Snow-Bound - A Winter Idyl

As the Spirits of Darkness be stronger in the dark, so Good Spirits, which be Angels of Light, are augmented not only by the Divine light of the Sun, but also by our common Wood Fire: and as the Celestial Fire drives away dark spirits, so also this our Fire of Wood doth the same. - Cor. AGRIPPA, Occult Philosophy, Book I. ch. v Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow, and, driving oer the fields, Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air Hides hills and woods, the rivet and the heaven, And veils the farm-house at the gardens end. The sled and traveller stopped, the couriers feet Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed In a tumultuous privacy of storm. - Emerson. The Snow Storm.     The sun that brief December day     Rose cheerless over hills of gray,     And, darkly circled, gave at noon     A sadder light than waning moon.     Slow tracing down the thickening sky     Its mute and ominous prophecy,     A portent seeming less than threat,     It sank from sight before it set.     A chill no coat, however stout,     Of homespun stuff could quite, shut out,     A hard, dull bitterness of cold,     That checked, mid-vein, the circling race     Of life-blood in the sharpened face,     The coming of the snow-storm told.     The wind blew east; we heard the roar     Of Ocean on his wintry shore,     And felt the strong pulse throbbing there     Beat with low rhythm our inland air.     Meanwhile we did our nightly chores,     Brought in the wood from out of doors,     Littered the stalls, and from the mows     Raked down the herds-grass for the cows     Heard the horse whinnying for his corn;     And, sharply clashing horn on horn,     Impatient down the stanchion rows     The cattle shake their walnut bows;     While, peering from his early perch     Upon the scaffolds pole of birch,     The cock his crested helmet bent     And down his querulous challenge sent.     Unwarmed by any sunset light     The gray day darkened into night,     A night made hoary with the swarm,     And whirl-dance of the blinding storm,     As zigzag, wavering to and fro,     Crossed and recrossed the winged snow     And ere the early bedtime came     The white drift piled the window-frame,     And through the glass the clothes-line posts     Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts.     So all night long the storm roared on     The morning broke without a sun;     In tiny spherule traced with lines     Of Natures geometric signs,     In starry flake, and pellicle,     All day the hoary meteor fell;     And, when the second morning shone,     We looked upon a world unknown,     On nothing we could call our own.     Around the glistening wonder bent     The blue walls of the firmament,     No cloud above, no earth below,     A universe of sky and snow     The old familiar sights of ours     Took marvellous shapes; strange domes and towers     Rose up where sty or corn-crib stood,     Or garden-wall, or belt of wood;     A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed,     A fenceless drift what once was road;     The bridle-post an old man sat     With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat;     The well-curb had a Chinese roof;     And even the long sweep, high aloof,     In its slant splendor, seemed to tell     Of Pisas leaning miracle.     A prompt, decisive man, no breath     Our father wasted: Boys, a path!     Well pleased, (for when did farmer boy     Count such a summons less than joy?)     Our buskins on our feet we drew;     With mittened hands, and caps drawn low,     To guard our necks and ears from snow,     We cut the solid whiteness through.     And, where the drift was deepest, made     A tunnel walled and overlaid     With dazzling crystal: we had read     Of rare Aladdins wondrous cave,     And to our own his name we gave,     With many a wish the luck were ours     To test his lamps supernal powers.     We reached the barn with merry din,     And roused the prisoned brutes within.     The old horse thrust his long head out,     And grave with wonder gazed about;     The cock his lusty greeting said,     And forth his speckled harem led;     The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked,     And mild reproach of hunger looked;     The horned patriarch of the sheep,     Like Egypts Amun roused from sleep,     Shook his sage head with gesture mute,     And emphasized with stamp of foot.     All day the gusty north-wind bore     The loosening drift its breath before;     Low circling round its southern zone,     The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone.     No church-bell lent its Christian tone     To the savage air, no social smoke     Curled over woods of snow-hung oak.     A solitude made more intense     By dreary-voiced elements,     The shrieking of the mindless wind,     The moaning tree-boughs swaying blind,     And on the glass the unmeaning beat     Of ghostly finger-tips of sleet.     Beyond the circle of our hearth     No welcome sound of toil or mirth     Unbound the spell, and testified     Of human life and thought outside.     