Harriet Annie Wilkins

“ For the fire doth but clear the dross, the waves but wash the dust,
From off the jewels of purest gold, such jewels I hold in trust,
For I should have claimed you still as mine, if we never more had met,
Till free from stain of sorrow or sin we stand where hope's suns ne'er set,
Where angels live on, in their life of love, unchanged yet ever new,
And then the time, God's own right time would have come for my taking you,
For this re-union upon earth, is the sign, beloved wife
Of the eternal rest we'll share in the bright hereafter life ”

“ While by that grave I sang "Abide with me,"
As on the night when Victor went to sea;
Ah, I was leaning then upon the breast
That five-and-twenty years has been at rest.
Oh, Victor! art thou gone so far away
That thou cans't hear no earth tone night or day?
Sometimes it seems as if thou wert not far,
Nearer and warmer than the nearest star.
How the wind moans--Ethel, my precious one,
Where shall we wander by to-morrow's sun?
Homeless and friendless in a stranger land,
Our Saviour help and aid; Thy mighty hand
Can save, Thine ear can list each bitter moan. ”

“ Unhappy Cain!
Thou hast so loved to wreathe the clinging vine,
And welcomed with pure joy the delicate fruit,
Till thou hast felt a kindred feeling twine
Around thy heart, grown with each fibrous root
Of tree, or moss, or flower,
Growing in field or bower,
Or ripening grain.
But henceforth, Cain,
When the bright gleaming of the rosy morn
Proclaims another glorious summer day,
Thou may'st walk forth to greet the earth newborn,
And pluck the blushing roses on thy way;
They at thy touch shall blight,
Stricken with some strange might,
Some dire pain. ”

“ Were with me in the storm last night, like angels round my bed.
"So many and great dangers that we cannot stand upright,"
"Defend us by thy mercy, from all perils of this night."
Lady, I am a mother, none know it here save you;
Don't blush for me, there is no shame, I am a wife, leal and true.
Lady, true love is born of heaven, we may deem it dead and past,
And sit with bowed down head alone, the heart's door closed and fast;
When suddenly we hear a voice, and spite of bolt or bar,
Like its dear Master, there it stands, stretching its arms afar ”

“ Then they started up from the brake and thorn,
And hastening away by the light of the morn,
They fled from cavern and moat.
And the bird peeped out of a pine tree tower,
And shrank away at the sight,
The humming-bird fled to his rose-hung bower,
The bright bee curled himself snug in a flower,
O'ertaken by fear and fright.
And the river which rolled for ages, still
In a gentle flow unriven,
Now bears on its bosom by man's proud will,
By the arts of industry and skill,
The blessings to mortals given. ”

“ For on no shore
Shall fair earth yield unto thy stalwart arms;
No, thou may'st dig, and prune, and plant in vain,
And noxious worms and things of poisonous harms
Shall not be banished at the will of Cane;
Thou'lt set seed-bearing root,
Thou'lt plant life-giving fruit
No more, no more.
Depart! Depart!
Ah no, not greater than the soul can bear,
Did'st thou not always find whatever grain
Thou cast, the same grew upward full and fair,
Thou would'st not look upon the pure lamb slain,
To faith true sacrifice
Thou would'st not turn thine eyes ”

“ When I am in my coffin, and soon now I'll be at rest,
Will you lay this little curl of gold upon my quiet breast,
God and the angels only know where the other half lies hid,
In the green sod of old Ireland, neath a baby's coffin lid,
Don't'leave me yet, it is near night, I feel so strange to-day,
You know the prayers for dying ones, oh kneel once more and pray,
Thank God for sending one to me, where the wild tempests roll,
You won't forget--the little curl--Saviour receive my soul. ”

“ Down in the fairest of fairy dells, in sight of the blue sea's breast,
When Uncle Roy who had sailed to India, many long years before,
Gone from the towers of Edinburgh, and made piles of golden store,
Sent for me all in a hurry and ere long he died on my breast,
And far from the land of the heather we laid him gently to rest.
And then came the fever to me, sick and weak at the point of death,
Raving for Aimee--they told me 'twas Aimee at every breath.
Weeks passed and I woke again one day to breath as it were new air.
The crisis over; now health, life, love and myself a millionaire. ”

