184
Of Husband and of Father; nor unhearing
Of that divine and nightly-whispering Voice,
Which from my childhood to maturer years
Spake to me of predestinated wreaths,
Bright with no fading colours!
Yet at times
My soul is sad, that I have roam'd through life
Still most a Stranger, most with naked heart
At mine own home and birth-place: chiefly then,
When I remember thee, my earliest Friend!
Thee, who did'st watch my boy-hood and my youth;
Did'st trace my wanderings with a Father's eye;
And boding evil yet still hoping good
Rebuk'd each fault, and over all my woes
Sorrow'd in Silence! He who counts alone
The beatings of the solitary heart,
That Being knows, how I have lov'd thee ever,
Lov'd as a brother, as a Son rever'd thee!
Oh! tis to me an ever new delight
To talk of thee and thine; or when the blast
Of the shrill winter, rattling our rude sash,
Endears the cleanly hearth and social bowl;