We minded that the sharpest ear     The buried brooklet could not hear,     The music of whose liquid lip     Had been to us companionship,     And, in our lonely life, had grown     To have an almost human tone.     As night drew on, and, from the crest     Of wooded knolls that ridged the west,     The sun, a snow-blown traveller, sank     From sight beneath the smothering bank,     We piled, with care, our nightly stack     Of wood against the chimney-back,     The oaken log, green, huge, and thick,     And on its top the stout back-stick;     The knotty forestick laid apart,     And filled between with curious art     The ragged brush; then, hovering near,     We watched the first red blaze appear,     Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam     On whitewashed wall and sagging beam,     Until the old, rude-furnished room     Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom;     While radiant with a mimic flame     Outside the sparkling drift became,     And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree     Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free.     The crane and pendent trammels showed,     The Turks heads on the andirons glowed;     While childish fancy, prompt to tell     The meaning of the miracle,     Whispered the old rhyme: Under the tree,     When fire outdoors burns merrily,     There the witches are making tea.     The moon above the eastern wood     Shone at its full; the hill-range stood     Transfigured in the silver flood,     Its blown snows flashing cold and keen,     Dead white, save where some sharp ravine     Took shadow, or the sombre green     Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black     Against the whiteness at their back.     For such a world and such a night     Most fitting that unwarming light,     Which only seemed whereer it fell     To make the coldness visible.     Shut in from all the world without,     We sat the clean-winged hearth about,     Content to let the north-wind roar     In baffled rage at pane and door,     While the red logs before us beat     The frost-line back with tropic heat;     And ever, when a louder blast     Shook beam and rafter as it passed,     The merrier up its roaring draught     The great throat of the chimney laughed;     The house-dog on his paws outspread     Laid to the fire his drowsy head,     The cats dark silhouette on the wall     A couchant tigers seemed to fall;     And, for the winter fireside meet,     Between the andirons straddling feet,     The mug of cider simmered slow,     The apples sputtered in a row,     And, close at hand, the basket stood     With nuts from brown Octobers wood.     What matter how the night behaved?     What matter how the north-wind raved?     Blow high, blow low, not all its snow     Could quench our hearth-fires ruddy glow.     O Time and Change! with hair as gray     As was my sires that winter day,     How strange it seems, with so much gone     Of life and love, to still live on!     Ah, brother! only I and thou     Are left of all that circle now,     The dear home faces whereupon     That fitful firelight paled and shone.     Henceforward, listen as we will,     The voices of that hearth are still;     Look where we may, the wide earth oer     Those lighted faces smile no more.     We tread the paths their feet have worn,     We sit beneath their orchard trees,     We hear, like them, the hum of bees     And rustle of the bladed corn;     We turn the pages that they read,     Their written words we linger oer,     But in the sun they cast no shade,     No voice is heard, no sign is made,     No step is on the conscious floor!     Yet Love will dream, and Faith will trust,     (Since He who knows our need is just,)     That somehow, somewhere, meet we must.     Alas for him who never sees     The stars shine through his cypress-trees     Who, hopeless, lays his dead away,     Nor looks to see the breaking day     Across the mournful marbles play!     Who hath not learned, in hours of faith,     The truth to flesh and sense unknown,     That Life is ever lord of Death,     And Love can never lose its own!     We sped the time with stories old,     Wrought puzzles out, and riddles told,     Or stammered from our school-book lore     The Chief of Gambias golden shore.     How often since, when all the land     Was clay in Slaverys shaping hand,     As if a far-blown trumpet stirred     The languorous sin-sick air, I heard     Does not the voice of reason cry,     Claim the first right which Nature gave,     From the red scourge of bondage fly,     Nor deign to live a burdened slave!     Our father rode again his ride     On Memphremagogs wooded side;     Sat down again to moose and samp     In trappers hut and Indian camp;     Lived oer the old idyllic ease     Beneath St. Francois hemlock-trees;     Again for him the moonlight shone     On Norman cap and bodiced zone;     Again he heard the violin play     Which led the village dance away,     And mingled in its merry whirl     The grandam and the laughing girl.     