And light leaves trembling round, and early love
Deep in each breast. What reck’d their souls of strife
Between their fathers? Unto them young life
Spread out the treasures of its vernal years;
And if they wept, they wept far other tears
Than the cold world brings forth. They stood, that hour,
Speaking of hope; while tree, and fount, and flower,
And star, just gleaming through the cypress boughs,
Seem’d holy things, as records of their vows.
But change came o’er the scene. A hurrying tread