Inadequate
 FRIEND of my heart when you’re away
I fashion for my tongue,
A thousand things to say to you
But dear heart when you come,
How needless is my well formed phrase,
And my care chosen words,
Take swift and sudden flight away,
Like small wind-riven birds.
And with you here, my full glad heart
Can only say, you’ve come.
For all your touching, pleading ways
But serve to make me dumb.
Old Masonry
 LONG, long ago in our old street
Back from the busy road,
An old deserted stone house stood
Breaking beneath its load.
Such ruin that remained of peaks
Stood out against the skies.
And the memory of old things
Looked from behind its eyes.
In summer time this dead old house
Set in its flowery space.
One likened to a stranger
In a much too friendly place.
In winter time its creaking frame
With all its falling beams,
Was like a sea rocked sailor
Grown weary of his dreams.
It leaned a little westward.
And now I think it knew,
And was waiting other voices
It long had listened to.{3}
Once I was part of this old ruin
When I myself were young.
Out of pity I must leave you
And half the song unsung.
 
Hymn of Adoration
 I AM grown weary for new scenes
But not of human make.
But O! for hills and long green fields,
A splintered, glittering lake.
This day I am an intimate
With sky and bird and tree.
With budding boughs and turbulent streams
And God’s immensity.
I am enamored with fresh days
Drenched with rain and sun.
The tho’t of thine omnipotence
O! God has made me dumb.
Thy goodness is so wide, a thing
Beat, for me slower time.
I cannot sing so great a song
In one short life like mine.
Sweet Distress
 I HAVE known the beauty
Of a firegold west.
And from the hurt in rainsong
I shall never rest.
I heard the water running
From a green hill’s crest,
But what is sweet in sorrow
Hearts remember best.
 
The Chastening
 I SEE thee now thine innocence
Writ on thy soul’s clear skies.
Thy laughter loving mouth
Thy love provoking eyes.
I mark thy soft girl fairness
Thy strong young body’s grace,
The woman soul that I have nursed
Dawning behind thy face.
I note with fear thy heedless
And unchided turbulence.
Unfaltering faith in life and love
Thine air of confidence.
And then I see as seers might see
Even as one’s own God.
Thy straight, slim youthfulness
Bend to the chastening rod.
I writhe to think I may not bear
The blows, for thine own sake
I can not, tho’ ’tis mine to know
How one small heart can ache.{7}
In the winds of thy fierce breaking
God grant I never see
Thy flashing spirit sullen,
Or thy lips in mutiny.
But rather child, I’d have thee know
Even as I the rod,
As a tuning fork to bring thy song
Back to the harp of God.
The Four Winds of Heaven
 WHEN I hear the north wind
It never fails to bring,
Reminders of for-get-me-nots
And sunny days in spring.
And O! the east wind carries
Upon its scented sail,
The tho’t of pink arbutus
In some secluded vale.
And how I’d like to gather
When winds are in the west,
A brace of orange blossoms
To hold against my breast.
But O! I love the south wind
That breathes across the loam,
For O! the tender south wind
Just whispers dear “come home!”
 
Friend
 LAST night when I was watching shadows lengthen
From twilight into deeper, darker lines,
The lazy river caught my little boat dear,
And swept it in among the clinging vines.
And somehow in the mirror of the current
I saw your kindly face look back at me.
Then I reached my eager hands toward you
As one would do to friends across the sea.
Friend O! mine, don’t think that I’ve forgotten,
Tho’ parted now by many a weary mile.
In every little pool I see reflected,
Your eyes forever tender with a smile
And someday when GOD calls me from my dreaming
And draws me from life’s loneliness apart,
I’ll carry all these things that I remember—
About you, up to heaven in my heart.
Humility
 I HAVE come a long way
Over sea and sod.
I found nothing small as me,
Nothing great as GOD.
God has in his keeping
Eternities of time.
He hears worlds of trouble
But, gives ear to mine.
He sways stars and planets,
“Keeps the keys of death.”
But in his loving kindness
Paused to give me breath.
I have seen a mountain
Sweet flowers, a bird, a tree.
God has lovely children
Dare he look on me?
 
Shadows
 I SAT with dreams and mated them with shadows
Where sunlight flecked the grass and trickled thru
Each swaying twig and branch of spruce and elder
Adoringly, they somehow spoke of you.
I sat tense-eyed, my longing vision sensing,
An unseen, art-wise hand begin to trace.
With all love’s magic trickery displaying
To me; your hair, your pallid waiting face.
In all these voiceless years of night and grieving
Above thy grave I grasp this gleam of grace.
Perhaps sometime, where is no pain or parting
I’ll smile again into your waiting face.
 
Two Roads
 THERE are two roads near Joppa town
And here I doubting stood,
For one went winding round the hill
The other thru the wood.
And if I took the winding road
’Twould lead me thru the mall,
Of noise and gossipers for which
I have no heart at all.
Sweet briar nodded from the hill,
The blue bells from the shade.
A purple finch decided me,
So in the wood I stayed.
A brooding bird and restless young,
Began to chide and fret.
And wonder in bird fashion what
I ever came to get.
A green snake ran across my path
Its eyes were jewel small.
A flying squirrel left a tree,
That seemed ten paces tall.{13}
I picked a fern that had uncurled
Itself from out the ground.
And O! the wood delighted me,
The way it stood around.
And there were holy moments when
My very soul went still.
And sad I was for folks who took
The road around the hill.
And when I left the sancted place,
My arms were loaded down.
It cost me not one pang to shun,
The road to Joppa town.
The Reason
 WHEN I was but a little girl
Mere flotsam on life’s sea,
Because of youth a lovely rose
Meant, just a rose to me.
Before I knew that love was life,
And life were all of love.
The sky was only atmosphere
And God frowned up above.
But now I am a woman grown
And know love tenderly,
I can not tell you dear how much
God’s roses mean to me.
 
When June Comes
 WHEN June comes back again I’ll sit
Away back from the road and dip
My face and arms in clover blooms,
And drink my fill of their perfumes,
And steep myself in one great gleam
Of sunlight, and I’ll dream,
And dream,
And dream.
I’ll lean back in the grass and sigh
And look love at the blue, blue sky.
Until my senses reel and reel,
Like elm tree branches and a feel—
Of drowsiness oozes between,
My eyelids, while I dream,
And dream,
And dream.
A lethargy binds tongue and lips,
And creeps down to my fingertips.
Troubles, cares and everything,
Float out past my remembering.
And all the world is one great beam
Of gladness, while I dream,
And dream,
And dream.
 
Through Loving Eyes
 LIKE a careless child in the drifts it stood
Against the darkness of the wood,
Even the path was not cut through
Up to the door it led you to.
Beauty untarnished, but never a sound
Save for the whispering trees around.
Its shining eyes on the cold world shone
Warm and bright from its snowy comb.
Cheer was the word the blue fume wrote
As it cleared itself from the chimney’s throat.
The drifts that lay on the tent like sheds
Were like the covers of untouched beds.
A great white garment of snow and frost
Was laid on the fence, but the hedge was lost.
A-while away the home garden park
Divides itself from the woods soft dark.
Dear God I said, you had meant to please
When giving man such gifts as these.
 
