home where spirits dwell.
68 
PART III.
The grace of the soul is sure to impart expressiveness and beauty to the face. It must beam through its
external veil; and daily, as the material becomes subordidate to the spiritual, will its transparency increase. Eva
was lovely, for the spirit of love folded its wings upon her
breast. All nature administered to her beauty; and angelic
teachings revealed whence came the power that winneth
all hearts. The mother is aware of the spell resting upon
her daughter, or rather, that which seemed a spell to her,
buit which, in truth, was nothing more than fidelity to the
rights of the soul, obedience to the voice uttered in that
holy of holies. Unable to comprehend the truthfulness of
her character, she almost recoils from its gentle revealings. Alas!  that to assimilate to the good and beautiful should debar us from human sympathy! Eva walked
in  an atmosphere of light, and images  of surpassing 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
sweetness were ever presented to her eye.  The dark
and distorted shapes that haunt the vision of the unenlightened and the erring, dared not approach her.  She
wept over the blindness of her mother, and tenderly
revealed to her the great truths that pressed upon her own
mind, and the freedom and the light in which the soul
might be preserved. She blamed not the errors into which
weak humanity is prone to be betrayed, but deplored that
it should thus blind its own spiritual vision, and thus impress dark and ineffaceable characters upon the soul; and
thus sink, where it should soar.
As years passed on, no wonder, each
An inward grane revealed;
For where the soul is peace and love,
It may not be concealed.
They stamp a beauty on the brow,
A softness on the face,
And give to every wavy line
A tenderness and grace.
70 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Long golden hair in many curls
Waved o'er young Eva's brow;
Imparting depth to her soft eye,
And pressed her neck of snow:
Her cheek was pale with lofty thought,
And calm her maiden air;
And all who heard her birdlike voice,
Felt harmony was there.
And winning were her household ways,
Her step was prompt and light,
To save her mother's weary tread,
Till came the welcome night;
And though the toil might useless be,
The housewife's busy skill,
Enough for Eva that it bore
Inscribed a mother's will;
71
I 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
For humble things exalted grow
By sentiment impressedThe love that bathes the way-worn feet,
Or leans upon the breast;
For love, whate'er its offering be,
Lives in a hallowed air,
And holy hearts before its shrine,
Alone may worship there.
Young Eva's cheek was lily pale,
Her look was scarce of earth,
And doubtingly the mother spoke,
Who gave to Eva birth.
"0O Eva, leave thy thoughtful ways,
And dance and sing, my child;
For thy pallid cheek is tinged with blue,
Thy words are strange and wild.
72 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Thy father died-a widow left,
An orphan birth was thine,
I longed to see thy infant eyes
Look upward into mine.
I hoped upon thy sweet young face,
Thy father's look to see;
But Eva, Eva, sadly strange
Are all thy ways to me.
While yet a child, thy look would hold
Communion with the sky;
Too tranquil is thy maiden air;
The glances of thine eye
Are such as make me turn away,
E'en with a shuddering dread,
As if my very soul might be
By thy pure spirit read."
7
73 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Slow swelled a tear from Eva's lid,
She kissed her mother's cheek,
She answered with an earnest look,
And accents low and meek:"Dear mother, why should mortals seek
Emotions to conceal?
As if to be revealed were worse
Than inwardly to feel.
The human eye I may not fear,
It is the light within,
That traces on the growing soul
All thought, and every sin.
That mystic book, the human soul, -
Where every trace remains,
The record of all thoughts and deeds,
The record of all stains.
74
., 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Dear mother! in ourselves is hid
The holy spirit-land,
Where Thought, the flaming cherub, stands
With its relentless brand;
We feel the pang when that dread sword
Inscribes the hidden sin,
And turneth every where to guard
The paradise within."
"Nay, Eva, leave these solemn words,
Fit for a churchman's tongue,
And let me see thee deck thy hair,
A maiden blithe and young.
When others win admiring eyes,
And looks that speak of love,
Why dost thou stand in thoughful guise?
Why cold and silent move?
75
:r-, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Thy beauty sure should win for thee
Full many a lover's sigh,
But on thy brow there is no pride,
Nor in thy placid eye.
Dear Eva! learn to look and love,
And claim a lover's prayer,
Thou art too cold for one so young,
So gentle and so fair."
"Nay, mother! I must be alone,
With no companion here,
None, none to joy when I am glad,
With me to shed a tear;
For who would clasp a maiden's hand
In grot or sheltering grove,
If one unearthly gift should bar
All sympathy and love!
76
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Such gift is mine, the gift of thought,
Whence all will shrink away,
E'en thou from thy poor child dost turn,
With doubting and dismay.
And who shall love, and who shall trust,
Since she who gave me birth,
Knows not the child that prattled once
Beside her lonely hearth?
I would I were, for thy dear sake,
What thou would'st have me be;
Thou dost not comprehend the bliss
T'hat's given unto me;
That union of the thought and soul
With all that's good and bright,
The blessedness of earth and sky,
The growing truth and light.
7*
77 
THE  SINLESS CHILD.
That reading of all hidden things
All mystery of life,
Its many hopes, its many fears,
The sorrow and the strife.
A spirit to behold in all,
To guide, admonish, cheer,
Forever in all time and place,
To feel an angel near."
Dear Eva! lean lipon mny breast,
And let me press thy hand,
That I may hear thee talk awhile
Of thy own spirit-lanld.
And yet I would the pleasant sun
Were shining in the sky,
The blithe birds singing through the air,
And busy life, were by.
78
,~ 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
For when in converse, like to this,
Thy low, sweet voice I-hear,
Strange shudderings o'er my senses creep,
Like touch of spirits near,
And fearful grow familiar things,
In silence and the night,
The cricket piping in the hearth,
Half fills me with affright.
I hear the old trees creak and sway,
And shiver in the blast;
I hear the wailing of the wind,
As if the dead swept past.
Dear Eva!'tis a world of gloom,
The grave is dark and drear,
We scarce begin to taste of life
Ere death is standing near."
79
e 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Then Eva kissed her mother's cheek,
And look'd with sadden'd smnile,
Upon her terror-stricken face,
And talked with her the while;
And O! her face was pale and sweet,
Though deep, deep thought was there,
And sadly calm her low-toned voice
For one so young and fair.
"Nay mother, everywhere is hid
A beauty and delight,
The shadow lies upon the heart,
The gloom upon the sight;
Send but the spirit on its way
Communion high to hold,
And bursting from the earth and sky,
A glory we behold'!
80 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And did we but our primal state
Of purity retain,
We might, as in our Eden days,
With angels walk again.
And memories strange of other times
Would break upon the mind,
The linkings, that the present join,
To what is left behind.
The little child at dawn of life
A holy impress bears,
The signet-mark by heaven affixed
Upon his forehead wears;
And nought that impress can efface,
Save his own wilful sin,
Which first begins to draw the veil
That shuts the spirit in.
81 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And one by one its lights decay,
Its visions tend to earth,
Till all those holy forms have fled
That gathered round his birth;
Or dimi and faintly may they come,
Like memories of a dream,
Or come to blanch his cheek with fear,
So shadow-like they seem.
