Written for a benevolent Society in the metropolis, the object of which is to relieve poor women during the first month of their widowhood, to preserve what little property they may have from wreck and ruin, in a season of embarrassment, when kindness and good counsel are especially needed; and, so far as may be practicable, to assist the destitute with future means of maintaining themselves and their fatherless children.
"The short and simple annals of the poor.”—GRAY.
MINE is a tale of every day,
Yet turn not thou thine ear away;
For 'tis the bitterest thought of all,
The worm-wood added to the gall,
That such a wreck of mortal bliss,
That such a weight of wo as this,
Is no strange thing,-but, strange to say!
The tale, the truth of every day.
At Mary's birth, her mother smiled
Upon her first, last, only child,
And, at the sight of that young flower,
Forgot the anguish of her hour;
Her pains return'd;—she soon forgot
Love, joy, hope, sorrow,—she was not.
Her partner stood, like one bereft
Of all,—not all, their babe was left;
By the dead mother's side it slept,
Slept sweetly;-when it woke, it wept.
"Live, Mary, live, and I will be
Father and mother both to thee!"
The mourner cried, and while he spake,
His breaking heart forebore to break;
Faith, courage, patience, from above,
Flew to the help of fainting love.
While o'er his charge that parent yearn'd,
All woman's tenderness he learn'd,
All woman's waking, sleeping care,
-That sleeps not to her babe,—her prayer,
Of power to bring upon its head,
The richest blessings heaven can shed;
All these he learn'd, and lived to say,
"My strength was given me as my day."
So the Red Indian of those woods,
That echo to Lake Erie's floods,
Reft of his consort in the wild,
Became the mother of his child!
Nature (herself a mother) saw
His grief, and loosed her kindliest law :
Warm from its fount life's stream, propell'd,
His breasts with sweet nutrition swell'd,
At whose strange springs, his infant drew
Milk, as the rose-bud drinks the dew.
Mary from childhood rose to youth,
In paths of innocence and truth;
-Train'd by her parent, from her birth,
To go to heaven by way of earth,
She was to him, in after-life,
Both as a daughter and a wife.
Meekness, simplicity, and grace,
Adorn'd her speech, her air, her face ;
The spirit, through its earthly mould,
Broke, as the lily's leaves unfold;
Her beauty open'd on the sight,
As a star trembles into light.
Love found that maiden; love will find
Way to the coyest maiden's mind;
Love found and tried her many a year,
With hope deferr'd, and boding fear;
To the world's end her hero stray'd;
Tempests and calms his bark delay'd;
What then could her heart-sickness soothe ?
"The course of true love ne'er ran smooth!"
Her bosom ached with drear suspense,
Till sharper trouble drove it thence:
Affliction smote her father's brain,
And he became a child again.
prayers, the pangs, the tears, He breathed, felt, shed on her young years, That duteous daughter well repaid,
Till in the grave she saw him laid,
Beneath her mother's church-yard stone:
-There first she felt herself alone;
But while she gazed on that cold heap,
Her parents' bed, and could not weep,
A still small whisper seem'd to say,
Strength shall be given thee as thy day :" Then rush'd the tears to her relief;
A bow was in the cloud of grief.
Her wanderer now, from clime to clime,
Return'd, unchanged by tide or time,
True as the morning to the sun;
-Mary and William soon were one;
And never rang the village bells
With sweeter falls or merrier swells,
Than while the neighbours, young and old,
Stood at their thresholds, to behold,
And bless them, till they reach'd the spot,
Where woodbines girdled Mary's cot,
Where throstles, perch'd on orchard trees,
Sang to the hum of garden bees :
And there no longer forced to roam-
William found all the world at home;
Yea, more than all the world beside,
-A warm, kind heart to his allied.
Twelve
of humble life they spent,
years
With food and raiment well content;
In flower of youth and flush of health,
They envied not voluptuous wealth;
The wealth of poverty was theirs,
-Those riches without wings or snares,
Which honest hands, by daily toil,
May dig from every generous
A little farm, while William till'd,
Mary her household cares fulfill'd;
And love, joy, peace, with guileless mirth,
Sate round the table, warm'd their hearth;
Whence rose, like incense, to the skies,
Morning and evening sacrifice,
And contrite spirits found, in prayer,
That home was heaven, for God was there.
Meanwhile the May-flowers on their lands
Were yearly pluck'd by younger hands;
New comers watch'd the swallows float,
And mock'd the cuckoo's double note;
Till, head o'er head, in slanting line,
They stood, a progeny of nine,
That might be ten ;-but ere that day,
The father's life was snatch'd away;
Faint from the field one night he came;
Fever had seized his sinewy frame,
And left the strong man, when it pass'd,
Frail as the sere leaf in the blast;
A long, long winter's illness, bow'd
His head;-spring-daisies deck'd his shroud.
Oh! 'twas a bitter day for all,
The husband's, father's funeral;
The dead, the living, and the unborn
Met there, were there asunder torn.
Scarce was he buried out of sight,
Ere his tenth infant sprang to light,
And Mary, from her child-bed throes,
To instant, utter ruin rose;
Harvests had fail'd, and sickness drain'd
Her frugal stock-purse, long retain'd;
Rents, debts, and taxes all fell due,
Claimants were loud, resources few,
Small, and remote ;-yet time and care
Her shatter'd fortunes might repair,
If but a friend,—a friend in need,—
Such friend would be a friend indeed,—
Would, by a mite of succour lent,
Wrongs irretrievable prevent!
She look'd around for such an one,
And sigh'd but spake not,-"Is there none?"
-Oh! if he come not ere an hour,
All will elapse beyond her power,
And homeless, helpless, hopeless, lost,
Mary on this cold world be tost
With all her babes! * * * * *
Came such a friend!—I must not say;
Mine is a tale of every day :
But wouldst thou know the worst of all,
The wormwood mingled with the gall,
Go visit thou, in their distress,
The widow and the fatherless,
And thou shalt find such wo as this,
Such breaking up of earthly bliss,
Is no strange thing,—but, strange to say!
The tale-the truth-of every day.
Go, visit thou, in their distress,
THE WIDOW and the FATHERLESS.
"O woman! in our hours of ease,
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please;
-When pain and anguish wring the brow,
A ministering angel thou!"
SCOTT's Marmion, canto vi.
He had no friend on earth but thee;
No hope in heaven above;
By day and night, o'er land and sea,
No solace but thy love:
He wander'd here, he wander'd there,
A fugitive like Cain;
And mourn'd like him, in dark despair,
A brother rashly slain.
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