He sought, in old cathedrals, to retrace The rapturous visions given to poets there For, while the chanting monks their chorals sang, "Lift up the poor, and let the oppressed go free!" He wrote of many a lovely lake and bay; Of olive groves and cities strange and quàint; Romance enriched with many a pleasing lay Of ancient knight and medieval saint. Still through his heart some sense of failure thrilled- At last, with scanty sheaves, as gleaners come, He turned his restless footsteps toward his home. II. "The cloud-capped mountains and the sea," he said, "Have had their bards, whom they inspired and taught; Perchance their grandeur had my spirit led To higher strains, with nobler meanings fraught. But thou, O ever-green and ever-blooming sod! Thou art, even as the hills, a thought of God; Teach all thy varied language unto me: From thee I sprang-my fame must spring from thee!" He learned its every aspect: morning dim, With all her cloudy tents encamping there; To him its untamed winds their vigor brought- And when some gorgeous blossom from its green- Dazzling the eyes that on her beauty smiled, The beckoning shore of some new hemisphere: For never bard, with tuneful voice or pen, Had praised its perfect loveliness till then. And soon the prairie loved him-filled his song As any mountain trumpet ever blew To Greek immortals when the world was new. "I sweep from northern frost to southern sea, Whom my great river binds with silver band. One wave must murmur tones American. "Therefore in me shall broader thought find room, In my indulgent soil, my generous air. "Grand were those lays of early poets born; The embattled steep, the castle, and the tower, This strain he sang through many changing keys; The call to battle on its silence broke, When War's swift summons spread its fierce alarms Ah! then he thought no more of theme nor rhyme; Of men who rose to save a father-land; And they that, languishing in mortal pain, In lonely wards saw day's last sun grow dim, He did not need to search the mouldy Past Sweet eyes where Roland's fate no gloom had cast- Grew dim o'er lines that praised, with mournful pride, And full hearts blessed him in whose verse were read So in his country's love he grew; his life Ennobling hers, from her received its crown. To thoughts with which her myriad homes were rife And those bright blooms that first he gave to fame CHARLES LANDOR. 66 “I ONLY CLODHOPPERS. WISH you wouldn't call the child 'Li,' said my mother; "it jars upon every nerve in my body. She was christened Lily." "Lily!" mimicked my father, and laughed uproariously; "a nice-looking lily she is!" My poor mother made no reply; she could not refuse to acknowledge that the name was entirely unsuited to the gaunt, gawky girl of fifteen that buttered her father's bread with a hand almost as brown and brawny as his own. "Not but that she suits me well enough," added my father, as he noted a hot flush leap into my face. "I'd. rather have you as you are, my girl, than any lily of them all. You know they toil not, neither do they spin, and that kind of thing wouldn't suit a poor farmer like me. My father patted me upon the shoulder as he went out into the field, but the riotous blood lingered in my face, and while washing the greasy dishes and pans that accumulate so rapidly in a farm kitchen, I declared to myself that the lilies had a good time of it, and no wonder they were so pretty; they had nothing to do, and were arrayed gloriously every day. I decided that nothing could be more unjust than the way things were parceled out in this world, and slammed every individual plate, and rattled every pan, until mother called out that I was "driving her crazy." Then father came in again; he looked tired and discouraged, and went with a weary step into the sitting-room, where mother lay upon the lounge, and Patience Clark, the dressmaker, droned on incessantly with the small news of the village. can finish up the dishes." I started out to the field, and father followed me to the furrow, where the skittish mare was quietly chewing a bit of loose harness. I picked up the reins and father the plow-handle, and away we went cheerily. The mare was used to my voice, and was gentle as a kitten. I was thinking what a nice breeze there was, and how pretty the apple-blossoms looked, when suddenly a voice called to us from the fence: "Hallo, Mr. Ware! That's tough work for a girl." My father stopped the horses with a jerk. "I suppose 'tis," he said; "but this pesky field, John, is so mortal full of stones and stubbles, and the critter knows Li's voice; but