Page:Pleasant Memories of Pleasant Lands.djvu/257

 232 VILLAGE FUNERAL.

Faint on the far horizon, boasts how oft The bomb-fires blazed, and the tired sentinel Kept watch and ward against her warrior step, Or threatened wrath.

Yet sweeter t is to note The simple habitudes of rural life, Safe from such hurly twixt the sea and shore, As shreds the rock in fragments.

Twining round

Trellis or prop, or o er the cottage wall Weaving its wiry tendrils, interspersed With the rough serrate leaf, profuse and dark, The aromatic hop, the grape of Kent, Lifts its full clusters, of a paler green, Loved for the simple vintage.

Many a tale

Of interest and sympathy is rife Among the humble harvesters of Kent ; And one I heard, which I remember still. In a lone hamlet, the narrator said, I saw a funeral. Round the open grave Gathered a band of thoughtful villagers, While pressing nearest to its shelving brink, A slender boy of some few summers stood, Sole mourner, with a wild and wishful eye Fixed on the coffin. When they let it down Into the darksome pit, and the coarse earth From the grave-digger s shovel falling, gave A hollow sound, there rose such bitter wail, Prolonged and deep, as I had never heard Come from a child.

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