And thus all doubtingly he lives
Amid his gloomy fears,
And feels within his inmost soul,
Earth is a vale of tears:
And scarce his darkened thoughts may trace
The mystery within;
For faintly gleams the spirit forth
When shadow'd o'er by sin.
82
'- 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Unrobed, majestic, should the soul
Before its God appear,
Undimmed the image He affixed,
Unknowing doubt or fear;
And open converse should it hold,
With meek and trusting brow;
Such as man was in Paradise
He may be even now.
But when the deathless soul is sunk
To depths of guilt and wo,
It then a dark communion holds
With spirits from below."
And Eva shuddered as she told
How every heaven-born trace
Of goodness in the human soul
Might wickedness efface.
83
L
I 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Alas! unknowing what he doth,
A judgment-seat man rears,
A stern tribunal throned within,
Before which he appears;
And conscience, minister of wrath,
Approves him or condemns,
He knoweth not the fearful risk,
Who inward light contemns.
"0 veil thy face, pure child of God,"
With solemn tone she said,
"And judge not thou, but lowly weep,
That virtue should be dead!
Weep thou with prayer and holy fear,
That o'er thy brother's soul,
Effacing life, and light and love,
Polluting waves should roll.
84 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Weep for the fettered slave of sense,
For passion's minion weep!
For him who nurtureth the worm,
In death that may not sleep;
And tears of blood, if it may be,
For him, who plunged in guilt,
Perils his own and victim's soul,
When human blood is spilt.
For him no glory may abide
In earth or tranquil sky,
Fearfuill to him the human face,
The searching human eye.
A light beams on him everywhere;
Revealing in its ray,
An erring, terror-stricken soul,
Launched from its orb away.
8
85
i 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Turn where he will, all day he meets
That cold and leaden stare;
His victim pale, and bathed in blood,
Is with him everywhere;
He sees that shape upon the cloud,
It glares from out the brook,
The mist upon the mountain side,
Assumes that fearful look.
He sees, in every simple flower,
Those dying eyes gleam out;
And starts to hear that dying groan,
Amid some merry shout.
The phantom comes to chill the warmth,
Of every sunlight ray,
He feels it slowly glide along,
Where forest shadows play.
86 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And when the solemn night comes down,
With silence dark and drear,
His curdling blood and rising hair
Attest the victim near.
With hideous dreams and terrors wild,
His brain from sleep is kept,
For on his pillow, side by side,
That gory form hath slept."
"0 Eva, Eva, say no more,
For I am filled with fear;
Dim shadows move along the wall;
Dost thou not see them here?Dost thou not mark the gleams of light,
The shadowy forms move by?"
"Yes, mother, beautiful to see!
And they are always nigh.
87
T_ 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
0, would the veil for thee were raised
That hides the spirit-land,
For we are spirits draped in flesh,
Communing with that band;
And it were weariness to me,
Were only human eyes
To meet my own with tenderness,
In earth or pleasant skies."
88
L 
PART IV.
The widow, awe-struck at the revealments of her
daughter, is desirous to learn more; for it is the nature of
the soul to search into its own mysteries: however dim
may be its spiritual perception, it still earnestly seeks to
look into the deep and the hidden. The light is within
itself, and it becomes more and more clear at every step
of its progress, in search of the true and the beautiful.The widow, hardly discerning this light, which is to grow
brighter and brighter to the perfect day, calls for the material lights that minister to the external eye; that thus she
may be hid from those other lights that delight the vision
of her child. Eva tells of that mystic book-the human
soul-upon which, thoughts, shaped into deeds, whether
externally, or only in its own secret chambers, inscribe a
8*
I
i 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
character that must be eternal. But it is not every character that is thus clearly defined as good or evil. Few,
indeed, seize upon thought, and bring its properties palpably before them. Impressions are allowed to come and go
with a sort of lethargic indifference, leaving no definite
lines behind, but only a moral haziness. The widow recollects the story of old Richard, and Eva supplies portions
unknown to her mother, and enlarges upon the power of
conscience, that fearful judge placed by the Infinite within
the soul, with the two-fold power of decision, and punishment.
"Then trim the lights, my strange, strange child,
And let the faggots glow;
For more of these mysterious things
I fear, yet long, to know.
I glory in thy lofty thought,
Thy beauty and thy worth,
But, Eva, I should love thee more,
Did'st thou seem more like earth."
90
F. 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
A pang her words poor Eva gave,
And tears were in her eye,
She kissed her mother's anxious brow,
And answered with a sigh;"Alas! I may not hope on earth
Cqompanionship to find,
Alone must be the pure in heart,
Alone the high in mind!
We toil for earth, its shadowy veil
Envelops soul and thought,
Anid hides that discipline and life,
Within our being wrought.
We chain the thought, we shroud the soul,
And backward turn our glance,
When onward should its vision be,
And upward its advance.
91
e. 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
I may not scorn the spirit's rights,
For I have seen it rise,
All written o'er with thought, thought, thought,
As with a thousand eyes!
The records dark of other years,
All uneffaced remain;
Unchecked desire forgotten long,
With its eternal stain.
Recorded thoughts, recorded deeds,
Its character attest,
No garment hides the startling truth,
Nor screens the naked breast.
The thought, fore-shaping evil deeds,
The spirit may not hide,
It stands amid that searching light,
Which sin may not abide.
92
9 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And never may the spirit turn
From that effulgent ray,
It lives for ever in the glare
Of an eternal day;
Lives in that penetrating light,
A kindred glow to raise,
Or every withering sin to trace
Within its searching blaze.
Few, few the shapely temple rear,
For God's abiding placeThat mystic temple, where no sound
Within the hallowed space
Reveals the skill of builder's hand;
Yet with a silent care
That holy temple riseth up,
And God is dwelling there. (a)
93
w
a 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Then weep not when the infant lies.
In its small grave to rest,
With scented flowers springing forth
From out its quiet breast;
A pure, pure soul to earth was given,
Yet may not thus remain;
Rejoice that it is rendered back,
Without a single stain.
Bright cherubs bear the babe away
With many a fond embrace,
And beauty, all unknown to earth,
Upon its features trace.
They teach it knowledge from the fount,
And holy truth and love;
The songs of praise the infant learns,
As angels sing above."
94
il 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The widow rose, and on the blaze
Tile crackling faggots thirewAnd then to her maternal breast
Her gentle daughter drew.
"Dear Eva! when old Richard died,
In madness fierce and wild,
Why did he in his phrenzy rave
About a murdered child!
He died in beggary and rags,
Friendless and grey, and old;
Yet he was once a thriving man,
Light-hearted, too, I'm told.
Dark deeds were whispered years ago,
But nothing came to light;
He seemed the victim of a spell,
That nothing would go right.
95
T7 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
His young wife died, and her last words
Were breathed to him alone,
But'twas a piteous sound to hear
Her faint, heart-rending moan.
Some thought, in dreams he had divulged
A secret hidden crime,
Which she concealed with breaking heart,
Unto her dying time.
From that day forth he never smiled;
Morose and silent grown,
He wandered unfrequented ways,
A moody man and lone.
The schoolboy shuddered in the wood,
When he old Richard passed,
And hurried on, while fearful looks
He o'er his shoulder cast.