run in the house, Li-" "No, no, father, I ain't a bit tired" (with an indignant look at John Bates). "Let me try a hand at the plow, Mr. Ware, and do you drive a bit." "Well, if you will, John," said my father, resigning his plow, and taking the reins from my hand. "Run in the house, Li, and rest." I ran in the house, and this is the way I rested: I finished washing and wiping the dishes, folded down the clothes, mopped up the kitchen, helped to milk six cows, made biscuit for tea, set the table, cleared every thing away again, and helped Martha get things ready for an early breakfast, so that we could commence ironing early in the morning. I murmured to myself, "Why should we only toil, the roof and crown of things ?" and entered the sitting-room just in time to hear Patience Clark say, "She was so glad Lily was a girl; that boys were worked to death upon a farm." 66 'Dear, dear!" sighed my mother, "it's impossible to make Lily look graceful; but do slope the shoulders a little more, Miss Clark." "It's no use talkin'," said father, "I can't manage that team and plow the field alone; it's as much as a man can do to keep the plow in "If I do they'll pucker and bag," replied the the ground with those stones and stubbles, let dress-maker, "for she's as square as square can alone guidin' that skittish mare. be." "Farmin's poor work nowadays, Mr. Ware," said Patience Clark. "It never was any thing else that I can remember," said my mother. And my father, heaving a huge sigh, murmured under his breath, "Job's comforters," and came out into the kitchen again. "Li," he said, "I wish you were a boy." "For the hundredth time, father." "And yet I wouldn't change you for a rude lad of your age; but there's that pesky fiveacre lot!" Then he sighed again. "She's like her father," said my mother. And finding they were not ready to try on my dress, I went out in the porch, where father was smoking his pipe. "Softly!" he said. "Look, Li, at that fellow on the clothes-line!" At that moment a flood of music poured from the throat of a belated blackbird that rocked to and fro upon the rope before us; a robin was cheated into taking up the refrain, and the frogs commenced to thud, the moon climbed up in the wan sky, and father and I sat there silently for hours. At last he said, as we went into the house, "It's a pretty place, Li; we must take care of the And on his death-bed, four years later, his last words were, "Take care of the farm, Li." 'Father," said I, flinging down the dishtowel, "I can drive the horses, and you shall plow; wait a minute, and I'll get my sun-bon-farm. net." Father laughed at the idea, then he refused outright; but seeing me tie my sun-bonnet and let down my sleeves, a ray of hope lighted up his face; then he said, "What will your mother say?" "She won't know any thing about it, and Martha 'll be through with her washing and VOL. XLI.-No. 243.-28 But how was a girl of nineteen to take care of a farm, an invalid mother, and a lame brother? The place was in wretchedly poor condition; and my father had literally lost his strength and broken his heart in striving to clear off the mortgage. The dear old farm was and completely governed by impulse. I told him all my projects about the farm; and he listened to me with as much gravity as if I were consulting him upon a matter of law. When I had finished, he looked kindly upon my flushed and tear-stained face, and bade me be of good cheer, and not to mind about the mortgagehe would take care I was not troubled about a ruin, in fact; and I used to think sometimes the very outside loveliness of it was a bitter mockery. Why were the tangled flowers so beautiful, and the gnarled old trees so fancifully fair? The ground was one mass of stones, and the trees bore the knottiest fruit that ever was seen; and, toil as you might, it seemed impossible to get a living and pay the interest money, let alone the principal. Then the part-that-and advised me to use my ready money ing with father was a bitter wrench. I felt as if there wasn't much left to live for, until the night of the funeral, when little Dolph stole into my bed, poor little lambkin! Adolphus was a foolish name for him, too; but as I hugged my little brother in my arms, and quieted his wild sobbing, I vowed to myself that it was better, after all, I was not a lily; and that I would take care of mother and Dolph and the farm somehow. When Patience Clark was making up the mourning I heard her say something to mother about "book-learnin'" and "rooms in the village;" and I knew the meaning of it when mother