Worship
 I DID not always know ’twas kind
Of thee to let me pass,
And with my sacrilegious feet
Walk lightly thru thy grass.
How could I know, when I was young
’Twas one of thine own dreams,
To tender me the license of
Thy hills and singing streams.
How could’st thou take even a part
Of thy remotest time,
And weld me, poor unworthly link,
Into this chain of thine.
One day I learned at cost of pain
Among the shadows dim,
Thy gift of violets, Oh! God
Their fragrance cutting in.
I set apart one hallowed day
Forever dear to me.
Because thou taughtest me to love
A flowering apple tree.{19}
And since I’ve older grown and drawn
To solitudes apart,
I find I cannot tell the Lord
All that is in my heart.
Evermore
 Then I go on from here I’ll take
The ever pleasant memory of a lake.
I’ll tightly lock within my spirit breast
The picture of a grim old mountain’s crest.
A little stream’s song running ever clear
And all the lonely places I hold dear.
A mocking bird, a drenched and dripping tree.
O! I shall keep my hunger for the sea.
I shall keep my knowledge of the paths I know
The gates of many mornings and the glow,
Of sunset, on a firegold window pane,
The mist on young nasturtiums after rain.
Virginia creeper on some quaint old garden wall
The sound of dropping nuts, I’ll take them all.
The falling leaves, the closing of the year,
I’ll not forget, tho’ I go on from here.
These tho’ts I shall retain (e’en past the gates of death),
Of burnished autumn leaves, a tiny baby’s breath.{21}
In my heart I’ll take the Heaven’s most untried height
A moon drowned flower, from some star riven night.
I shall remember thru great ages of GOD’S time
The wind in clover, rain in summer time.
Think you I could forget, thru death’s wild fret and pain
The look of slim young birches in the rain?
A City Guest
 THE wonder never went out of her eyes
When she saw the sweep of our wide blue skies,
The things we farmers forget in the pain
Of sowing and planting and reaping again.
Things taken for granted loose the touch
Of newness and dazzle we love so much.
While she, soft-eyed and with shining face,
Found pleasure in all things about the place.
She gathered the flowers in wind and rain
That we called common and tho’t real plain.
From the sweep of our lawn to the poppy bed
Flaunting their colors about her head.
Till we ourselves looked with glad new eyes
On an old, old setting, but a new sunrise.
Cold grey days she would rise and sing
For she found beauty in everything.
Will she ever know in the city street
How we think of her when the snow and sleet,
Make houses enjoyable things to own,
How often we mention her name at home?{23}
Can she ever know with her warm flower heart,
How she gave us back what we lost in part.
How the thought of her when it’s cold with rain,
Fills the house and the halls, with herself again.
 
Reminders
 THE sun, the wind, and rain
The trees, the flowers and skies,
A grosbeak’s note
From its flaming throat
And my bosom is tossed with sighs.
Eyebeams and locks of hair
The curve of a white cheek near,
Each day of the week
Filled full of the sweet
Reminders of you, my dear.
The crowd and the city street,
A hill that is bleak and bare.
A fleecy cloud
Floating high and proud
And I think of my darling’s hair.
A voice that is strangely like
Your own that I turn to see;
A silvery laugh,
Convincing me half
My dreams have been fooling me.
 

Soul
 BECAUSE,
There never was a voice on earth
Could soothe its harrowings,
That’s why these souls God gave to us
Are always lonely things.
Because,
Life is so short, and death so sure,
And worlds uncertain things,
And time so fleet and heaven so high
Souls have such restless wings.
Because,
’Twas fashioned in the heavenly realm
Of God’s creative schemes,
That’s why a soul goes hungrily
From dream to shining dream.
 
Farewell
 WHEN you are twining wreaths of rose and columbine
To soften outlines of a tomb too new,
Remember, spring makes little tents all green and cool
For soldier boys this old world never knew.
When spring comes tripping down the lane once more
And children bring you violets of blue,
When your tender heart is strained, beyond the breaking
Let this be my farewell, dear heart, to you.
When spring comes romping, singing, back again,
Dressed in her garments fragrant, fresh and new;
When once more robins sing among the budding trees
All honey sweet, with apple blooms and dew.{27}
When you have searched the woods as once you did
For specimens of moss and long, dank fern,
Remember, that I too have loved the flowers
But, look no more, no more for my return.
Rainbow Ribbons
 BRING me rainbow ribbons
And a band of blue,
Bring me threads of silver
From the moonbeams’ hue.
Bring a pure cloud fleecy,
Snatch a sunbeam bright,
Tints from twilight evenings,
Matchless and just right,
To mate with all her beauty.
These amassed will make the dreams
Tender, pure and holy
Of a girl just turned thirteen.
Bring me rainbow ribbons
From the sunset too
Then a white tho’t from the angels
Who are holding hands with you.
Bring the rosebud’s fragrance
And the apple blossom’s bloom
The hushed voice from the morning
Then leave a little room,{29}
For a thousand transient colors
From a God’s infinite dream
And you’ll have the soul and fancies
Of a girl just turned thirteen.
 
My Neighbor’s Roses
 MY neighbor’s roses always grow
In such a tantalizing row,
Of fragrance and perfume,
A riotous mass of twilight bloom.
And I am tempted oftentimes
When walking where the stray ones climb,
To reach my willing hands out so
And clasp each crimson, flaming glow.
A breeze steals softly thru the day
And brushes them too far away.
Christ! make me kind enough to give
Of roses while my friends yet live.
And if they reach their eager hands,
To where my flowers with clinging bands,
Are nodding, tempting, from the row.
Oh! Christ I pray let breezes blow
A thousand fragrant, tender charms
Into my neighbor’s outstretched arms.
Then keep my burning heart and tho’t,
Tender enough to stay them not.
 
The Long Twilight
 WHEN “Pop” is bald, and my hair is white,
And the stage is set, for a long twilight;
When we are alone in our little den
He with his pipe and I with my pen,
’Twill not be regrets that make us sigh
For we will have things that the world can’t buy.
For we have snatched from the mirth mad throng
A little of love and a deathless song.
A few glad dreams and our tho’ts all white,
The silence of God, in the long twilight.
When “Pop” is bald and my hair is white,
And we’re nearing the end of the long twilight,
’Twill not seem cold in the darksome wood
For we have been friends with solitude.
And often yearned in the shadows cold
For the friendly smiles the gods withold.
Hearts all the braver for the feel of pain,
For a rose grows sweeter every time it rains.{32}
A few glad notes from a comrade’s song
We’ll sing in the night as we go along.
For we carry the blossoms a frost ne’er blights
And we’ll have no morning till we’ve said goodnight.
 
A Lone Walk
 WHEN I had left the city street
And lost the open road,
I breathed contentedly and deep
As one who shifts a load.
I wasn’t caring where I went
Or where I meant to go.
But I was tossing from my path
The brown leaves drifted so.
When I was wondering aimlessly
Just what my quest would bring.
I saw a pink arbutus bloom
And heard a warbler sing.
The sky seemed blue and higher here
Than it was back in town.
And Oh! the wind delighted me,
The way it blew around.
And then I sought the grey glen road.
Went with it thru the wood.
And in its long green isles I walked
And worshipfully stood.{34}
My neighbor questioned from the fence
What I had seen out there?
I said I sought adventure
And I found it everywhere.
A Death Blow
 HE said goodbye, you hobbled out,
The Doctor shut the door.
From your face I knew he’d told you
Things we had guessed before.
I saw you slightly tremble
But I reached you ere you fell.
Your fixèd face said many things
More than you cared to tell.
One does not receive death warrants
As one would a courtesy.
After awhile your head went up
And you talked it all out with me.
Brave little woman I knew you
Knew you were never afraid.
Not for yourself, You forbid me—
To speak and my questions you staid.
All I could give was silence.
Your pride forbade me much.
Tho’ I longed to bear your burden
Even to be your crutch.
 
The Breath of Life
 I’D like to lift the threads of life
And weave them on a loom
And make a pattern beautiful,
As any day in June.
I’d put ten thousand violets
And shimmering leaves of green,
Around the edge and over it,
To hide each vulgar seam.
Because, death brushed me with dark wings,
Reluctant passed me by,
I take the threads of life again
And weave and smile and sigh.
But if I had a God-like power
Omnipotence of mind,
To put the tho’t of suffering
And death a league behind.
Life would be violets to me
Much sweeter than a dream.
The pattern on my loom would show
No raw and ghastly seam.{37}
But then methinks it is because
Of what the looms disclose.
The breath of life is sweeter
Than the fragrance of a rose.
A Day in Spring
 GO slow, O! day immaculate;
Much slower than the rest.
Master of time, mark every hour
As tho’ thou were not pressed,—
Or hurried. But more leisurely
And gently let them chime.
Oh! morn, take off thy wings of speed
And let this day be mine.
O! day, immaculate and kind,
Make no rude haste or speed.
But loiter in less trodden paths
Walk lightly o’er the mead.
Spring and I are holding hands
On a green hill’s dazzling crest.
Make this day, God, go very slow
More slowly than the rest.
 
