Thrice since then had the lanes been white,
      And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom;
    And now, when the cows came back at night,
      The feeble father drove them home.

    For news had come to the lonely farm
      That three were lying where two had lain;
    And the old man’s tremulous, palsied arm
      Could never lean on a son’s again.

    The summer day grew cool and late: 
      He went for the cows when the work was done;
    But down the lane, as he opened the gate,
      He saw them coming one by one: 

    Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess,
      Shaking their horns in the evening wind;
    Cropping the buttercups out of the grass,
      But who was it following close behind?

    Loosely swung in the idle air
      The empty sleeve of army blue;
    And worn and pale, from the crisping hair,
      Looked out a face that the father knew.

    For close-barred prisons will sometimes yawn,
      And yield their dead unto life again;
    And the day that comes with a cloudy dawn,
      In golden glory at last may wane.

    The great tears sprang to their meeting eyes;
      For the heart must speak when the lips are dumb,
    And under the silent evening skies
      Together they followed the cattle home.

KATE PUTNAM OSGOOD.

KRINKEN.

“Krinken” is the dearest of poems.

“Krinken was a little child. 
It was summer when he smiled!”

Eugene Field, above all other poets, paid the finest tribute to
children.  This poet only, could make the whole ocean warm because a
child’s heart was there to warm it.

Krinken was a little child,—­
It was summer when he smiled. 
Oft the hoary sea and grim
Stretched its white arms out to him,
Calling, “Sun-child, come to me;
Let me warm my heart with thee!”
But the child heard not the sea
Calling, yearning evermore
For the summer on the shore.

    Krinken on the beach one day
    Saw a maiden Nis at play;
    On the pebbly beach she played
    In the summer Krinken made. 
    Fair, and very fair, was she,
    Just a little child was he. 
   “Krinken,” said the maiden Nis,
   “Let me have a little kiss,—­
    Just a kiss, and go with me
    To the summer-lands that be
    Down within the silver sea.”

    Krinken was a little child—­
    By the maiden Nis beguiled,
    Hand in hand with her went he
    And ’twas summer in the sea. 
    And the hoary sea and grim
    To its bosom folded him—­
    Clasped and kissed the little form,
    And the ocean’s heart was warm.

    Now the sea calls out no more;
    It is winter on the shore,—­
    Winter where that little child
    Made sweet summer when he smiled;
    Though ’tis summer on the sea
    Where with maiden Nis went he,—­
    It is winter on the shore,
    Winter, winter evermore.