3. But a sudden change came o'er his heart Ere the setting of the sun; And Tubal Cain was filled with pain For the evil he had done. He saw that men with rage and heat Made war upon their kind; That the land was red with blood they shed, The 4. And for many a day old Tubal Cain And his hand forbore to smite the ore, But he rose at last with a cheerful face, And bared his strong right arm for work, And the red sparks lit the air, "Not alone for the blade was the bright steel made!" And he fashioned the first ploughshare. 5. And men, taught wisdom from the past, In friendship joined their hands, Hung the sword in the hall, the spear on the wall, And ploughed the willing lands; And sang, "Hurrah for Tubal Cain! Our stanch good friend is he; And for the ploughshare and the plough Though we may thank him for the plough, RE-VISITING THE HOME OF CHILDHOOD. mor-ti-fi-ed, greatly annoyed. un-mol-est-ed, undisturbed. mute, silent. in-vol-un-tar-il-y, without in- as-so-ci-a-tions, incidents con- nur-tur-ing, feeding. 1. A kind of dread had hitherto kept me back; but I was restless now, till I had accomplished my wish. I set out one morning to walk; I reached Widford about eleven in the forenoon; after a slight breakfast at my inn, where I was mortified to perceive the old landlord did not know me again-old Thomas Billet, he has often made angle-rods for me when a child-I rambled over all my accustomed haunts. 2. Our old house was vacant, and to be sold; I entered, unmolested, into the room that had been my bed-chamber. I kneeled down on the spot where my little bed had stood: I felt like a child; I prayed like one. It seemed as though old times were to return again. I looked round involuntarily, expecting to see some face I knew; but all was naked and mute. The bed was gone. My little pane of painted window, through which I loved to look at the sun when I awoke on a fine summer's morning, was taken out, and had been replaced by one of common glass. 3. I visited by turns every chamber; they were all desolate and unfurnished, one excepted, in which the owner had left a harpsichord, probably to be sold: I touched the keys; I played some old Scottish tunes, which had delighted me when a child. Past associations revived with the music, blended with a sense of unreality, which at last became too powerful-I rushed out of the room to give vent to my feelings. 4. I wandered, scarce knowing where, into an old wood that stands at the back of the house; we called it the Wilderness. A well-known form was missing that used to meet me in this place; it was thine, Ben Moxam, the kindest, gentlest, politest of human beings, yet was he nothing higher than a gardener in the family. 5. Honest creature, thou didst never pass me in my childish rambles without a soft speech and a smile. I remember thy goodnatured face, But there is one thing for which I can never forgive thee, Ben Moxam, that thou didst join with an old maiden aunt of mine in a cruel plot to lop away the hanging branches of the old fir-trees. I remember them sweeping to the ground. 6. I have often left my childish sports to ramble in this place; its glooms and its solitude had a mysterious charm for my young mind, nurturing within me that love of quietness and lonely thinking which has accompanied me to maturer years. 7. In this Wilderness I found myself after a ten years' absence. Its stately fir-trees were yet standing, with all their luxuriant company of underwood; the squirrel was there, and the melancholy cooings of the woodpigeon-all as I had left it; my heart softened at the sight. 8. My parents were both dead; I had no counsellor left, no experience of age to direct me, no sweet voice of reproof. I paced round the Wilderness, seeking a comforter. I prayed that I might be restored to that state of innocence in which I had wandered in those shades. 9. I returned with languid feelings to my inn. I ordered my dinner, green pease and a sweetbread it had been a favourite dish with me in my childhood-I was allowed to have it on my birthdays. I was impatient to see it come upon the table; but when it came I could scarce eat a mouthful-my tears choked me. 10. After dinner I visited the churchyard where my parents were interred. I had been present at my father's burial, and knew the spot again; my mother's funeral I was prevented by illness from attending: a plain stone was placed over the grave, with their initials carved upon it, for they both occupied one grave. 11. I prostrated myself before the spot; I kissed the earth that covered them; I contemplated with gloomy delight the time when I should mingle my dust with theirs, and kneeled with my arms incumbent on the grave-stone, in a kind of mental prayer, for I could not speak. 12. Having performed these duties, I arose with quieter feelings, and felt leisure to attend to indifferent objects. Still I continued in the churchyard, reading the various inscriptions, and moralising upon them with that kind of levity which will not unfrequently spring up in the mind in the midst of deep melancholy. I read of nothing but careful parents, loving husbands, and dutiful children. I said jestingly, Where be all the bad people buried? Bad parents, bad husbands, bad children, what cemeteries are appointed for these? 13. Do they not sleep in consecrated ground -or is it a pious fiction, a generous oversight, in the survivors, which thus tricks out men's epitaphs when dead, who, in their lifetime, discharged the offices of life perhaps but |