Dead rather than living, they left me. Thus all that I had was distrained on.
I spake not; in dreary despondence re-crossing my threshold,
And thus from the bed of her sorrow a low voice of misery accosts me;
“Look around if thou canst not find aught for my hunger’s appeasing;
How sweet were a draught of new milk, for I thirst, and the babe findeth nothing!”
Thus spake she; a darkness came over my eyesight, and sorrowing
I went to the cow-shed, where stood the lean, famishing creature,
And chewed a poor mouthful of rye-straw. I pressed the dry udder,
For milk trying vainly, for not a drop answered the pressure.
Despairing, yet dreading a failure, yet harder assayed I,