Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/98

20, 1861.] “It is dreadful,” repeated Mrs. Hawkesley, slowly, “but not so dreadful as this. And your first impulse is to find an excuse for the murderer.”

“No, no, I did not, I do not. I was only saying—how eager you are to judge me!—I was only saying how it must have been, for I remember that poor Robert declared he would one day be the death of Ernest.”

“Of Ernest?” said Mrs. Hawkesley, bitterly. “Can you use the name as if—O! I cannot speak to you, Bertha. May it please God to bring you to a fitter state of mind! I cannot speak to you. There is the telegram; read it if you please, and if you can, pray to be forgiven the fearful wickedness which has brought a good man to such a grave. Oh! Bertha, Bertha!”

And, weeping the only tears which had been shed at that interview, to which she had looked with so much agitation, Beatrice hastened from the room.

“What would she have had me say,” murmured Bertha, when she was alone. “Throw myself back in an agony, and declare that I loved him better than my life. I did not, and I will not say so.”

time was toward the heats of June, And all the mellow afternoon With my ripe heart was just in tune, As I lay a-dreaming.

For yes, my heart was ripe with love; The very airs that stirr’d the grove Blew kisses o’er me from above, As I lay a-dreaming.

The river glided smoothly by— The blue bright bird shot silently Between my covert and the sky As I lay a-dreaming.

By drooping alders doubly bound, The water slid without a sound Until, below the rooted ground Where I lay a-dreaming.

It smote a bank of ruddy loam, Where, underneath, a secret dome Of pebbles fretted it in foam As I lay a-dreaming.

But further, where the stream was wide, The kine were standing side by side Cooling their knees against the tide, As I lay a-dreaming.

And still beyond, were orchards green, Red cottage roofs, and in between Bright meadows, where the scythe had been While I lay a-dreaming.

And over all, the hollow hills, Fill’d with that purple light, which fills Our hearts too with such regal thrills, As we lie a-dreaming.

But my low nest was shut within To such a leafy calm, wherein My thoughts went freely out and in As I lay a-dreaming. The squirrel on his branch at play— The blossom falling from the may— No creatures moved but such as they, Where I lay a-dreaming.

So sweet a spot, so soft a breeze— Such beauty of enfolding trees! Ah! what could mar my luscious ease As I lay a-dreaming?

A country wench came by, to see Whereas her missing kine should be; And this is what she said to me As I lay a-dreaming:

“Git up, ye dawdlin’ gaspin’ loon! Ah’d liever gang mah waas to t’ toon An’ fettle t’ sheep this efternoon Nor lig theer a-dreamin’!”

I look’d at her in strange surprise: I could not think in anywise She was an angel from the skies, Though I lay a-dreaming. For oh, too deep was the disguise: The hand with which she veil’d her eyes Seem’d like a Titan’s hand in size, As I lay a-dreaming.

She was a woman though, and young— The very creature I had sung In fancy, with a poet’s tongue, As I lay a-dreaming.

Therefore I spake and answer’d her: “Maiden, you do but come to stir My soul, and make it joyfuller To lie here a-dreaming.

“For you too, gracious as a fawn, By ferny glade and mossy lawn Full oft have loved, at eve or dawn To lie thus a-dreaming.

“And all the interwoven grace Of sound and hue that fill’d the place Has doubtless ‘passed into your face,’ As you lay a-dreaming.

“Oh, you then, nursed in summer woods, And lull’d by rolling waterfloods, Will give me leave, in these high moods, To lie here a-dreaming.”

The maiden stared, but answered not: Yet, striding slowly from the spot, I heard her say—I know not what— As I lay a-dreaming.

“Yon chap’s a snivellin’ tiv hissell, An’ wat he meeans Ah canna tell; He’s daft, Ah doot, or drunk wi’ yell Te lig theer a-dreamin’.”

to Jewish law, “If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die, then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten: but the owner of the ox shall be quit.” After giving this command, Moses proceeds to enforce the doctrine of the responsibility of the beast’s owner, and to ensure his punishment, should he wittingly