96
wE  
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And nought could lure him from his mood,
Save his own trusting boy,
Who climbed the silent father's neck,
With ministry of joy,
That gentle boy, unlike a child,
Companions never sought,
Content to share his father's crust,
His father's gloomy lot.
With weary foot and tattered robe,
Beside him, day by day,
He roamed the forest and the hill,
And o'er the rough highway;
And he would prattle all the time
Of things to childhood sweet;
Of singing bird, or lovely flower,
That sprang beneath their feet.
9
97 
THE SINLESS CHILD,
Sometimes he chid the moody man,
With childhood's fond appeal: —
'Dear father, talk to me awhile,
How very lone I feel!
My mother used to smile so sad,
And talk and kiss my cheek,
And sing to me such pretty songs;
So low and gently speak.
Then Richard took him in his arms
With passionate embrace,
And with an aching tenderness
He gazed upon his face;Tears rushled into his hollow eyes,
He murmured soft and wild,
And kissed with more than woman's love
The fond but frightened child.
98,
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
He died, that worn and weary boy;
And they that saw him die,
Said, on his father's rigid brow
Was fixed his fading eye.
His little stiffening hand was laid
Within poor Richard's grasp;And when he stooped for one last kiss,
.He took his dying gasp.
It crazed his brain,-poor Richard rose
A maniac fierce and wild,
Who mouthed and muttered everywhere,
About a murdered child."
"And well he might," young Eva said,
"For conscience, day by day,
Commenced that retribution here,
That filled him with dismay.
99 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Unwedded, but a mother grown,
Poor Lucy pressed her child,
With blushing cheek and dropping lid,
And lip that never smiled.
Their wants were few; but Richard's hand
Must buy them daily bread,
And fain would Lucy have been laid
In silence with the dead.
For want, and scorn, and blighted fame
Had done the work of years,
And oft she knelt in lowly prayer,
In penitence and tears;
That undesired child of shame,
Brought comfort to her heart,
A childlike smile to her pale lip,
By its sweet baby art.
100
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And yet, as years their passage told,
Faint shadows slowly crept
Upon the blighted maiden's mind,
And oft she knelt and wept
Unknowing why, her wavy form
So thin and reed-like grew,
And so appealing her blue eyes,
They tears from others drew.
Years passed away, and Lucy's child,
A noble stripling grown,
A daring boy with chesnut hair,
And eyes of changeful brown,
Had won the love of every heart,
So gentle was his air,
All felt, whate'er might be his birth,
A stainless heart was there.
9*
101 
THE  SINLESS CHILID.
The boy was missing, none could tell
Where last he had been seen;
They searched the river many a day,
And every forest screen;
But never more his filial voice
Poor Lucy's heart might cheer;
Lorn in her grief, and dull with wo,
She never shed a tear.
And every day, whate'er the sky,
With head upon her knees,
And hair neglected, streaming out
Upon the passing breeze,
She sat beneath a slender tree
That near the river grew,
And on the stream its pendant limbs
Their penciled shadows threw.
102
w 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The matron left her busy toil,
And called her child from play,
And gifts for the lone mourner there
She sent with him away.
The boy with nuts and fruit returned,
Found in the forest deep,
A portion of his little store
Would for poor Lucy keep.
That tree, with wonder all beheld,
Its growth was strange and rare;
The wintry winds, that wailing passed,
Scarce left its branches bare,
And round its roots a verdant spot
Knew neither change nor blight,
And so poor Lucy's resting place
Was alway green and bright.
103
f 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Some said its bole more rapid grew
From Lucy's bleeding heart,
For, sighs from out the heart,'tis said,
A drop of blood will start. (b)
It was an instinct deep and high
Which led that Mother there,
And that tall tree aspiring grew,
By more than dew or air.
The winds were hushed, the little bird
Scarce gave a nestling sound,
The warm air slept along the hill,
The blossoms drooped around;
The shrill-toned insect scarcely stirred
The dry and crisp6d leaf;
The laborer laid his sickle down
Beside the bending sheaf.
104 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
A dark, portentous cloud is seen
To mount the eastern sky,
The deep-toned thunder rolling on,
Proclaims the tempest nigh!
And now it breaks with deafening crash,
And lightnings livid glow;
The torrents leap from mountain crags
And wildly dash below.
Behold the tree! its strength is bowed
A shattered mass it lies;
What brings old Richard to the spot,
With wild and blood-shot eyes?
Poor Lucy's form is lifeless there,
And yet he turns away,
To where a heap of mouldering bones
Beneath the strong roots lay.
105
tr 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Why takes he up, with shrivelled hands,
The riven root and stone,
And spreads them with a trembling haste
Upon each damp, grey bone.
It may not be, the whirlwind's rage
Again hath left them bare,
Earth hides no more the horrid truth,
A murdered child lies there!
Of wife, and child, and friends bereft,
And all that inward light,
Which calmly guides the white-haired man,
Who listens to the right;
Old Richard laid him down to die,
Himself his only foe,
His baffled nature groaning out
Its weight of inward wo."
106
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PART TV.
The storm is raging without the dwelling of the widow,
but all is tranquil within. Eva hath gone forth in spiritual
vision, and beheld the cruelty engendered by wealth and
luxury-the cruelty of a selfish and unsympathizing heart.
She relates what she has seen to her mother-'-Pho vision
of the neglected cbildroil anci their affluent stepmother.
Sins of omission are often as terrible in their consequences,
and as frightful in the retribution as crimes committed
intentionally. Certain qualities of the heart are of such
a nature, that, when in excess, they resolve themselves
into appropriate forms. The symbol of evil becomes
mentally identified with its substance, and the fearful
shapes thus created haunt the vision like realities. The
inj~er is always fearful of the injured. No wrong is ever
done with a sense of security; least of all, wrong to the
innocent and unoffending. The belief of a Protecting
Power watching over infancy, is almost universal-; its
agency being recognized even by those who have forgone
the blessing in their own behalf. The little child is a 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
mystery of gentleness and love, while it is preserved in
its own atmosphere; and it is a fearful thing to turn its
young heart to bitterness; to infuse sorrow and fear, where
the elements should be only joy and faith. In maturer
years, it is ever the state of the soul, the prevailing motivethe essential character that involves human peace or
wretchedness. " The Kingdom of Heaven is within you,"
said the Great Teacher; and as we wander from the innocence of children, and allow selfishness or vice to increase
upon the domain of te holy. distrust usurps the place of
confidence and joy.
The loud winds rattled at the door  The shutters creaked and shook,
While Eva, by the cottage hearth,
Sat with abstracted look.
With every gust, the big rain-drops
Upon the casement beat,
How doubly, on a night like this,
Are home and comfort sweet!
i08
I 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The maiden slowly raised her eyes,
And pressed her pallid brow:"Dear mother! I have been far hence:
My sight is absent now!
O mother!'tis a fearful thing,
A human heart to wrong,
To plant a sadness on the lip,
Where smiles and peace belong.
In selfishness or callous pride,
The sacred tear to start,
Or lightest finger dare to press
Utpon the burdened heart.
And doubly fearful, when a child
Lifts its imploring eye,
And deprecates the cruel wrath
With childhood's pleading cry.
10
109 
.- THE SINLESS CHILD.
The child is made for smiles and joy,
Sweet emigrant from heaven,
The sinless brow and trusting heart,
To lure us there, were given.
