Page:Poems Greenwell.djvu/274

Were wet with tears, and yet he ever loved
A cheerful word that had instruction in it;
"When Mary was a little girl," he said,
Turning unto my father, "at the school
I taught her all her ten commandments duly,
And made her say them over and again
Till I was sure she knew them perfectly.
But God himself has taught her that Eleventh one,
Our Blessed Master bade us learn by heart,
And I am sure she knows it perfectly."
 .... Now have you heard
My story; it has been
A long one: rather I have made it so,
Loving to linger over it, for now
Those that it tells of only live for me
In thoughts by day, and dreams upon my bed;
Now there is little more remains to tell.
 Trav. Except of how you came to leave old England,
And settle in this lone and distant place.
 Mary. It was through William, Sir, that used to think
(Being, unlike most other country people.
Of an inquiring, active turn of mind)
The New World was more roomy than the Old,
And fairer prospects open to our children;
And both are good, I know, for God made both;
And we have prospered well in this, yet still,
In part, I missed the things I left behind,
Although I brought my chiefest treasure with me;