Historic leaves, volume 2, April, 1903 - January, 1904

The squirrel quick hath run
Across the track unto the old gray wall,
Wreathed o'er with thorny vines, while brambles tall
Beset it 'round; and 'neath the summer sun
Floats the bronzed butterfly until—behold!—
His wings are turning all to burnished gold!
And all day, in the wild young cricket's ear,
The locust proseth; but she will not hear.
And, hark! a sudden stream of melody
Comes quivering through the calm and silent wood;
Tis the sweet thrush, far from the gazing eye,
Who swelleth now her little gushing throat
Alone for her dear mate and tender brood;
And, ere the air hath caught that lovely note,
Tis gone, and all the woods are dark and lone.
And long they wait expectant of that tone,
Nor know they where she sits, until again
Her music runneth quick through all their bowers,
And ceaseth. Ah! no nightingales of Spain,
That sing at night around Grenada's towers,
So fondly all my ear and heart did gain.

There is a reflection of considerable variety of experience in this volume. The organist in the Spanish cathedral, compelling into his notes the image of his dead wife, gives place to the vastness and awe of the desolate ocean seen from the shore at Beverly. Here is a German lesson, inspiring the young teacher with a hopeless passion for his fair pupil. There is a sympathetic portrayal of a sick woman, waiting patiently from day to day, and from season to season, for the death that is so long in coming, but that comes at last. Glimpses of natural beauty relieve the sadness of such scenes. Take, for example, ‘The Silent Way,’ describing a woodland path so thickly guarded that neither the winds of March nor the midsummer sun, nor even November frost, can enter.