go.’          200

 

  Him running on thus hopefully she heard,

And almost hoped herself; but when he turn’d

The current of his talk to greater things

In sailor fashion roughly sermonizing

On providence and trust in Heaven, she heard,          205

Heard and not heard him; as the village girl,

Who sets her pitcher underneath the spring,

Musing on him that used to fill it for her,

Hears and not hears, and lets it overflow.

 

  At length she spoke ‘O Enoch, you are wise;          210

And yet for all your wisdom well know I

That I shall look upon your face no more.’

 

  ‘Well then,’ said Enoch, ‘I shall look on yours.

Annie, the ship I sail in passes here

(He named the day) get you a seaman’s glass,          215

Spy out my face, and laugh at all your fears.’

 

  But when the last of those last moments came,

‘Annie, my girl, cheer up, be comforted,

Look to the babes, and till I come again,

Keep everything shipshape, for I must go.          220

And fear no more for me; or if you fear

Cast all your cares on God; that anchor holds.

Is He not yonder in those uttermost

Parts of the morning? if I flee to these

Can I go from Him? and the sea is His,          225

The sea is His: He made it.’

 

                           Enoch rose,

Cast his strong arms about his drooping wife,

And kiss’d his wonder-stricken little ones;

But for the third, the sickly one, who slept          230

After a night of feverous wakefulness,

When Annie would have raised him Enoch said

‘Wake him not; let him sleep; how should the child

Remember this?’ and kiss’d him in his cot.

But Annie from her baby’s forehead clipt          235

A tiny curl, and gave it: this he kept

Thro’ all his future; but now hastily caught

His bundle, waved his hand, and went his way.

 

  She, when the day, that Enoch mention’d, came,

Borrow’d a glass, but all in vain: perhaps          240

She could not fix the glass to suit her eye;

Perhaps her eye was dim, hand tremulous;

She saw him not: and while he stood on deck

Waving, the moment and the vessel past.

 

  Ev’n to the last dip of the vanishing sail          245

She watch’d it, and departed weeping for him;

Then, tho’ she mourned his absence as his grave,

Set her sad will no less to chime with his,

But throve not in her trade, not being bred

To barter, nor compensating the want          250

By shrewdness, neither capable of lies,

Nor asking overmuch and taking less,

And still foreboding ‘what would Enoch say?’

For more than once, in days of difficulty

And pressure, had she sold her wares for less          255

Than what she gave in buying what she sold:

She failed and sadden’d knowing it; and thus,

Expectant of that news which never came,

Gain’d for her own a scanty sustenance,

And lived a life of silent melancholy.          260

 

  Now the third child was sickly-born and grew

Yet sicklier, tho’ the mother cared for it

With all a mother’s care: nevertheless,

Whether her business often called her from it,

Or thro’ the want of what it needed most,          265

Or means to pay the voice who best could tell

What most it needed—howsoe’er it was,

After a lingering,—ere she was aware,—

Like the caged bird escaping suddenly,

The little innocent soul flitted away.          270

 

  In that same week when Annie buried it,

Philip’s true heart, which hunger’d for her peace

(Since Enoch left he had not look’d upon her),

Smote him, as having kept aloof so long.

‘Surely’ said Philip ‘I may see her now,          275

May be some little comfort;’ therefore went,

Past thro’ the solitary room in front,

Paused for a moment at an inner door,

Then struck it thrice, and, no one opening,

Enter’d; but Annie, seated with her grief,          280

Fresh from the burial of her little one,

Cared not to look on any human face,

But turn’d her own toward the wall and wept.

Then Philip standing up said falteringly

‘Annie, I come to ask a favour of you.’          285

 

  He spoke; the passion in her moan’d reply

‘Favour from one so sad and so forlorn

As I am!’ half abashed him; yet unask’d,

His bashfulness and tenderness at war,

He set himself beside her, saying to her:          290

‘I came to speak to you of what he wished,

Enoch, your husband: I have ever said

You chose the best among us—a strong man:

For where he fixt his heart he set his hand

To do the thing he will’d, and bore it thro’.          295

And wherefore did he go this weary way,

And leave you lonely? not to see the world—

For pleasure?—nay, but for the wherewithal

To give his babes a better bringing-up

Than his had been, or yours: that was his wish.          300

And if he come again, vext will he be

To find the precious morning hours were lost.

And it would vex him even in his grave,

If he could know his babes were running wild

Like colts about the waste. So, Annie, now—          305

Have we not known each other all our lives?

