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CXLIV.

As thro' the land at eve we went,
And plucked the ripened ears,

We fell out, my wife and I,
We fell out I know not why,

And kissed again with tears.

And blessings on the falling out
That all the more endears,

When we fall out with those we love
And kiss again with tears!

For when we came where lies the child

We lost in other years,

There above the little grave,
O there above the little grave,
We kissed again with tears.

A. Tennyson.

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CXLV.

We watched her breathing thro' the night,

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her breast the wave of life
Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seemed to speak,
So slowly moved about,

As we had lent her half our powers

To eke her living out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied—
We thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came dim and sad,
And chill with early showers,
Her quiet eyelids closed-she had
Another morn than ours.

T. Hood.

CXLVI.

With her white hands claspt she sleepeth; heart is hushed and lips are cold;

Death shrouds up her heaven of beauty, and a weary way

I go,

Like the sheep without a Shepherd on the wintry norland wold,

With the face of day shut out by blinding snow.

O'er its widowed nest my heart sits moaning for its young that's fled

From this world of wail and weeping, gone to join her

starry peers;

And my light of life's o'ershadowed where the dear one lieth dead,

And I'm crying in the dark with many fears.

All last night-tide she seemed near me, like a lost beloved bird,

Beating at the lattice louder than the sobbing wind and

rain;

And I called across the night with tender name and fond

ling word;

And I yearned out thro' the darkness, all in vain.

Heart will plead, "Eyes cannot see her: they are blind with tears of pain;"

And it climbeth up and straineth, for dear life to look

and hark

While I call her once again: but there cometh no refrain, And it droppeth down, and dieth in the dark.

Gerald Massey.

CXLVII.

Bright be the place of thy soul!
No lovelier spirit than thine

E'er burst from its mortal control,

In the orbs of the blessed to shine.

On earth thou wert all but divine,
As thy soul shall immortally be;

And our sorrow may cease to repine,

When we know that thy God is with thee.

Light be the turf of thy tomb!

May its verdure like emeralds be: There should not be the shadow of gloom In aught that reminds us of thee.

Young flowers and an evergreen tree
May spring from the spot of thy rest:
But nor cypress nor yew let us see;
For why should we mourn for the blest!

Lord Byron.

CXLVIII.

Weep not for her whom the veil of the tomb,
In life's happy morning, hath hid from our eyes,
Ere sin threw a blight o'er the spirit's young bloom,
Or earth had profaned what was born for the skies.

Death chilled the fair fountain, ere sorrow had stained it; "Twas frozen in all the pure light of its course, And but sleeps till the sunshine of Heaven has unchained it,

To water that Eden where first was its source.

Oh, then was her moment, dear spirit, for flying From this gloomy world, while its gloom was unknown

And the wild hymns she warbled so sweetly in dying, Were echoed in heaven by lips like her own.

Weep not for her-in her spring-time she flew
To that land where the wings of the soul are unfurled;
And now like a star beyond evening's cold dew,
Looks radiantly down on the tears of the world.

T. Moore.

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