And stretched her hands out, crying, "Mary mild,
Mother of mercy, help me!-help your child!"
And Mary answered, "From thy bitter past,
Welcome, my child! oh, welcome home at last!
I filled thy place. Thy flight is known to none,
For all thy daily duties I have done ;
Gathered thy flowers, and prayed, and sung, and
slept ;

Didst thou not know, poor child, thy place was kept?
Kind hearts are here; yet would the tenderest one
Have limits to its mercy: God has none.

And man's forgiveness may be true and sweet,
But yet he stoops to give it. More complete
Is Love that lays forgiveness at thy feet,

And pleads with thee to raise it. Only Heaven Means crowned, not vanquished, when it says 'Forgiven !""

Back hurried Sister Monica; but where

Was the poor beggar she left lying there?

Gone; and she searched in vain, and sought the place

For that wan woman, with the piteous face:

But only Angela at the gateway stood,

Laden with hawthorn blossoms from the wood.

And never did a day pass by again,

But the old portress, with a sigh of pain,
Would sorrow for her loitering: with a prayer
That the poor beggar, in her wild despair,
Might not have come to any ill; and when
She ended, "God forgive her!" humbly then
Did Angela bow her head, and say "Amen!"
How pitiful her heart was! all could trace
Something that dimmed the brightness of her face
After that day, which none had seen before;
Not trouble-but a shadow-nothing more.

Years passed away. Then, one dark day of dread
Saw all the sisters kneeling round a bed,
Where Angela lay dying; every breath
Struggling beneath the heavy hand of death.
But suddenly a flush lit up her cheek,

She raised her wan right hand, and strove to speak.
In sorrowing love they listened; not a sound
Or sigh disturbed the utter silence round.
The very tapers' flames were scarcely stirred,
In such hushed awe the sisters knelt and heard.
And through that silence Angela told her life :
Her sin, her flight; the sorrow and the strife,

And the return; and then clear, low and calm, " and the psalm

"Praise God for me, my sisters;

Rang up to heaven, far and clear and wide,
Again and yet again, then sank and died;
While her white face had such a smile of peace,
They saw she never heard the music cease;
And weeping sisters laid her in her tomb,
Crowned with a wreath of perfumed hawthorn bloom.

And thus the Legend ended. It may be
Something is hidden in the mystery,
Besides the lesson of God's pardon shown,
Never enough believed, or asked, or known.
Have we not all, amid life's petty strife,
Some pure ideal of a noble life

That once seemed possible? Did we not hear
The flutter of its wings, and feel it near,
And just within our reach? It was.
We lost it in this daily jar and fret,

And yet

And now live idle in a vague regret.
But still our place is kept, and it will wait,
Ready for us to fill it, soon or late :

No star is ever lost we once have seen,

We always may be what we might have been.

Since Good, though only thought, has life and breath,

God's life- -can always be redeemed from death; And evil, in its nature, is decay,

And hour can blot it all away;

any

The hopes that lost in some far distance seem,

May be the truer life, and this the dream.

園

ENVY.

E was the first always: Fortune

Shone bright in his face.

I fought for years; with no effort
He conquered the place:

We ran; my feet were all bleeding,
But he won the race.

Spite of his many successes
Men loved him the same;
My one pale ray of good fortune
Met scoffing and blame.

When we erred, they gave him pity,

But me-only shame.

My home was still in the shadow,

His lay in the sun:

I longed in vain: what he asked for
It straightway was done.

C