I do beseech you by the love you bear

Him and his children not to say me nay—

For, if you will, when Enoch comes again

Why then he shall repay me—if you will,          310

Annie—for I am rich and well-to-do.

Now let me put the boy and girl to school:

This is the favour that I came to ask.’

 

  Then Annie with her brows against the wall

Answer’d ‘I cannot look you in the face;          315

I seem so foolish and so broken down.

When you came in my sorrow broke me down;

And now I think your kindness breaks me down;

But Enoch lives; that is borne in on me:

He will repay you: money can be repaid;          320

Not kindness such as yours.’

 

                         And Philip ask’d

‘Then you will let me, Annie?’

 

                             There she turn’d,

She rose, and fixed her swimming eyes upon him,          325

And dwelt a moment on his kindly face,

Then calling down a blessing on his head

Caught at his hand, and wrung it passionately,

And past into the little garth beyond.

So lifted up in spirit he moved away.          330

 

  Then Philip put the boy and girl to school,

And bought them needful books, and everyway,

Like one who does his duty by his own,

Made himself theirs; and tho’ for Annie’s sake,

Fearing the lazy gossip of the port,          335

He oft denied his heart his dearest wish,

And seldom crost her threshold, yet he sent

Gifts by the children, garden-herbs and fruit,

The late and early roses from his wall,

Or conies from the down, and now and then,          340

With some pretext of fineness in the meal

To save the offence of charitable, flour

From his tall mill that whistled on the waste.

 

  But Philip did not fathom Annie’s mind:

Scarce could the woman when he came upon her,          345

Out of full heart and boundless gratitude

Light on a broken word to thank him with.

But Philip was her children’s all-in-all;

From distant corners of the street they ran

To greet his hearty welcome heartily;          350

Lords of his house and of his mill were they;

Worried his passive ear with petty wrongs

Or pleasures, hung upon him, play’d with him

And call’d him Father Philip. Philip gain’d

As Enoch lost; for Enoch seem’d to them          355

Uncertain as a vision or a dream,

Faint as a figure seen in early dawn

Down at the far end of an avenue,

Going we know not where: and so ten years,

Since Enoch left his hearth and native land,          360

Fled forward, and no news of Enoch came.

 

  It chanced one evening Annie’s children long’d

To go with others, nutting to the wood,

And Annie would go with them; then they begg’d

For Father Philip (as they call’d him) too:          365

Him, like the working bee in blossom-dust,

Blanch’d with his mill, they found; and saying to him

‘Come with us father Philip’ he denied;

But when the children pluck’d at him to go,

He laugh’d and yielded readily to their wish,          370

For was not Annie with them? and they went.

 

  But after scaling half the weary down,

Just where the prone edge of the wood began

To feather toward the hollow, all her force

Fail’d her; and sighing ‘Let me rest’ she said;          375

So Philip rested with her well-content;

While all the younger ones with jubilant cries

Broke from their elders, and tumultuously

Down thro’ the whitening hazels made a plunge

To the bottom, and dispersed, and bent or broke          380

The lithe reluctant boughs to tear away

Their tawny clusters, crying to each other

And calling, here and there, about the wood.

 

  But Philip sitting at her side forgot

Her presence, and remember’d one dark hour          385

Here in this wood, when like a wounded life

He crept into the shadow: at last he said

Lifting his honest forehead, ‘Listen, Annie,

How merry they are down yonder in the wood.’

‘Tired, Annie?’ for she did not speak a word.          390

‘Tired?’ but her face had fallen upon her hands;

At which as with a kind of anger in him,

‘The ship was lost,’ he said, ‘the ship was lost!

No more of that! why should you kill yourself

And make them orphans quite?’ And Annie said          395

‘I thought not of it: but—I know not why—

Their voices make me feel so solitary.’

 

  Then Philip coming somewhat closer spoke.

‘Annie, there is a thing upon my mind,

And it has been upon my mind so long,          400

That tho’ I know not when it first came there,

I know that it will out at last. O Annie,

It is beyond all hope, against all chance,

That he who left you ten long years ago

Should still be living; well then—let me speak:          405

I grieve to see you poor and wanting help:

I cannot help you as I wish to do

Unless—they say that women are so quick—

Perhaps you know what I would have you know—

I wish you for my wife. I fain would prove          410

A father to your children: I do think

They love me as a father: I am sure

That I love them as if they were mine own;

And I believe, if you were fast my wife,

That after all these sad uncertain