Yet not while Walter lived-for, though their pa

rents

Lay buried side by side as now they lie,

The old Man was a father to the boys,

Two fathers in one father: and if tears,

Shed when he talked of them where they were not,
And hauntings from the infirmity of love,

Are aught of what makes up a mother's heart,
This old Man in the day of his old age

Was half a mother to them.-If you weep, Sir,
To hear a Stranger talking about Strangers,
Heaven bless you when you are among your kin-

died!

Aye. You may turn that way-it is a grave

Which will bear looking at.

LEONARD.

These Boys-1 hope

They loved this good old Man ?

PRIEST.

'They did—and truly :

But that was what we almost overlooked,

They were such darlings of each other. For

Though from their cradles they had lived with

Walter,

The only Kinsman near them in the house,
Yet he being old, they had much love to spare,
And it all went into each other's hearts.

Leonard, the elder by just eighteen months,
Was two years taller: 'twas a joy to see,

To hear, to meet them! from their house the School
Was distant three short miles-and in the time

Of storm and thaw, when every water-course

And unbridged stream, such as you may have noticed

Crossing our roads at every hundred steps,
Was swoln into a noisy rivulet,

Would Leonard then, when elder boys perhaps
Remained at home, go staggering through the fords
Bearing his Brother on his back. I've seen him,
On windy days, in one of those stray brooks,
Aye, more than once I've seen him mid-leg deep,

Their two books lying both on a dry stone
Upon the hither side: and once I said,
As I remember, looking round these rocks
And hills on which we all of us were born,

That God who made the great book of the world
Would bless such piety—

LEONARD.

It may be then

PRIEST.

Never did worthier lads break English bread!

The finest Sunday that the Autumn saw,
With all its mealy clusters of ripe nuts,

Could never keep these boys away from church,
Or tempt them to an hour of sabbath breach.
Leonard and James! I warrant, every corner
Among these rocks, and every hollow place
Where foot could come, to one or both of them
Was known as well as to the flowers that grow

there.

Like Roe-bucks they went bounding o'er the hills:

They played like two young Ravens on the crags :
Then they could write, aye and speak too, as well
As many of their betters-and for Leonard!
The very night before he went away,

In my own house I put into his hand

A Bible, and I'd wager twenty pounds,
That, if he is alive, he has it yet.

LEONARD.

It seems, these Brothers have not lived to be

A comfort to each other.

PRIEST.

That they might

Live to that end, is what both old and young

In this our valley all of us have wished,

And what, for my part, I have often prayed:

But Leonard

LEONARD.

Then James still is left among you?

`PRIEST.

"Tis of the elder Brother I am speaking:

They had an Uncle, he was at that time

A thriving man,

and trafficked on the seas:

And, but for this same Uncle, to this hour
Leonard had never handled rope or shroud.
For the Boy loved the life which we lead here;
And, though a very Stripling, twelve years old,
His soul was knit to this his native soil.

But, as I said, old Walter was too weak

To strive with such a torrent; when he died,

The Estate and House were sold, and all their

Sheep,

A pretty flock, and which, for aught I know,
Had clothed the Ewbanks for a thousand years.
Well-all was gone, and they were destitute.
And Leonard, chiefly for his Brother's sake,
Resolved to try his fortune on the seas.

'Tis now twelve years since we had tidings from

him.

If there was one among us who had heard

That Leonard Ewbank was come home again,