In War Time, and Other Poems/The Countess

To E. W.

''I inscribed this poem to Dr. Elias Weld of Haverhill, Massachusetts, to whose kindness I was much indebted in my boyhood. He was the one cultivated man in the neighborhood. His small but well-chosen library was placed at my disposal. He is the "wise old doctor" of Snow-Bound. Count Francois de Vipart with his cousin Joseph Rochemont de Poyen came to the United States in the early part of the present century. They took up their residence at Rocks Village on the Merrimac, where they both married. The wife of Count Vipart was Mary Ingalls, who as my father remembered her was a very lovely young girl. Her wedding dress, as described by a lady still living, was "pink satin with an overdress of white lace, and white satin slippers." She died in less than a year after her marriage. Her husband returned to his native country. He lies buried in the family tomb of the Viparts at Bordeaux.''

I know not, Time and Space so intervene, Whether, still waiting with a trust serene, Thou bearest up thy fourscore years and ten, Or, called at last, art now Heaven's citizen; But, here or there, a pleasant thought of thee, Like an old friend, all day has been with me. The shy, still boy, for whom thy kindly hand Smoothed his hard pathway to the wonder-land Of thought and fancy, in gray manhood yet Keeps green the memory of his early debt. To-day, when truth and falsehood speak their words Through hot-lipped cannon and the teeth of swords, Listening with quickened heart and ear intent To each sharp clause of that stern argument, I still can hear at times a softer note Of the old pastoral music round me float, While through the hot gleam of our civil strife Looms the green mirage of a simpler life. As, at his alien post, the sentinel Drops the old bucket in the homestead well, And hears old voices in the winds that toss Above his head the live-oak's beard of moss, So, in our trial-time, and under skies Shadowed by swords like Islam's paradise, I wait and watch, and let my fancy stray To milder scenes and youth's Arcadian day; And howsoe'er the pencil dipped in dreams Shades the brown woods or tints the sunset streams, The country doctor in the foreground seems, Whose ancient sulky down the village lanes Dragged, like a war-car, captive ills and pains. I could not paint the scenery of my song, Mindless of one who looked thereon so long; Who, night and day, on duty's lonely round, Made friends o' the woods and rocks, and knew the sound Of each small brook, and what the hillside trees Said to the winds that touched their leafy keys; Who saw so keenly and so well could paint The village-folk, with all their humors quaint, The parson ambling on his wall-eyed roan. Grave and erect, with white hair backward blown; The tough old boatman, half amphibious grown; The muttering witch-wife of the gossip's tale, And the loud straggler levying his blackmail,-- Old customs, habits, superstitions, fears, All that lies buried under fifty years. To thee, as is most fit, I bring my lay, And, grateful, own the debt I cannot pay. . . . . . . . . . . Over the wooded northern ridge, Between its houses brown, To the dark tunnel of the bridge The street comes straggling down.

You catch a glimpse, through birch and pine, Of gable, roof, and porch, The tavern with its swinging sign, The sharp horn of the church.

The river's steel-blue crescent curves To meet, in ebb and flow, The single broken wharf that serves For sloop and gundelow.

With salt sea-scents along its shores The heavy hay-boats crawl, The long antennae of their oars In lazy rise and fall.

Along the gray abutment's wall The idle shad-net dries; The toll-man in his cobbler's stall Sits smoking with closed eyes.

You hear the pier's low undertone Of waves that chafe and gnaw; You start,--a skipper's horn is blown To raise the creaking draw.

At times a blacksmith's anvil sounds With slow and sluggard beat, Or stage-coach on its dusty rounds Fakes up the staring street.

A place for idle eyes and ears, A cobwebbed nook of dreams; Left by the stream whose waves are years The stranded village seems.

And there, like other moss and rust, The native dweller clings, And keeps, in uninquiring trust, The old, dull round of things.

The fisher drops his patient lines, The farmer sows his grain, Content to hear the murmuring pines Instead of railroad-train.

Go where, along the tangled steep That slopes against the west, The hamlet's buried idlers sleep In still profounder rest.

Throw back the locust's flowery plume, The birch's pale-green scarf, And break the web of brier and bloom From name and epitaph.

A simple muster-roll of death, Of pomp and romance shorn, The dry, old names that common breath Has cheapened and outworn.

Yet pause by one low mound, and part The wild vines o'er it laced, And read the words by rustic art Upon its headstone traced.

Haply yon white-haired villager Of fourscore years can say What means the noble name of her Who sleeps with common clay.

An exile from the Gascon land Found refuge here and rest, And loved, of all the village band, Its fairest and its best.

He knelt with her on Sabbath morns, He worshipped through her eyes, And on the pride that doubts and scorns Stole in her faith's surprise.

Her simple daily life he saw By homeliest duties tried, In all things by an untaught law Of fitness justified.

For her his rank aside he laid; He took the hue and tone Of lowly life and toil, and made Her simple ways his own.

Yet still, in gay and careless ease, To harvest-field or dance He brought the gentle courtesies, The nameless grace of France.

And she who taught him love not less From him she loved in turn Caught in her sweet unconsciousness What love is quick to learn.

Each grew to each in pleased accord, Nor knew the gazing town If she looked upward to her lord Or he to her looked down.

How sweet, when summer's day was o'er, His violin's mirth and wail, The walk on pleasant Newbury's shore, The river's moonlit sail!

Ah! life is brief, though love be long; The altar and the bier, The burial hymn and bridal song, Were both in one short year!

Her rest is quiet on the hill, Beneath the locust's bloom Far off her lover sleeps as still Within his scutcheoned tomb.

The Gascon lord, the village maid, In death still clasp their hands; The love that levels rank and grade Unites their severed lands.

What matter whose the hillside grave, Or whose the blazoned stone? Forever to her western wave Shall whisper blue Garonne!

O Love!--so hallowing every soil That gives thy sweet flower room, Wherever, nursed by ease or toil, The human heart takes bloom!--

Plant of lost Eden, from the sod Of sinful earth unriven, White blossom of the trees of God Dropped down to us from heaven!

This tangled waste of mound and stone Is holy for thy sale; A sweetness which is all thy own Breathes out from fern and brake.

And while ancestral pride shall twine The Gascon's tomb with flowers, Fall sweetly here, O song of mine, With summer's bloom and showers!

And let the lines that severed seem Unite again in thee, As western wave and Gallic stream Are mingled in one sea!