This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
WITHOUT AND WITHIN.
99
But as to champing steed the noise of battle from afar,
That bids him paw the ground, and neigh to trumpet-sound, Ha, ha!
Is Fame to poet-soul, and mine hath shared among the rest;
Yet was the praise of earliest days the sweetest and the best!

And it is with me now as when with keen, ambitious breast,
At school I struggled with my mates, and ever foremost pressed;
Yet knew not what I won—the worth or sweetness of my prize—
Till I took it home, and read them both within my mother's eyes!

My mother! She to whom I read my earliest rude essays,
Who pinned my verses in her gown, and on her household ways,
As she kept moving, to herself she said them ever soft;
I had a True-love afterwards that read them not so oft!