Then who shall dare its simple faith
And loving heart to chill,
Or its frank, upward, beaming eye
With sorrowing tears to fill!
I look within a gorgeous room,
A loftyZdame behold,
A lady with forbiding air,
And forehead, high and cold;
I hear an infant's plaintive voice,
For grief hath brought it fears,
None soothe it with a kind caress,
None wipe away its tears
110
LI, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
His sister hears with pitying heart
Her brothers wailing cry,
And on the stately step-dame turns
Her earnest, tearful eye.
O lady, chilling is the air,
And fearful is the night,
Dear brother fears t boalone,
I'll bring him to the light.
On our dead mother hear him call;
I hear him weeping say,
Sweet mother, kiss poor Eddy's cheek,
And wipe his tears away.'
Red grows the lady's brow with rage,
And yet she feels a strife 
Of anger and of terror too,
At thought of that dead wife.
111
rat 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Wild roars the wind, the lights burn blue,
The watch-dog howls with fear,
Loud neighs the steed from out the stall:
What form is gliding near?
No latch is raised, no step is heard,
But a phantom fills the space,A sheeted spectre from the dead,
With cold and leaden face
What boots it that no other eye
Beheld the shade appear 
The guilty lady's guilty soul
Beheld it plain and clear,
It slowly-glides within the room,
And sadly looks aroundAnd stooping, kissed her daughter's cheek
With lips that gave no sound.
112
r 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Then softly on the step-dame's arm
She laid a death-cold hand,
Yet it hath scorched within the flesh
Like to a burning brand.
And gliding on with noiseless foot,
O'er winding stair and hall,
She nears the chamber where is heard
Her infant's trembling call.
She smoothed the pillow where he lay,
She warmly tucked the bed,
Shle wiped his tears, and stroked the curls
That clustered round his head.
The child, caressed, unknowing fear,
Hath nestled him to rest;
The Mother folds her wings beside —
The Mother froin the Blest! (c)
10 *
113
c 
THE SINLESS CHILD
Fast by the eternal throne of God
Celestial beings stand,
Beings, who guide the little child
With kind and loving hand:
And wo to him who dares to turn
The infant foot aside,
Or shroud the light that ever should
Within his soul abide."
114
F_r 
PART IV.
It is the noon of summer, and the noonday of Eva's
earthly existence.   She hath held communion with all
that is great and beautiful in nature, till it hath become a
part of her being; till her spirit hath acquired strength
and maturity, and been reared to a beautiful and harmoni
ous temple, in which the true and the good delight to
dwell. Then cometh the mystery of womanhood; its
gentle going forth of the affections seeking for that holiest
of companionship, a kindred spirit, responding to all its
finer essences, and yet lifting it above itself.  Eva had
listened to this voice of her woman's nature; and sweet
visions had visited her pillow. Unknown to the external
vision, there was one ever present to the soul; and when
he erred, she had felt a lowly sorrow that, while it still
more perfected her own nature, went forth to swell likewise the amount of good in the great universe of God.
At length Albert Linne, a gay youth, whose errors are
those of an ardent and inexperienced nature, rather than
of an assenting will, meets Eva sleeping under the canopy
of the great woods, and he is at once awed by the purity
_. 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
that enshrouds her. He is lifted to the contemplation of
the good-to a sense of the wants of his better nature.
Eva: awakes and recognizes the spirit that forever and
ever is to be one with hers; that is to complete that mystic marriage, known in the Paradise of God; that marriage
of soul with soul.   Eva the pure minded, the lofty in
thought, and great in soul, recoiled not from the errors
of him who was to be made mete for the kingdom of
Heaven, through her gentle agency, for the mission of
the good and the lovely, is not to the good, but to the
sinful. The mission of woman, is to the erring of man.
'Tis the summer prime, when the noiseless air
In perfumed chalice lies,
And the bee goes by with a lazy hum
Beneath the sleeping skies:
When the brook is low, and the ripples bright,
As down the stream they go;
The pebbles are dry on the upper side,
And dark and wet below.
116
U7 — 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The tree that stood where the soil's athirst,
And the mulleins first appear,
Hath a dry and rusty colored bark,
And its leaves are curled and sere;
But the dog-wood and the hazel bush,
Have clustered round the brookTheir roots have stricken deep beneath,
And they have a verdant look.
To the juicy leaf the grasshopper clings,
And he gnaws it like a file,
The naked stalks are withering by,
Where he has been erewhile.
The cricket hops on the glistering rock,
Or pipes in the faded grass,
The beetle's wings are folded mute,
Where the steps of the idler pass.
117 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The widow donned her russet robe,
Her cap of snowy hue,
And o'er her staid maternal form
A sober mantle threw;
And she, while fresh the morning light,
Hath gone to pass the day,
And ease an ailing neighbour's pain
Across the meadow way.
Young Eva closed the cottage door;
And wooed by bird and flower,
She loitered on beneath the wood,
Till came the noon-tide hour.
The sloping bank is cool and green,
Beside the sparkling rill;
The cloud that slumbers in the sky,
Is painted on the hill.
118
F::7 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The spirits poised their purple wings
O'er blossom, brook and dell,
And loitered in the quiet nook
As if they loved it well.
Young Eva laid one snowy arm
Upon a violet bank,
And pillow'd there her downy cheek
While she to slumber sank.
A smile is on her gentle lip,
For she the angels saw,
And felt their wings a covert make
As round her head they draw.
A maiden's sleep, how pure it is!
The innocent repose
That knows no dark nor troublous dream,
Nor love's wild waking knows!
119
L
I 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
A huntsman's whistle; and anon
The dogs come fawning round,
And now they raise the pendent ear,
And crouch along the ground.
The hunter leaped the shrunken brook,
The dogs hold back with awe,
For they upon the violet bank
The slumbering maiden saw.
A reckless youth was Albert Linne,
With licensed oath and jest,
Who little cared for woman's fame,
Or peaceful maiden's rest.
Like things to him, were broken vows  The blush, the sigh, the tear;
What hinders he should steal a kiss,
From sleeping damsel here?
kI
120
7;, — 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
He looks, yet stays hiis eager foot;
For, on that spotless brow,
And that closed lid, a something rests
He never saw till now;
He gazes, yet he shrinks with awe
From that fair, wondrous face,
Those limbs so quietly disposed,
With more than maiden grace.
He seats himself upon the bank
And turns his face away,
And Albert Linne, the hair-brained youth,
Wiished in his heart to pray.
But thronging came his former life,
What once he called delight,
The goblet, oath, and stolen joy,
How palled they on his sight!
11
121
i2 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
He looked within his very soul,
Its hidden chamber saw,
Inscribed with records dark and deep
Of mnany a broken law.
No more he thinks of maiden fair,
No more of ravished kiiss,
Forgets he that pure sleeper nigh
Hath brought his thoughts to this?
Now Eva opens her child-like eyes
And lifts her tranquil head,
And Albert, like a guilty thing
Had from her presence fled.
But Eva held her kindly hand
And bade him stay awhile;He dared not look upon her eyes,
He only marked her smile;
122 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And that so pure and winning beamed,
So calm and holy too,
That o'er his troubled thoughts at once
A quiet charm it threw.
