Gently as hers was raised? Did strangers shed
The kindly tears which bathed that feverish brow
And wasted cheek with half-unconscious flow?
Something was there that, through the lingering night,
Outwatches patiently the taper’s light—
Something that faints not through the day’s distress,
That fears not toil, that knows not weariness—
Love, true and perfect love! Whence came that power,
Uprearing through the storm the drooping flower?
Whence?—who can ask? The wild delirium pass’d,