Or, nearer home, our steps he led     Where Salisburys level marshes spread     Mile-wide as flies the laden bee;     Where merry mowers, hale and strong,     Swept, scythe on scythe, their swaths along     The low green prairies of the sea.     We shared the fishing off Boars Head,     And round the rocky Isles of Shoals     The hake-broil on the drift-wood coals;     The chowder on the sand-beach made,     Dipped by the hungry, steaming hot,     With spoons of clam-shell from the pot.     We heard the tales of witchcraft old,     And dream and sign and marvel told     To sleepy listeners as they lay     Stretched idly on the salted hay,     Adrift along the winding shores,     When favoring breezes deigned to blow     The square sail of the gundelow     And idle lay the useless oars.     Our mother, while she turned her wheel     Or run the new-knit stocking-heel,     Told how the Indian hordes came down     At midnight on Cocheco town,     And how her own great-uncle bore     His cruel scalp-mark to fourscore.     Recalling, in her fitting phrase,     So rich and picturesque and free,     (The common unrhymed poetry     Of simple life and country ways,)     The story of her early days,     She made us welcome to her home;     Old hearths grew wide to give us room;     We stole with her a frightened look     At the gray wizards conjuring-book,     The fame whereof went far and wide     Through all the simple country side;     We heard the hawks at twilight play,     The boat-horn on Piscataqua,     The loons weird laughter far away;     We fished her little trout-brook, knew     What flowers in wood and meadow grew,     What sunny hillsides autumn-brown     She climbed to shake the ripe nuts down,     Saw where in sheltered cove and bay     The ducks black squadron anchored lay,     And heard the wild-geese calling loud     Beneath the gray November cloud.     Then, haply, with a look more grave,     And soberer tone, some tale she gave     From painful Sewells ancient tome,     Beloved in every Quaker home,     Of faith fire-winged by martyrdom,     Or Chalkleys Journal, old and quaint,     Gentlest of skippers, rare sea-saint!     Who, when the dreary calms prevailed,     And water-butt and bread-cask failed,     And cruel, hungry eyes pursued     His portly presence mad for food,     With dark hints muttered under breath     Of casting lots for life or death,     Offered, if Heaven withheld supplies,     To be himself the sacrifice.     Then, suddenly, as if to save     The good man from his living grave,     A ripple on the water grew,     A school of porpoise flashed in view.     Take, eat, he said, and be content;     These fishes in my stead are sent     By Him who gave the tangled ram     To spare the child of Abraham.     Our uncle, innocent of books,     Was rich in lore of fields and brooks,     The ancient teachers never dumb     Of Natures unhoused lyceum.     In moons and tides and weather wise,     He read the clouds as prophecies,     And foul or fair could well divine,     By many an occult hint and sign,     Holding the cunning-warded keys     To all the woodcraft mysteries;     Himself to Natures heart so near     That all her voices in his ear     Of beast or bird had meanings clear,     Like Apollonius of old,     Who knew the tales the sparrows told,     Or Hermes who interpreted     What the sage cranes of Nilus said;     Content to live where life began;     A simple, guileless, childlike man,     Strong only on his native grounds,     The little world of sights and sounds     Whose girdle was the parish bounds,     Whereof his fondly partial pride     The common features magnified,     As Surrey hills to mountains grew     In White of Selbornes loving view,     He told how teal and loon he shot,     And how the eagles eggs he got,     The feats on pond and river done,     The prodigies of rod and gun;     Till, warming with the tales he told,     Forgotten was the outside cold,     The bitter wind unheeded blew,     From ripening corn the pigeons flew,     The partridge drummed i the wood, the mink     Went fishing down the river-brink.     In fields with bean or clover gay,     The woodchuck, like a hermit gray,     Peered from the doorway of his cell;     The muskrat plied the masons trade,     And tier by tier his mud-walls laid;     And from the shagbark overhead     The grizzled squirrel dropped his shell.     Next, the dear aunt, whose smile of cheer     And voice in dreams I see and hear,     The sweetest woman ever Fate     Perverse denied a household mate,     Who, lonely, homeless, not the less     Found peace in loves unselfishness,     And welcome wheresoeer she went,     A calm and gracious element,     Whose presence seemed the sweet income     And womanly atmosphere of home,     Called up her girlhood memories,     The huskings and the apple-bees,     The sleigh-rides and the summer sails,     Weaving through all the poor details     And homespun warp of circumstance     A golden woof-thread of romance.     