Autumn
 ISEE you now, your autumn gown
In wanton fashion hung,
Your crimson scarf half rakishly,
To trifling breezes flung.
I was distressed and sad to think
You did not even care.
But once your harp sang low and sweet
You breathed a solemn prayer.
You sang soft broken numbers
Sad as your soul’s distress,
And I loved you no matter how wanton
Or scarlet or scanty your dress.
 
Little Girl
 FROM out the calendar of time
Grant me one glorious day.
And let me follow singing streams,
So cool with tossing spray.
And riot in their pebbled beds
Where willows bend and swirl
Their giddy heads, as once they did
When I was, “little girl.”
And let me feel again the clutch
One gets down in the throat
From long admiring, silent things
Faint sounds and clouds afloat.
Let afternoon slip languidly,
Tree branches bend and twirl
Adoringly: as once they did
When I was “little girl.”
Give me one riotous unbound day
To climb a dizzy hill.
Waist deep in laurel, where wood birds
Gyrate and mock and trill.{41}
Where even timid walkers’ steps
Unloose great rocks that hurl,
Delightedly, to depths I feared
When I was “little girl.”
Grant me one free unbounded day
Wherein I may explore,
The land where dream folks’ houses shed
Moon dazzle from the door.
Oh! riotous day detain my steps
Clasp me from this mist whirl
And let me live the dreams I dreamed
When I was “little girl.”
My Old House and the Weather
 IGROW so very weary
Of the city’s crowded street
The babbling of voices
The restlessness of feet.
I often wish my friends would talk
Less dexterous and less clever,
And let me say a word about
My old house and the weather.
I long to stop those restless feet
And if I only could,
I’d still their babbling tongues awhile
With back-home quietude.
I long to let them know about
Birches that stand together,
And the hand that threw the blooms around
My old house and the weather.
But as it is I only take
Mere twigs of it to town,
The lilacs when they’re on the bush
And roses tumbling round.{43}
But folks forget so hurriedly
And talk of fuss and feather,
I think they’d best come out and
My old house and the weather.
Bluestone River, W. Va.
 SOMETIME in my day dreaming
Thru’ my half-lidded eyes,
I’m seeing old Virginia
And Old Virginia skies.
The narrow, crooked roadway,
The path by which we came,
And then I see the river,
Bluestone river, in the rain.
Then there’s the drooping willows
Swaying, swirling, side by side.
And the hollyhocks keep nodding
To each other in the tide.
And the mists we love o’ mornings
Puts our dropping tears to shame.
When we see it clear the river,
Bluestone river, in the rain.
And there’s the little homestead
Just across the running stream,
It beckons from the mountain
Like a kind hand in a dream.{45}
A soft, mellow light is breaking
From each golden window pane,
And it shines down on the river,
Bluestone river, in the rain.
Sea Hunger
 I’VE languished under many moons
And loved them all. Ah me!
But now my heart is filled too full
Of hunger for the sea.
When thinking of the white gulls
That ride the creamy foam,
I almost hear the brave winds
O’er singing seas at home.
And when I think of white mists
That rise from shore to shore,
In utter weariness I weep
But cannot see them more.
And some day when I leave my dreams
These tides in which I’ve striven,
I’ll lock their memories in my breast
And carry them to heaven.
Tree Sounds
 THE forest closed and folded
About me like a tent.
The tree tops swayed and toppled
Rain riven and wind-rent.
The old harp in the pine trees
Struck cords minor and deep.
So in the storm tossed forest
I was rocked to sleep.
That was long ago, O’ ages,
Yet thru these rushing years,
The sounds of a wind rent forest
Is ever in my ears.
 
A Wish
 THEY called me girl, gave me the name
Of one I’ll never see.
I wish they’d given me instead
The name of some nice tree.
A tree that rocks with every wind,
Fast rooted in the ground,
Straining its eager branches up
To where God’s looking down.
A neighbor to the grass and flowers.
A friend to all the skies,
A lovely tree that dares to romp
With every bird that flies.
A spruce, an elm, a tamarack;
Dear heaven, how can there be
A lovelier name, and how I wish
They’d given one to me.
 
Middle Creek, W. Va.
 IHAVE a longing for a hill
A passion for small streams.
And there’s a creek that winds itself
Among my muted dreams.
A tumbling stream, you know the kind,
With water running clear,
Where birds might bathe between its songs
And pilgrims hover near.
It twines itself, love-fashion, round
A flowering tree, then worms—
And oozes in between the roots,
Of sycamores and ferns.
Petals float down and mingle with
Ribbons of grass while I
Am conscious that I am dreaming,
And writing while I sigh.
Endie
 I LIKE to visit Endie’s house
She’s like a dream herself,
She has the books I know and love
Upon her reading shelf.
And when I go to her we talk
About the clouds and wind,
And if I drop from clouds to clods
Why; Endie doesn’t mind.
I like the streams, the singing ones,
But Endie likes a fall;
And if I disagee with her
She doesn’t mind at all.
Endie has a thousand things
To plant in one small space;
When I find it can’t be done
Regret is in her face.
She often says O! dare we plant,
Narcissus in a row?
But she agrees and I agree
Where hollyhocks should grow.
I only need to mention tea
And Endie’s soft eyes shine.{51}
And then she talks; her language flows
More eloquent than mine.
Once ambition burned my breast
Endie, too, was fired.
But here is where I stop to rest
For Endie’s getting tired.
 
In Our Old Street
 WE children played in a queer old street
That persistently seemed to hide,
Itself and us in a kindly way
From the great wide world outside.
And how we loved in our childishness
God’s work on the sea and land.
But death was secretive, dark and deep,
And never showed us his hand.
With awe we gazed on his work, sad work
And the flutter of ribbons white,
Made us all catch hands, hold our breath and sob
In our restless dreams at night.
When a baby came to our queer old street
So downy and vague and new,
We tiptoed out of the soft, dark room,
And the mystery grew and grew.
But many things we have learned since then
For life has a strange sad way,{53}
We left the hills and the queer old street
Where we used to shout and play.
One of the things we have learned is this:
Tho’ death rides around rough shod,
Back of our births and our deaths and our loves
Is the all-kind heart of GOD.
Honey
 HIS eyes were wide and large and bright
As shining drops of dew,
In which two violets had drowned
Themselves and made them blue.
His lips were O! so soft to kiss
His smile was quaint and funny;
Couldn’t think of any name
To call him only Honey.
No one ever tho’t that I
Was his sister Sue.
For my eyes were just as black
As his eyes were blue.
And my hair was like a crow
His so golden sunny.
Father ridicules the name
But keeps on saying Honey.
 
Moon Dazzle
 LAST night, as tho’ with new washed eyes
I looked upon a lake.
Something within me sharply stirred
An understanding ache.
An ardent willow swayed and dipped
The cool depths of lagoon.
Unstirred miles of grass and dew
Lay lonely to the moon.
It seemed I’d never seen a night
Or such a scene before.
The moonbeams stretched a splintered path
From shore to shadowed shore.
I marveled thus, and wondered how
In unveiled hours to come,
Could such a pulseless thing like death
Make one so eager, dumb.
To Friends
 LAST night, when I was wearied to my soul,
I was slipping out to dreamland very fast.
When I tho’t about you, and the things you did,
The help you gave, for which I did not ask.
Your unselfishness and kind deeds true,
Kept coming up before me like a scroll.
I could not count the many things you did,
For me, when I was sick, in body and in soul.
My undeserving self grew very, very tired.
With all the counting of them, and I slept.
But, ’twas just to dream again of all these things,
And in my restless sleep, I wept, and wept, and wept.
 