“ They are gone from the battle, the shot and shell,
And in our anguish we're not alone;
The Father knows all the grief we have known;
Oh God, who once heard the Christ's bitter cry,
Thou knowest what we feel when we see them die.
Our light, has been hid
By the coffin lid,
And dark our noon.
God hears our moan,
He knows how a stricken heart had said,
"Oh, number her not with the silent dead,
For if she stays watching the golden sea,
God help, for what will become of me?
The last rose out of my childhood's bower,
From my English garden, the last sweet flower ”

“ Ethel, we should speak kindly of the dead,
Unable to defend themselves, their spirits fled
To worlds unknown to us, we cannot see
The homes they occupy, the destiny
It pleases God to give them, this we know
That our reaping must be what we sow,
If we plant thistles, we the thorn shall meet,
If we sow ripe grains, we shall harvest wheat,
And something else we know of future life,
That be the memories of war and strife,
Of evil thoughts which may have been controlled
Of hearts through which wild passions unchecked rolled ”

“ Abel, what have you carved on your altar, in that wild devotion
By which you in vain seek to soften the anger of heaven?
A circle, to show that your God is all near, is filling
The seen and unseen with His incomprehensible presence.
Well, so let it be, then; I'll not contradict the illusion.
One thing appears certain, that we have offended our Maker,
Who visits unjustly on us the mistakes of our parents,
As if we ever reached out our hands for fruit once forbidden.
Shall we never be free from the thorns and the thistles upspringing? ”

“ A man can live without love, but he can't get along without gold,
And a woman and child sadly hamper a fellow that's poor or old.
How can a gentleman work and toil year after year like a slave?
For when you've worked your life away you're asked, "Why did not you save?"
Not that I would reproach my wife, I daresay she has done her best;
But women can earn such a trifle, and grow weak if they lose their rest.
Not that Aimee has ever grumbled, and I am not to be blamed,
If she choose to work and stitch away from morn till the sunset flamed ”

“ Thy faith and trust in God is like the pole star's glow
To some benighted sailor; yes, e'en now a thought
Has come to me like light from dawning sunbeam brought.
My father, Ethel, was a Mason; ere he died
He called me to him, and kneeling at his side,
Gave me a jewel, charged me with his dying breath
Never to give it up except for life or death,
For when at last he died we were almost alone,
And stranger's ears were those which heard his dying moan,
The hands of strangers robed him for the grave,
The feet of strangers laid him where the cedars wave. ”

“ An old familiar look of one that I love as we love the dead.
Love her? love Aimee? do I love her less, because since I kissed her last
Over my desolate heart the tides of twenty-five years have passed?
I am longing to-night to hear her hymn, her sweet "Abide with me,"
As she sang it, leaning upon my breast the night I put out to sea. ”

“ Heavily rolleth the wintry clouds,
And the ceaseless snow is falling, falling,
While the frost king's troops in their icy shrouds
Whistle and howl like lost spirits calling.
In a scantily furnished tenement room.
Through which the same frost troops are sighing,
Churlishly gloweth the charcoal flame,
While a man lies there in penury dying.
Nothing new on this beautiful earth,
Are hunger and nakedness, cold and pain,
Over God's sinless creation of love
The serpent glides with his poisonous train.
"Where is Aimee?" ”

“ Is it thinking so much of Arthur, brings Aimee before me here,
Aimee, my idol, my darling, my pet, who always spoke words of cheer,
Did I say what brings her near me to-night, she is with me every day.
God help me, for Aimee's another man's wife three thousand miles away,
Oh how we loved! there's no use in talking, all do not love the same,
To some 'tis the bread and breath of life, to some it is only a name. ”

“ No money, no means, the last thing's gone, and Ethel and you in need!
Well, you must have managed badly enough with only two mouths to feed,
For you can't count me as much, the little support I take,
A little stimulant now and then, swallowed only for your sake.
Aimee, I must have some now--nothing left? what is that glittering thing?
Aimee, you dear one, dispose of that; of what use is our wedding ring?
Don't be cross for the sake of the child, you say, why you angel dear,
Who would ever doubt you, so good, so true, you have nothing to fear. ”

