The Two Friends

Fast friends at school two maidens grew,
And wintry age still found them true,
Ellen of gentle clinging mould,
And Maud who seemed reserved and cold.
Maud loved to question why and how.
What men are taught all-keen to know.
Yet learned with graceful modesty
And blushed to make some wise reply.
But Ellen, she was formed for love,
More soft than softest airs that move
Instinct with cooings from the grove.
Once only, yet a girl, she loved
A midshipman, who sailed and roved
O'er half the world, but kept as leal
A heart as when he used to kneel
An infant by his mother's side.
Yet he was poor : a guardian's pride
And shallow fondness often urge
Of him who sweeps the alien surge —
And in his lonely nightwatch sees
Her face in phosphor-foam that flees,
But loves yon stars best, for they keep
Blest eyes upon her innocent sleep —
That boys are fickle roaming far,
That greater, wealthier suitors are
Here at her feet — but sensitive
To love as little flowers that give
Their closest secrets to the morn
At his first kiss, and shut forlorn
Their crimson tips when skies are grey,
Where conscience sheds no doubtful ray
This tender woman from her way
Not prayers nor fires may tempt to stray.
And so she waits for weary years ;
And since she cannot bend with tears
Hearts warped by worldliness, they hold
A solemn council as they fold,
These lovers with their sacred love,
Who bids them, would they worthy prove,
Forsake the world to follow Him ;
So Maud with vision suffused and dim
In part from joy, in part maybe
From some dim hungering jealousy.
Receives the fugitives, whose home
Their home with her shall hence become.
He grows a leader in the state,
While all her life is consecrate
To cheer him wearied oft, and tend
Fair infants God to them may lend.
The sick and poor around her bless
Her grace of human tenderness,
While men, half-hearted foes of wrong,
With her wax chivalrous and strong.
Though worldlings shun with coward sense
Her dauntless front of innocence.
At noble deeds her heart would bound
As a war-horse at the trumpet's sound ;
And glories of the earth and air
Her limpid spirit mirrors fair —
Nor only shrines them, since they don
Fresh forms and lovelier every one
From sprouting seedlike in her soul ;
Till carols of the Spring-bird roll
From her white throat in human strain
More rare to nature given again ;
She feels the blossomed landscape wane
Hued like young wheat-bloom through the boughs
Of foliaged oaks, and placid cows
In lustrous cowslip-meadows lie,
One lapse of light the river nigh ;
And lo ! such landscapes of our land
Glow new-born 'neath her fairy hantl
Creating — even as bees who dive
In flower-sweets their own to hive.
But when the West grew all suffused
With sunset, and the farms were fused
With their own orchards on the hill,
The murmurous water-wheel stood still
Beside the bridge in yonder vale,
Nor yet the cushat plainings fail,
Then would she through the open door
That opened on the lawn outpour
A mystic organ harmony
So dreamlike over earth and sky
That in dusk woods wee birds that doze
Sank deeper into sweet repose :
While Maud hung over her, or drank
That music as the twilight sank
Upon the terrace walk, until
The fluttering white robe would fill
Her grateful sight, till Ellen came
And her pale spirit-brow the flame
Of a young moon kissed sisterly ;
Maud asked no heaven, with Ellen by.

Men called her somewhat cold and stern ;
On blatant folly she could turn
Severely — not for her the looks
Of amorous men ; in learned books
Immersed she seemed, and yet she kept
A nook of heart where Ellen crept
So warm the love of common wives
Were pale, methinks, to that which lives
In this stern woman for her friend.
If Ellen absent do not send
By every mail some word that bears
On her own self, tells how she fares.
Even the very dress she wears,
That Maud may image her distinct,
The daily drudgeries have linked
With them no joy for Maud ; she droops.
And only for to-morrow hopes.

The little ones had asked a boon
One balmy summer afternoon
When they and Ellen and her lord
To spend what days he might afford
From public duties here with Maud
Had come : the children eager prayed
That where by Maud's command was made
Up high among the chestnut boughs,
Where the breeze freshly stirs and soughs.
What Maud had called a children's nest
(Not stern to them the weans confessed)
With nailed sawn branch and stairs that wound
About the grey trunk from the ground.
That here at tea-time should be spread
Their evening meal — and here new bread,
Fresh pats of butter, milk that foamed,
Huge strawberries ripe crimson-domed,
In porcelain translucent slight
As eggs the shy wildbird by flight
In her moss nest reveals to light,
And other dainties, on the rude
Plank of a table tempting stood.
The children feasted, Ellen by
Aglow with their felicity.
While light and shade from flickering leaves
Soft chequerwork about them weaves ;
Then gamesome through the woods they run,
Their shadows in the westering sun
Slow-lengthening, and laugh and pull
The bluebells, what a basketful !
And Maud and Ellen wander too,
While notes of rapture filter through
The leafage as from Heaven's blue ;
So arm in arm they wander home.
But in the after sunset gloom
Out on the dusky dewy lawn
Those dulcet organ-tones are borne.

