The Hidden Servants and Other Very Old Stories. Alexander Francesca

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      Though long vanished, and so fair!

      Dewy flowers and April air;

      Thankful that the storms of noon

      Spent their force and died so soon;

      Thankful, as their echoes cease,

      For this twilight hour of peace.

      But my life, to evening grown,

      Still has pleasures of its own.

      Up my stairway, long and steep,

      Now and then the children creep;

      Gather round me, where I sit

      All day long, and dream, and knit;

      Fill my room with happy noise—

      May God bless them, girls and boys!

      Then sweet eyes upon me shine,

      Dimpled hands are laid in mine;

      And I never ask them why

      They have sought to climb so high;

      For 'twere useless to enquire!

      'Tis a story they desire,

      Taken from my ancient store,

      None the worse if heard before;

      And they turn, with pleading looks,

      To my shelf of time-worn books,

      Bound in parchment brown with age.

      Little in them to engage

      Children's fancy, one would say!

      Yet, when tired with noisy play,

      Nothing pleases them so well

      As the stories I can tell

      From those pages, old and gray,

      With their edges worn away;

      Spelling queer, and Woodcut quaint.

      Angel, demon, prince, and saint,

      Much alike in face and air;

      Houses tipping here and there,

      Lion, palm-tree, hermit's cell,

      And much more I need not tell.

      Then they all attentive wait,

      While the story I relate,

      And, before the half is told,

      I forget that I am old!

      But one age there seems to be

      For the little ones and me.

      What though all be new and strange,

      Little children never change;

      All is shifting day by day—

      Worse or better, who can say?

      Much we lose, and much we learn,

      But the children still return,

      As the flowers do, every year;

      Just as innocent and dear

      As those babes who first did meet

      At our Heavenly Master's feet.

      In His arms He took them all:

      Oh, 'tis precious to recall—

      Blessèd to believe it true—

      That what we love He loved too!

      Since the time when life was new,

      All my long, long journey through,

      I have story-teller been.

      When a child I did begin

      To my playmates; later on,

      Other children, long since gone,

      Came to listen; and of some,

      Still the children's children come!

      Some, the dearest, took their flight,

      In the early morning light,

      To the glory far away,

      Made for them and such as they.

      I have lingered till the last;

      All the busy hours are past;

      Now my sun is in the west,

      Slowly sinking down to rest

      Ere it wholly fades from view,

      One thing only I would do:

      From my stories I would choose

      Those 't would grieve me most to lose.

      And would tell them once again

      For the children who remain,

      And for others, yet to be,

      Whom on earth I may not see.

      Here, within this volume small,

      I have thought to write them all;

      And to-day the work commence,

      Trusting, ere God call me hence,

      I may see the whole complete.

      It will be a labour sweet,

      Calling back, in sunset glow,

      Happy hours of long ago.

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