The pastoral curfew of the cow-bell rung. Thus soothed and pleased, our backward path we took, Praising the farmer's home. He only spake, Looking into the sunset o'er the lake, Like one to whom the far-off is most near: "Yes, most folks think it has a pleasant look; I love it for my good old mother's sake, Who lived and died here in the peace of The lesson of his words we pondered o'er, As silently we turned the eastern flank Of the mountain, where its shadow deepest sank, Doubling the night along our rugged road: We felt that man was more than his abode, The inward life than Nature's raiment more; And the warm sky, the sundown-tinted hill, The forest and the lake, seemed dwarfed and dim Before the saintly soul, whose human will Meekly in the Eternal footsteps trod, Making her homely toil and household ways An earthly echo of the song of praise Swelling from angel lips and harps of seraphim! O NCE more on yonder laurelled height The summer flowers have budded; Once more with summer's golden light The vales of home are flooded; And once more, by the grace of Him Of every good the Giver, We sing upon its wooded rim Its pines above, its waves below, As fair as when the young Brissot Beheld it seaward flowing, And bore its memory o'er the deep, To soothe a martyr's sadness, And fresco, in his troubled sleep, We know the world is rich with streams Whose music murmurs through our dreams We know that Arno's banks are fair, And, poet-tuned, the Doon and Ayr But while, unpictured and unsung Our river waits the tuneful tongue And cunning hand to show it, We only know the fond skies lean And the sweet soul of our Undine No fickle Sun-God holds the flocks No icy kiss of Dian mocks The youth beside it sleeping: Our Christian river loveth most The beautiful and human; The heathen streams of Naiads boast, But ours of man and women. The miner in his cabin hears Or Santee's bloom of cotton, |