From "Malcolm's Katie" (I)

THE Land had put his ruddy gauntlet on,
Of Harvest gold, to dash in Famine's face.

And like a vintage wain, deep dy'd with juice,
The great moon falter'd up the ripe, blue sky,
Drawn by silver stars — like oxen white
And horn'd with rays of light. — Down the rich land
Malcolm's small valleys, fill'd with grain, lip-high,
Lay round a lonely hill that fac'd the moon,
And caught the wine-kiss of its ruddy light.

A cusp'd dark wood caught in its black embrace
The valleys and the hill, and from its wilds,
Spic'd with dark cedars, cried the whip-poor-will.

A crane, belated, sail'd across the moon ;
On the bright, small, close link'd lakes green islets lay,
Dusk knots of tangl'd vines, or maple boughs,
Or tuft'd cedars, boss'd upon the waves.

The gay enamell'd children of the swamp
Roll'd a low bass to treble tinkling notes
Of little streamlets leaping from the woods.

Close to old Malcolm's mills, two wooden jaws
Bit up the water on a sloping floor ;
And here, in season, rush'd the great logs down,
To seek the river winding on its way.

In a green sheen, smooth as a Naiad's locks,
The waters roll'd between the shudd'ring jaws
Then on the river level roar'd and reel'd
In ivory-arm'd conflict with itself.

" Look down," said Alfred, " Katie, look and see
How that but pictures my mad heart to you ;
It tears itself in fighting that mad love
You swear is hopeless — hopeless — is it so ? "
" Ah, yes ! " said Katie, " ask me not again."

" But Katie, Max is false ; no word has come,
Nor any sign from him for many months,
And — he is happy with his Indian wife."

She lifted eyes fair as the fresh grey dawn
With all its dews and promises of sun.

" O, Alfred ! — saver of my little life —
Look in my eyes and read them honestly."

He laugh'd till all the isles and forests laugh'd.

" O simple child ! what may the forest flames
See in the woodland ponds but their own fires ?

And have you, Katie, neither fears nor doubts ? "
She, with the flow'r-soft pinkness of her palm
Cover'd her sudden tears, then quickly said :
" Fears, — never doubts, for true love never doubts."