The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864. Various

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      Unheard, below the living shuttles shifted

      Backward and forth, and wove, in love or strife,

      In mirth or pain, the mottled web of life:

      But when at last came upward from the street

      Tinkle of bell and tread of measured feet,

      The sick man started, strove to rise in vain,

      Sinking back heavily with a moan of pain.

      And the monk said, "'T is but the Brotherhood

      Of Mercy going on some errand good:

      Their black masks by the palace-wall I see."—

      Piero answered faintly, "Woe is me!

      This day for the first time in forty years

      In vain the bell hath sounded in my ears,

      Calling me with my brethren of the mask,

      Beggar and prince alike, to some new task

      Of love or pity,—haply from the street

      To bear a wretch plague-stricken, or, with feet

      Hushed to the quickened ear and feverish brain,

      To tread the crowded lazaretto's floors,

      Down the long twilight of the corridors,

      'Midst tossing arms and faces full of pain.

      I loved the work: it was its own reward.

      I never counted on it to offset

      My sins, which are many, or make less my debt

      To the free grace and mercy of our Lord;

      But somehow, father, it has come to be

      In these long years so much a part of me,

      I should not know myself, if lacking it,

      But with the work the worker too would die,

      And in my place some other self would sit

      Joyful or sad,—what matters, if not I?

      And now all's over. Woe is me!"—"My son,"

      The monk said soothingly, "thy work is done;

      And no more as a servant, but the guest

      Of God thou enterest thy eternal rest.

      No toil, no tears, no sorrow for the lost

      Shall mar thy perfect bliss. Thou shalt sit down

      Clad in white robes, and wear a golden crown

      Forever and forever."—Piero tossed

      On his sick pillow: "Miserable me!

      I am too poor for such grand company;

      The crown would be too heavy for this gray

      Old head; and God forgive me, if I say

      It would be hard to sit there night and day,

      Like an image in the Tribune, doing nought

      With these hard hands, that all my life have wrought,

      Not for bread only, but for pity's sake.

      I'm dull at prayers: I could not keep awake,

      Counting my beads. Mine's but a crazy head,

      Scarce worth the saving, if all else be dead.

      And if one goes to heaven without a heart,

      God knows he leaves behind his better part.

      I love my fellow-men; the worst I know

      I would do good to. Will death change me so

      That I shall sit among the lazy saints,

      Turning a deaf ear to the sore complaints

      Of souls that suffer? Why, I never yet

      Left a poor dog in the strada hard beset,

      Or ass o'erladen! Must I rate man less

      Than dog or ass, in holy selfishness?

      Methinks (Lord, pardon, if the thought be sin!)

      The world of pain were better, if therein

      One's heart might still be human, and desires

      Of natural pity drop upon its fires

      Some cooling tears."

                                                                                  Thereat the pale monk crossed

      His brow, and muttering, "Madman! thou art lost!"

      Took up his pyx and fled; and, left alone,

      The sick man closed his eyes with a great groan

      That sank into a prayer, "Thy will be done!"

      AMBASSADORS IN BONDS

      Mr. Deane walked into church on Easter Sunday, followed by a trophy. This trophy had once been a chattel, but was now, as Mr. Deane assured him, a man. Scarcely a shade darker than Mr. Deane himself as to complexion, in figure quite as prepossessing, in bearing not less erect, he passed up the north aisle of St. Peter's to the square pew of the most influential of the wardens, who was also the first man of the Church Musical Committee.

      The old church was beautiful with its floral decorations on this festival. The altar shone with sacramental silver, and rare was the music that quickened the hearts of the great congregation to harmonious tunefulness. The boys in their choral, Miss Ives in her solos, above all, the organist, in voluntary, prelude, and accompaniment, how glorious! If a soul in the church escaped thankfulness in presence of those flowers, in hearing of that music, I know not by what force it could have been conducted that bright morning to the feet of Love. It was "a day of days."

      To the trophy of Deane this scene must have been strangely new. No doubt, he had before now sat in a church, a decorated church, a church where music had much to do with the service. But never under such circumstances had he stood, sat, knelt, taking part in the worship, a man among men. Of this Mr. Deane was thinking; and his brain, not very imaginative, was taxed to conceive the conception of freedom a man must obtain under precisely these circumstances.

      But the man in question was thinking thoughts as widely diverse from these attributed to him as one could easily imagine. Of himself, and his position, scarcely at all. And when he thought, he smiled; but the gravity, the abstraction into which he repeatedly lapsed, seemed to say for him that freedom was to him more than he knew what to do with. No volubility of joy, no laughter, no manifested exultation in deliverance from bondage: 't was a rare case; must one believe his eyes?

      Probably the constraint of habit was upon the fugitive, the contraband. Homesickness in spite of him, it might be. Oh, surely freedom was not bare to him as a winter-rifled tree? Not a bud of promise swelling along the dreary waste of tortuous branches? Possibly some ties had been ruptured in making his escape, which must be knit again before he could enter into the joy he had so fairly won. For you and me it would hardly be perfect happiness to feast at great men's tables, while the faces we love best, the dear, the sacred faces, grow gaunt from starvation.

      Mr. Deane took to himself some glory in consequence of his late achievements. He was a practical СКАЧАТЬ