And still foreboding 'what would Enoch say?'

For more than once, in days of difficulty And pressure, had she sold her wares for less

Than what she gave in buying what she sold:

She fail'd and sadden'd knowing it; and thus,

Expectant of that news which never came, Gain'd for her own a scanty sustenance, And lived a life of silent melancholy.

Now the third child was sickly-born

and grew

Yet sicklier, tho' the mother cared for it With all a mother's care: nevertheless, Whether her business often call'd her from it,

Or thro' the want of what it needed most, Or means to pay the voice who best could tell

What most it needed-howsoe'er it was, After a lingering,-ere she was aware,— Like the caged bird escaping suddenly, The little innocent soul flitted away.

In that same week when Annie buried it,

Philip's true heart, which hunger'd for her peace

(Since Enoch left he had not look'd upon her),

Smote him, as having kept aloof so long. 'Surely,' said Philip, 'I may see her now, May be some little comfort;' therefore went,

Past thro' the solitary room in front, Paused for a moment at an inner door, Then struck it thrice, and, no one opening, Enter'd; but Annie, seated with her grief, Fresh from the burial of her little one, Cared not to look on any human face,

Then Annie with her brows against the

wall

Answer'd 'I cannot look you in the face; I seem so foolish and so broken down. When you came in my sorrow broke me down ;

And now I think your kindness breaks me down ;

But Enoch lives; that is borne in on me : He will repay you : money can be repaid; Not kindness such as yours.'

And Philip ask'd 'Then you will let me, Annie?'

There she turn'd,

She rose, and fixt her swimming eyes upon

him,

And dwelt a moment on his kindly face,
Then calling down a blessing on his head
Caught at his hand, and wrung it passion-
ately,

And past into the little garth beyond.
So lifted up in spirit he moved away.

Then Philip put the boy and girl to school,

And bought them needful books, and

everyway,

Like one who does his duty by his own, Made himself theirs; and tho' for Annie's sake,

Fearing the lazy gossip of the port,

He oft denied his heart his dearest wish, And seldom crost her threshold, yet he sent Gifts by the children, garden-herbs and fruit,

The late and early roses from his wall, Or conies from the down, and now and then,

With some pretext of fineness in the meal To save the oftence of charitable, flour From his tall mill that whistled on the

waste.

But Philip did not fathom Annie's mind:

Scarce could the woman when he came

upon her,

Out of full heart and boundless gratitude Light on a broken word to thank him with. But Philip was her children's all-in-all; From distant corners of the street they ran To greet his hearty welcome heartily ; Lords of his house and of his mill were they ;

Worried his passive ear with petty wrongs Or pleasures, hung upon him, play'd with him

And call'd him Father Philip. Philip

gain'd

As Enoch lost; for Enoch seem'd to them
Uncertain as a vision or a dream,
Faint as a figure seen in early dawn
Down at the far end of an avenue,
Going we know not where: and so ten

years,

Since Enoch left his hearth and native

land,

Fled forward, and no news of Enoch

came.

It chanced one evening Annie's children

long'd

To go with others, nutting to the wood, And Annie would go with them; then

they begg'd

For Father Philip (as they call'd him) too: Him, like the working bee in blossom

dust,

Blanch'd with his mill, they found; and

saying to him

'Come with us Father Philip' he denied ; But when the children pluck'd at him to go, He laugh'd, and yielded readily to their wish,

For was not Annie with them? and they

went.

But after scaling half the weary down, Just where the prone edge of the wood began

To feather toward the hollow, all her force Fail'd her; and sighing, 'Let me rest' she said:

So Philip rested with her well-content; While all the younger ones with jubilant cries

Broke from their elders, and tumultuously Down thro' the whitening hazels made a plunge

To the bottom, and dispersed, and bent or broke

The lithe reluctant boughs to tear away Their tawny clusters, crying to each other And calling, here and there, about the wood.

But Philip sitting at her side forgot Her presence, and remember'd one dark hour

Here in this wood, when like a wounded life

He crept into the shadow : at last he said, Lifting his honest forehead, 'Listen, Annie,

How merry they are down yonder in the wood.

Tired, Annie?' for she did not speak a word.

'Tired?' but her face had fall'n upon her

hands;

At which, as with a kind of anger in him, 'The ship was lost,' he said, 'the ship was lost!

No more of that! why should you kill yourself

And make them orphans quite?' And Annie said

'I thought not of it: but-I know not

why

Their voices make me feel so solitary.'