EVA.
A TRUE STORY.
I.
THE MAIDEN'S HOME.
A cottage in a peaceful vale;
A jasmine round the door;
A hill to shelter from the gale;
A silver brook before.
Oh, sweet the jasmine's buds of snow,
In mornings soft with May;
Oh, silver-clear the waves that flow,
Reflecting heaven, away!
A sweeter bloom to Eva's youth
Rejoicing Nature gave;
And heaven was mirror'd in her truth
More clear than on the wave.
Oft to that lone sequester'd place
My boyish steps would roam,
There was a look in Eva's face
That seem'd a smile of home.
And oft I paused to hear at noon
A voice that sang for glee;
Or mark the white neck glancing down,—
The book upon the knee.—
II.
THE IDIOT BOY.
Who stands between thee and the sun?—
A cloud himself,—the Wandering One!
A vacant wonder in the eyes,—
The mind, a blank, unwritten scroll;—
The light was in the laughing skies,
And darkness in the Idiot's soul.
He touch'd the book upon her knee—
He look'd into her gentle face—
"Thou dost not tremble, maid, to see
Poor Arthur by thy dwelling-place.
I know not why, but where I pass
The aged turn away;
And if my shadow vex the grass,
The children cease from play.
My only playmates are the wind,
The blossom on the bough!
"Why are thy looks so soft and kind?
Thou dost not tremble—thou!"
Though none were by, she trembled not—
Too meek to wound, too good to fear him;
And, as he linger'd on the spot,
She hid the tears that gush'd to hear him.—