Page:A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields.djvu/185

Or if in the loved native place,
The cradle of his touching dreams,
He strayed in fields, until in face
Port-Royal rose 'mid rainbow gleams;
If he beheld its cloisters cool,
Its long wall and its lonely pool,
As weeps an exiled man he wept.
To weep was sweet! What blessed rain
For Champmeslé and La Fontaine
He shed each year, the day they slept.

But never gentler tears were seen
To flow in love from any lid,
Than his when brows of fair sixteen
Beneath the shrouding veils were hid,
And when the girls with solemn vows,
Acknowledging the Lord as Spouse,
Trod on their festal garlands gay,
And giving up their beauty's crown,
Their long hair, erst let loosely down,
With tears, from parents passed away.

He also had to pay his debt,
And to the temple bring his lamb:
Upon his youngest's brow was set
The seal of Him who said, I Am.
The wedding-ring her finger graced,
Pale, pale, before the altar placed,
Her Lord Divine she longed to see:
While heedless of the pomp and crowd,
Incense, and organ swelling loud,
The father sobbed on bended knee.