It was the season of unfolding leaves,

Of days advancing toward their utmost length,
And small birds singing happily to mates

Happy as they. With spirit-saddening power
Winds pipe through fading woods; but those blithe

notes

Strike the deserted to the heart; I speak

Of what I know, and what we feel within.
-Beside the cottage in which Ellen dwelt
Stands a tall ash-tree; to whose topmost twig
A thrush resorts, and annually chants,
At morn and evening from that naked perch,
While all the undergrove is thick with leaves,
A time-beguiling ditty, for delight

Of his fond partner, silent in the nest.

- Ah why,' said Ellen, sighing to herself, 'Why do not words, and kiss, and solemn pledge; "And nature that is kind in woman's breast, And reason that in man is wise and good, ́ And fear of him who is a righteous judge; Why do not these prevail for human life, To keep two hearts together, that began Their spring-time with one love, and that have need 'Of mutual pity and forgiveness, sweet

To grant, or be received; while that poor bird'O come and hear him! Thou who hast to me 'Been faithless, hear him, though a lowly creature, 'One of God's simple children that yet know not 'The universal Parent, how he sings

'As if he wished the firmament of heaven

' Should listen, and give back to him the voice
'Of his triumphant constancy and love;
The proclamation that he makes, how far
'His darkness doth transcend our fickle light!'

Such was the tender passage, not by me
Repeated without loss of simple phrase,
Which I perused, even as the words had been

Committed by forsaken Ellen's hand
To the blank margin of a Valentine,

Bedropped with tears. 'Twill please you to be told
That, studiously withdrawing from the eye
Of all companionship, the Sufferer yet

In lonely reading found a meek resource:
How thankful for the warmth of summer days,
When she could slip into the cottage-barn,
And find a secret oratory there;

Or, in the garden, under friendly veil
Of their long twilight, pore upon her book
By the last lingering help of the open sky
Until dark night dismissed her to her bed!
Thus did a waking fancy sometimes lose
The unconquerable pang of despised love.

A kindlier passion opened on her soul
When that poor Child was born. Upon its face
She gazed as on a pure and spotless gift
Of unexpected promise, where a grief

Or dread was all that had been thought of,-joy Far livelier than bewildered traveller feels, Amid a perilous waste that all night long Hath harassed him toiling through fearful storm, When he beholds the first pale speck serene Of day-spring, in the gloomy east, revealed, And greets it with thanksgiving. 'Till this hour,' Thus, in her Mother's hearing Ellen spake, 'There was a stony region in my heart; 'But He, at whose command the parched rock 'Was smitten, and poured forth a quenching stream, 'Hath softened that obduracy, and made "Unlooked-for gladness in the desert place,

To save the perishing; and, henceforth, I breathe 'The air with cheerful spirit, for thy sake

My Infant and for that good Mother dear,

Who bore me; and hath prayed for me in vain ;

'Yet not in vain; it shall not be in vain.'

She spake, nor was the assurance unfulfilled;
And if heart-rending thoughts would oft return,
They stayed not long. The blameless Infant grew;
The Child whom Ellen and her Mother loved
They soon were proud of; tended it and nursed;
A soothing comforter, although forlorn ;
Like a poor singing-bird from distant lands
Or a choice shrub, which he, who passes by
With vacant mind, not seldom may observe
Fair-flowering in a thinly-peopled house,
Whose window, somewhat sadly, it adorns.

Through four months' space the Infant drew its food

From the maternal breast; then scruples rose ; Thoughts, which the rich are free from, came and crossed

The fond affection. She no more could bear
By her offence to lay a twofold weight
On a kind parent willing to forget

Their slender means: so, to that parent's care
Trusting her child, she left their common home,
And undertook with dutiful content

A Foster-mother's office.

'Tis, perchance,

Unknown to you that in these simple vales
The natural feeling of equality

Is by domestic service unimpaired;

Yet, though such service be, with us, removed
From sense of degradation, not the less

The ungentle mind can easily find means
To impose severe restraints and laws unjust,
Which hapless Ellen now was doomed to feel :
For (blinded by an over-anxious dread
Of such excitement and divided thought
As with her office would but ill accord)
The pair, whose infant she was bound to nurse,
Forbad her all communion with her own:

Week after week, the mandate they enforced.
-So near! yet not allowed, upon that sight
To fix her eyes-alas! 'twas hard to bear!
But worse affliction must be borne-far worse;
For 'tis Heaven's will-that, after a disease
Begun and ended within three days' space,
Her child should die; as Ellen now exclaimed,
Her own-deserted child!-Once, only once,
She saw it in that mortal malady;

And, on the burial-day, could scarcely gain
Permission to attend its obsequies.

She reached the house, last of the funeral train ;
And some one, as she entered, having chanced
To urge unthinkingly their prompt departure,
'Nay,' said she, with commanding look, a spirit
Of anger never seen in her before,

'Nay, ye must wait my time!' and down she sate,
And by the unclosed coffin kept her seat
Weeping and looking, looking on and weeping,
Upon the last sweet slumber of her Child,

Until at length her soul was satisfied.

You see the Infant's Grave; and to this spot,
The Mother, oft as she was sent abroad,
On whatsoever errand, urged her steps:

!

Hither she came; here stood, and sometimes knelt
In the broad day, a rueful Magdalene!
So call her; for not only she bewailed
A mother's loss, but mourned in bitterness
Her own transgression; penitent sincere
As ever raised to heaven a streaming eye
-At length the parents of the foster-child,
Noting that in despite of their commands
She still renewed and could not but renew
Those visitations, ceased to send her forth;
Or, to the garden's narrow bounds, confined.
I failed not to remind them that they erred;
For holy Nature might not thus be crossed,

Thus wronged in woman's breast: in vain I pleaded-
But the green stalk of Ellen's life was snapped,
And the flower drooped; as every eye could see,
It hung its head in mortal languishment.
-Aided by this appearance, I at length

Prevailed; and, from those bonds released, she went
Home to her mother's house.

The Youth was fled; The rash betrayer could not face the shame Or sorrow which his senseless guilt had caused; And little would his presence, or proof given Of a relenting soul, have now availed; For, like a shadow, he was passed away From Ellen's thoughts; had perished to her mind For all concerns of fear, or hope, or love, Save only those which to their common shame, And to his moral being appertained:

Hope from that quarter would, I know, have brought
A heavenly comfort; there she recognised

An unrelaxing bond, a mutual need;
There, and, as seemed, there only.

She had built,

Her fond maternal heart had built, a nest
In blindness all too near the river's edge;
That work a summer flood with hasty swell
Had swept away; and now her Spirit longed
For its last flight to heaven's security.
-The bodily frame wasted from day to day;
Meanwhile, relinquishing all other cares,
Her mind she strictly tutored to find peace
And pleasure in endurance. Much she thought,
And much she read; and brooded feelingly
Upon her own unworthiness. To me,
As to a spiritual comforter and friend,
Her heart she opened; and no pains were spared
To mitigate, as gently as I could,

The sting of self-reproach, with healing words.
Meek Saint! through patience glorified on earth!