To a Meadow Lark
 AND when I saw him stamping over
My little patch of shrubs and clover,
His steel bright gun held shoulder high
I scarce could check, a smothered cry.
Because I knew your nest was low
So shuddered when I saw him go.
A gunshot and I scarce could see
You had flown screaming to a tree.
O little bird with troubled breast,
A miracle has saved your nest.
I’m sorry you were frightened so,
You should not build your nest so low.
 
Broken Numbers
 AMYSTERY puzzled and vexed me,
Unsolvable, strange and deep.
Perplexed and worn out in spirit
It followed me into my sleep.
Then with eyes that were heavy with dreaming
I drifted from darkness to dawn.
For the raindrops scattered my shadows
With numbers of broken song.
I thought of the heavy mystery
That troubled me yesterday,
It seemed I never could solve it
Or drive it completely away.
And I thought of the thousands of moments
When each, to oneself stands alone,
Thrown back on oneself for the answer
The answer that never comes home.
As I pondered each sad broken number
The raindrops made on the pane,
The shine came to me, came in bundles,
For I heard the song in the rain.{59}
Shine is a guest we have often
Grief being seldom is great.
I have no quarrel with mystery
I have no quarrel with fate.
I’m Going Out
 I’M going out where breezes blowing round
Make trim kept acres look half country and half town.
Where March winds tossed and blew the leaves away
Into the fences corner yesterday.
Oaks that never dropt last summer’s leaves at all
Were coaxed at last today to leave them fall.
I’m going out to this street’s very end,
Where city atmosphere and country spaces blend,
And hear the whirring wings of lonely larks,
That circle like burnt embers o’er the park.
I’ll have my hair in torrents blowing wild
About my pallid features like some child,
That had its romping days of childish fun
Most strangled e’er they ever had begun.
I’d like to walk around a field that’s barr’d
From other pleasant places winter scarr’d.
Where drifts have filled the corners there I know
Is still a faint suggestion of late snow.{61}
So when your luncheon hour and mine comes round,
I will have gone beyond the edge of town.
 
Ingleside
 THE road that goes to Ingleside
Can’t be described at all,
’Tis sweet beyond the telling
And the trees are paces tall.
Spring o’ year at Ingleside
Is pungent sweet of breath.
And for its rainfilled, tumbling streams
I’m homesick unto death.
Confusing flowers fill the wood
Like nodding plumes of flame.
The like of which one’s never seen
And no one knows the name.
The hills that look on Ingleside
Are emerald to the brow.
And I would give a thousand dreams
If I could see them now.
 
Friendship
 ONCE on a time there was a road
Went winding by my door.
And fain I was to travel it
In search of golden store.
And O! how oft with heavy heart
The weary miles I trod,
And many a sorry tale I learned
Upon the open road.
Often times I was made glad
And oft my heart was sore.
For folk who traveled on the road
That winded by my door.
Adventure came, aye many a time,
And even now I sigh.
And sorry am to count the times
The false gods caught my eye.
But now I keep a little spot
Just off the busy road,
And there I patient, wise-eyed wait
Those of the heavy load.{64}
And kindly then I draw them in
While warm heart talks to heart.
And when night darkens I have found
We’re sorry for to part.
This happened too once on a time
When I was weak and sore.
I drew a jewel from the road
That winded by my door.
But then I very often find
Two roads so different meet,
And many a friend I’ve found and kept
For whom I did not seek.
 
This Year
 THIS year’s breezes gently toss
A fern uncurling from the moss;
Arbutus trailing lengths along;
Brown thrush thrilling with his song.
The grosbeak sings a song of cheer,
“Ain’t” things beautiful this year?
The dandelions are here again
Amongst the grass like golden rain.
A hawthorn raining petals white,
Whilst dripping with the dews of night.
A mocker’s notes, round, sweet and clear.
“Ain’t” things beautiful this year?
So thankful that old winter’s gone
Fond hearts beat a tender song.
The meadow lark in circles high,
Sings songs of faith against the sky.
While in my heart I greatly fear,
Things are too beautiful this year.
 
Spring Walkers
 ISN’T there just a hint in the air
That spring’s hiding out in the garden somewhere?
Remember the place where the violets grew?
Let’s all go and see if they’ve been stirring too.
That sounded like wings, O! look it’s a bird.
How did he know that the mosses had stirred.
Before we can really think it is spring
He’s here on his faith, and started to sing.
Someone’s been here, the leaves have been tossed
As if one were looking for things that were lost.
And ruthlessly left to the late April snow
The pale slender necks of the first buds below.
Let’s cover them up, it doesn’t seem fair
To leave them like this, see that birch over there?
We’ll remember the place and come back again,
When the sun is some warmer, and there’s been a rain.
Let’s walk thru the wood, and come back this way
I dislike to go home, I wish it were May.{67}
Here’s a place I adore, this tender dark wood.
It’s a source of delight, and if one only could
Just come here and visit awhile every day,
’Twould charm every heartache one has quite away.
This path has surprises at every bend.
This log has been here since I can’t tell you when.
We just walk around or climb over this way,
’Twould spoil the whole scene if they took it away.
This tree has been tired standing up long ago
’Twas March, the old roughneck, gave it the last blow.
It looks like a man-contrived arch o’er a drive,
The vines will cling round it and keep it alive.
I’m tired. Let’s go back, we’ve come a long way
I dislike to go home, I wish it were May.
Winter Woods
 WOULD you like to walk to Elm Court
Now that winter’s here?
Yes it is a little chilly,
But you’ll like it, never fear.
I’d like to see that little path,
The one you sketched, you know,
After last night’s storm it surely
Must be rimmed around with snow.
The grey grouse slept I’m certain
Beneath the patches white,
The hills protrude a dazzling crest
Into the dawn’s cold light.
If attempts were made to climb
Up to its softened blue,
Every time we stepped up one
We’d slip back more than two.
But now, we’ll just go thru this woods
And this deep snow, my dear,
Will make a worth while picture
For it’s beautiful this year.
Let us plow thru this deep snow drift
To that small half frozen stream,{69}
We’ll see nicer ferns I’ll wager
Than a summer’s ever seen.
Ferns in winter? yes there’s plenty.
Will you only just look here
How frost fashions from plain water
Things so beautiful and queer.
Wait awhile! here’s beauty,
This stream bank’s frozen dirt
Boasts an edge as sweet and dainty
As a lady’s underskirt.
In summer this is lovely
But old winter has its charms
When these tender little trees stand round
With ice clothes on their arms.
It’s very quiet, but lonely never,
You can push these twigs apart
And in the softened stillness
Almost feel and hear God’s heart.
And one may feel this darkness
Like soft velvet one unrolls,
Its very quiet is soothing,
To a city weary soul.
See these bushes! all the edges
Have a perfect picot hem,
Like women’s restless fingers
Had picked up now and then.{70}
We must find the pathway back
When the sun comes stealing thru,
Like old magic, all these wonders
Will be dripping from our view.
I prefer to keep this picture
Just as we have seen it here,
This lovely morning, to my fancy
Is too beautiful, I fear.
Brother O’ Mine
 DO you remember the cardinal’s call,
Brother O’ mine?
The hills that we climbed, be they ever so tall,
With never a fear for a hurt or a fall,
Wondering ever if skies did fall,
Brother O’ mine.
Many a hill we’ve climbed since then,
Brother O’ mine.
Been pelted with roses and rinsed with the rain
Of our sorrowing teardrops time and again;
Despair in our hearts and a clutch of pain,
Brother O’ mine.
And there were pebbles that hurt our feet
Brother O’ mine.
But the dust of the highway seemed velvet sweet
Tho’ many a cross and trials we’d meet,
With daisies and graves at our very feet,
Brother O’ mine.{72}
Father we had in the bygone days,
Brother O’ mine.
And mother to wipe all our tears away.
Tho’ sodden the sky, and shadows be grey
God will speak clear of the mist some day,
Brother O’ mine.
Dream
 THE flowers upon my lady’s hat,
Kept bobbing so this way then that,
Until the Church seemed faint and blurred
The morning Psalms I scarcely heard.
Unless I see I cannot hear,
So, I just admired that flower so near.
’Twas unlike any bloom that blows
On trees or waves in garden rows,
Where clings the morning glory vine
Or beds of phlox or columbine,
Like nothing in the drowsy south
With love songs oozing from its mouth,
In all the languorous, summer noons
Or riotous breaths of all perfumes,
Like nothing in my garden bed
Of flowers washed blue or drenched red;
Peculiarly designed it sat
And nodded on my lady’s hat.
I summoned all my powers to wit
But could not find a name for it.
I sought my couch with troubled breast,
I could not from my memory wrest{74}
The name of that tormenting bloom,
Till wearied tossing, then I swooned
Into forgetfulness and dreamed
Of lands beyond where sunlight streamed,
In gardens where an angel talked
In soft glad whispers as he walked.
And touched each blossoming bud and bell
With pride and love ineffable.
But one he loved beyond compare;
He stooped and kissed the petals rare.
With eagerness I did persist
To see the flower the angel kissed.
And there it grew a thing intact,
The flower upon my lady’s hat.
It stood a straight slim tossing flame
And I had yet to learn its name.
With this in mind I tried to talk,
But the angel only sped his walk.
I could have cried for very shame,
Then someone called me by my name.
The room was pink with morning light,
Because dreams vanish with the night;
And things are not what they seem,
I called the little flower “dream.”
 
