Mounting his Mexican steed, with his Indian guides and companions,

Homeward Basil returned, and Evangeline stayed at the Mission.

Slowly, slowly, slowly the days succeeded each other,Days and weeks and months; and the fields of maize that were springing

Green from the ground when a stranger she came, now waving about her,

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Lifted their slender shafts, with leaves interlacing, and forming 1210 Cloisters for mendicant crows and granaries pillaged by squirrels. Then in the golden weather the maize was husked, and the

maidens

Blushed at each blood-red ear, for that betokened a lover,
But at the crooked laughed, and called it a thief in the cornfield.
Even the blood-red ear to Evangeline brought not her lover.
"Patience!" the priest would say; "have faith, and thy prayer
will be answered!

Look at this vigorous plant that lifts its head from the meadow,
See how its leaves are turned to the north, as true as the magnet;
This is the compass-flower, that the finger of God has planted
Here in the houseless wild, to direct the traveller's journey
Over the sea-like, pathless, limitless waste of the desert.
Such in the soul of man is faith. The blossoms of passion,
Gay and luxuriant flowers, are brighter and fuller of fragrance,
But they beguile us, and lead us astray, and their odor is deadly.
Only this humble plant can guide us here, and hereafter
Crown us with asphodel flowers, that are wet with the dews of
nepenthe."

So came the autumn, and passed, and the winter-yet Gabriel

came not;

Blossomed the opening spring, and the notes of the robin and

bluebird

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Sounded sweet upon wold and in wood, yet Gabriel came not.
But on the breath of the summer winds a rumor was wafted
Sweeter than song of bird, or hue or odor of blossom.
Far to the north and east, it said, in the Michigan forests,
Gabriel had his lodge by the banks of the Saginaw River.

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And, with returning guides, that sought the lakes of St. Lawrence,
Saying a sad farewell, Evangeline went from the Mission.
When over weary ways, by long and perilous marches,

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She had attained at length the depths of the Michigan forests, Found she the hunter's lodge deserted and fallen to ruin!

Thus did the long sad years glide on, and in seasons and places 1240 Divers and distant far was seen the wandering maiden ;— Now in the Tents of Grace of the meek Moravian Missions, Now in the noisy camps and the battle-fields of the army, Now in secluded hamlets, in towns and populous cities.

Like a phantom she came, and passed away unremembered. 1245 Fair was she and young, when in hope began the long journey; Faded was she and old, when in disappointment it ended.

Each succeeding year stole something away from her beauty, Leaving behind it, broader and deeper, the gloom and the shadow. Then there appeared and spread faint streaks of gray o'er her forehead,

1250 Dawn of another life, that broke o'er her earthly horizon, As in the eastern sky the first faint streaks of the morning.

V

In that delightful land which is washed by the Delaware's waters,

Guarding in sylvan shades the name of Penn the apostle,

Stands on the banks of its beautiful stream the city he founded. 1255 There all the air is balm, and the peach is the emblem of beauty, And the streets still reëcho the names of the trees of the forest, As if they fain would appease the Dryads whose haunts they molested.

There from the troubled sea had Evangeline landed, an exile, Finding among the children of Penn a home and a country. 1260 There old René Leblanc had died; and when he departed,

Saw at his side only one of all his hundred descendants. Something at least there was in the friendly streets of the city, Something that spake to her heart, and made her no longer a stranger;

And her ear was pleased with the Thee and Thou of the Quakers, 1265 For it recalled the past, the old Acadian country,

Where all men were equal, and all were brothers and sisters.
So, when the fruitless search, the disappointed endeavor,
Ended, to recommence no more upon earth, uncomplaining,
Thither, as leaves to the light, were turned her thoughts and her
footsteps.

As from the mountain's top the rainy mists of the morning
Roll away, and afar we behold the landscape below us,
Sun-illumined, with shining rivers and cities and hamlets,
So fell the mists from her mind, and she saw the world far below
her,

Dark no longer, but all illumined with love; and the pathway
Which she had climbed so far, lying smooth and fair in the dis-

tance.

Gabriel was not forgotten. Within her heart was his image,
Clothed in the beauty of love and youth, as last she beheld him,
Only more beautiful made by his deathlike silence and absence.
Into her thoughts of him time entered not, for it was not.
Over him years had no power; he was not changed, but trans-
figured;

He had become to her heart as one who is dead, and not absent;
Patience and abnegation of self, and devotion to others,
This was the lesson a life of trial and sorrow had taught her.
So was her love diffused, but, like to some odorous spices,
Suffered no waste nor loss, though filling the air with aroma.
Other hope had she none, nor wish in life, but to follow,
Meekly with reverent steps, the sacred feet of her Saviour.
Thus many years she lived as a Sister of Mercy; frequenting
Lonely and wretched roofs in the crowded lanes of the city,

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Where distress and want concealed themselves from the sunlight, 1290 Where disease and sorrow in garrets languished neglected.

