'His deeds yet live, the worst is yet to come.
Yet let your sleep for this one night be sound:
I do forgive him!'

'Thanks, my love,' she said,
'Your own will be the sweeter,' and they slept.

THE GRANDMOTHER.

THE GRANDMOTHER.
-------<>-------

I.
And Willy, my eldest-born, is gone, you say, little
Anne?
Ruddy and white, and strong on his legs, he looks
like a man.
And Willy's wife has written: she never was
over-wise,
Never the wife for Willy: he would n't take my advice.

II.
For, Annie, you see, her father was not the man to
save,
Had n't a head to manage, and drank himself into his
grave.
Pretty enough, very pretty! but I was against it for
one.
Eh!--but he would n't hear me--and Willy, you say,
is gone.

III.
Willy, my beauty, my eldest-born, the flower of the
flock;
Never a man could fling him: for Willy stood like a
rock.
'Here's a leg for a babe of a week!' says doctor; and
he would be bound,
There was not his like that year in twenty parishes
round.

IV.
Strong of his hands, and strong on his legs, but still of
his tongue!
I ought to have gone before him: I wonder he went
so young.
I cannot cry for him, Annie: I have not long to
stay;
Perhaps I shall see him the sooner, for he lived far
away.

V.
Why do you look at me, Annie? you think I am hard
and cold;
But all my children have gone before me, I am so
old:
I cannot weep for Willy, nor can I weep for the
rest;
Only at your age, Annie, I could have wept with the
best.

VI.
For I remember a quarrel I had with your father, my
dear,
All for a slanderous story, that cost me many a
tear.
I mean your grandfather, Annie: it cost me a world
of woe,
Seventy years ago, my darling, seventy years
ago.

VII.
For Jenny, my cousin, had come to the place, and I
knew right well
That Jenny had tript in her time: I knew, but I
would not tell.
And she to be coming and slandering me, the base
little liar!
But the tongue is