Shine and Shower
 IT’S the cross that makes the triumph
A glorious thing to share,
It’s the sweet behind the bitter
Makes the burden light to bear.
It’s the shine past all the raining
Of the heart-break and the tear,
It’s the faith in dim tomorrow’s
Clears the mist from yesteryears.
So I’ll take my shine and shower
The bitter with the sweet,
And I’ll make a friend of sorrow
Every time we chance to meet.
Give me triumph with disaster
And my share of gain and loss
And I’ll not be asking angels
For a sweeter, gentler cross.
Lines to Death
 THE harp like strings of destiny
Stretched taut awhile, then broke,
So life gives o’er the battle
To death’s relentless stroke.
What’s wealth with all its glitter
When the sands of life are spent?
It cannot unfold the curtain
Of that solitary tent.
Fame is just a tempting bauble
That comes when least we call,
And fate stands thus dividing
Rain and roses ’mongst us all.
Life is just a few short summers,
Breath of roses and a prayer.
Then a little tent to sleep in
When we grow too tired to care.
The high, the low, the haughty,
The humble, too, meet here.
And share like common brothers
The sorrow and the tear.{77}
But life must have its raining
For the master wills it so;
And broken harps are mended,
After death has struck the blow.
 
To the New Year
 THIS morning when I saw you
Looking into my bedroom window,
I thought that I disliked you very much,
For all I could see
You very much resembled other days
Spotless and so wholesome,
With all your tinsel bright,
But, your beauty touched me not at all.
But I decided to put up with you
As one would with strange, unwelcome guests.
I turned you around and about many, many times,
As a child would a new toy.
You were a lovely sight,
And yet I felt a bit depressed,
Till of a sudden I thought
I saw you smile.
Or was it only fancy?
Then I gave you my profoundest thought
For a short while.
And way down in your remotest depths
Great possibilities looked out at me,{79}
And I thought of all the things you might do
For this restless world.
So I fell in love with you,
Before you were a half hour old.
Homesickness
 THE folks whom we visit, but once in a while
Those friends who are far, far away,
May be thoughtful and generous indeed to a fault
And kindness itself every day.
Not even the hills with the mist on the top
And the sun shooting flames ’cross the loam,
Can make me forget, nor still the wild fret
In my heart for the place I call home.
The valleys like Eden are misty and deep:
They are washed with the dews of the morn.
They but serve to depress me and make me a prey
To longings both sad and forlorn.
The lilt of the trees and the song of the birds
Once so cheery have sobered their tone,
For my heartstrings are tied, to a little fireside
In a place that I love to call home.
 
To Love
 THO’ I am slow of speech, it matters not,
For this I know you feel and understand.
Tho’ break I at your nearness, yet I draw apart,
With wonder at the touches of your hand.
Your eager eyes, so near my drooping lids
Appraise my flushes, and you understand
How fain I am to go, yet do draw near,
And tremble at the touches of your hands.
Tho’ death should come and seal my eyelids shut,
And tho’ I tremble at his cold commands,
I could be drawn away e’en from the tomb, methinks
If then, dear, you would touch me with your hands.
 
Your Friend
 THO’ you’re a heathen to the core
And cause him untold pain,
He knows everything about you
But loves you just the same.
You need not always seek him
For he’s often seeking you.
He has a welcome for the stranger
But a warmer heart for you.
He is rather scarce on talking
But at listening he is good.
You love to be around him
But respect his solicitude.
He is tactful of your failings,
Well acquainted with your whim;
And there’s nothing in this wide, wide world
You would not do for him.
Draw Closer to the Fire
 THE summer sweets have faded,
The hedge, the vine, and briar,
Come, put your hand in mine, my friend,
Draw closer to the fire.
From footstools let us view the heights
To which great minds aspire;
Here’s Riley, Keats and Emerson,
Draw closer to the fire.
A brave refrain from unknown bards
And Byron’s brave satire,
Frank Stanton’s tears and tenderness,
Draw closer to the fire.
Tho’ cold the winds and fierce the blast,
And thwarted our heart’s desire,
We’ve Robert Frost to cheer the hearth,
Draw closer to the fire.
Give me your hand, my steadfast friend;
The words that friends require
Stay with me thru the dying year,
Draw closer to the fire.
 
What Love Is
 LOVE is a magnetism
That enables two people
To see one another as
No one else can see them,
A compelling unresisting element
Drawing them into each other’s arms.
Love is an unselfish devotion,
Giving service without reward,
Sacrifice without compensation,
Suffering without alleviation.
It is a power, a force,
The fundamental principle of life,
Without which, the mere act of living
Becomes a farce and a mockery.
Love is the foundation of every
Unselfish act, in this grey old world.
It is the rosy amber hearthstone
Of earth’s flaming paradise, and
A stepping stone to a better world called heaven.
THE SNOW I
 The tinkling of postillion-bells broke the stillness of the crisp winter night—a coachman driving from the station perhaps. They rang out near the farm, were heard descending into a hollow; then, as the horses commenced to trot, they jingled briskly into the country, their echoes at last dying away beyond the common.
 
Polunin and his guest, Arkhipov, were playing chess in his study. Vera Lvovna was minding the infant; she talked with Alena for a while; then went into the drawing-room, and rummaged among the books there.
 
Polunin's study was large, candles burnt on the desk, books were scattered about here and there; an antique firearm dimly shone above a wide, leather-covered sofa. The silent, moonlit night peered in through the blindless windows, through one of which was passed a wire. The telegraph-post stood close beside it, and its wires hummed ceaselessly in the room somewhere in a corner of the ceiling—a monotonous, barely audible sound, like a snow-storm.
 
The two men sat in silence, Polunin broad-shouldered and bearded,
Arkhipov lean, wiry, and bald.
Alena entered bringing in curdled milk and cheese-cakes. She was a modest young woman with quiet eyes, and wore a white kerchief.
 
"Won't you please partake of our simple fare?" she asked shyly, inclining her head and folding her hands across her bosom.
 
