260

I dare not breathe my mother's name:
A daughter's right I dare not crave
To weep above her unblest grave!

"Let me not live until my heart,
With few to pity, and with none
To love me, hardens into stone.

"O God! have mercy on thy child,

Whose faith in thee grows weak and small,
And take me ere I lose it all!"

265 A shadow on the moonlight fell,

And murmuring wind and wave became
A voice whose burden was her name.

270

275

PART IV.

THE BETROTHAL.

HAD then God heard her? Had He sent
His angel down? In flesh and blood,
Before her Esek Harden stood!

He laid his hand upon her arm:
"Dear Mabel, this no more shall be;
Who scoffs at you must scoff at me.

"You know rough Esek Harden well;
And if he seems no suitor gay,
And if his hair is touched with gray,

"The maiden grown shall never find

His heart less warm than when she smiled,
Upon his knees, a little child!"

280 Her tears of grief were tears of joy, As, folded in his strong embrace,

285

290

295

300

25

She looked in Esek Harden's face.

Oh, truest friend of all!" she said,
"God bless you for your kindly thought,
And make me worthy of my lot!"

He led her forth, and, blent in one,
Beside their happy pathway ran
The shadows of the maid and man.

He led her through his dewy fields,

To where the swinging lanterns glowed,
And through the doors the huskers showed.

"Good friends and neighbors!” Esek said,
"I'm weary of this lonely life;
In Mabel see my chosen wife!

"She greets you kindly, one and all;
The past is past, and all offence
Falls harmless from her innocence.

"Henceforth she stands no more alone:
You know what Esek Harden is; —
He brooks no wrong to him or his.

"Now let the merriest tales be told,
And let the sweetest songs be sung
That ever made the old heart young!

"For now the lost has found a home;
And a lone hearth shall brighter burn,
As all the household joys return!"

Oh, pleasantly the harvest-moon,

Between the shadow of the mows,

Looked on them through the great elm-boughs!

310 On Mabel's curls of golden hair,

On Esek's shaggy strength it fell;

And the wind whispered, "It is well!"

IV.

COBBLER KEEZAR'S VISION.

["THIS ballad was written," Mr. Whittier says, 66 on the occasion of a Horticultural Festival. Cobhler Keezar was a noted character among the first settlers in the valley of the Merrimack."]

THE beaver cut his timber

With patient teeth that day,

The minks were fish-wards, and the crows
Surveyors of highway, -

5 When Keezar sat on the hillside
Upon his cobbler's form,
With a pan of coals on either hand
To keep his waxed-ends warm.

ΤΟ

And there, in the golden weather,

He stitched and hammered and sung;
In the brook he moistened his leather,

In the pewter mug his tongue.

Well knew the tough old Teuton
Who brewed the stoutest ale,
15 And he paid the goodwife's reckoning
In the coin of song and tale.

20

The songs they still are singing
Who dress the hills of vine,
The tales that haunt the Brocken
And whisper down the Rhine.

Woodsy and wild and lonesome,
The swift stream wound away,
Through birches and scarlet maples
Flashing in foam and spray, -

25 Down on the sharp-horned ledges
Plunging in steep cascade,
Tossing its white-maned waters
Against the hemlock's shade.

30

Woodsy and wild and lonesome,

East and west and north and south;

Only the village of fishers

Down at the river's mouth;

Only here and there a clearing,
With its farm-house rude and new,
35 And tree-stumps, swart as Indians,
Where the scanty harvest grew.

No shout of home-bound reapers,
No vintage-song he heard,

19. The Brocken is the highest summit of the Hartz range in Germany, and a great body of superstitions has gathered about the whole range. May-day night, called Walpurgis Night, is held to be the time of a great witch festival on the Brocken.

40

And on the green no dancing feet

The merry violin stirred.

"Why should folk be glum," said Keezar,
"When nature herself is glad,
And the painted woods are laughing

At the faces so sour and sad?"

45 Small heed had the careless cobbler What sorrow of heart was theirs

50

Who travailed in pain with the births of God,
And planted a state with prayers,

But give him his ale and cider,
Give him his pipe and song,

55 Little he cared for Church or State,
Or the balance of right and wrong.

60

""Tis work, work, work," he muttered, -
"And for rest a snuffle of psalms!"

He smote on his leathern apron
With his brown and waxen palms.

"Oh for the purple harvests

Of the days when I was young!
For the merry grape-stained maidens,
And the pleasant songs they sung!

65"Oh for the breath of vineyards, Of apples and nuts and wine!