For well she kept her genial mood     And simple faith of maidenhood;     Before her still a cloud-land lay,     The mirage loomed across her way;     The morning dew, that dries so soon     With others, glistened at her noon;     Through years of toil and soil and care,     From glossy tress to thin gray hair,     All unprofaned she held apart     The virgin fancies of the heart.     Be shame to him of woman born     Who hath for such but thought of scorn.     There, too, our elder sister plied     Her evening task the stand beside;     A full, rich nature, free to trust,     Truthful and almost sternly just,     Impulsive, earnest, prompt to act,     And make her generous thought a fact,     Keeping with many a light disguise     The secret of self-sacrifice.     O heart sore-tried! thou hast the best     That Heaven itself could give thee, rest,     Rest from all bitter thoughts and things!     How many a poor ones blessing went     With thee beneath the low green tent     Whose curtain never outward swings!     As one who held herself a part     Of all she saw, and let her heart     Against the household bosom lean,     Upon the motley-braided mat     Our youngest and our dearest sat,     Lifting her large, sweet, asking eyes,     Now bathed in the unfading green     And holy peace of Paradise.     Oh, looking from some heavenly hill,     Or from the shade of saintly palms,     Or silver reach of river calms,     Do those large eyes behold me still?     With me one little year ago:     The chill weight of the winter snow     For months upon her grave has lain;     And now, when summer south-winds blow     And brier and harebell bloom again,     I tread the pleasant paths we trod,     I see the violet-sprinkled sod     Whereon she leaned, too frail and weak     The hillside flowers she loved to seek,     Yet following me whereer I went     With dark eyes full of loves content.     The birds are glad; the brier-rose fills     The air with sweetness; all the hills     Stretch green to Junes unclouded sky;     But still I wait with ear and eye     For something gone which should be nigh,     A loss in all familiar things,     In flower that blooms, and bird that sings.     And yet, dear heart remembering thee,     Am I not richer than of old?     Safe in thy immortality,     What change can reach the wealth I hold?     What chance can mar the pearl and gold     Thy love hath left in trust with me?     And while in lifes late afternoon,     Where cool and long the shadows grow,     I walk to meet the night that soon     Shall shape and shadow overflow,     I cannot feel that thou art far,     Since near at need the angels are;     And when the sunset gates unbar,     Shall I not see thee waiting stand,     And, white against the evening star,     The welcome of thy beckoning hand?     Brisk wielder of the birch and rule,     The master of the district school     Held at the fire his favored place,     Its warm glow lit a laughing face     Fresh-hued and fair, where scarce appeared     The uncertain prophecy of beard.     He teased the mitten-blinded cat,     Played cross-pins on my uncles hat,     Sang songs, and told us what befalls     In classic Dartmouths college halls.     Born the wild Northern hills among,     From whence his yeoman father wrung     By patient toil subsistence scant,     Not competence and yet not want,     He early gained the power to pay     His cheerful, self-reliant way;     Could doff at ease his scholars gown     To peddle wares from town to town;     Or through the long vacations reach     In lonely lowland districts teach,     Where all the droll experience found     At stranger hearths in boarding round,     The moonlit skaters keen delight,     The sleigh-drive through the frosty night,     The rustic party, with its rough     Accompaniment of blind-mans-buff,     And whirling plate, and forfeits paid,     His winter task a pastime made.     Happy the snow-locked homes wherein     He tuned his merry violin,     Or played the athlete in the barn,     Or held the good dames winding-yarn,     Or mirth-provoking versions told     Of classic legends rare and old,     Wherein the scenes of Greece and Rome     Had all the commonplace of home,     And little seemed at best the odds     Twixt Yankee pedlers and old gods;     Where Pindus-born Arachthus took     The guise of any grist-mill brook,     And dread Olympus at his will     Became a huckleberry hill.     A careless boy that night be seemed;     But at his desk he had the look     And air of one who wisely schemed,     And hostage from the future took     In trained thought and lore of book.     Large-brained, clear-eyed, of such as he     Shall Freedoms young apostles be,     Who, following in Wars bloody trail,     Shall every lingering wrong assail;     All chains from limb and spirit strike,     Uplift the black and white alike;     Scatter before their swift advance     The darkness and the ignorance,     The pride, the lust, the squalid sloth,     Which nurtured Treasons monstrous growth,     Made murder pastime, and the hell     Of prison-torture possible;     The cruel lie of caste refute,     Old forms remould, and substitute     For Slaverys lash the freemans will,     For blind routine, wise-handed skill;     A school-house plant on every hill,     Stretching in radiate nerve-lines thence     The quick wires of intelligence;     Till North and South together brought     Shall own the same electric thought,     In peace a common flag salute,     And, side by side in labors free     And unresentful rivalry,     Harvest the fields wherein they fought.     