Silent and absent-minded, the chess-players sat down to table and supped. Alena was about to join them, but just then her child began to cry, and she hurriedly left the room. The tea-urn softly simmered and seethed, emitting a low, hissing sound in unison with that of the wires. The men took up their tea and returned to their chess. Vera Lvovna returned from the drawing-room; and, taking a seat on the sofa beside her husband, sat there without stirring, with the fixed, motionless eyes of a nocturnal bird.
 
"Have you examined the Goya, Vera Lvovna?" Polunin asked suddenly.
 
"I just glanced through the History of Art; then I sat down with
Natasha."
"He has the most wonderful devilry!" Polunin declared, "and, do you know, there is another painter—Bosch. He has something more than devilry in him. You should see his Temptation of St. Anthony!"
 
They began to discuss Goya, Bosch, and St. Anthony, and as Polunin spoke he imperceptibly led the conversation to the subject of St. Francis d'Assisi. He had just been reading the Saint's works, and was much attracted by his ascetical attitude towards the world. Then the conversation flagged.
 
It was late when the Arkhipovs left, and Polunin accompanied them home. The last breath of an expiring wind softly stirred the pine- branches, which swayed to and fro in a mystic shadow-dance against the constellations. Orion, slanting and impressive, listed across a boundless sky, his starry belt gleaming as he approached his midnight post. In the widespread stillness the murmur of the pines sounded like rolling surf as it beats on the rocks, and the frozen snow crunched like broken glass underfoot: the frost was cruelly sharp.
 
On reaching home, Polunin looked up into the overarching sky, searching the glittering expanse for his beloved Cassiopeian Constellation, and gazed intently at the sturdy splendour of the Polar Star; then he watered the horses, gave them their forage for the night, and treated them to a special whistling performance.
 
It struck warm in the stables, and there was a smell of horses' sweat. A lantern burned dimly on the wall; from the horses' nostrils issued grey, steamy cloudlets; Podubny, the stallion, rolled a great wondering eye round on his master, as though inquiring what he was doing. Polunin locked the stable; then stood outside in the snow for a while, examining the bolts.
 
In the study Alena had made herself up a bed on the sofa, sat down next it in an armchair and began tending her baby, bending over it humming a wordless lullaby. Polunin sat down by her when he came in and discussed domestic affairs; then took the child from Alena and rocked her. Pale green beams of moonlight flooded through the windows.
 
Polunin thought of St. Francis d'Assisi, of the Arkhipovs who had lost faith and yet were seeking the law, of Alena and their household. The house was wrapped in utter silence, and he soon fell into that sound, healthy sleep to which he was now accustomed, in contrast to his former nights of insomnia.
 
The faint moon drifted over the silent fields, and the pines shone tipped with silver. A new-born wind sighed, stirred, then rose gently from the enchanted caverns of the night and soared up into the sky with the swift flutter of many-plumed wings. Assuredly Kseniya Ippolytovna Enisherlova was not asleep on such a night.
CHAPTER II.
 The day dawned cold, white, pellucid—breathing forth thin, misty vapour, while a hoar-frost clothed the houses, trees, and hedges. The smoke from the village chimneypots rose straight and blue. Outside the windows was an overgrown garden, a snow-covered tree lay prone on the earth; further off were snow-clad fields, the valley and the forest. Sky and air were pale and transparent, and the sun was hidden behind a drift of fleecy white clouds.
 
Alena came in, made some remark about the house, then went out to singe the pig for Christmas.
 
The library-clock struck eleven; a clock in the hall answered. Then there came a sudden ring on the telephone; it sounded strange and piercing in the empty stillness.
 
"Is that you, Dmitri Vladimirovich? Dmitri Vladimirovich, is that you?" cried a woman's muffled voice: it sounded a great way off through the instrument.
 
"Yes, but who is speaking?"
 
"Kseniya Ippolytovna Enisherlova is speaking", the voice answered quietly; then added in a higher key: "Is it you, my ascetic and seeker? This is me, me, Kseniya."
 
"You, Kseniya Ippolytovna?" Polunin exclaimed joyfully.
 
"Yes, yes … Oh yes!… I am tired of roaming about and being always on the brink of a precipice, so I have come to you … across the fields, where there is snow, snow, snow and sky … to you, the seeker…. Will you take me? Have you forgiven me that July?"
 
Polunin's face was grave and attentive as he bent over the telephone:
 
"Yes, I have forgiven," he replied.
 
One long past summer, Polunin and Kseniya Ippolytovna used to greet the glowing dawn together. At sundown, when the birch-trees exhaled a pungent odour and the crystal sickle of the moon was sinking in the west, they bade adieu until the morrow on the cool, dew-sprinkled terrace, and Polunin passionately kissed—as he believed—the pure, innocent lips of Kseniya Ippolytovna.
 
But she laughed at his ardour, and her avid lips callously drank in his consuming, protesting passion, only to desert him afterwards, abandoning him for Paris, and leaving behind her the shreds of his pure and passionate love.
 
That June and July had brought joy and sorrow, good and ill. Polunin was already disillusioned when he met Alena, and was living alone with his books. He met her in the spring, and quickly and simply became intimate with her, begetting a child, for he found that the instinct of fatherhood had replaced that of passion within him.
 
Alena entered his house at evening, without any wedding-ceremony, placed her trunk on a bench in the kitchen, and passing quickly through into the study, said quietly:
 
"Here I am, I have come." She looked very beautiful and modest as she stood there, wiping the corner of her mouth with her handkerchief.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna arrived late when dusk was already falling and blue shadows crept over the snow. The sky had darkened, becoming shrouded in a murky blue; bullfinches chirruped in the snow under the windows. Kseniya Ippolytovna mounted the steps and rang, although Polunin had already opened the door for her.
 
The hall was large, bright, and cold. As she entered, the sunrays fell a moment on the windows and the light grew warm and waxy, lending to her face—as Polunin thought—a greenish-yellow tint, like the skin of a peach, and infinitely beautiful. But the rays died away immediately, leaving a blue crepuscular gloom, in which Kseniya Ippolytovna's figure grew dim, forlorn, and decrepit.
 
Alena curtseyed: Kseniya Ippolytovna hesitated a moment, wondering if she should give her hand; then she went up to Alena and kissed her.
 
"Good evening", she cried gaily, "you know I am an old friend of your husband's."
 
But she did not offer her hand to Polunin.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna had greatly changed since that far-off summer. Her eyes, her wilful lips, her Grecian nose, and smooth brows were as beautiful as ever, but now there was something reminiscent of late August in her. Formerly she had worn bright costumes—now she wore dark; and her soft auburn hair was fastened in a simple plait.
 
They entered the study and sat down on the sofa. Outside the windows lay the snow, blue like the glow within. The walls and the furniture grew dim in the twilight. Polunin—grave and attentive—hovered solicitously round his guest. Alena withdrew, casting a long, steadfast look at her husband.
 
"I have come here straight from Paris", Kseniya explained. "It is rather queer—I was preparing to leave for Nice in the spring, and was getting my things together, when I found a nest of mice in my wardrobe. The mother-mouse ran off, leaving three little babes behind her; they were raw-skinned and could only just crawl. I spent my whole time with them, but on the third day the first died, and then the same night the other two…. I packed up for Russia the next morning, to come here, to you, where there is snow, snow…. Of course there is no snow in Paris—and it will soon be Christmas, the Russian Christmas."
 
She became silent, folded her hands and laid them against her cheek; for a moment she had a sorrowful, forlorn expression.
 
"Continue, Kseniya Ippolytovna", Polunin urged.
 
"I was driving by our fields and thinking how life here is as simple and monotonous as the fields themselves, and that it is possible to live here a serious life without trivialities. You know what it is to live for trivialities. I am called—and I go. I am loved—and I let myself be loved! Something in a showcase catches my eye and I buy it. I should always remain stationary were it not for those that have the will to move me….
 
"I was driving by our fields and thinking of the impossibility of such a life: I was thinking too that I would come to you and tell you of the mice…. Paris, Nice, Monaco, costumes, English perfumes, wine, Leonardo da Vinci, neo-classicism, lovers, what are they? With you everything is just as of old."
 