Light thought, light words were all forgot,
He breathed a holier air,
He felt thespower of womanhood  Its purity was there.
And soft beneath their silken fringe
Beamed Eva's dovelike eyes,
That seemed to claim a sisterhood,
With something in the skies.
Her gentle voice a part become
Of air, and brook, and bird,
And Albert listened, as if he
Such music only heard.
123
r 
THE SINLESS CHILD
0 Eva! thou the pure in heart,
Why falls thy trembling voice?
A blush is on thy maiden cheek,
And yet thine eyes rejoice.
Another glory wakes for thee
WherCer thine eyes may rest;
And deeper, holier thoughts arise *
Within thy peaceful breast.
Thine eyelids droop in tenderness,
New smiles thy lips combine,
For thou dost feel another soul
Is blending into thine.
Thou upward raisest thy meek eyes,
And it is sweet to thee;
To feel the weakness of thy sex,
Is more than majesty.
124 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
To feel thy shrinking nature claim
The stronger arm and brow;
Thy weapons, smiles, and tears, and prayers,
And blushes such as now.
A woman, gentle Eva thou,
Thy lot were incomplete,
Did not all sympathies of soul
Within thy being meet.
Those deep, dark eyes, that open brow,
That proud and manly air,
How have they mingled with thy dreams
And with thine earnest prayer!
And how hast thou, all timidly,
Cast down thy maiden eye,
When visions have revealed to thee
That figure standing nigh!
11 *
125
ur 
THE SINLESS CIIILD.
Two spirits launched companionless
A kindred essence sought,
And one in all its wanderings
Of such as Eva thought.
The good, the beautiful, the true,
Should nestle in his heart,
Should lure him by her gentle voice,
To choose the better part.
And he that kindred being soughlt,
Had searched withl restless care
For that true, earnest, woman-soul
Among the bright and fairHe might not rest, he felt for him,
One such had been created,
Whose maiden soul in quietude
For his call meekly waited.
126 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And oft when beaming eyes were nigh,
And beauty's lip was smiling,
And bird-like tones were breathing round
The fevered sense beguiling;
He felt this was not what he sought  The soul such mockery spurned,
And evermore with aching zeal,
For that one being yearned.
And she whose loving soul went forth
Wherever beauty dwelt;
Who with the truthful and the good
A genial essence felt,
Oh! often in her solitude,
By her own soul oppressed,
She fain had nestled like a dove
Within one stranger breast.
127
L., 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Thoug,h higher, holier far than those
Who listening to her voice,
A something caught of better things,
That make the heart rejoice;
Yet teaching thus her spirit lone
Aweary would have knelt,
And learned with child-like reverence,
Where deeper wisdom dwelt.
And now that will of stronger growth,
That spirit firmer made,
Instinctive holds her own in check,
Her timid footsteps stayed;
And Eva in her maidenhood,
Half trembles with new fear,
And on her lip that strange, deep smile,
The handmaid of a tear.
128
t,'.
.,  
THE SINLESS CHILD.
While doubting thus, a seraph stayed
His radiant course awhile;
And with a heavenly sympathy,
Looked on with beaming smile:
And thus his words of spirit-love.
Trust and assurance brought,
And bade her where the soul finds birth,
To weakly question not.
Content to feel-care not to know,
The sacred source whence its ariseRespect in modesty of soul,
This mystery of mysteries:
Mere mind with all its subtle arts,
Hath only learned when thus it gazed
The inmost veil of human hearts,
E'en to themselves must not be raised.
129
u 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Her trusting hand, then Eva laid
In that of Albert Linne,
And for one trembling moment turned
Her gentle thoughts within.
Deep tenderness was in the glance
That rested on his face,
As if her woman-heart had found
Its own abiding place.
And when she turned her to depart
Her voice more liquid grew,
"Dear youth, thy thoughts and mine are one;
One source their being drew!
And they must mingle evermore;  Thy thoughts of love and me,
Will, as a light, thy footsteps guide
To life and mystery."
130
'I.. 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And then she bent her timid eyes,
And as beside she knelt,
The pressure of her sinless lips
Upon his brow he felt.
Low, heart-breathed words she uttered then:
For him she breathed a prayer;
He turned to look upon her face,  The maiden was not there.!
131
I 
PART VII.
Eva hath fulfilled her destiny. Material things can
no further minister to the growth of her spirit.  That
waking of the soul to its own deep mysteries-its oneness with another, has been accomplished. A human soul
is perfected. Slie had moved amid the beings around her
one, but unlike them, in the world-but not of it. Those
who had felt the wisdom of her sweet teachings, yet felt
repelled, as by a sacred influence. They dared not crave
companionship with a spirit so lofty, and yet so meek.And thus, though the crowd, as it were, might press upon
her, she was yet alone in her true spiritual atmosphere.
To them she became a light, a guide, but to Albert Linne
alone, was her mission of Womanhood. In her he learned
that no one seeketh in vain, the good and the true-that
as our faith is, it is given unto us.  He confidently sought
for the Divine, and it was given unto him. He but touched
her garment and she perceived the soul test.
Sorrow and pain-hope, with its kin-spirit, fear, are
not for the sinless. She hath walked in an atmosphere
of light, and her faith hath looked within the veil.
L 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
The true woman, with woman's love and gentleness, and
trust and childlike simplicity, yet with all her noble aspirations and spiritual discernments, she hath known them all
without sin, and sorrow may not visit such. She ceased
to be present-she passed away liklie the petal that hath
dropped from the rose-like the last sweet note of the
singing-bird, or the dying close of the wind harp.  Eva is
the lost pleiad in the sky of womanhood.  Has her spirit
ceased to be upon the earth? Does it not still brood over
our woman hearts?-and doth not her voice blend ever
with the sweet voices of Nature!  Eva, mine own, my
beautiful, I may not say-farewell.
Twas night-bright beamed the silver moon,
And all the stars were out;
The widow heard within the dell
Sweet voices all about.
The loitering winds were made to sound
Her sinless daughter's name)
While to the roof a rare toned-bird
With wondrous music came.
12
133 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And long it sat upon the roof
And poured its mellow song,
That rose upon the stilly air,
And swelled the vales along.
It was no earthly thing she deemed,
That, in the clear moonlight,
Sat on the lowly cottage roof,
And charmed the ear of night. (d)
The sun is up, the flowerets raise
Their folded leaves from rest;
The bird is singing in the branch
Hard'by its dewy nest.
The spider's thread, from twig to twig,
Is glittering in the light,
With dew-drops has the web been lIhung
Through all the starry night.
134 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Why tarries Eva long in bed,
For she is wont to be
The first to greet the early bird,
The waking bud to see?
Why stoops her mother o'er the couch
With half suppressed breath,
And lifts the deep-fringed eyelid up?  That frozen orb is death!
Why raises she the small pale hand,
And holds it to the light?
There is no clear transparent hue
To meet her dizzy sight.
She holds the mirror to her lips
To catch the moistened air:
The widowed mother stands alone
With her dead daughter there!
135
v 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
And yet so placid is the face,
So sweet its lingering smile,
That one might deem the sleep to be
The maiden's playful wile.
No pain the quiet limbs had racked,
No sorrow dimm'd the brow,
So tranquil had the life gone forth,
She seemed but slumbering now.
