And muttered like the muttering of a storm. 
My little lamb came bleating mournfully;
Angered I struck him;—­out among the trees
I wandered mumbling ‘beggar’ as I went,
And beating in through all my burning soul
The bitter thoughts it conjured, till my brain
Reeled and I sunk upon the dew-damp grass,
And—­utterly exhausted—­slept till morn.

“I dreamed a dream—­all mist and mystery. 
I saw a sunlit valley beautiful
With purple vineyards and with garden-plats;
And in the vineyards and the garden-plats
Were happy-hearted youths and merry girls
Toiling and singing.  Grandsires too were there,
Sitting contented under their own vines
And fig-trees, while about them merrily played
Their children’s children like the sportive lambs
That frolicked on the foot-hills.  Low of kine,
Full-uddered, homeward-wending from the meads,
Fell on the ear as soft as Hulder’s loor
Tuned on the Norse-land mountains.  Like a nest
Hid in a hawthorn-hedge a cottage stood
Embowered with vines beneath broad-branching elms
Sweet-voiced with busy bees.

[Illustration:  PAUL’S DREAM]

“On either hand
Rose steep and barren mountains—­mighty cliffs
Cragged and chasm’d and over-grown with thorns;
And on the topmost peak a golden throne
Blazoned with burning characters that read—­
‘Climb’—­it is yours.’  Not far above the vale
I saw a youth, fair-browed and raven-haired,
Clambering among the thorns and ragged rocks;
And from his brow with torn and bleeding hand
He wiped great drops of sweat.  Down through the vale
I saw a rapid river, broad and deep,
Winding in solemn silence to the sea—­
The sea all mist and fog.  Lo as I stood
Viewing the river and the moaning sea,
A sail—­and then another—­flitted down
And plunged into the mist.  A moment more,
Like shapeless shadows of the by-gone years,
I saw them in the mist and they were gone—­
Gone!—­and the sea moaned on and seemed to say—­
’Gone—­and forever!’—­So I gladly turned
To look upon the throne—­the blazoned throne
That sat upon the everlasting cliff. 
The throne had vanished!—­Lo where it had stood,
A bed of ashes and a gray-haired man
Sitting upon it bowed and broken down. 
And so the vision passed.

“The rising sun
Beamed full upon my face and wakened me,
And there beside me lay my pet—­the lamb—­
Gazing upon me with his wondering eyes,
And all the fields were bright and beautiful,
And brighter seemed the world.  I rose resolved. 
I let the cottage and disposed of all;
The lamb went bleating to a neighbor’s field;
And oft my heart ached, but I mastered it. 
This was the constant burden of my brain—­
’Beggar!’—­I’ll teach him that I am a man;
I’ll speak and he shall listen; I will rise,
And he shall see my course as I go up
Round after round the ladder of success. 
Even as the pine upon the mountain-top
Towers o’er the maple on the mountain-side,
I’ll tower above him.  Then will I look down
And call him Father:—­He shall call me Son.’