Then once again the groups were drawn
    Through corridors, or down the lawn,
    Which bloomed in beauty like a dawn: 
    Where countless fountains leap alway,
    Veiling their silver heights in spray,
    The choral people held their way.

    There, ’mid the brightest, brightly shone
    Dear forms he loved in years agone,—­
    The earliest loved,—­the earliest flown: 
    He heard a mother’s sainted tongue,
    A sister’s voice who vanished young,
    While one still dearer sweetly sung!

    No further might the scene unfold,
    The gazer’s voice could not withhold,
    The very rapture made him bold: 
    He cried aloud, with clasped hands,
    “O happy fields!  O happy bands,
    Who reap the never-failing lands!

    “O master of these broad estates,
    Behold, before your very gates
    A worn and wanting laborer waits! 
    Let me but toil amid your grain,
    Or be a gleaner on the plain,
    So I may leave these fields of pain!

    “A gleaner, I will follow far,
    With never look or word to mar,
    Behind the Harvest’s yellow car: 
    All day my hand shall constant be,
    And every happy eve shall see
    The precious burden borne to Thee!”

    At morn some reapers neared the place,
    Strong men, whose feet recoiled apace,—­
    Then gathering round the upturned face,
    They saw the lines of pain and care,
    Yet read in the expression there
    The look as of an answered prayer.

* * * * *

THE NEW-ENGLAND REVOLUTION OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

In the first week of March, 1689, Sir Edmund Andros returned to Boston from an expedition against the Indians of Maine.  He had now governed New England more than two years for King James II., imitating, in his narrow sphere, the insolent despotism of his master.

The people had no share in the government, which was conducted by Andros with the aid of Counsellors appointed by the King.  Some of these were the Governor’s creatures,—­English adventurers, who came to make their fortunes.  Their associates of a different character were so treated that they absented themselves from the Council-Board, and at length not even formal meetings were held.  Heavy taxes were arbitrarily imposed on the inhabitants.  Excessive fees were demanded for the transaction of business in the courts and public offices.  Town-meetings were forbidden, except one to be held in each year for the choice of assessing-officers.  The ancient titles to land in the Colony were declared to be worthless, and proprietors were required to secure themselves by taking out new patents from the Governor, for which high prices were extorted.  Complaint of these usurpations was severely punished by fine and imprisonment.  An order that “no man should remove out of the country without the Governor’s leave” cut off whatever small chance existed of obtaining redress in England.  The religious feelings of the people were outraged.  The Governor directed the opening of the Old South Church in Boston for worship according to the English ritual.  If the demand had been for the use of the building for a mass, or for a carriage-house for Juggernaut, it would scarcely have given greater displeasure.