stopped crying after supper, and grew quite cheerful over her cup of tea. "Lily," she said, in her languid way, "my poor child, I trust there are happier days in store for us. Thanks to the education which I insisted upon your having, you may be able to take the place of Miss Gibbons at the village school. We will sell this wretched place, dear, and get rooms at the village." in improving the place, suggesting the improvements in a way that led me to think agriculture was a part of law. Father died in midwinter; and when the spring came the place was busy with the hum of labor. The barn-yard was drained, a great muck-heap made from the refuse of the stalls, six poor cows sold for two good ones-and on the fifteenth of June, when I was twenty years old, the place was blooming like a rose. Had it not been for John Bates, my nearest neighbor, I should not have got along so well. We went shares with the five-acre lot, John Bates and I, and on this very fifteenth of June the plants were brought down, and every hand about the place busied in setting them out. When we were putting in the last row, Dolph came running out to the field, and said that I was to come in directly, for Lawyer Williams was there, and Miss Gibbons, and they were to stay to tea, as it was my birthday. I started to nry feet, and pushed back my sun-bonnet, and there, within a rod or two of us, was the My heart came up in my throat. prettiest creature that ever the eye rested upon. "Oh, mother!" I said; "father told me to I thought, as I always did, when I saw her, that take care of the farm; and I should die cooped her name-Grace-was as suited to her as mine up in that hot room with a lot of dirty children!" was unsuited to me, and I did not blame John My mother set down her cup of tea, went for staring at her, open-mouthed, as she walked and lay upon the lounge, and commenced cry-back with me to the house. ing again. "You'd rather be among cows and pigs than among your fellow-creatures!" she said. "You're like your father; and he never had any more sentiment or feeling about him than a-a-cabbage!" Father wasn't cold in his grave! I flung myself out of the room, and walked up to Patience Clark, as she was wiping her hands on the rolling towel in the kitchen. "Listen here," I said, setting my teeth hard; "don't put any more nonsense in mother's head, if you please!" "Gracious powers! how you frightened me, Lily! I almost jumped out of my skin!" And she went into the sitting-room with rather a crestfallen air. But mother always had her way; and I think we should have fallen into the groove Patience Clark had suggested but for a timely codicil that was found to father's will. It left the place to Dolph, with only a life interest to mother, and five hundred dollars to me. The money was left with Lawyer Williams, at Wimbleton; and he rode down the week after father died, and gave it into my hands. "I do not think you will spend it in furbelows," he said; and there was something about him that inspired confidence. I was forlornly destitute of friends, "You'll stay too, John ?" I said to my fellowworkman. He nodded cheerfully. What an honest, bright, winsome face he had! But never before had I felt that sudden pang of discontent and envy. It was because I was tired as a girl could be, and felt begrimed with heat and dirt, and I did not blame mother for looking upon me with a sort of disgust, and bidding me go to my room and dress immediately. The perfume of clean linen mingled with that of the June roses in my room. There was my pretty muslin dress. But I fidgeted before the glass, and tugged at my hair, pulling it out in huge tangles; but, tug as I might, I could not change its sombre brown to a ruddy gold-and a frown between the eyes is no beautifier. I declared inwardly I never would linger so long again over my dirty fields, nor toil so fiercely for what seemed to me then a wretched reward. This discontent was, however, of short duration. Honest toil brings an even temper, and adds hugely to the cheerfulness of one's nature by promoting a good digestion. Then, when I had put a ribbon about my neck, and smoothed the ugly wrinkle from my brow, I saw in the glass a rather comely face, after all, with nice brown eyes like my father's. ONLY CLODHOPPERS. I looked out of the window at my field, and in his eye. I thought he was offended, and I John was putting in the very last plant. Tears could not say a word; but presently he turned How could I to me with his cheery smile, and said, "Have of remorse sprang to my eyes. have called it a dirty field, and