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Rh Than touch such women with my finger-end They top the poor street-walker by their lie, And look the better for being so much worse The devil’s most devilish when respectable. But you, dear, and your story.’ ‘All the rest Is here,’ she said, and sighed upon the child. ‘I found a mistress-sempstress who was kind And let me sew in peace among her girls; And what was better than to draw the threads All day and half the night, for him, and him? And so I lived for him, and so he lives, And so I know, by this time, God lives too.’ She smiled beyond the sun, and ended so, And all my soul rose up to take her part Against the world’s successes, virtues, fames. ‘Come with me, sweetest sister,’ I returned, ‘And sit within my house, and do me good From henceforth, thou and thine! ye are my own From henceforth. I am lonely in the world, And thou art lonely, and the child is half An orphan. Come, and, henceforth, thou and I Being still together, will not miss a friend, Nor he a father, since two mothers shall Make that up to him. I am journeying south, And, in my Tuscan home I’ll find a niche, And set thee there, my saint, the child and thee, And burn the lights of love before thy face, And ever at thy sweet look cross myself