They laid her down beside the brook
Upon the sloping hill,
And that strange bird with its rare note,
Is singing o'er her still.
The sunbeam warmer loves to rest
Upon the heaving mound,
And those unealithlilv blossoms spring,
Uncultured from the ground.
136
L_7 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
There Albert Iinne, an altered man,
Oft bowed in lowly prayer,
And pondered o'er those mystic words
Which Eva uttered there.
That pure compassion, angel-like,
Whichl touched her soul when he,
A guilty and heart-stricken man,
Would from her presence flee;
Her sinless lips from earthly love,
So tranquil and so free;
And that low, fervent prayer for him,
She breathed on bended knee.
As Eva's words and spirit sank
More deeply in his heart,
Young Albert Linne went forth to act
The better human part.
12'
137
r-,:
L!, 
THE SINLESS CHILD.
Nor yet alone did Albert strive;
For, blending with his own,
In every voice of prayer or praise
Was heard young Eva's tone.
He felt her lips upon his brow,
Her angel form beside;
And nestling niearest to his heart,
WVas she-THE SPIRIT BRIDE.
The Siniless Child, with mission high,
Awhile to Earth was given,
To shew uis that our world should be
The vestibule of Heaven.
Did we but in the holy light
Of truth and goodness rise,
We might communion hold with God
And spirits from the skies.
138
LI 
TIIE ACORN.
= 4 
Pi 
pIV             p',' l 
THE ACORN.
AN acorn fell from an old oak tree,
And lay on the frosty ground" 0, what shall the fate of the acorn be!"
Was whispered all around,
By low-toned voices, chiming sweet,
Like a floweret's bell when swungAnd grasshopper steeds were gathering fleet,
And the beetl's hoofs up-lung
r',
6 
THE ACORN.
For the woodland Fays came sweeping past
In the pale autumnal ray,
Where the forest leaves were falling fast,
And the acorn quivering lay;
They came to tell what its fate should be,
Though life was unrevealed;
For life is holy mystery,
Where'er it is conceal'd.
They came with gifts that should life bestow'
The dew and the living airThe bane that should work its deadlv wo    Was found with the Fairies there.
In the gray moss-cup was the mildew brought,
And the worm in the rose-leaf roll'd,
And many things with destruction fraught,
That its fate were quickly told.
142
-F.. 
THE ACORN.
But it needed not; for a blessed fate
Was the acorn's doomed to beThe spirits of earth should its birth-time wait,
And watch o'er its destiny.
To a little sprite was the task assigned
To bury the acorn deep,
Away from the frost and searching wind,
When they through the forest sweep.
I laughed outright at the small thing's toil,
As he bow'd beneath the spade,
And he balanced his gossamer wings the while
To look in the pit he made.
A thimble's depth it was scarcely deep,
When the spade aside he threw,
And roll'd the acorn away to sleep
In the hush of dropping dew.
143
k 
THE ACORN.
The spring-time came with its fresh, warm air,
And its gush of woodland song;
The dew came down, and the rain was there,
And the sunshine rested long;
Then softly the black earth turn'd aside,
The old leaf arching o'er,
And up, where the last year's leaf was dried,
Came the acorn-shell once more.
With coil'd stem, and a pale green hue,
It look'd but a feeble thing;
Then deeply its roots abroad it threw,
Its strength from the earth to bring.
The woodland sprites are gathering round,
Rejoiced that tile task is doneThat another life from the noisome ground
Is up to the pleasant sun.
144 
THE ACORN.
Thle young child pass'd with a careless tread,
And the germn had well-nigh crush'd,
But a spider, launch'd on her airy thread,
The cheek of the stripling brush'd.
He little knew, as he started back,
How thle acorn's fate was hung
On the very point in the spider's track
Where the web on his cheek was flung.
T'he autumn came, and it stood alone,
And bow'd as the the wind pass'd byThe wind that utter'd its dirge-like moan
In the old oak sere and dry;
And the hollow branches creak'd and sway'd
But they bent not to the blast,
For the stout oak tree, where centuries play'd
Was sturdy to the last.
13
145
A.1
v 
THE ACORN.
A schoolboy beheld the lithe young shoot,
And his knife was instant out,
To sever the stalk from the spreading root,
And scatter the buds about;
To peel the bark in curious rings,
And many a notch and ray,
To beat the air till it whizzing sings,
Then idly cast away.
His hand was stay'd; he knew not why:
'Twas a presence breathed aroundA pleading from the deep-blue sky,
And up from the teeming ground.
It told of the care that had lavish'd been
In sunshine and in dewOf the many things that had wrought a screen
When peril around it grew.
146 
THIE ACORN.
It told of the oak that once had bow'd,.
As feeble a thing to see;
But now, when the storm was raging loud,
It wrestled mightily.
There's a deeper thought on the schoolboy's brow,
A new love at his heart,
And hle ponders nmutch, as with footsteps slow
He turns him to depart.
Up grew the twig, with a vigour bold,
In the shade of the parent tree,
And the old oakl knew that his doom was told,
Wlhen the sapling sprang so friee.
Then the fierce wiinds came, and they raging tore
The hollow limbs away;
And the damp moss crept from the earthy floor
Around the trunk, time-worn and gray.
147
rz.
!L 
THE ACORN.
The young oak grew, and proudly grew,
For its roots were deep and strong;
And a shadow broad on the earth it threw,
And the sunlight linger'd long
On its glossy leaf, whiere the flickering light
Was flung to the evening sky;
And the wild bird came to its airy height,
And taught her young to fly.
In acorn-time came the truant boy,
With a wild and eager look,
And he mark'd the tree with a wondering joy,
As the wind the great limbs shook.
He look'd where the moss on the north side grew,
The gnarled arms outspread,
The solemnn shadow the huge tree threw,
As it tower'd above his head:
148
IIF 
THE ACORN.
And vague-like fears the boy surround,
In the shadow of that tree;
So growing up from the darksome ground,
Like a giant mystery.
His heart beats quick to the squirrel's tread
On the withered leaf and dry,
And he lifts not up his awe-struck head
As the eddying wind sweeps by.
And regally the stout oak stood,
In its vigour and its pride;
A monarch own'd in the solemn wood,
With a sceptre spreading wideNo more in the wintry blast to bow,
Or rock in the summer breeze;
But draped in green, or star-like snow,
Reign king of the forest trees.
13 *
149
TV 
THE ACORN.
And a thousand years it firmly grew,
Anld a thousand blasts defied;
And, mighty in strength, its broad arms threw
A shadow dense and wide.
It grew where the rocks were bursting out
From the thin and heaving soilWhere the ocean's roar, and the sailor's shout,
Were mingled in wild turmoil
Where the far-off sound of the restless deep
Came up with a booming swell;
And the white foam dash'd to the rocky steep,
But it loved the tumult well.
Then its huge limbs creak'd in the midnight air,
And joined in the rude uproar:
For it loved the storm and the lightning's glare,
And the sound of the breaker's roar.
150 
THE ACORN.
The bleaching bones of the seabird's prey
Were heap'd on the rocks below;
And the bald-head eagle, fierce and gray,
Look'd off from its topmost bough.
Where its shadow lay on the quiet wave
The light boat often swung,
And the stout ship, saved from the ocean-grave,
Her cable round it flung.
