THE WIFE'S SONG.
Old aunt Hester and the Browns went up on the day of the burial.
What Maggie's minister felt, standing in sight of the white robe, the flowers, the white, white face, the folded hands, on which lay an air of such heavenly repose as to keep him inwardly weeping, was that life had gone too hard with her, as it does with thousands upon thousands of tender souls, and had worn her out. So he said about the right things concerning the dear one, concerning life, properly so -called . If he had known all that one there could have told him the stranger sitting at the still one's feet, constantly weeping beneath her veil- I doubt if he could have spoken at all, the fate would have seemed so cruel.
CHAPTER XVII.
FROM this time Herbert returned to Kansas no more, but had his home and business at Manchester, (as John had, who returned soon after;) and Herbert and Mr. Butler were friends, in the best meaning of the oft-perverted term. The latter began to paint the human face divine"-the human face as yet undivine; painted such a Magdalen as you never saw, unless you have seen his- and such a Christ ! His paintings, as all the world saw, were chiefly of sorrowful women, hungry women, women burdened heavily in body, women with no burden perceptible, but, in looking, you felt how drear the weight was on their spirits.
I hardly know how it was with Mrs. Butler, but I think if we were to ask any of her acquaintances about her, they would shrug their shoulders, and answer, "Oh! I guess she's Mrs. Butler still. I guess you would find her so!"
Not a weed can the mother, or Anna, or Charley Edgerly, (Squire Edgerly now) ever find on the grave of Maggie; the father, a good, sober man now, picks the first leaves of them all. But they and Anna's children, one of whom they call Maggie, may often be seen laying flowers upon the grave, hanging wreaths upon the stone. And not once do they omit it when her birth and burial-day comes round, even if paths must be opened through the deep snow-drifts to admit them to the spot. Then it is, “Aunt Maggie, aunt Maggie!" At no time is her name heard so often among them as in that season when with joy they are already welcoming the approaching seasons of Christmas and New-Year.
"There are the elms aunt Maggie used to think were so beautiful- and they are," the children say, nothing but their hats and their glowing faces showing above the sleigh-robes. This is on Christmas or New-Year mornings, when their father, making best use of that pause in his busy life, is taking Anna and the children out for a drive in the frosty air. "And there's the hill where she and mamma, and uncle Herbert used to go after berries, with the little baskets we've got now. Only we don't use aunt Maggie's," they add, with lowered tones. "That hangs up with a beautiful wreath on it—a beautiful wreath the beautiful Mrs. Brown made."
In Mrs. Brown's garden, in the summer, in her conservatory, in the winter, blooms one plant she cherishes more tenderly than all the rest: it is the rose that used to be Maggie's.
In aunt Hester's rooms, (which are hardly lonely now, with her two great boys," as she calls John and Herbert, coming and going, and with Irish Ellinor at work in kitchen and dining room) the quaint-hearted old lady sits at her knitting or her hemming, and saying to her cat, "You knew her, puss. You've lain more than once, with your sleepy head on your paws, in her lap, dozing and purring in great comfort. You never had such frolics with anybody as you had with her one time, when you were a kitten, and she was a young girl, as full of play as a kitten. This is what makes the boys like you so ; what made Herbert bring home that handsome necklace to you the other day? We all make a queen of you, you see; but you mustn't think it is all on account of your being so amazing clever, for it isn't."
THE WIFE'S SONG.
I LIVE today on yesterday,
Since my true-love's away;
The morning red, so bright o'erhead,
Ere long will shade to gray ;
But naught mind I, or clock or sky,
Too long the minutes stay.
I live today on yesterday,
Suce my true-love's away;
He whistled long his parting song,
Full sweet was his delay;
Anon he put his sandals on,
And vanished in the gray.
I live today on yesterday,
Since my true-love's away;
But, hark! I hear him caroling,
"Sweet wife, be always gay;"
Il ear no mere, at the open door,
He kisses my words away!
D. K. A.
