Page:Anne Bradstreet and her time.djvu/345

Rh CHAPTER XVI.

.

N the midst of all this agitation and confusion Anne Bradstreet pursued her quiet way, more disposed to comment on the misdoings of the Persians or Romans than on anything nearer home, though some lines in her "Dialogue between Old England and New," indicate that she followed the course of every event with an anxious and intelligent interest. In 1657, her oldest son had left for England, where he remained until 1661, and she wrote then some verses more to be commended for their motherly feeling than for any charm of expression:

Thou mighty God of Sea and Land, I here resigne into thy hand The Son of prayers, of vowes, of teares, The child I stayed for many yeares. Thou heard'st me then and gave'st him me; Hear me again, I give him Thee. He's mine, but more, O Lord thine own, For sure thy Grace is on him shown. No friend I have like Thee to trust, For mortall helps are brittle Dust.