Autumn Leaves | Page 7

came out
for a little walk, it was so pleasant, and stopped in to see how little
Henry did, since his sickness. You know I always call him _my boy_."
(Yes, Aunt Molly, the only boy in the universe that, for you, had any
good in him.) After the proper amount of urging, she would lay aside
her bonnet and black satin mantle, saying, "Well, I didn't come here to
get my tea, but you are so urgent, I believe I will stay."

Aunt Molly's asides were often amusing. She was so very deaf that she
could not hear her own voice, and often imagined she was whispering,
when she could be heard across the room.
On one occasion she saw a gentleman who was a stranger to her, in the
parlor, when she went to visit one of the ladies who were kind and
attentive to her. She sat a few minutes looking keenly at him, and then
whispered, "Who's that?" "Mr. Jay." "Who?" "MR. JAY." "Who?"
"MR. JAY." "Oh-o-oh! Mr. Jay. Well, what does he do for a living?"
"He's a tutor, Ma'am." "What?" "A TUTOR." "What?" "A TUTOR."
"Oh-o-oh! I thought you said a suitor!"
Aunt Molly owned the little brown cottage, where her widowed mother,
she said, had lived, and there she died. As soon as she was laid in her
grave, it was torn down, and the precious damson-tree was felled. I was
rather glad that the school-house was so ugly, that I might have a
double reason for hating the usurper. If Nemesis cared for school-boys,
she doubtless looks on with a grin, now, to see them scampering at
their will round the precincts of the former enemy of their race, and
listens with pleasure while they "make day hideous" where once the
bee and the humming-bird only broke the quiet of the little garden.
Aunt Molly had a vigorous, active mind, and a strong, tenacious
memory; and her love of the departed grandeur and Toryism of Court
Row, as she called that part of Brattle Street from Ash Street to Mount
Auburn, was pleasant and entertaining to those who listened to her tales
of other times.
Peace to her memory!
THE SOUNDS OF MORNING IN CAMBRIDGE.
I sing the melodies of early morn.
Hark!--'t is the distant roar of iron
wheels,
First sound of busy life, and the shrill neigh
Of vapor-steed,
the vale of Brighton threading,
Region of lowing kine and perfumed
breeze.
Echoes the shore of blue meandering Charles.
Straightway
the chorus of glad chanticleers
Proclaims the dawn. First comes one

clarion note,
Loud, clear, and long drawn out; and hark! again
Rises
the jocund song, distinct, though distant;
Now faint and far, like
plaintive cry for help
Piercing the ear of Sleep. Each knight o' the
spur,
Watchful as brave, and emulous in noise,
With mighty pinions
beats a glad reveille.
All feathered nature wakes. Man's drowsy sense

Heeds not the trilling band, but slumbrous waits
The tardy god of
day. Ah! sluggard, wake!
Open thy blind, and rub thy heavy eyes!

For once behold a sunrise. Is there aught
In thy dream-world more
splendid, or more fair?
With crimson glory the horizon streams,

And ghostly Dian hides her face ashamed.
Now to the ear of him who
lingers long
On downy couch, "falsely luxurious,"
Comes the
unwelcome din of college-bell
Fast tolling. . . . . .
"'T is but the
earliest, the warning peal!"
He sleeps again. Happy if bustling chum,

Footsteps along the entry, or perchance,
In the home bower,
maternal knock and halloo,
Shall break the treacherous slumber. For
behold
The youth collegiate sniff the morning zephyrs,
Breezes of
brisk December, frosty and keen,
With nose incarnadine, peering
above
Each graceful shepherd's plaid the chin enfolding.
See how
the purple hue of youth and health
Glows in each cheek; how the
sharp wind brings pearls
From every eye, brightening those dimmed
with study,
And waste of midnight oil, o'er classic page
Long
poring. Boreas in merry mood
Plays with each unkempt lock, and
vainly strives
To make a football of the Freshman's beaver,
Or the
sage Sophomore's indented felt.
Behold the foremost, with deliberate
stride
And slow, approach the chapel, tree-embowered,
Entering
composedly its gaping portal;

Then, as the iron tongue goes on to
rouse
The mocking echoes with its call, arrive
Others, with hastier
step and heaving chest.
Anon, some bound along divergent paths

Which scar the grassy plain, and, with no pause
For breath, press up
the rocky stair. Straightway,
A desperate few, with headlong, frantic
speed,
Swifter than arrow-flight or Medford whirlwind,
Sparks
flying from iron-shod heels at every footfall,
Over stone causeway
and tessellated pavement,--
They come--they come--they leap--they

scamper in,
Ere, grating on its hinges, slams the door

Inexorable. . . . . .
Pauses the sluggard, at Wood and Hall's just
crossing,
The chime melodious dying on his ear.
Embroidered
sandals scarce maintain their hold
Upon his feet, shuffling, with heel
exposed,
And 'neath his upper garment just appears
A
many-colored robe; about his throat
No comfortable scarf, but
crumpled gills
Shrink from the scanning eye of passenger
The
omnibus o'erhauling. List! 't was the last,
Last stroke! it dies away,