Change came to the mighty things of earth    Old empires pass'd away;
Of the generations that had birth,
0 Death! where, where were they?
Yet fresh and green the brave oak stood,
Nor dreamed it of decay,
Though a thousand times in the autumn wood
Its leaves on the pale earth lay.
151
w 
THE ACORN.
A sound comes down in the forest trees,
An echoing from the hill;
It floats far off on the summer breeze,
And the shiore resounds it shrill.
Lo! the monarch tree no more shall stand
Like a watch-tower of thie mainThe strokes fall thick from the woodman's hand,
And its falling shakes the plain.
The stout old oak!-'Twas a worthy tree,
And the builder marked it out;
And hlie smiled its angled limbs to see,
As he measured the trunk about.
Already to him was a gallant bark
Careering the rolling deep,
And in sunshine, calm, or tempest dark,
Her way she will proudly keep.
152
L 
THE ACORN.
The chisel clinks, and the hammer rings,
And the merry jest goes round;
While he who longest and loudest sings
Is the stoutest workman found.
With jointed rib, and trunnel'd plank
The work goes gayly on,
And light-spoke oaths, when the glass they drank,
Are heard till the task is done.
She sits on the stocks, the skeleton ship,
With her oaken ribs all bare,
And the child looks up with parted lip,
As it gathers fuel thereWith brimless hat, the bare-foot boy
Looks round with strange amaze.
And dreams of a sailor's life of joy
Are mingling in that gaze.
153
re 
THE ACORN.
With graceful waist and carvings brave
The trial lull waits the seaAnd she proudly stoops to the crested wave,
While round go the cheerings three.
Hier prow swells up from the yeasty deep,
Where it plunged in foam and spray;
And the glad waves gathering round her sweep
And buoy her in their play.
Thou wert nobly rear'd, 0 heart of oak!
In the sound of the ocean roar,
Where the surging wave o'er the rough rock broke
And bellow'd along the shoreAnd how wilt thou in the storm rejoice,
With the wind through spar and shroud,
To hear a sound like the forest voice,
When the blast was raging loud!
154
Fim 
THE ACORN.
With snow-white sail, and streamer gay,
She sits like an ocean-sprite,
Careering on in her trackless way,
In sunshine or dark midnight:
Her course is laid with fearless skill,
For brave hearts mall the helm;
And the joyous winds her canvass fill    Shall the wave the stout ship whelm?
On, on she goes, where icebergs roll,
Like floating cities by;
Where meteors flash by the northern pole,
And the merry dancers fly;
Where the glittering light is backward flung
From icy tower and dome,
And the frozen shrouds are gayly hung
With gems from the ocean foam.
155
F 
THE ACORN.
On the Indian se. was her shadow cast,
As it lay like molten gold,
And her pendant shroud and towering mast
Seem'd twice on the waters told.
The idle canvass slowly swung
As the spicy breeze went by,
And strange, rare music around her rung
From the palm-tree growing nigh.
0, gallant ship, thou didst bear with thee
The gay and the breaking heart,
And weeping eyes look'd out to see
Thy white-spread sails depart.
And when the rattling casement told
Of many a perill'd ship,
The anxious wife her babes would fold,
And pray with trembling lip.
156
t 
THE ACORN.
The petrel wheeled in her stormy flight;
The wind piped shrill and high;
On the topmast sat a pale blue light,
That flickered not to the eye:
The black cloud came like a banner down,
And down came the shrieking blast;
The quivering ship on her beams is thrown,
And gone are helm and mast.
Helmless, but on before the gale,
She ploughs the deep-troughed wave:
A gurgling sound-a phrenzied wail    And the ship hath found a grave.
And thus is the fate of the acorn told,
That fell from the old oak tree,
And the woodland Fays in the frosty mould
Preserved for its destiny.
14
157
wor   
SONNETS.
LI 
SONNETS.
POESY.
With no fond, sickly thirst for fame, I kneel,
Oh, goddess, of the high-born art to thee;
Not unto thee with semblance of a zeal
I come, oh, pure and heaven-eyed Poesy!
Thou art to me a spirit and a love,
Felt ever from the time, when first the earth,
In its green beauty, and the sky above
Informed my soul with joy too deep for mirth.
I was a child of thine before my tongue
Could lisp its infant utterance unto thee,
And now, albeit from my harp are flung
Discordant numbers, and the song may be
That which I would not, yet I know that thou
The offering wilt not spurn, while thus to thee I
bow.
14 *
Im 1 6 1 
SONNETS.
.   RELIGION.
ALONE, yet not alone, the heart doth brood
WiLi a sad fondness o'er its hidden grief;
Broods with a miiser's joy, wherein relief
Ccmnes with a semblance of its own quaint mood.
Howv many hearts this point of life have passed!
And some a train of light behind have cast,
Tc show us what hath been, and what may be;
Thi:t thus have suffered all the wise and good,
TLt s wept and prayed, thus struggled, and were
free.
So cloth the pilot, trackless through the deep,
UInswerving by the stars his reckoning keep,
Hl( treads a highway not untried before,
AiJ,l thence he courage gains, and joy doth reap,
IUnfialtering lays his course, and leaves behind the
shore.
162
,L7-_r
LI-, 
SONNETS.
THE UNATTAINED.
AND is this life? and are we born for this?
To follow phantoms that elude the grasp,
Or whatso'er's secured, within our clasp,
To withering lie, as if each mortal kiss
Were doomed death's shuddering touch alone to
meet.
O Life! has thou reserved no cup of bliss?
Must still THE UNATTAINED beguile our feet?
The UNATTAINED with yearnings fill the breast,
That rob, for aye, the spirit of its rest?
Yes, this is Life; and everywhere we meet,
Not victor crowns, but wailings of defea;
Yet faint thou not, thou dost apply a test,
That shall incite thee onward, upward still,
The present cannot sate, nor e'er thy spirit fill.
163
Ff. 
SONNETS.
AN INCIDENT.
A SIMPLE thing, yet chancing as it did,
When life was bright with its illusive dreams,
A pledge and promise seemed beneath it hid;
The ocean lay before me, tinged with beams,
That lingering draped the west, a wavering stir,
And at my feet there fell a worn, grey quill;
An eagle, high above the darkling fir,
With steady flight, seemed there to take his fill
Of that pure ether breathed by him alone.
0! noble bird! why didst thou loose for me
Thy eagle plume? still unessayed, unknown
Must -be that pathway fearless winged by thee;
I ask it not, no lofty flight is mine,
I would not soar like thee, in loneliness to pine!
164 
SONNETS.
LIFE.
SUGGESTED BY COLE'S FOUR PAINTINGS REPRESENTING
THE VOYAGE OF LIFE.
CHILDHOOD.
THOU poet-painter, preacher of great truth,
Far more suggestive thine than written tomeLo, we return with thee to that vast dome,Dim cavern of the past. Visions uncouth,
Vague, rayless, all impalpable in sooth,
Send back the startled soul. The waters come
All tranquilly from that dim cavern forth,
The mystic tide of human life. A child,
Borne on its bosom, sports with blossoms wild.
