WITH THE TIDE.

YESTREEN, the hour before he died,

He groan'd, and said: "Dear lass, Go see if the tide be like to turn And my poor soul to "Ass." And I went. But I swore to God as I went, That I would not let him pass.

I went down to the twilight shore, I watch'd the full tide swell, And I set my heart, as it rose and rose, To hold him, 'gainst it fell. My heart was as deep as Heaven with love, And as hot with pain as Hell.

And, being at last in a lone place, With nought save Him beside, "0 God! God! What's come to Your heart To let such ill betide P

Oh, how do You dare to make us so, And hurt us so?" I cried.

"If it was but the lads, to drown one by one, again: Or our little lassie You made be born For just that week o' pain : —Nay, wring my life out, drop by drop,"

I said, " and I'll not com- plain—

"But him, that I've seen to all these years, An' him that's loved me so— God ! there is that atwixt us twain Even You can scarcely know ! Oh, he's mine !" I cried, "and I'll keep him mine !

And I will not let him go!"

. . . . The still sea and sky stood there

Against me, like a wall.

The nncolour'd sea and sky they hung Like a straight, seamless pall. The faint wan waves, like breaths they rose, Like dying breathe did fall.

But, quick an' strong above them, I Heard my own heart-throbs sound,

My thoughts, 'mid that dead hush, I felt

Beating round an' round.

0 I felt I was the one live thing Left, in a world aswound.

Ay, 'twiat the sleeping air and sky,

An' the tide that seem'd asleep, I mind how I stood, all stir and strain My man's life for to keep— Till, sudden, It fell! Sudden, on me Fell the grey quiet deep.

It was not peace, it was not pain, Not hope and not despair.... . . . . It was myself drawn out of me,

And I set empty there. . . .

I heard slow words from my own mouth Dropping, like a prayer.

(The sea an' sky stood firm, the waves Kept up their plashing sound, I seemed to wake to the life of things,

Now mine was fall'n aswound. A speck, on a speck of the earth I stood— An' the whole World lay all round.) And I said : " What must be, will be, Whether I will or no. . . ." "There's That in the world must take its way

Across our weal and woe. . . . There's more to the World than you an' me . . .

An' "David! David! . . . . Go I" . . . .

. . . . Nest, a sea-snail crawl'd on the sand,

Tho hard sand shining- brown,-

Years back, each ebb has drain'd it, years To come, each flood will drown:

"There's a need," I said, " and a want—that's why. . . ." An' I watch'd the tide go down. . . .

. . . . Calm I went in, calm I took His dead face to my breast. The vacant night, the vacant day, Have pass'd me undistress'd, I've had to agree with the Will of God,

My heart's broke, but at rest.

B. B. BaVGHAN.