Another guest that winter night     Flashed back from lustrous eyes the light.     Unmarked by time, and yet not young,     The honeyed music of her tongue     And words of meekness scarcely told     A nature passionate and bold,     Strong, self-concentred, spurning guide,     Its milder features dwarfed beside     Her unbent wills majestic pride.     She sat among us, at the best,     A not unfeared, half-welcome guest,     Rebuking with her cultured phrase     Our homeliness of words and ways.     A certain pard-like, treacherous grace     Swayed the lithe limbs and dropped the lash,     Lent the white teeth their dazzling flash;     And under low brows, black with night,     Rayed out at times a dangerous light;     The sharp heat-lightnings of her face     Presaging ill to him whom Fate     Condemned to share her love or hate.     A woman tropical, intense     In thought and act, in soul and sense,     She blended in a like degree     The vixen and the devotee,     Revealing with each freak or feint     The temper of Petruchios Kate,     The raptures of Sienas saint.     Her tapering hand and rounded wrist     Had facile power to form a fist;     The warm, dark languish of her eyes     Was never safe from wraths surprise.     Brows saintly calm and lips devout     Knew every change of scowl and pout;     And the sweet voice had notes more high     And shrill for social battle-cry.     Since then what old cathedral town     Has missed her pilgrim staff and gown,     What convent-gate has held its lock     Against the challenge of her knock!     Through Smyrnas plague-hushed thoroughfares,     Up sea-set Maltas rocky stairs,     Gray olive slopes of hills that hem     Thy tombs and shrines, Jerusalem,     Or startling on her desert throne     The crazy Queen of Lebanon     With claims fantastic as her own,     Her tireless feet have held their way;     And still, unrestful, bowed, and gray,     She watches under Eastern skies,     With hope each day renewed and fresh,     The Lords quick coming in the flesh,     Whereof she dreams and prophesies!     Whereer her troubled path may be,     The Lords sweet pity with her go!     The outward wayward life we see,     The hidden springs we may not know.     Nor is it given us to discern     What threads the fatal sisters spun,     Through what ancestral years has run     The sorrow with the woman born,     What forged her cruel chain of moods,     What set her feet in solitudes,     And held the love within her mute,     What mingled madness in the blood,     A life-long discord and annoy,     Water of tears with oil of joy,     And hid within the folded bud     Perversities of flower and fruit.     It is not ours to separate     The tangled skein of will and fate,     To show what metes and bounds should stand     Upon the souls debatable land,     And between choice and Providence     Divide the circle of events;     But He who knows our frame is just,     Merciful and compassionate,     And full of sweet assurances     And hope for all the language is,     That He remembereth we are dust!     At last the great logs, crumbling low,     Sent out a dull and duller glow,     The bulls-eye watch that hung in view,     Ticking its weary circuit through,     Pointed with mutely warning sign     Its black hand to the hour of nine.     That sign the pleasant circle broke     My uncle ceased his pipe to smoke,     Knocked from its bowl the refuse gray,     And laid it tenderly away,     Then roused himself to safely cover     The dull red brands with ashes over.     And while, with care, our mother laid     The work aside, her steps she stayed     One moment, seeking to express     Her grateful sense of happiness     For food and shelter, warmth and health,     And loves contentment more than wealth,     With simple wishes (not the weak,     Vain prayers which no fulfilment seek,     But such as warm the generous heart,     Oer-prompt to do with Heaven its part)     That none might lack, that bitter night,     For bread and clothing, warmth and light.     Within our beds awhile we heard     The wind that round the gables roared,     With now and then a ruder shock,     Which made our very bedsteads rock.     We heard the loosened clapboards tost,     The board-nails snapping in the frost;     And on us, through the unplastered wall,     Felt the light sifted snow-flakes fall.     But sleep stole on, as sleep will do     When hearts are light and life is new;     Faint and more faint the murmurs grew,     Till in the summer-land of dreams     They softened to the sound of streams,     Low stir of leaves, and dip of oars,     And lapsing waves on quiet shores.     