“Let them paint fresh colours on vale and hill,
Let them say new flowers bloom brighter;
’Tis the same old rut on the highway still
Which she trod when her steps were lighter
And the same old hopes that her way beguiled,
And the same old griefs,—no other,
Ah, they wait hard by for yourself, my child,
As they did for your poor old mother.
“On her tired breast shall you tell your tale
When the drifting doubts distress you;