IN ARCADIE.
I gladly returned, like a tired child, to the kindly faces and hearty
greetings of my loving and much loved father, mother, brothers, green
fields, and all the beautiful children of summer.
"Born where the night owl hooted to the stars,
Cradled where sunshine crept through leafy bars;
Reared where wild roses bloomed most fair,
And songs of meadow larks made glad the summer air,
"Each dainty zephyr whispers follow me,
Ten thousand leaflets beckon from each tree;
All say, 'why give a life to longings vain?
Leave fame and gold: come home: come home again.'
"I hear the forest murmuring 'he has come'
A feathered chorus' joyous welcome home;
Each flower that nods a greeting seems a part
Of nature's welcome back to nature's heart."
The old home was much changed, and for the better. With much patient
toil, the unsightly rocks and stumps had been removed from the fields
which sloped gracefully to the little river and were covered with
tall, waving, luxuriant grasses, starred with buttercups, clover, and
daisies. The dilapidated house and barn had given place to modern
buildings; apple, pear, and peach-trees, covered with fragrant
blossoms were substituted for their decayed and skeleton prototypes;
the narrow, crooked, muddy lane, where horses and wagons had struggled
through the knee-deep, and often hub-deep sticky clay, had become a
firm and fairly straight highway.
My house in the tree on the hilltop, where I had often rehearsed my
orations and sermons in such stentorian tones that the amazed cows
lifted their tails on high and took to their heels, welcomed me back
embowered in leafy new-grown branches.
My second brother, realizing that as "unto the bow the cord is, as
unto the child the mother, so unto man the woman is--useless one
without the other," had taken unto himself a good wife, the daughter
of the deacon, our next neighbor. My mother thus had a much needed
helper, as their farms, like their owners, were joined in wedlock.
[Illustration: I Rehearsed My Orations with Startling Effect.]
The worthy deacon and my deeply religious father alternately led the
family devotions, and peace and comfort prevailed. The mowing machine,
horse-hoe, corn-planter and power-rake dispensed with the drudgery of
the scythe and back-breaking hand tools. A protective tariff had set
the mill wheels rolling in the neighboring cities, thus furnishing
excellent markets for all the products of the farm. The sky-scraping
shoe manufactories, where men, like automatons, delved night and day
for a few weeks and then leaving them to semi-starvation for the rest
of the year, had not yet arrived.
One of my brothers had, like most of the farmers of that day, his
little shop where in winter he coined a few hundred dollars
making boots and shoes, and where I earned many precious pennies,
blackballing the edges and occasionally pegging by hand, all of which
is now done by machinery.
We could now afford occasional holidays, when we all gaily sailed down
the river, dug clams, caught lobsters in nets, regaled ourselves with
toothsome chowders, broils and stews in the open air, and had many
rollicking good times swimming in the breakers, frolicking, old and
young, like children. We pitched our tents on old Bar Island, slept on
the fragrant hay at night, played ball, and renewed our youth inhaling
deep draughts of the salty wind which bloweth in from the sea.
When sailing home one day with a wet sheet, a flowing main, and a
breeze following far abaft, we espied a boat submerged to the gunwhale
floating out to sea. Throwing our yacht up into the wind, we took the
craft in tow to the landing, and were surprised and delighted beyond
measure to find it nearly half full of fine large lobsters, held
there by a wire netting. For weeks we and all the neighbors held high
carnival boiling and eating the luscious crustaceans.
We had much merriment one day on a fishing excursion at the expense
of a parsimonious member of our crew. At first he alone pulled in the
much prized tomcods and flounders. "Well," said he, "I think we better
go in, each one for himself." "All right," was the reply, but soon
stingy ceased to catch any, while the rest of us pulled in the fish as
fast as we could throw the hooks. Mr. Greedy looked very solemn, and
at last, unable to repress his selfishness longer, shouted: "I think
we better share all alike!" "Too late," was the chorus, and while he
carried home but a beggarly string, the rest rejoiced in our great
abundance.
These seem like little incidents, light as airy nothings, but they
come back to memory in the twilight of life when other and greater
events are all forgotten.
When the crops were all harvested, and the winds and snows of winter
shut me out from my woodland, river, and seashore haunts, I grew weary
of the monotony of the indoor country life, and once more went to the
city of Boston in the endless quest of the unattainable.
Restless as the sea, we are never satisfied this side the stars; but
we are all looking forward to that sweet by and by, "as the hart
panteth for the water brook."
I shall be satisfied, not here, not here
Not where the sparkling waters fade into mocking
sands as we draw near,
Where in the wilderness each footstep falters,
I shall be satisfied; but, oh, not here.
Not here, where every dream of bliss deceives us,
Where the worn spirit never finds its goal,
But haunted ever by thoughts that grieve us,
Across our souls floods of bitter memories roll.
Satisfied, satisfied, the soul's vague longing,
The aching void, which nothing earthly fills,
Oh, what desires upon my mind are thronging,
As my eyes turn upward to the heavenly hills!
Shall they be satisfied, the spirit's yearning,
For sweet communion with kindred minds?
The silent love that here meets no returning,
The inspiration, which no language finds?
There is a land, where every pulse is thrilling,
With rapture, earth's sojourners may not know,
Where heaven's repose the weary heart is stilling,
And peacefully earth's storm-tossed currents flow.
Far out of sight, while yet the flesh enfolds us,
Lies that fair country, where our hearts abide,
And, of its bliss, naught more wondrous is told us,
Than these few words, I shall be satisfied.