Originally published in St. James's Magazine (W. Kent) vol.1 #4 (Jul 1861).
When Ellen Dean was tall enough to touch
A tall man's bosom with her golden curls,
She strewed field-flowers upon her mother's grave;
And, quite deprived of those whom nature gave
Her little heart a visible right to love,
Sat in the sunshine, underneath the porch,
Weak as a new-yeaned lamb. Then God, who sows
Bright hearts among the dark ones here and there,
Guided the heart of Farmer Morrison
To little Ellen. For the Farmer saw
Old memories in the sorrow of the child,—
Bethinking gently how himself had grieved
When, left the keeper's orphan, he had sat
Alone among the hounds, before he owned
His short-horn'd oxen. So the Farmer said:
"The child, I take it, is a goodly child,
One well worth loving, and of pretty parts,
And truly, there is that about her face
Which likes me. I will take the little child,
And love her well, and rear her with my boy;
And she shall have the little empty room
Where slept our daughter Mary ere she died,
And Wife shall love her as she loved her own."
So Ellen dwelt with Farmer Morrison,
Weeping no longer, for the Farmer loved
His foster-child and reared her with his boy;
And every night within the little room
Where slept his daughter Mary ere she died
Small Ellen knelt and prayed a pretty prayer
Her mother taught her; and the Farmer's dame
Soon loved her much as she had loved her own.
The pleasant pattering of her tiny feet,
Her voice, the music of her young delights,
Had memories for Farmer Morrison,
Who taught the little eyes to look a love
Which stirred along the blood like summer warmth
And made him young again. Then Ellen nurst
An eloquently silent happiness.
But looking on the Farmer's only boy,
She found him hard, and heard him shape hard thoughts
In bitter words; for Edward envied her
The gentle words and thoughts that were her due.
So Ellen, when her yellow hair had shone
Three springs and summers at the Farmer's knee,
Had not yet learnt to love or like his boy,
Nor sought to love him. But the children lived
Together still, and Edward flung dark looks
Upon the little maiden, night and morn.
When Ellen Dean grew nearer woman's state
She carried more and more, yet unaware,
Into the house of Farmer Morrison
Those thoughts of womanhood which take delight
In household things,—and bustled through the farm
With such an air of business in her mien
As partly hid her lowly gentleness.
Then Edward, older by a spring then she,
Saw all at once, but idly, and with thoughts
So far from pleasant that his speech was hard,
That Ellen Dean was pretty in her place,
A winning maid beyond the wont of maids,
Healthily handsome. But the Farmer stretched
His resting limbs at ease in good old age
By his fireside, and dreamed a father's dream
Of Ellen: brief, he longed before he died
To see her loved of Edward, and to dance
The blood of three-and-twenty to his face
Among the reapers, on their wedding-day.
A neighbour's son, young Walter Watson, cast
Kind looks on Ellen. Walter was a youth
Reared in the tumult of the winds and rains,
Tough arm'd and breasted like a boulder-stone,
Red-cheeked and roughly hewn, but yet at heart
Tender as girlish fancies. So he nurst
(Acting and hoping in his honest way)
A passionate pleasurable sympathy
Half instinct and half love, a sympathy
Betrayed by his own blushing eagerness
To keep it hidden. Simple Ellen Dean,
Thinking but little then and knowing less,
And he so seeming worthy of her love,
Knew hardly if she loved the man or not.
Meantime the idle Edward Morrison
Busied his brain with books, befooled by hopes
Too lofty for enjoyment. For the youth
Had nursed an idle passion for the words
Dead dreamers wedded to the nation's fame;
And even when a little black-eyed boy
Sitting with Ellen in the village school,
He loved his books and surely proved he held
A head upon his shoulders. So he dwelt
Apart from Ellen, seeing her enough
To know that she was fair; and Ellen Dean,
Graceful and gentle as a summer cloud,
Was mirror'd day by day and hour by hour
In that calm household,—as a summer cloud
Is sweetly imaged in a sleeping lake.
Then, reading in her foster-father's eyes
The wishes of his age, the maiden looked
Into her heart's clear mirror unaware,
And saw the eyes of Edward Morrison
Looking hard thoughts; and all at once she felt
The music of his name along her blood,
And partly loved him. But she weighed the love
And found it wanting, and her heart felt weak,
And chafing down her soul with serious thoughts,
She said within herself, "He loves me not,
His heart is cold, his heart is otherwhere,
He loves me not." When, at the thought, her blood
Blushed like a full-blown rose with woman's pride,
And with a woman's pride she asked herself
If he were worthy. Thus she shrank away
From her own bosom, shuddering to behold
An image that had scarcely touched her dreams;
And so at last, surprised and weak of will,
Went doubting if she loved the man or not.
And Edward, dwelling in his world of books,
Thought of young Ellen in his easy way,—
Just as a man might think about his horse,
Proud of its paces. He was coldly kind
And smiled upon that pretty dwelling-place
For Innocence; but often while he sat
Apart, she seemed so worthy in his sight,
He started, doubtful of his heart and eyes,
And ever after could not choose but watch
The sweet contented language of her looks,
And seek her side, and listen for her steps,
And think her face looked winning when she smiled:
And so at last, half angry and half pleased,
Went doubting if he loved the girl or not.