unprofitable you any message for Wimbleton, Miss Lily? Then, as he labor? Could any thing be prettier than the I'm going down to see about those oxen.' "N-now?" I stammered. rich dark mould, and the rows of tender green? No, not even eyes of heavenly blue, and hair stepped off the sill, I added, "You'll have supof ruddiest gold! There was something posi- per first, John ?" "I think not, Miss Lily," he replied; "it's tively beautiful to me about that cabbage-field, and I gazed upon it lovingly from my window, a nice ride by daylight, and I don't remember going over again in my mind the profit we ever seeing things look so fresh and green. So There's such a lot of wild roses down that way. hoped to gain from it, John Bates and I. many thousand cabbages at so much a head. I've often thought, Miss Lily, Rose would have I think there is nothing nicer in the way of been a prettier and better name for you-there's building castles than an agricultural one, one such a bloom and sweetness about a rose; and takes such a tangible delight in watching the I never did care for lilies myself," he added, structure grow day by day; then, even if it with an involuntary glance at the loiterers in tumbles down ingloriously, are the delights of the garden. anticipation to be reckoned as nothing? I will not say that my step was light when I went down stairs; but my heart was at ease, and I made some of the lightest and Then I flakiest of French biscuits for tea. went into mother's room to get down the china. Lawyer Williams and Miss Gibbons were sauntering about the garden, and mother looked upon them with a frown. "You don't think it possible, Lily," she said, "that old fool is caught by her pretty face?" "I shouldn't wonder, mother," I replied; "it is such a very pretty face." "And to think of your coming into the parlor with that old sun-bonnet hanging from your head, and your face in a blaze with heat! Why didn't you slip up stairs quietly?" "A cabbage rose, John ?" I said, laughingly. "A bramble rose, Lily," he replied, coming close to me and lowering his voice; "such as grew in the garden of Eden." Then he went away without even a biscuit, and out of sheer gratitude I stood looking after him, until the voice of Patience Clark, at my elbow, made me start. "Good gracious, Lily! why, I thought it You'll spile that young man, was Martha! sure as this world-he'll be as set up as-as-" she added, somewhat at a loss for a comparison-"as a peacock." So Patience Clark took the place at the table that should have been poor John's, and mother was scarcely able to eat a mouthful after all. The summer flitted by; the golden-rods and chrysanthemums were "It's the fault of the house, mother. I'm all in bloom. There never was a castle so subtoo substantial a figure to slip through stones stantial as the one I built about the cabbages. and mortar. You know one has to pass through I have always thought a host of fairies guarded them and tilled them at night; while all about that way." "Yes, yes," sighed my poor mother; "it's us there was rot and mildew, and the cabbages such a miserably built old barn-not a conven- would neither head nor prosper, our field throve ience about it. But who, in the name of good-amazingly; and when all was done, and they ness, is coming this way? Why, truly it is that John Bates, with his hair all wet and curled, his face shining with soap-suds, and one of those What does he want, queer linen coats on. Lily?" "He wants his supper, I suppose," I said, "And is he to get it here?" she cried, raising were gathered and sold, I had a nice little sum to pay upon the mortgage. One day in October I went down to Wimbleton, but Mr. Williams had been called to meet a client some distance in the country. "Tell him Miss Ware called," I said to the boy; and that night Mr. Williams rode up to Mother had grown weaker of late, the farm. and went to bed early, and Dolph and I sat I do not know croning over our books in the parlor, when a knock at the door startled us. It was only Mr. why my heart beat so wildly, nor why I called to Dolph to run to the door. Williams, and we sat down comfortably to chat together. I told him of my intention to pay him a little on the mortgage, and spoke glowingly of my cabbage-fields; he seemed to waive the matter aside, and turning to Dolph, asked, Dolph gathered in quite a grave and formal manner, the lad's permission to see me alone. up his books and went out of the room. "A fine boy!" cried Mr. Williams; "and not so lame, I think, as he gets stronger." Then I launched into a panegyric upon Dolph |