Poems (Stephens)/The leather man

by Eliza Jane Stephens

THE LEATHER MAN.

He came from a land of sunniest skies—
 And beautiful vine clad hills,
Where blossoms unfold their loveliest dyes—
 And bubble clear founts and rills.

Forsaking all those in earliest prime,
 While favored with strength and grace—
Though never a working of guilt or crime
 Was written upon his face.

A stranger was he, without friend or kin—
 A being indeed forlorn,
And wandering hither and thither was seen,
 With pity, but not with scorn.

Though children at first beheld him with fear,
 And hurriedly by him past,
And many a home when first he drew near,
 Had doors securely made fast

His language we illy could understand,
 But sometimes in sweetest tone,
He sang a dear hymn so hopeful and grand,
 It seemed the hope was his own.

His clothing of leather was ne'er out of date,
 He wasted no time in talk—
But whenever seen, if early or late,
 Was Soberly on the walk.

But never a word was he heard to say
 Of parent or child or wife,
And naught of the woe that made him a prey
 And wrecked his reason and life

And never but once was he seen to smile,
 And that when a child at play
With very winsomeness seemed to beguile
 The care from his breast away.

He sought for the deepest, loneliest wood,
 Afar from the haunts of men,
And there in the dreariest solitude
 He slept in his cheerless den

And often as asked why choosing his way
 "So sorry," was the reply,
If sorry for what, he only would say
 "For much," and then breathe a sigh.

And so at last, when racked with pain,
 Refusing all proffered aid,
He feebly crept to his cavern again,
 And death's stern summons obeyed.

Oh well may we pray the Father of all
 To guide us with His hand,
Life's a struggle, the bravest may fall,
 The yielding can scarcely stand.