So time wears on ; Maud's late brown hair
Is streaked with grey, though not the fair
Of Ellen's in its gleamy fold ;
And she is absent, as of old.
But now so far her dwelling-place
Long linger letters o'er the space.
Her health has ailed, and friends advise
For her the warmth of southern skies ;
But thrice the welcome echoing horn
Has thrilled Maud in the sunny morn ;
She knows yon bluff mail-guard may bear
The writing that she holds so dear —
Each morn a blank — her heart feels faint.
Yet never makes she open plaint.
At length, 'mongst others, rimmed with black
A letter comes — not hers — and back
The blood ebbs sudden from her face ;
Some dizzy darkness doth efface
The happy day ; she dares not read —
She knows all day for her is dead.
And yet the record is of peace.
Of life still lapsing till it cease.
And our few fretful bubbles die
In fathomless tranquillity !
Herself had told of orange-groves
Beneath the window that she loves.
Whence she can look upon the main
Rich velvet-blue with ne'er a stain,
O'erarched with sapphire crystalline
Pale blending in horizons fine :
The letter adds that there she lay,
And with each rising of the day
Fresh-crowned with youth's immortal ray
A little more she fades away.
Albeit the strong man sobbing pray :
Close to her window, damp the brow.
Faint to the dim eye waneth now
Yon far seablue, and soft warm aiv
To failing sense doth fragrance bear
Of her dear garden ; till so calm
She passed it seemed that air of balm
Lured sisterlike her gentle sprite
To flutter with it into light.
The end to Ellen came serene ;
Death was on Jesus' breast to lean
After life's supper by Him spread —
Maud only felt that she was dead.

They said her friend was gone before ;
She felt she would not see her more.
She did her duties as of old.
But all her face looked grey and cold.
Some glow with their own spirit's heat,
Their joy full-pulsed will ever beat
And kindle dullest clouds that stain
Till sorrow burns in glory's train ;
But some for joy do much depend
On what these favoured spirits lend.
And like a snow-alp Maud grew wan
When Ellen sank who was her sun.
Nor had she left a friend to stir
The healing fount of tears for her ;
For then with broken whispers they.
Naming the one beloved who lay
In darkness yonder, surely could
Ease each her solitary load.
To lose one only friend is loss —
Is loss of all — and ne'er would cross
Maud's lips from now that sacred name:
But Ellen's sunny room the same
As when she left it stays, all fair
And only waiting Ellen there
As Maud has decked ; she keeps the key ;
None ever enter there but she
At night when all sleeps tranquilly,
If weeping there are none to see.
Each little trifle lying out
'Gainst Ellen's coming spread about
She has been wont how oft ! to use ;
Maud even her favourite flowers renews.
And as to name the lost none dare,
So from the dark day Maud can bear
No stranger hand to touch the keys
Whose organ-tones upon the breeze
Were wont at evening time to float,
Nor have the hushed woods heard a note
Since Ellen went ; but in her room
Maud lives in ever lonely gloom,
Her heart in Ellen's foreign tomb.
Scarce would she see a human face
Unless for duty.
But the place
In later years one visited :
Nor knew that sacred to the dead
Maud kept the organ — waiting there,
And finding music many a year
Laid by disused as it was left
By Ellen, took it up and cleft
The long years' silence with a strain
That Maud of yore had been more fain
To listen for than any one.
When happy day's bright current on
With lapse insensible had flown.
And it was such a summer-eve,
Fair as those were, and Maud to leave
Her solitary chamber thought,
P"or evening's peace within her wrought
Some peace of spirit, and she felt
As Ellen's spirit with her dwelt —
When lo ! once more the organ breathes,
And as she trembling stands enwreathes
Her numb and wounded heart once more
As in dear faded eves of yore
With old familiar arms of love —
As if such grief found power to move
At last the daisy- sprinkled dead
To turn and yearn to it and spread
Wide arms of love to fold us round
For all the deep sleep underground !
To Maud that organ-voice had grown
As Ellen's voice, her very own,
Rare breathings from her secret soul :
Who now but Ellen's self should roll
To-night the old weird harmonies
So faintly breathed as from the skies
To call the sweet mist in the eyes ?
" And is she come herself again ?
Even in God's very smile my pain
Like a vague shadow flitted o'er
Her basking spirit, and it bore
Her down a moment, ah I not more
An angel than she was of yore I "
She weeps but quiet tears and sweet
While silent steals she down and fleet.
So noiseless entering the player
Plays on, nor dreams that she is there.
She stands in deepening twilight, now
The old low melancholy flow
Of wind is in the elms ; through tears
Afar through twilight vague appears
The figure playing, she could deem
It is the Ellen of her dream !
She knows she dreams, yet loves too well
To let the dear illusion dwell ;
Until at last so mighty throbs
Her pent emotion that she sobs
Aloud, and startling causes turn
The player, who views amazed the stern
Pale woman shaken thus with grief —
Ah ! healthful tears, ye bring relief.

" Go on " she murmurs and she prays
P'or all the music Ellen plays.
So from that day God eased her load,
And more submissively she trod
Her lonely way, and comfort sought
In those sweet works that Ellen wrought.
Through intercourse with many poor.
Who bless her now she is no more.
She fell on sleep with hope the while
One face would on her waking smile.