Page:Pleasant Memories of Pleasant Lands.djvu/188

 PARTING AND DEATH. 1G3

Their trembling colors with the vernal green, A student boy, who dwelt among the hills, Taught her of love. There rose an ancient tree. The glory of their humble garden s bound, Around whose rough circumference of trunk A garden-seat was wreathed ; and there they sat, Watching gray-vested twilight, as she bore Such gtfts of tender, and half-uttered thought As lovers prize. When the thin-blossomed furze Gave out its autumn sweetness, and the walls Of that low cot, with the red-berried ash Kindled in pride, they parted ; he to toil Amid his college tasks, and she to weep.

The precious scrolls, that with his ardent heart So faithfully were tinged, unceasing sought

Her hand, and o er their varied lines to pore Amid his absence, was her chief delight.

At length they came not. She with sleepless eye, And lip that every morn more bloodless grew, Demanded them in vain. And then the tongue

Of a hoarse gossip told her, he was dead: Drowned in the deep, and dead!

Her young heart died

Away at those dread sounds. Her upraised eye Grew large and wild, and never closed again. Hark ! hark ! he calleth, I must hence away,&quot; She murmured oft, but faint and fainter still, Nor other word she spake.

And so she died.

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