The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1888-01-14
TEMPERANCE.
THE GREATEST SORROW.

Three aged danes in the rosy mist
OF the sunsets fading gold
Gazed where the amber and amethyst
OF the twilight lay unrolled.
"Theres never a sorrow on earth like mine"
Dame Margaret said, with a sigh;
My heart ever mourns for its lost spring time,
And the blue gone out Of its sky.
No happier mo ther in all the town
Than with my string of pearls:
Three heads were golden and three we're
brown
Three boys and three laughing girls
They filed the cottage with riotous glee;
But scourge swept DER the land
And none of my darlings were left to me-
Not one of my joyous band.
. breast that has thrilled with love divine
o crownless and desolate throne!
Was ever grief great as mine
sorrow so deep as my ownE
Your happy past holds memory sweet"
Dame Elizabeth sadly said
1.-THE echoing patter Of little feet
And the CLEAN of each golden head.
You know they are waiting in endless day
For the mamma they loved on earth.
Ali surely no sorrow should cloud her way
Who has given six angels birth.
Ny breast never thrilled with the fnger-ti
OF that rapturous love divine;
Thave no memory of sweet, moist lips:
Was ever sorrow like miner
No future to hope for, no past have /;
life without love, spent alone;
No dear one to sorrow when death draws
Was ever q grief like my own?''
"Remorse stands not in the door of your past"
Dame Rachel said, with frown,
" with it's letters of steel to bind you fast
Till you bow meath sorrows crown.
You can but feel that when all is confessed,
In that day when our sins are known,
The darlings who lay on your loving breast
VIII plead for you there at Gods throne.
And y0u-though you have none in Paradise,
'Ts u glad assurance to know
AS you sit in tn glow of these amber skies
You have none in the depths of woe.
We say God is loving and merciful;
We have faith; we believe; we trust;
But our hearts are stubborn-we may not
school
Them for that which we know is just.
81, too, was a mother, and my own hand
Placed curse on my motherhood.
laid on the brow of my boy brand
Which barred him from all that was good.
kindled the unholy fire in him
That burned with wild unrest,
And his sweet, warm lips drew the poison in
AS he lay upon my breast.
] taught him Our Father his rosy lips
Learned the long prayer-learned it well,
pointed to Heaven and gave him sips
OF the drink which has peopled hell!
With wine on our table, and brandy sauce
For the buildings, and in the pies
All! little dreamed l that sins surest cause
Could Turk meath such innocent guise.
" Iloved my boy, though my own hand hurled
Him down to the depths of sin;
You can not know how my hearts wide world
Was conferred and bounded by him.
That fatal lesson, so surely learned
Ere he knew deceit or doubt
The fire had kndled burned and burned,
Till it burned the angel out.
Then the tend he had swallowed ragged with
in
For bind him. confne him, who cam
Till the hands of my boy were stained with
sin
And the blood of his fellow man.
The forfeit of sin like his is-death!
Be still, oh, my aching heart!
], who had witnessed his first sweet breath,
Saw that struggling breath depart.
See! the stars still CLEAN, and the sky is
blue,
The sun never forgets to shine;
And the world has sorrowng hearts, tits true;
But who has a sorrow like m ne?''
Rose Hdrt10ick Thorpe. in DemoreStS Monthly.