A Presence, felt, but still unseen, the boat'
With gentle hand guides onward, and beguiled
With music lost in other years, they float
Upon the stream. The hours unfelt, for life
Is joy in its first voyage, with light and blossoms
rife.
165
7,m 
SONNETS.
YOUTH.
Alas, the Spirit lingers, but its hland
No more the barque sustains. The daring youth
Has seized the helm, and deeper launches forth,
His eye amid illusions of ideal landBright castles, built in air, fame, glory, wortlh,
Fabrics, that still receding, seem to stand;
He sports no more mid blossoms of green earth;
He hears no more the music of his birth;
The future lures him, pinnacles and towers,
And half he chides the lagging of the hours,
Unheeds their sunshine, blessedness and mirth;
For onward is his course, he asks not where,
Since fancy paints the prospect passing fair.
166
L. 
SONNET5.
MANHOOD.
Still onward goes the barque-the tide
Bears it along where breakers foam and roar,
And oaks unbending, riven, line the shore;
Dense vapors rising, all the future hide;
And how shall he that future peril bide?
The guiding helm he eager grasps no more;
Time weighs the prow, the wave is deep beside;
Swift flows the current, fierce the gathering strife,
The struggle and the buffetings of life.
Half he recoils, yet calmly bides the test,
With hands clasped firmly on the unconquered
breast;
Nor meets alone that hour with peril rife
Forth from on high the guardian Spirit bends
With ministry of love, and holy valour sends.
167 
SONNETS.
OLD AGE.
Thy mission is accomplished-painter-sage,
Look to thy crown of glory-for thy brow
Is circled with its radiant halo now.
No more earth's turmoil will thy soul engage,
Its hopes unquiet, littleness, or rage.
With thine own voyager thou hast heard the sound
Of that vast ocean, waveless, rayless, dread,
Where time's perpetual tribute, circling round,
Drops silent in, all passionless and dead.
When thine own voyage is o'er, and thou shalt
near
The eternal wave, thus, thus above thy head
May opening glories shield thy heart from fear;
A child again, but strong in faith and prayer,
Thou shalt look meekly up-behold thy God is
there!
168
i6 
SONNETS.
A DREAM.
I DREAMED last night, that I myself did lay
Within the grave, and after stood and wept,
My spirit sorrowed where its ashes slept!
'Twas a strange dream, and yet methinks it may
Prefigure that which is akin to truth.
How sorrow we o'er perished dreams of youth,
High hopes and aspirations doomed to be
Crushed and o'ermastered by earth's destiny!
Fame, that the spirit loathing turns to ruth;
And that deluding faith so loth to part,
That earth will shrine for us one kindred heart!
Oh,'tis the ashes of such things that wring
Tears from the eyes-hopes like to these depart,
And we bow down in dread o'ershadowed by
death's-wing!
15
169
rF 
SONNETS.
THE BARD.
IT cannot be, the baffled heart, in vain,
May seek, amid the crowd, its throbs to hide;
Ten thousand others kindred pangs may bide,
Yet not the less will our own griefs complain.
Chained to our rock, the vulture's gory stain,
And tearing beak is every moment rife,
Renewing pangs that end but with our life.
Thence bursteth forth the gushing voice of song,
The soutl's deep anguish thence an utterance finds,
Appealing to all hearts: and human minds
Bow down in awe: thence doth the Bard belong,
Unto all times: and this, 0 this is fameHe asked it not: his soul demanded bread,
And ye, charmed with the voice, gave but a stone
instead.
170
r,
k 
SONNETS.
[The writer's first passage up the Hudson was on a tranquil night at the close of summer, a clear moonshine makingr the stars pase in the deep sky. Nothing could exceed
the loveliness of the scene, as doubling point after point,
the river at each turn revealed a new aspect of beauty.
It was no loiyec the  majstie  Hudson, sweeping its proud
waters to the ocean, bearing a fleet upon its bosom, and
making a grand highway for wealth and luxury; but a
graceful, sentient creature,  withl  an onward purpose,
gliding amId the hills, and smiling as it overcame  the
obstacles in its path.]
TO THE HUDSON.
Ot! river, gently as a wayward child,
I saw thee'mid the moonlight hills at rest,
Capricious thing, with thine own beauty wild,
How  did'st thou still the throbbings of thy
breast!
171 
SONNETS.
Rude headlands were about thee, stooping round
As if amid the hills to hold thy stay;
But thou did'st hear the far-off ocean sound,
Inviting thee from hill and vale away,
To mingle thy deep waters with its own;
And, at that voice, thy steps did onward glide,
Onward from echoing hill and valley lone;
Like thine, oh, be my course —nor turned
aside,
While listing to the soundings of a land,
That like the ocean call invites me to its strand.
172 
NOTES.
15 *  
NOTES
TO THE SINLESS CHILD.
(a),, There was neither hammer nor axe, nor any tool
of iron, heard in the house while it was building."
1 Kings, chap. vi. verse 7.
(b) It is a common belief among the vulgar, that a
sigh always forces a drop of blood from the heart, and
many curious stories are told to that effect; as for instance,
a man wishing to be rid of his wife, in order to marry one
more attractive, promised her the gift of six new dresses,
and sundry other articles of female finery, provided she
would sigh three times every morning before breakfast, for
three months. She complied, and before the time had
expired, was in her grave.  Many others of a like nature
might be recorded.  The old writers are full of allusions
of a like kind, particularly Shakspeare, ", blood consuming
sighs," &c. 
NOTES.
(c) The worship of the Madonna is in the true spirit of
poetry. She became to the christian world what the
Penates had been to the classical. In-confining ourselves
to the abstractions of religion, we run the hazard of
making it one of thought rather than of emotion.   A
woman must aiways worship through her affections, and
one may readily conceive the comfort which the household faithl in the presence of the Madonna is likely to
inspire.
(d) WVe are indebted to the Aborigines for this beautiful superstition. The Indian believes that if the wekolis
or whlipporwill alights upon the roof of his cabin and sings
its sweet plaintive song, it portends death to one of its inmates.  The o men is almost universally regarded in NewEngland. Thle author recollects once hearing an elderly
lady relate with singular pathos, an incident of the kind
She was blest with a son of rare endowments and great
piety.  In the absence of his father he was wont to minister at the family altar; and unlike the stern practices of the
Pilgrims, from whose stock he was lineally descended, he
176 
NOT ES.
prostrated himself in prayer in the lowliest humility. It
was touching to hear his clear low voice, and see his spiritual face while kneeling at this holy duty.
One quiet moonlight night while thus engaged, the mother's heart sank within her to hear the plaintive notes
of the whippoorwill blending with the voice of prayer. It
sat upon the roof and continued its song long after the devotions had ceased. The tears rushed to her eyes, and she
embraced her son in a transport of grief. She felt it must
be ominous. In one week he was borne away, and the daisies grew, and the birds sang over his grave
177 
I 
CONTENTS.
PAGE
XV
. 37
PREFACE
The Sinless Child
The Acorn
SONNETS.
e.  161
~. 162
.  163
164
Religion.
The Unattained
An Incident..
Cole's Paintings of The
Childhood
Youth.
Manhood
Old Age
The Bard........
To The Hudson... 
Notes to The Sinless Child...
. 141
Poesy
. 165
166
. 167
168
. 169
170
. 171
175
A Dream 
I