Year: 1868

Maud Muller, on summers day,
Raked the meadow sweet with hay
Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Ofsimple beauty and rustic health.
Singing, she wrought and her merry glee
The mock bird echoed from his tree.
But when she glanced to the far OF town,
Which from its hill-slope looked down,
The sweet song died, and vague unrest,
And nameess longing filled her breast
A wish, that she hardly dared to own,
For something better than she had known.


The Judge rode slowly down the lane,
Smoothing his horses chestnut name.
He drew his bride in the shade
ofthe apple-trees, to greet the maid,
And ask draught from the spring that flowed
Through the meadow across the road.
The stopped where the cold spring bubbled up,
And flled for him her small tin cup,
And blushed as she gave 1t, looking down,
On her feet so bare. and her tattered gown.
"Thanksr' said the Judge. "a sweeter draught
From fairer hand was never quaffed."
He spoke OF the grass and flowers and tree
or the singing birds and humming bees;
Then talked OF the haying, and wondered


whether


The cloud In the west would bring foul weather
And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown,
And her graceful ankles bare and brown;
And listened while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long FLASHED hazel eyes,
Atlast like one who for delay
Seeks a vain excuse he rode away.


Maud Muller looked and sighed. "Ah me!
That the Judges bride might be!
He would dress me up in silks so fine
And praise and toast me ut his wine
Ny father should wear a broadcoth coat;
My brother should sail painted boat
I'd dress my mother so grand and gay;
And the baby should have n new toy each day
And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor.
And all should bless me who left our door"


The Judge looked back ns he climbed the hill
And saw Maud Muller standing still;
"A form more fair, a face more sweet.
Ne'er hath been my lot to meet;
And her modest answer and graceful air
Show her wise and good as she is fair.
Would she were mine, and I, to-day,
Like her a harvester of hay:


No doubtful balances of rights or wrongs,
Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,
But low of cattle and song ofbirds,
And health and quiet and loving words
But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold,
And his mother, vain other rank and gold,
so closing his heart, the Judge rode on,
And Maud was left i'm the field alone.
But the lawyers smiled in that afternoon,
when he hummed in court an old love tune
And the young girl unused beside the well,
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.


He welded wife of richest dover,
Who lived for fashion, as he for power,
Yet in his marble hearth's bright glow,
lie watched a picture come and go;
And sweet Maud Mulcr's hazel eyes
Looked out in their innocent surprise
or when the wine in his glass was red,
He longed for the way y-slde well, instead;
And closed his eyes on his garnishcd rooms,
Todream OF meadows and clover-blooms,
And the proud man sighed. with secret pain {;
''Ah that were free again!


Free as when rode that day,


Where the barefoot maiden ralIed her hay


She married Il man unearned anu poor,
And many children played round her door:
But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain,
Left teheir traces on heart and brain.
And oft, when the summer sun shone hot
on the new mown hay in the meadow lot,
And She heard the little spring brook fall
Over the roadside through the wall,
In the shade of the apple-tree again
She saw rider draw his rein;


And, gazing down with timid grace,
She felt his pleased eyes read her face.
Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Stretched away into stately halls
The weary wheel to a spinnet turned,
The tallow candle an astral burned.
And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
Dozing and grumbling DER pipe and mug,
A manly form at her side she saw,


And joy was duty, and love was law.
Then she took up her burden of life again
Saying only, "It might have been"


Alas for maiden alas for Judge!


For rich repiner and household drudge!
God pity them both and pity us all.
Whe vainly the dreams of youth recall.
For OF all sad words Of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these ut might have BEEN"
All, we'll for us all some sweet hope lies
Deeply buried from human eyes;


And in hehereafter, angels may


Roll the stone from its grave away!