She rose and crossed to the window.
 
"The snow is blue-white here, as it is in Norway—I jilted Valpyanov there. The Norwegian people are like trolls. There is no better place than Russia! With you nothing changes. Have you forgiven me that July?"
 
Polunin approached and stood beside her.
 
"Yes, I have forgiven", he said earnestly.
 
"But I have not forgiven you that June!" she flashed at him; then she resumed: "The library, too, is the same as ever. Do you remember how we used to read Maupassant together in there?"
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna approached the library-door, opened it, and went in. Inside were book-cases behind whose glass frames stood even rows of gilded volumes; there was also a sofa, and close to it a large, round, polished table. The last yellow rays of the sun came in through the windows. Unlike that in the study, the light in here was not cold, but warm and waxy, so that again Kseniya Ippolytovna's face seemed strangely green to Polunin, her hair a yellow-red; her large, dark, deep-sunken eyes bore a stubborn look.
 
"God has endowed you with wonderful beauty, Kseniya, Ippolytovna,"
Polunin said gravely.
She gave him a keen glance; then smiled. "God has made me wonderfully tempting! By the way, you used to dream of faith; have you found it?"
 
"Yes, I have found it."
 
"Faith in what?"
 
"In life."
 
"But if there is nothing to believe in?"
 
"Impossible!"
 
"I don't know. I don't know." Kseniya Ippolytovna raised her hands to her head. "The Japanese, Naburu Kotokami, is still looking for me in Paris and Nice… I wonder if he knows about Russia…. I have not had a smoke for a whole week, not since the last little mouse died; I smoked Egyptians before …. Yes, you are right, it is impossible not to have faith."
 
Polunin went to her quickly, took her hands, then dropped them; his eyes were very observant, his voice quiet and serious.
 
"Kseniya, you must not grieve, you must not."
 
"Do you love me?"
 
"As a woman—no, as a fellow-creature—I do," he answered firmly.
 
She smiled, dropped her eyes, then moved to the sofa, sat down and arranged her dress, then smiled again.
 
"I want to be pure."
 
"And so you are!" Polunin sat down beside her, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees.
 
They were silent.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna said at last: "You have grown old, Polunin!"
 
"Yes, I have grown old. People do, but there is nothing terrible in that when they have found what they sought for."
 
"Yes, when they have found it…. But what about now? Why do you say that? Is it Alena?"
 
"Why ask? Although I am disillusioned, Kseniya, I go on chopping firewood, heating the stove, living just to live. I read St. Francis d'Assisi, think about him, and grieve that such a life as his may not be lived again. I know he was absurd, but he had faith, And now Alena—I love her, I shall love her for ever. I wish to feel God!"
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna looked at him curiously:
 
"Do you know what the baby-mice smelt like?"
 
"No, why do you ask?"
 
"They smelt like new-born babies—like human children! You have a daughter, Natasha. That is everything."
 
The sun sank in an ocean of wine-coloured light, and a great red wound remained amidst the drift of cold clouds over the western horizon. The snow grew violet, and the room was filled with shadowy, purplish twilight. Alena entered and the loud humming of the telegraph wires came through the study's open door.
 
By nightfall battalions of fleeting clouds flecked the sky; the moon danced and quivered in their midst—a silver-horned goddess, luminous with the long-stored knowledge of the ages. The bitter snow-wind crept, wound, and whirled along in spirals, loops, and ribbons, lashing the fields, whining and wailing its age-old, dismal song over the lone desolate spaces. The land was wretched, restless, and forlorn; the sky was overcast with sombre, gaping caverns shot through with lurid lines of fire.
 
At seven o'clock the Arkhipovs arrived.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna had known them a long time: they had been acquaintances even before Arkhipov's marriage. As he greeted her now, he kissed her hand and began speaking about foreign countries— principally Germany, which he knew and admired. They passed into the study, where they argued and conversed: they had nothing much to talk about really. Vera Lvovna was silent, as usual; and soon went to see Natasha. Polunin also was quiet, walking about the room with his hands behind his back.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna jested in a wilful, merry, and coquettish fashion with Arkhipov, who answered her in a polite, serious, and punctilious manner. He was unable to carry on a light, witty conversation, and was acutely conscious of his own awkwardness. From a mere trifle, something Kseniya Ippolytovna said about fortune-telling at Christmas, there arose an old-standing dispute between the two men on Belief and Unbelief.
 
Arkhipov spoke with calmness and conviction, but Polunin grew angry, confused, and agitated. Arkhipov declared that Faith was unnecessary and injurious, like instinct and every other sentiment; that there was only one thing immutable—Intellect. Only that was moral which was intelligent.
 
Polunin retorted that the intellectual and the non-intellectual were no standard of life, for was life intelligent? he asked. He contended that without Faith there was only death; that the one thing immutable in life was the tragedy of Faith and the Spirit.
 
"But do you know what Thought is, Polunin?"
 
"Yes, indeed I do!"
 
"Don't smile! Do you not know that Thought kills everything? Reflect, think thrice over what you regard as sacred, and it will be as simple as a glass of lemonade."
 
"But death?"
 
"Death is an exit into nothing. I have always that in reserve—when I am heart-broken. For the present I am content to live and thrive."
 
When the dispute was over, Vera Lvovna said in a low voice, as calm as ever:
 
"The only tragic thing in life is that there is nothing tragical, while death is just death, when anyone dies physically. A little less metaphysics!"
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna had been listening, alert and restless.
 
"But all the same," she answered Vera Lvovna animatedly, "Isn't the absence of tragedy the true tragedy?"
 
"Yes, that alone."
 
"And love?"
 
"No, not love."
 
"But aren't you married?"
 
"I want my baby."
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna, who was lying on the sofa, rose up on her knees, and stretching out her arms cried:
 
"Ah, a baby! Is that not instinct?"
 
"That is a law!"
 
The women began to argue. Then the dispute died down. Arkhipov proposed a game of chance. They uncovered a green table, set lighted candles at its corners and commenced to play leisurely and silently as in winter. Arkhipov sat erect, resting his elbows at right angles on the table.
 
The wind whistled outside, the blizzard increased in violence, and from some far distance came the dismal, melancholy creaking and grinding of iron. Alena came in, and sat quietly beside her husband, her hands folded in her lap. They were killing time.
 
"The last time, I sat down to play a game of chance amidst the fjords in a little valley hotel; a dreadful storm raged the whole while," Kseniya Ippolytovna remarked pensively. "Yes, there are big and little tragedies in life!"
 
The wind shrieked mournfully; snow lashed at the windows. Kseniya stayed on until a late hour, and Alena invited her to remain overnight; but she refused and left.
 
Polunin accompanied her. The snow-wind blew violently, whistling and cutting at them viciously. The moon seemed to be leaping among the clouds; around them the green, snowy twilight hung like a thick curtain. The horses jogged along slowly. Darkness lay over the land.
 
Polunin returned alone over a tractless road-way; the gale blew in his face; the snow blinded him. He stabled his horses; then found Alena waiting up for him in the kitchen, her expression was composed but sad. Polunin took her in his arms and kissed her.
 
"Do not be anxious or afraid; I love only you, no one else. I know why you are unhappy."
 
Alena looked up at him in loving gratitude, and shyly smiled.
 
"You do not understand that it is possible to love one only. Other men are not able to do that," Polunin told her tenderly.
 
The hurricane raged over the house, but within reigned peace. Polunin went into his study and sat down at his desk; Natasha began to cry; he rose, took a candle, and brought her to Alena, who nursed her. The infant looked so small, fragile, and red that Polunin's heart overflowed with tenderness towards her. One solitary, flickering candle illumined the room.
 
There was a call on the telephone at daybreak. Polunin was already up. The day slowly broke in shades of blue; there was a murky, bluish light inside the rooms and outside the windows, the panes of which were coated with snow. The storm had subsided.
 
