WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE,
BY ELMINA WALDO CAREY.
Do you remember, Alred dear,
The peach-tree's cool and ample shade,
Where first our hearts learned love and fear,
And vows of constancy were made?
The peach-tree stands there, now as then,
Its shadow just as dim and mild,
And over all the sacred glen
The vines of strawberries run wild.
Still all about the water's edge
Beds of green flags in beauty lie,
And, sloping towards the elder-hedge,
Are fields of graceful waving rye.
But, Alred dear, not by our feet
Will the round clover-heads be pressed,
For years must pass before we meet
In that dear valley of the west.
Sometimes my heart is filled with fear,
Yet if not, Alred, in that land,
'Tis bliss to know, in some bright sphere
You'll wait to take my trembling hand.