Page:Pleasant Memories of Pleasant Lands.djvu/406

 SIGHT OF NATIVE LAND. 381

Not by wealth or taste alone

Are your inmate treasures shown ;

Though perchance your firesides show

Signs of penury and woe,

Yet where er with prayerful sigh

Sits the mother patiently,

Plying still her needle s care

For the child that slumbers there,

&quot;Whereso er in cottage low

Rocks the cradle to and fro,

There the eye of God doth turn,

There the lamp of soul doth burn :

Roofs ! that nurse this deathless light,

Precious are ye in His sight.

Throngs ! I see ye on the strand, As the steamer nears the land, Some might fortune s favorites seem, Borne on pride or pleasure s stream ; Others, marked by weary care, Labor s rugged livery wear ; Ye, who humbly dig the soil, Brow and hand embrowned with toil, If ye eat my country s bread, If to work her weal ye tread, Faithful even in lowliest sphere, Friends ye are, like kindred dear.

Since I last these scenes surveyed, Who have in the tomb been laid ?

�� �