THE STRAY BLOSSOM.

Under a ruined abbey wall,

Whose fallen stones, with moss o’ergrown,

About the smooth fresh turf were strown,

And piled around the roots—and tall,

Green-ivied trunks, and branching arms

Of beeches, sheltering from the storms,

Within its empty, roofless hall—

There, in a broken sill, I spied

A little blossom, purple-eyed.

I took it thence, and carried far

The plant into a greenhouse, where

I tended it, with blossoms rare,

Until it brightened, like a star

Delivered from a passing cloud,

That hides it ’neath a silver shroud,

Yet fails its loveliness to mar;

Until it ceased to be a wild

And common thing—and then I smiled.

It grew, and thrived; new buds put forth,

And more, and more, and still became

More fruitful, till, no more the same

Meek, lowly child of the far north,

It reared its lordly stem on high,

Climbing towards the distant sky,

As though it deemed its greater worth

Deserved a higher place, and kept

Still reaching onwards—then I wept.

I wept, because I thought the weed

Showed strange ingratitude to me,

And had forgot how lovingly

I nourished it when in its need.

And then the flower bent down its head,

Touched me caressingly, and said:

‘Think not that I forget thy deed,

The tender care and constant thought

That in my life this change have wrought.

‘Now to the far-off skies I climb,

Because I fain would show thee, there

Is something higher than the care

Of a mere plant, to fill the time

God giveth thee. How, then, my love

For thee more truly can I prove

Than by thus pointing to a clime

Where Hope’s fulfilment thou shalt find,

And earthly love to heaven’s, bind?’

* * * * *

So, from a tiny seedling, grows

Sweet Friendship’s root from year to year,

Nourished alike by smile and tear,

By sun and storm, and winter snows

Of jealousy and blind mistrust;

Through which the deathless plant shall thrust

Its growing flower, until it blows

At last, within that land on high

Where virtues bloom eternally.

F. E. S.

Printed and Published by W. & R. Chambers, 47 Paternoster Row, London, and 339 High Street, Edinburgh.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The whale suckles her young, and is therefore a mammal, and not, strictly speaking, a fish. It is, however, so called by all sailors.