Who drives the horses of the sun
Shall lord it but a day;
Better the lowly deed were done,
And kept the humble way.
The rust will find the sword of fame,
The dust will hide the crown;
Ay, none shall nail so high his name
Time will not tear it down.
The happiest heart that ever beat
Was in some quiet breast
That...
Out of the old house, Nancy—moved up into the new;
All the hurry and worry is just as good as through.
Only a bounden duty remains for you and I—
And that ’s to stand on the doorstep here, and bid the old house good-bye.
What a shell we ’ve lived in, these nineteen or twenty years!
Wonder it hadn’t smashed in, and tumbled about our ears;
Wonder...
The Stately Homes of England,
How beautiful they stand!
Amidst their tall ancestral trees,
O’er all the pleasant land;
The deer across their greensward bound
Through shade and sunny gleam,
And the swan glides past them with the sound
Of some rejoicing stream.
The merry Homes of England!
Around their hearths by night,...
Oh, the auld house, the auld house,—
What though the rooms were wee?
Oh! kind hearts were dwelling there,
And bairnies fu’ o’ glee;
The wild rose and the jessamine
Still hang upon the wa’:
How mony cherished memories
Do they, sweet flowers, reca’!
Oh, the auld laird, the auld laird,
Sae canty, kind, and crouse...
A Naked house, a naked moor,
A shivering pool before the door,
A garden bare of flowers and fruit,
And poplars at the garden foot;
Such is the place that I live in,
Bleak without and bare within.
Yet shall your ragged moors receive
The incomparable pomp of eve,
And the cold glories of the dawn
Behind your shivering trees...
Or, Blessings of To-day
IF we knew the woe and heart-ache
That await us on the road;
If our lips could taste the wormwood,
If our backs could feel the load;
Would we waste to-day in wishing
For a time that ne’er may be?
Would we wait in such impatience
For our ships to come from sea?
If we knew the baby fingers...
Our bugles sang truce,—for the night-cloud had lowered,
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky;
And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw,
By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain;
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I...
An’ O! may I never live single again,
I wish I may never live single again;
I hae a gudeman, an’ a hame o’ my ain,
An’ O! may I never live single again.
I ’ve twa bonnie bairnies, the fairest of a’,
They cheer up my heart when their daddie’s awa’;
I ’ve one at my foot, and I ’ve one at my knee;
An’ fondly they look, an’ say “Mammie” to me...
A Little elbow leans upon your knee,
Your tired knee that has so much to bear;
A child’s dear eyes are looking lovingly
From underneath a thatch of tangled hair.
Perhaps you do not heed the velvet touch
Of warm, moist fingers, folding yours so tight;
You do not prize this blessing overmuch,—
You almost are too tired to pray to-...
I Rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow
Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow.
And then I must scrub, and bake, and sweep,
Till stars are beginning to blink and peep;
But the young lie long and dream in their bed
Of the matching of ribbons, the blue and the red,
And their day goes over in idleness,
And they sigh if the wind but lift...
