And we were friends, and, far into the nights,

Would analyze the wisdom of old days

By all the tests of Science in her prime;

Anon would tramp afield, to fruits and flowers,

And the long prototypes of trees and beasts

Graven in sandstone; so, at last, would come,

Through lanes of talk, to that perennial tree,—

The Tree of Life, on which redemption hangs.

But there fell out of tune; we parted there,

He bolstering up a creed too broad for me!