I wonder whether it had been as wise
If Edward Morrison and Ellen Dean
Had lifted up their passion to the stars,
And thrown it starward on the face and eyes,
In lieu of feeding one unnatural growth
Of shapeless feeling. Walter in the nonce
Sang at the plough, and fostered thoughts that paid
Tributes to hope, doting upon his love
As sweet girl-mothers dote upon and bless
Their new-born babes. So Ellen Dean became
The very heart and hinge of Walter's days.
It came to pass that Farmer Morrison,
A thriving and a moneyed man by this,
Weighed Edward's wishes for a college-life;
And after many days it came to pass
That Edward left the farm to invocate
Tough speculations meant for cooler heads.
But somehow, ere he left, the stripling thought
New thoughts of Ellen, and his heart began
To throng thro' all its pulses, restlessly.
So one blue evening when the yellow star
Rose on the ledge of sunset, and the owl
Moaned in the belfry with his double voice,
He cried within his bosom, "I will tell
Ellen I love her; for my father's eyes
Are in her heart. When I shall face the world
A fairer maid and purer blood may buy
My passion; but I love her well enough
To swear I love her. Meantime I shall do
My father's will, and make the old man glad,
And Ellen Dean will wait because she loves
My father. If I choose no higher flight,
Then will I take the girl and marry her."
Then Edward sought for Ellen, and they walked
Together underneath the stars and moon;
But Edward, when he looked upon the girl,
And saw her face was very calm and cold,
And heard cold thoughts take motion in her voice
As frosty winds amid the sorrel stir,
Fled from his folly, saying, "I was mad
To think that I could love her! Ellen Dean
Is lowly as the grass about my feet."
So Ellen Dean and Edward Morrison
Wandered together in the quiet eve,
Vexed with themselves; and Ellen kept her heart
More hidden than the language of the star
Young lovers watch on pleasant nights of June.
Edward departed on the morrow morn,
And dwelt at college, smiting down her name,
But still half doubting if he loved or not.
So Edward dwelt at college, and his name
Was left between his aged father's lips,
And Ellen dwelt with Farmer Morrison
Dilating into comely womanhood.
Then Walter Watson wooed the wifely girl,
All in a little language of his own
That suited well the privy turn of love,
And lay, like light or odour in a flower,
In downward-looking eyes. When Edward left
The village bells were ringing in the year;
And ere the dewy watchet eyes of May
Gleamed thro' the fringes of the April clouds,
Poor Ellen broke with hope, because the man
Forgot his foster-sister when he wrote,
Saying within her bosom o'er and o'er,
"His heart is cold, his heart is otherwhere,
He loves me not." But Edward dwelt and dreamed
At college, crowing o'er a college fame,
Thinking at leisure of his country home,
Yet doubting, doubting if he loved or not.
But when the golden hair of autumn fell
Over the bosom of the peaceful earth,
Sweet Ellen Dean had summoned to her aid
A woman's courage, shunning Edward's name
And treading out his image from her heart.
Then Walter Watson led her into love,—
She sweetly blushing with a timid air,
And weeping, too, a little now and then,
Yet willing to be led. For Walter, taught
Apt phrases of most marriageable bliss,
Had wed them to his words and won the girl.
When whistling winds were in the waning woods,
And leaves were falling, Farmer Morrison
Weighing the chances, saw the thing was good;
And so the Farmer portioned Ellen Dean,
And danced the blood of twenty to his face
Among the reapers, on her wedding-day.
But Edward rose with little hope or none—
Pained by a loss and knowledge undefined,
Yet felt along the blood and in the brain—
And listening to his heart was first aware
It talked of Ellen; and he somehow felt
That Ellen, in her lowly gentleness,
Had given him love for love. Meantime there came
That tender letter from his sire, which told
Of Ellen's goodness, hinting that her youth
Had hungered all in secret for the boy,—
Just saying she had loved him. Then he cried,
"She loved me—Ellen loved me—I have trode
Her heart out, and she loved me." So he wept,
Until his bitter burning passion seemed
A separate soul, the cradle of sad thoughts,
Too sad indeed to lead to any good
The soul that bore them. At the last he said,
"God bless her! I have wronged her, I have erred;
Sweet heart she loved me and I killed her love—
God bless her!" So the strong man stood in tears,
And love, and shame that tingled to the bone.
So Ellen Dean and Walter Watson lived
A life of modest meaning, in a joy
Sacred to peace, and wore a marriage love
Of sober colour, bright enough to wear
Gladly and calmly. When the time of wheat
Came round again, when all the lands were glad,
And Ellen in the family Bible wrote
Her first child's name, the Farmer, full of days,
Died blessing Ellen, Edward, and the babe.
And Walter throve, and Edward Morrison
Wrote learnèd books still praised by her he loved,
Books for raw scholars, but admired the more
By her because she understands them not,
Books thumbed by Ellen in the winter nights
When yonder in the little farm she sits
With pretty children prattling at her knee.