“ Abel, I have no patience with such mock humiliations,
I have no need of a Saviour, I have no need of blood-shedding
To wash out the stain of my own or my father's transgression.
I for myself can make perfect and full restitution;
Look at the smoke of your altar curling upward so clearly,
Making white cloudlets on high in the blue of the firmament,
While mine sweeps the ground that is cursed like the trail of the serpent:
Why comes down the Maker of this blighted universe, asking
Why art thou wroth, and why is thy countenance fallen? ”

“ For the glory of the land we love, toward the setting sun.
I have but one request to make: When all is over, then
Let there be no fuss about me, bury me with my men.
Heap up no splendid monument in memory of my clay,
No tributary words to tell of one who's far away;
It matters not to passers by where lies my crumbling dust,
The cherubim and seraphim may have it in their trust;
And bones of better men than I have bleached all cold and white
Where scorching sunbeam goes by day and the prowling beast by night. ”

“ While you're resting, my darling,
I dream of the shadowy hour,
When one of us looks the last
On the light of its household bower,
Then a sad sigh heaves my breast,
And tears from my eyelids burst,
As I ask of the future dim,
"Which shall be summoned first?"
Sometimes I pray in terror
That you may be first to go,
Never again to sorrow,
Or to feel one throb of woe,
Beyond the mists of the river,
Where mystic shadows weave,
I have no fears, my beloved,
In One we both believe. ”

“ I know it was only she I loved, and thought of that eventide;
But now I can fully endorse the draft, "O Lord with me abide,"
And spite of the heavy clouds that hang o'er my life path near and far,
I own with Vera that "Christ's love stands at each end of the mystic bar,"
And so much of the desert life has been travelled by night and day,
That the shores of the summer land are not so very far away.
And although I know there is one dark sea where black waves heave and toss,
I know the Pilot who waits for me will carry me safely across. ”

“ They have no load of grief to bear,
Of sin no dark, deep stain,
And yet in patience take their share
Of storm, and frost and rain.
Oh, can it be unknown to us,
Without one human word,
The universal Father soothes
The death-bed of each bird ”

“ And Aimee had married another and sought the Australian shore.
She must have thought I was dead, Heaven help me, betwixt us ocean's roar.
I have sometimes wondered if gold is ever aught but a curse,
No, that's wrong--if honestly gained, no harm in a well filled purse,
But I often think of the little home standing there by the sea,
For far off merry England, the home planned for Aimee and me. ”

“ Till the "Senior Partner" gave a cough, and then all their mirth was done.
But I asked from Heaven though I know the way is mingled flower and thorn,
That not one from partner to porter may bear all I have borne.
So Jasper thinks I am sad; how the wintry winds whistle to-night!
Heaven grant no poor woman or children are out in this sleety blight. ”

“ His companions gather around him, but all mirth is hushed, tears fill their eyes, and choking words are whispered as they file round the casket, and look upon the calm dead face, that no more on earth will meet them with its wonted smile, and the pale hands that have done all their rough earthwork. His welcome we did not hear. Ah, it is well that the sound of harps and the silvery peals from the chiming bells of the city of God reach us not, or perchance we should "stand all the day idle." For are we not all entered Apprentices in this strange world of ours? Are we not all "serving our time?" ”

“ Take the sunshine as we go,
And when we come to the brink,
Where black waves ebb and flow,
We'll trust the voice which summons,
The love that has ever kept,
To fold in his arms one taken,
To lead by His hand one left. ”

“ Trust me with that Masonic jewel, I
Will keep it safe; perhaps this very man
May know of some one who would like to buy,
At least he'll let me know its worth, I can
But do the right.
Mother, deny me not,
I'll go as "Esther went unto the king,
God will protect me if the night is wild;
Perhaps some bright ray of sunshine I may bring,
Pray that good angels may surround your child,
And guard her lot."
Ethel's Mission. ”

“ For less would the burden be and the sin would be less I know,
If I knew that my darling was safe and blest where the angels are.
Why do I murmur? for God's will stands at each end of the mystic bar. ”