the love of Jesus dwelleth.
Gently in a bed they laid her,
Chafed her stiffening limbs and temples,
Pour'd the warm, life-giving cordial,
But what seem'd the most to cheer her,
Were some words by Bertha spoken
In her own, dear native language.
Voice of Fatherland! it quicken'd
All the heart's collapsing heart-strings,
As though bath'd, and renovated
In the Rhine's blue, rushing waters.
* * * * *
O'er the wildering waste of ocean,
Moved by zeal of emigration
She had ventured with her husband
To this western World of promise,
Rainbow-vested El-Dorado.
On that dreary waste of waters
He had died, and left her mourning,
All unguided, unbefriended.
--There the mother-sorrow found her
And compell'd her by the weeping
Of the new-born, to encounter
With a broken-hearted welcome
Life once more, which in the torrent
of her utter desolation
She had cast aside, contemning
As a burden past endurance.
--Outcast in this land of strangers,
Strange of speech, and strange in manner,
She had travel'd, worn and weary,
Here and there, with none to aid her,
Ask'd for work, and none employ'd her,
Ask'd for alms, and few reliev'd her,
Till at length, the wintry tempest
Smote her near that blessed roof-tree.
* * * * *
Heavy slumber weigh'd her downward,
Slumber from whence none awaketh.
Yet at morn they heard her sighing,
On her pillow faintly sighing,
"I am ready! I am ready!"
"Leonore! my child! my darling!"
Then they brought the infant to her,
Cleanly robed, and sweetly smiling,
And the parting soul turn'd backward,
And the clay-seal on the eyelids
Lifted up to gaze upon it.
Bertha kiss'd the little forehead,
Said "_mein kind_," and lo! a shudder
Of this earth's forgotten pleasure
Trembled o'er the dying woman,
And the white hand cold as marble
Strove to raise itself in blessing,
For the mother-joy was stronger
That one moment, while it wrestled
With the pausing king of terrors,
Stronger than the king of terrors.
Then they laid her icy fingers
Mid the infant's budding ringlets,
And the pang and grasp subsided
In a smile and whispering cadence,
"God, mein God, be praised!"--and silence
Settled on those lips forever.
* * * * *
Favor'd is the habitation
Where a gentle infant dwelleth,
When its brightening eye revealeth
The immortal part within it,
And its curious wonder scanneth
All its wide spread, tiny fingers,
And it
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