Night after night when the world was asleep, as the watchman

repeated

Loud, through the gusty streets, that all was well in the city,
High at some lonely window he saw the light of her taper.

Day after day, in the gray of the dawn, as slow through the

suburbs

Plodded the German farmer, with flowers and fruits for the

market,

Met he that meek, pale face, returning home from its watchings.

Then it came to pass that a pestilence fell on the city, Presaged by wondrous signs, and mostly by flocks of wild pigeons, Darkening the sun in their flight, with naught in their craws but

an acorn.

And, as the tides of the sea arise in the month of September, Flooding some silver stream, till it spreads to a lake in the

meadow,

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So death flooded life, and, o'erflowing its natural margin, Spread to a brackish lake the silver stream of existence. 1305 Wealth had no power to bribe, nor beauty to charm, the oppressor; But all perished alike beneath the scourge of his anger;Only, alas! the poor, who had neither friends nor attendants, Crept away to die in the almshouse, home of the homeless.

Then in the suburbs it stood, in the midst of meadows and woodlands;;

1310 Now the city surrounds it; but still, with its gateway and wicket Meek, in the midst of splendor, its humble walls seem to echo Softly the words of the Lord: "The poor ye always have with

"" you.

Thither, by night and by day, came the Sister of Mercy. The dying

Looked up into her face, and thought, indeed, to behold there 1315 Gleams of celestial light encircle her forehead with splendor, Such as the artist paints o'er the brows of saints and apostles, Or such as hangs by night o'er a city seen at a distance. Unto their eyes it seemed the lamps of the city celestial, Into whose shining gates erelong their spirits would enter.

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Thus, on a Sabbath morn, through the streets, deserted and silent,

Wending her quiet way, she entered the door of the almshouse. Sweet on the summer air was the odor of flowers in the garden, And she paused on her way to gather the fairest among them, That the dying once more might rejoice in their fragrance and beauty.

Then, as she mounted the stairs to the corridors, cooled by the east-wind,

Distant and soft on her ear fell the chimes from the belfry of Christ Church,

While, intermingled with these, across the meadows were wafted Sounds of psalms, that were sung by the Swedes in their church at Wicaco.

Soft as descending wings fell the calm of the hour on her spirit; 1330 Something within her said, "At length thy trials are ended;" And, with light in her looks, she entered the chambers of sickness. Noiselessly moved about the assiduous, careful attendants, Moistening the feverish lip, and the aching brow, and in silence. Closing the sightless eyes of the dead, and concealing their faces,

Where on their pallets they lay, like drifts of snow by the roadside. 1335 Many a languid head, upraised as Evangeline entered,

Turned on its pillow of pain to gaze while she passed, for her

presence

Fell on their hearts like a ray of the sun on the walls of a prison.
And, as she looked around, she saw how Death, the consoler,
Laying his hand upon many a heart, had healed it forever.
Many familiar forms had disappeared in the night time;
Vacant their places were, or filled already by strangers.

Suddenly, as if arrested by fear or a feeling of wonder,
Still she stood, with her colorless lips apart, while a shudder
Ran through her frame, and, forgotten, the flowerets dropped
from her fingers,

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And from her eyes and cheeks the light and bloom of the morning.
Then there escaped from her lips a cry of such terrible anguish,
That the dying heard it, and started up from their pillows.
On the pallet before her was stretched the form of an old man.
Long, and thin, and gray were the locks that shaded his temples; 1350
But, as he lay in the morning light, his face for a moment
Seemed to assume once more the forms of its earlier manhood;
So are wont to be changed the faces of those who are dying.
Hot and red on his lips still burned the flush of the fever,

As if life, like the Hebrew, with blood had besprinkled its portals, 1355
That the Angel of Death might see the sign, and pass over.
Motionless, senseless, dying, he lay, and his spirit exhausted
Seemed to be sinking down through infinite depths in the dark-

ness,

Darkness of slumber and death, forever sinking and sinking.

Then through those realms of shade, in multiplied reverberations, 1360
Heard he that cry of pain, and through the hush that succeeded
Whispered a gentle voice, in accents tender and saint-like,
"Gabriel! O my beloved!" and died away into silence.

Then he beheld, in a dream, once more the home of his childhood;
Green Acadian meadows, with sylvan rivers among them,
Village, and mountain, and woodlands; and, walking under their

shadow,

As in the days of her youth, Evangeline rose to his vision.
Tears came into his eyes; and as slowly he lifted his eyelids,
Vanished the vision away, but Evangeline knelt by his bedside.
Vainly he strove to whisper her name, for the accents unuttered

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