The Mistress of the Manse | Page 9

every ringlet was a snare,
And every hat, and every gown
And
slipper, something more than fair.
His love had glorified her grace,
And she was his, and not her own,--

So wholly his she had no place
Beside him on his lonely throne,

Or share in love's divine embrace.

And knowing that the coming days
Would strip her features of their
mask,
That duty then would speak her praise,
And love become a
loyal task,
Save he should find beneath the glaze
His fiery love of her had spread,
Diviner things he had not seen,

She feared her woman's heart and head
Were armed with charms and
powers too mean
To win the boon she coveted.
But still she saw and held her plan,
And fear made way for springing
hope.
If she was man's, then hers was man:
Both held their own in
even scope;
And then and there her life began.
LOVE'S PHILOSOPHIES.
I.
A wife is like an unknown sea;--
Least known to him who thinks he
knows
Where all the shores of promise be,
Where lie the islands of
repose,
And where the rocks that he must flee.
Capricious winds, uncertain tides,
Drive the young sailor on and on,

Till all his charts and all his guides
Prove false, and vain conceit is
gone,
And only docile love abides.
Where lay the shallows of the maid,
No plummet line the wife may
sound;
Where round the sunny islands played
The pulses of the
great profound,
Lies low the treacherous everglade.
And sailing, he becomes, perforce,
Discoverer of a lovely world;

And finds, whate'er may be his course,
Green lands within white seas
impearled,
And streams of unsuspected source
Which feed with gold delicious fruits,
Kept by unguessed Hesperides,

Or cool the lips of gentle brutes
That breed and browse among the
trees
Whose wind-tossed limbs and leaves are lutes,

The maiden free, the maiden wed,
Can never, never be the same.
A
new life springs from out the dead,
And, with the speaking of a name,

A breath upon the marriage-bed,
She finds herself a something new--
(Which he learns later, but no
less);
And good and evil, false and true,
May change their
features--who can guess?--
Seen close, or from another view.
For maiden life, with all its fire,
Is hid within a grated cell,
Where
every fancy and desire
And graceless passion, guarded well,
Sits
dumb behind the woven wire.
Marriage is freedom: only when
The husband turns the prison-key

Knows she herself; nor even then
Knows she more wisely well than
he,
Who finds himself least wise of men.
New duties bring new powers to birth,
And new relations, new
surprise
Of depths of weakness or of worth,
Until he doubt if her
disguise
Mask more of heaven, or more of earth.
Tears spring beneath a careless touch;
Endurance hardens with a
word;
She holds a trifle with a clutch
So strangely, childishly
absurd,
That he who loves and pardons much
Doubts if her wayward wit be sane,
When straight beyond his manly
power
She stiffens to the awful strain
Of some supreme or crucial
hour,
And stands unblanched in fiercest pain!
A jealous thought, a petty pique,
Enwraps in gloom, or bursts in
storm;
She questions all that love may speak,
And weighs its tone,
and marks its form,
Or yields her frailty to a freak
That vexes him or breeds disgust;
Then rises in heroic flame,
And
treads a danger into dust,
Or puts his doubting soul to shame
With
love unfeigned and perfect trust.

Still seas unknown the husband sails;
Life-long the lovely marvel
lasts;
In golden calms or driving gales,
With silent prow, or reeling
masts,
Each hour a fresh surprise unveils.
The brooding, threatening bank of mist
Grows into groups of virid
isles,
By sea embraced and sunlight kissed,
Or breaks into
resplendent smiles
Of cinnabar and amethyst!
No day so bright but scuds may fall,
No day so still but winds may
blow;
No morn so dismal with the pall
Of wintry storm, but stars
may glow
When evening gathers, over all!
And so thought Philip, when, in haste
Returning from his lengthened
stay--
The river and the lawn retraced--
He found his Mildred blithe
and gay,
And all his anxious care a waste.
To be half vexed that she could thrive
Without him through a
morning's span,
Upon the honey in her hive,
Was but to prove
himself a man,
And show that he was quite alive!
II.
A sympathetic word or kiss,
(Mildred had insight to discern,)

Though grateful quite, is quite amiss,
In leading to the life etern

The soul that has no bread in this.
The present want must aye be fed,
And first relieved the present care:

"Give us this day our daily bread"
Must be recited in our prayer

Before "forgive us" may be said.
And he who lifts a soul from vice,
And leads the way to better lands;

Must part his raiment, share his slice,
And oft with weary, bleeding
hands,
Pave the long path with sacrifice.
So on a pleasant summer morn,
Wrapped in her motive, sweet and

safe,
She sought the homes of sin and scorn,
And found her little
Sunday waif
Ragged, and hungry, and forlorn.
She called her quickly to her knee;
And with her came a motley troop

Of children, poor and foul as she,
Who gathered in a curious group,

And ceased their play, to hear and see.
Tanned brown