Next morn we wakened with the shout     Of merry voices high and clear;     And saw the teamsters drawing near     To break the drifted highways out.     Down the long hillside treading slow     We saw the half-buried oxen go,     Shaking the snow from heads uptost,     Their straining nostrils white with frost.     Before our door the straggling train     Drew up, an added team to gain.     The elders threshed their hands a-cold,     Passed, with the cider-mug, their jokes     From lip to lip; the younger folks     Down the loose snow-banks, wrestling, rolled,     Then toiled again the cavalcade     Oer windy hill, through clogged ravine,     And woodland paths that wound between     Low drooping pine-boughs winter-weighed.     From every barn a team afoot,     At every house a new recruit,     Where, drawn by Natures subtlest law     Haply the watchful young men saw     Sweet doorway pictures of the curls     And curious eyes of merry girls,     Lifting their hands in mock defence     Against the snow-balls compliments,     And reading in each missive tost     The charm with Eden never lost.     We heard once more the sleigh-bells sound;     And, following where the teamsters led,     The wise old Doctor went his round,     Just pausing at our door to say,     In the brief autocratic way     Of one who, prompt at Dutys call,     Was free to urge her claim on all,     That some poor neighbor sick abed     At night our mothers aid would need.     For, one in generous thought and deed,     What mattered in the sufferers sight     The Quaker matrons inward light,     The Doctors mail of Calvins creed?     All hearts confess the saints elect     Who, twain in faith, in love agree,     And melt not in an acid sect     The Christian pearl of charity!     So days went on: a week had passed     Since the great world was heard from last.     The Almanac we studied oer,     Read and reread our little store,     Of books and pamphlets, scarce a score;     One harmless novel, mostly hid     From younger eyes, a book forbid,     And poetry, (or good or bad,     A single book was all we had,)     Where Ellwoods meek, drab-skirted Muse,     A stranger to the heathen Nine,     Sang, with a somewhat nasal whine,     The wars of David and the Jews.     At last the floundering carrier bore     The village paper to our door.     Lo! broadening outward as we read,     To warmer zones the horizon spread;     In panoramic length unrolled     We saw the marvels that it told.     Before us passed the painted Creeks,     And daft McGregor on his raids     In Costa Ricas everglades.     And up Taygetos winding slow     Rode Ypsilantis Mainote Greeks,     A Turks head at each saddle-bow     Welcome to us its week-old news,     Its corner for the rustic Muse,     Its monthly gauge of snow and rain,     Its record, mingling in a breath     The wedding bell and dirge of death;     Jest, anecdote, and love-lorn tale,     The latest culprit sent to jail;     Its hue and cry of stolen and lost,     Its vendue sales and goods at cost,     And traffic calling loud for gain.     We felt the stir of hall and street,     The pulse of life that round us beat;     The chill embargo of the snow     Was melted in the genial glow;     Wide swung again our ice-locked door,     And all the world was ours once more!     Clasp, Angel of the backward look     And folded wings of ashen gray     And voice of echoes far away,     The brazen covers of thy book;     The weird palimpsest old and vast,     Wherein thou hidst the spectral past;     Where, closely mingling, pale and glow     The characters of joy and woe;     The monographs of outlived years,     Or smile-illumed or dim with tears,     Green hills of life that slope to death,     And haunts of home, whose vistaed trees     Shade off to mournful cypresses     With the white amaranths underneath.     Even while I look, I can but heed     The restless sands incessant fall,     Importunate hours that hours succeed,     Each clamorous with its own sharp need,     And duty keeping pace with all.     Shut down and clasp the heavy lids;     I hear again the voice that bids     The dreamer leave his dream midway     For larger hopes and graver fears     Life greatens in these later years,     The centurys aloe flowers to-day!     Yet, haply, in some lull of life,     Some Truce of God which breaks its strife,     The worldlings eyes shall gather dew,     Dreaming in throngful city ways     Of winter joys his boyhood knew;     And dear and early friends, the few     Who yet remain, shall pause to view     These Flemish pictures of old days;     Sit with me by the homestead hearth,     And stretch the hands of memory forth     To warm them at the wood-fires blaze!     And thanks untraced to lips unknown     Shall greet me like the odors blown     From unseen meadows newly mown,     Or lilies floating in some pond,     Wood-fringed, the wayside gaze beyond;     The traveller owns the grateful sense     Of sweetness near, he knows not whence,     And, pausing, takes with forehead bare     The benediction of the air