Part 39

At twenty-eight, the happy mother lives in a simple home, made beautiful by her children:--

"Heigho! daisies and buttercups! Mother shall thread them a daisy chain."

At thirty-five a widow; at forty-two giving up her children to brighten other homes; at forty-nine, "Longing for Home."

"I had a nestful once of my own, Ah, happy, happy I! Right dearly I loved them, but when they were grown They spread out their wings to fly. O, one after another they flew away, Far up to the heavenly blue, To the better country, the upper day, And--I wish I was going too."

The Songs of Seven will be read and treasured as long as there are women in the world to be loved, and men in the world to love them.

My especial favorite in the volume was the poem Divided. Never have I seen more exquisite kinship with nature, or more delicate and tender feeling. Where is there so beautiful a picture as this?

"An empty sky, a world of heather, Purple of fox-glove, yellow of broom; We two among them, wading together, Shaking out honey, treading perfume.

"Crowds of bees are giddy with clover, Crowds of grasshoppers skip at our feet, Crowds of larks at their matins hang over, Thanking the Lord for a life so sweet.

* * * * *

"We two walk till the purple dieth, And short, dry grass under foot is brown; But one little streak at a distance lieth Green like a ribbon to prank the down.

"Over the grass we stepped into it, And God He knoweth how blithe we were! Never a voice to bid us eschew it; Hey the green ribbon that showed so fair!

* * * * *

"A shady freshness, chafers whirring, A little piping of leaf-hid birds; A flutter of wings, a fitful stirring, A cloud to the eastward, snowy as curds.

"Bare, glassy slopes, where kids are tethered; Round valleys like nests all ferny lined; Round hills, with fluttering tree-tops feathered, Swell high in their freckled robes behind.

* * * * *

"Glitters the dew and shines the river, Up comes the lily and dries her bell; But two are walking apart forever, And wave their hands for a mute farewell.

* * * * *

"And yet I know past all doubting, truly-- And knowledge greater than grief can dim-- I know, as he loved, he will love me duly-- Yea, better--e'en better than I love him.

"And as I walk by the vast calm river, The awful river so dread to see, I say, 'Thy breadth and thy depth forever Are bridged by his thoughts that cross to me.'"

In what choice but simple language we are thus told that two loving hearts cannot be divided.

Years went by, and I was at last to see the author of the poems I had loved in girlhood. I had wondered how she looked, what was her manner, and what were her surroundings.

In Kensington, a suburb of London, in a two-story-and-a-half stone house, cream-colored, lives Jean Ingelow. Tasteful grounds are in front of the home, and in the rear a large lawn bordered with many flowers, and conservatories; a real English garden, soft as velvet, and fragrant as new-mown hay. The house is fit for a poet; roomy, cheerful, and filled with flowers. One end of the large, double parlors seemed a bank of azalias and honeysuckles, while great bunches of yellow primrose and blue forget-me-not were on the tables and in the bay-windows.

But most interesting of all was the poet herself, in middle life, with fine, womanly face, friendly manner, and cultivated mind. For an hour we talked of many things in both countries. Miss Ingelow showed great familiarity with American literature and with our national questions.

While everything about her indicated deep love for poetry, and a keen sense of the beautiful, her conversation, fluent and admirable, showed her to be eminently practical and sensible, without a touch of sentimentality. Her first work in life seems to be the making of her two brothers happy in the home. She usually spends her forenoons in writing. She does her literary work thoroughly, keeping her productions a long time before they are put into print. As she is never in robust health, she gives little time to society, and passes her winters in the South of France or Italy. A letter dated Feb. 25, from the Alps Maritime, at Cannes, says, "This lovely spot is full of flowers, birds, and butterflies." Who that recalls her Songs on the Voices of Birds, the blackbird, and the nightingale, will not appreciate her happiness with such surroundings?

With great fondness for, and pride in, her own country, she has the most kindly feelings toward America and her people. She says in the preface of her novel, Fated to be Free, concerning this work and Off the Skelligs, "I am told that they are peculiar; and I feel that they must be so, for most stories of human life are, or at least aim at being, works of art--selections of interesting portions of life, and fitting incidents put together and presented as a picture is; and I have not aimed at producing a work of art at all, but a piece of nature." And then she goes on to explain her position to "her American friends," for, she says, "I am sure you more than deserve of me some efforts to please you. I seldom have an opportunity of saying how truly I think so."

Jean Ingelow's life has been a quiet but busy and earnest one. She was born in the quaint old city of Boston, England, in 1830. Her father was a well-to-do banker; her mother a cultivated woman of Scotch descent, from Aberdeenshire. Jean grew to womanhood in the midst of eleven brothers and sisters, without the fate of struggle and poverty, so common among the great.

She writes to a friend concerning her childhood:--

"As a child, I was very happy at times, and generally wondering at something.... I was uncommonly like other children.... I remember seeing a star, and that my mother told me of God who lived up there and made the star. This was on a summer evening. It was my first hearing of God, and made a great impression on my mind. I remember better than anything that certain ecstatic sensations of joy used to get hold of me, and that I used to creep into corners to think out my thoughts by myself. I was, however, extremely timid, and easily overawed by fear. We had a lofty nursery with a bow-window that overlooked the river. My brother and I were constantly wondering at this river. The coming up of the tides, and the ships, and the jolly gangs of towers ragging them on with a monotonous song made a daily delight for us. The washing of the water, the sunshine upon it, and the reflections of the waves on our nursery ceiling supplied hours of talk to us, and days of pleasure. At this time, being three years old, ... I learned my letters.... I used to think a good deal, especially about the origin of things. People said often that they had been in this world, that house, that nursery, before I came. I thought everything must have begun when I did.... No doubt other children have such thoughts, but few remember them. Indeed, nothing is more remarkable among intelligent people than the recollections they retain of their early childhood. A few, as I do, remember it all. Many remember nothing whatever which occurred before they were five years old.... I have suffered much from a feeling of shyness and reserve, and I have not been able to do things by trying to do them. What comes to me comes of its own accord, and almost in spite of me; and I have hardly any power when verses are once written to make them any better.... There were no hardships in my youth, but care was bestowed on me and my brothers and sisters by a father and mother who were both cultivated people."