Page:The Poets and Poetry of the West.djvu/344

LOIS BRYAN ADAMS. Lois Bryan, daughter of John and Sarah Bryan, is a native of Moscow, Living- ston county, New York. She was born there on the fourteenth day of October, 1817. Her father, a prosperous carpenter, emigrated to Michigan when Lois was six years old. Her early education was acquired at district schools, in a new settlement. On the sixteenth day of April, 1841, Miss Bryan was married, at Constantine, Michigan, to James Randall Adams, a newspaper editor and pubHsher. Mr. Adams died at Kala- mazoo in 1848. His widow, being left without pecuniary resources, devoted herself to school-teaching. She spent three years in Kentucky as a teacher. Returning to Michigan, she became a regular contributor to the Micldgan Farmer. Li 1853 Mrs. Adams decided to make Detroit her place of permanent residence, and in 1856, she took a proprietory interest in the Farmer, since which period she has de- voted all her time and talents to its literary and business affairs. During twenty years Mrs. Adams has been a contributor to the newspaper litera- ture of Michigan, and has written occasionally for New York periodicals of wide cir- culation. A SONG FOR NEW-YEAR'S EVE. Aw AT with thoughts of pall and bier, And cypress bough and funeral tear. And wailings for the dying year. Our household fires shall burn to-night With warmer glow, while children bright Dance round us in the rosy light. Life was not given for tears and groans. The godlike gift of speech for moans, Or faces made for church-yard stones. Hang the green holly on your walls, And let the children's laughing calls Re-echo through the lighted halls. Those who have killed the year may weep. And low in dust and ashes creep. With wild laments and anguish deep ; But we have loved him best while here. Can bid him go with festal cheer. And lights and garlands round his bier. ( 3: He came to us a helpless child Amid the snows of winter wild- — Our hearths with blazing logs we piled. We gave him shelter from the storm, And closely wrapped his shivering form In softest wools and ermine warm. We fed him from our garden store — The richest fruits our orchards bore. And nuts fx'om many a foreign shore. Our corn and wine his strength supplied, Till, grown to boyhood by our side, We gloried in his youthful pride. We gave him flocks and fertile lands. We bowed our heads to his commands, And tilled his fields with willing hands. When lo, to crown his manhood's morn. The ripening wheat and tasseled corn Were of our loving labor born. Through all the summer's noontide heat, We toiled amid the clover sweet, 28 )