Page:Sibylline Leaves (Coleridge).djvu/63

41

THE FOSTER-MOTHER'S TALE.

 

A Dramatic Fragment.

 

Foster-Mother

.I never saw the man whom you describe.

Maria.

'Tis strange, he spake of you familiarly,

As mine and Albert's common Foster-Mother.

Foster-Mother.

Now blessings on the man, whoe'er he be,

That joined your names with mine! O my sweet lady!
As often as I think of those dear times,
When you two little-ones would stand at eve
On each side of my chair, and make me learn
All you had learnt in the day, and how to talk
In gentle phrase, then bid me sing to you—
'Tis more like heaven to come than what has been.