, 1861-12-27

there they were gold. Down to the cellar, with
er We all tend when wintry winds begin to blow
the, sent in baskets, and barrels and bins.
The sparows held council one day, went up
in cloud and rode away on the bllowy air; the
leaes grew pale and yellow, and rusty and brown,
and whrled in eddies over the withered grass
Song had fed with summer, and the foliage had
gope with the fruit Shiverng in the November
wind, stood the dismanted Orchard and waited ;
waited as zoe shall wait, in silence, yet in hope.
| The SHOWS have drfed round the Russets
ictles are pendant from the Gi,lifower but the
winters fire is glowing and cracking, and roaring
steAf up the broad chimney John has just
blu ed up the cellar stairs with huge bowl of
app fIad set it upon the hearth; a pitcher Of
I'd N1esing them company. They have been
IT,. .5ncei they are comfortable; so are we all.
1t y large circle we made then, for we were
all taere,
'Father, Mother,
! Sister, Brother,
/ All who held each other DEAR"
and the bowl and its comrade pass from hand to
hand. We were all talking of the summers that
had gone, of the springs that were to come, but
strange to say not one of us said word OF
the winter that was passing. Winter There
l0aS no winter there and then. 1t was all sum-
mer within doors and within hearts; bnt alas for
it, winter crept in there at last, within the charm
ed circle of the hearth light; and it crept up to
fathers brow and frosted it and mothers hair
that used to be so dark since we can remember
and silvered it; and drifed over a new grave in
the orchard, and we grew few and silent and
thoughtful, and passed one after another over the
old Threshold, and hardly ever returned. The
fewer we become the more let us love one an
otherl
That grave in the orchard All the fruit that
fell out of our hands and out of our hearts, and in
the midst of the rain, and lies there in the little
grave under the trees After Jennie died, It was
very lonely for while, and we used to hear the
mourning doves in the edge of the woods and we
thought it was Jennie signing for shelter again,
and we carried the things she loved best and laid
them very near where she lay; and we lived in
hope she would return with the blossoms; and
the blossoms came, and drifted white around the
head, and the birds sang sweety in the trees, and
the voices of the children were heard in the
orchard, but nothing could lure her; she never
came back again. Much thereat did we wonder
and grieve, for we had not heard then that what
they give to little children, who wander away
fba Of hat a
iittle tjar, makes it SO like home to them that
they never feel like leaving it more, but all tears
wiped away from their eyes, they sit down in
the orchards of God, whers leaves never wither,
and graves are never made.
Every one of us, you remember, had tree OF
his own then, that bore our name that were
planted when we were born. There in the cor
ner is Jennie's tree Jennie's tree? 1t is owner
less and wthered and dead Bless the old or
chard and its memories; the gray haired that
planted and grated it, and so went about marry
ing one to another, whose nuptals the Springs
halowed and blessed. Bless the children that
played in IFS shade, and keep them all as young
as they were then, till they are weary and sleep.
Bless the days that are gone, and the hope that
was in them.
We would not see the old orchard if we could.
The trees-the most of them-are withered and
gone; the grave has subsidized and the plOw has
passed over the spot; the paths we walked in are
effaced the friends we loved have fallen with the
blossoms; the railroad train rushes where the
ro,v Of Rnseefe once stood and the birds have
gone abroad to sing. But there in the midst Of
the heart, the old orchard shall eternally bloom,
and the Springs that are to come, shall reach even
the Zion of the Soul.