The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1896-03-06
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HE BALLAD OF Babe BELL,

IhoMAS BAlLE1 AIDRlCH.
Have you not heard the poets tell
How came the dainty Babie Bell
Into this world Of ours?
The gates of heaven were left ajar:
With folded hands and dreamy eyes,
Wandering out of Paradise,
She saw this planet, Ike star,
Hung in the glistening depths of even
Its bridges, running to and fro.
Ger which the white winged Angels go.
Bearing the holy Dead to heaven!
She touched bridge of tiowers-those feet,
So light they did not bend the bills
OF the celestial asphOdels!
They fell like dew upon the flowers,
Then all the air grew strangely sweet!
And thus came dainty Babie Bell
Into this world of ours.
She came and brought delicious May.
The swallows built beneath th..
Like sunlight in and out the :ves,
The robins went. the live-lOng day:
The lily swung its noseless bell,
And o'er the porch the trembling vhe
Seemed bursting with its veins of wine:
How sweetly, softly, twilight fell!
o, earth was full of singiDg-bird
And opening sprinp-tide flowers.
When the dainty Babie Bel
Came to this world of ours!
q Babie, dainty Babie B Ill,
How fair she grew from day to day!
What v oman-nature filled her eyes.
What poetry within them lay!
Those deep and tender twilight eyes,
So full of meaning, pure and bright
As if she yet stood in the light
OF those oped gates of Paradise!
And so we loved her more and more:
Ah never in our hearts before
Was love so lovely born:
We felt we had link between
This real world and that unseen
The land beyond the morn!
And for the love # those dear eyes,
For love of her whom God led forth,
iThe mothers being ceased on earth
When Babie came from Paradise)-
For love of Him who smote our lives,
And woke the chords OF joy and ,in,
We said, Dear Christ,-our hearts bent down
Ike violets after rain.
And now the orchards, which we're white
And red with blossoms when she came,
Were rich IN autumn's mellow prime:
The clustered apples burnt like flame,
The soft-cheeked peaches blushed and fell,
The ivory chestnut burst its shell,
The grapes hung purpling in the grange:
And time wrought just as rich a change
In little Babie Bell.
Her Ii. some form more perfect grew,
And in her features we could trace.
In softened curves. her mothers face.
Her angel-nature ripened too.
We thought her lovely " hen she came,
But she was holy, sanity now -.
Around hor pale, angelic brow
We saw slender ring of flame!
Gods hand had taken away the seal
That held the portals Of her speech;
Aud oft che said few strange words
Whose meaning lay beyond our reach.
She never was a child to us,
We never held her beings key:
We could not teach her holy thing:
She was Christ's self in purity.
1t came upon us by degree:
We saw its shadow ere it fell,
The knowledge that our God had sent
His messenger for Babie Bell.
We shuddered with unlanguaged pain,
And all our hopes were changed to fears,
And all our thoughts ran into tears
Like sunshine into rain.
We cried aloud in our belief
so, smite us gentlr, gently, God!
Teach US to bend and kiss the rod,
And perfect grow through grief"
All, how we loved her, God can tell;
Her heart was folded deep in ours.
Onr hearts are broken, Babe Bell
At last he came, the messenger,
The messenger from unseen lan1s:
And what did dainty Babie Bell:
She only crossed her little hands,
She only looked more meek and fai..
We parted back her silkeh hair:
We wOve the roses round her brow,
White buds, The summers drifted snow
Wrapped her from head to foot in fiower..
And thus went dainty B lbie Bell
Out of this world of ours!