“Sweet one, call me Margaret, instead,—
Your dear mother used to call me so.”
She was gentle, kind, and patient too,
Yet in vain: the children held apart.
Ah, their mother’s gentle memory dwelt
Near them, and her little orphans felt
She had the first claim upon their hearts.
So three years pass’d; then the war broke out;
And a rumor seemed to spread and rise;
First we guess’d what sorrow must befall,