POETRY.
THE WATCHERS.
PATIENT, with weary faces, Behind the dimity shade, Making delicate laces
They sit, no longer afraid.
They are so tired of waiting Behind the window-glass; Tired of parson's prating And the smile of parson's lass.
When they were young and glowing And plied their bobbins and laughed, They sat in the windows sewing, Where they could see the shaft; Then death roared in the darkness And ravened after his prize, And there came on them strength and starkness And fear in their ageing eyes.
Toll of their sons and brothers The mine took, year by year, And they were afraid for the others,—.
They are so tired of fear.
All day at perilous labour
Toiled their sons and their men, Until death fell like a sabre—
There was no more waiting then.
They knew it was surely coming, It hung by a hair or a thread : A crash and a stir and a humming, And then the roll of the dead.
Still while the twilight lingers They sit in the window-place, Plying with crooked old fingers
The bobbins, weaving their lace.
Women the mines unmated, With faces wrinkled and set ; All their lives they have waited, As they are waiting yet.
ETHEL TALBOT SCHEFFAUER.
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