"Have I aroused you? Were you still in bed?" called Kseniya.
 
"No, I was already up."
 
"On the watch?"
 
"Yes."
 
"I have only just arrived home. The storm whirled madly round us in the fields, and the roads were invisible, frozen under snow … I drove on thinking, and thinking—of the snow, you, myself, Arkhipov, Paris … oh, Paris…! You are not angry with me for ringing you up, are you, my ascetic?… I was thinking of our conversation."
 
"What were you thinking?"
 
"This…. We were speaking together, you see…. Forgive me, but you could not speak like that to Alena. She would not understand … how could she?"
 
"One need not speak a word, yet understand everything. There is something that unites—without the aid of speech—not only Alena and me, but the world and me. That is a law of God."
 
"So it is," murmured Kseniya. "Forgive me … poor old Alena."
 
"I love her, and she has given me a daughter…."
 
"Yes, that is true. And we … we love, but are childless… We rise in the morning feeling dull and depressed from our revels of overnight, while you were wisely sleeping." Kseniya Ippolytovna's voice rose higher. "'We are the heisha-girls of lantern-light,' you remember Annensky? At night we sit in restaurants, drinking wine and listening to garish music. We love—but are childless…. And you? You live a sober, righteous and sensible life, seeking the truth…. Isn't that so?' Truth!" Her cry was malignant and full of derision.
 
"That is unjust, Kseniya," answered Polunin in a low voice, hanging his head.
 
"No, wait," continued the mocking voice at the other end of the line; "here is something more from Annensky: 'We are the heisha-girls of lantern-light!'… 'And what seemed to them music brought them torment'; and again: 'But Cypris has nothing more sacred than the words I love, unuttered by us' …"
 
"That is unjust, Kseniya."
 
"Unjust!" She laughed stridently; then suddenly was silent. She began to speak in a sad, scarcely audible whisper: "But Cypris has nothing more sacred than the words I love, unuttered by us…. I love … love…. Oh, darling, at that time, in that June, I looked upon you as a mere lad. But now I seem small and little myself, and you a big man, who defends me. How miserable I was alone in the fields last night! But that is expiation…. You are the only one who has loved me devotedly. Thank you, but I have no faith now."
 
The dawn was grey, lingering, cold; the East grew red.
CHAPTER III.
 Kseniya Ippolytovna's ancestral home had reared its columns for fully a century. It was of classic architecture, with pediment, balconied hall, echoing corridors, and furniture that seemed never to have been moved from the place it had occupied in her forefathers' time.
 
The old mansion greeted her—the last descendant of the ancient name— with gloomy indifference; with cold, sombre apartments that were terrible by night, and thickly covered with the accumulated dust of many years. An ancient butler remained who recalled the former times and masters, the former baronial pomp and splendour. The housemaid, who spoke no Russian, was brought by Kseniya.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna established herself in her mother's rooms. She told the one ancient retainer that the household should be conducted as in her parents' day, with all the old rules and regulations. He thereupon informed her that it was customary in the times of the old masters for relatives and friends to gather together on Christmas Eve, while for the New Year all the gentry of the district considered it their duty to come, even those who were uninvited. Therefore it was necessary for her to order in the provisions at once.
 
The old butler called Kseniya Ippolytovna at eight; then served her with coffee. After she had taken it, he said austerely:
 
"You will have to go round the house and arrange things, Barina; then go into the study to read books and work out the expenses and write out recipes for your house-party. The old gentry always did that."
 
She carried out all her instructions, adhering rigorously to former rules. She was wonderfully quiet, submissive, and sad. She read thick, simply-written books—those in which the old script for sh is confused with that for t. Now and then, however, she rang up Polunin behind the old man's back, talking to him long and fretfully, with mingled love, grief, and hatred.
 
In the holidays they drove about together in droskies, and told fortunes: Kseniya Ippolytovna was presented with a waxen cradle. They drove to town with some mummers, and attended an amateur performance in a club. Polunin dressed up as a wood-spirit, Kseniya as a wood- spirit's daughter—out of a birch-grove. Then they visited the neighbouring landowners.
 
The Christmas holidays were bright and frosty, with a red morning glow from the east, the daylight waxy in the sun, and with long blue, crepuscular evenings.
CHAPTER IV.
 The old butler made a great ado in the house at the approach of the New Year. In preparation for a great ball, he cleared the inlaid floors, spread carpets, filled the lamps; placed new candles here and there; took the silver and the dinner-services out of their chests, and procured all the requisites for fortune-telling. By New Year's Eve the house was in order, the stately rooms glittering with lights, and uniformed village-lads stood by the doors.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna awoke late on that day and did not get up, lying without stirring in bed until dinner time, her hands behind her head. It was a clear, bright day and the sun's golden rays streamed in through the windows, and were reflected on the polished floor, casting wavy shadows over the dark heavy tapestry on the walls. Outside was the cold blue glare of the snow, which was marked with the imprints of birds' feet, and a vast stretch of clear turquoise sky.
 
The bedroom was large and gloomy; the polished floor was covered with rugs; a canopied double bedstead stood against the further wall; a large wardrobe was placed in a corner.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna looked haggard and unhappy. She took a bath before dinner; then had her meal—alone, in solitary state, drowsing lingeringly over it with a book.
 
Crows, the birds of destruction, were cawing and gossiping outside in the park. At dusk the fragile new moon rose for a brief while. The frosty night was crisp and sparkling. The stars shone diamond-bright in the vast, all-embracing vault of blue; the snow was a soft, velvety green.
 
Polunin arrived early. Kseniya Ippolytovna greeted him in the drawing-room. A bright fire burnt on the hearth; beside it were two deep armchairs. No lamps were alight, but the fire-flames cast warm, orange reflections; the round-topped windows seemed silvery in the hoar-frost.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna wore a dark evening dress and had plaited her hair; she shook hands with Polunin.
 
"I am feeling sad to-day, Polunin," she said in a melancholy voice.
They sat down in the armchairs.
"I expected you at five. It is now six. But you are always churlish and inconsiderate towards women. You haven't once wanted to be alone with me—or guessed that I desired it!" She spoke calmly, rather coldly, gazing obstinately into the fire, her cheeks cupped between her narrow palms. "You are so very silent, a perfect diplomat…. What is it like in the fields to-day? Cold? Warm? Tea will be served in a moment."
 
There was a pause.
 
At last Polunin broke the silence.
 
"Yes, it was bitterly cold, but fine." After a further pause he added: "When we last talked together you did not say all that was in your mind. Say it now."
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna laughed:
 
"I have already said everything! Isn't it cold? I have not been out to-day. I have been thinking about Paris and of that … that June…. Tea should be ready by this time!"
 
She rose and rung the bell, and the old butler came in.
 
"Will tea be long?"
 
"I will bring it now, Barina."
 
He went out and returned with a tray on which were two glasses of tea, a decanter of rum, some pastries, figs, and honey, and laid them on the little table beside the armchairs.
 
"Will you have the lamps lighted, Barina?" he inquired, respectfully.
 
"No. You may go. Close the door."
 
The old butler looked at them knowingly; then withdrew.
 Kseniya turned at once to Polunin.
"I have told you everything. How is it you have not understood? Drink up your tea."
 
"Tell me again," he pleaded.
 
"Take your tea first; pour out the rum. I repeat I have already told you all. You remember about the mice? Did you not understand that?" Kseniya Ippolytovna sat erect in her chair; she spoke coldly, in the same distant tone in which she had addressed the butler.
 
Polunin shook his head: "No, I haven't understood."
 
"Dear me, dear me!" she mocked, "and you used to be so quick-witted, my ascetic. Still, health and happiness do not always sharpen the wits. You are healthy and happy, aren't you?"
 
"You are being unjust again," Polunin protested. "You know very well that I love you."
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna gave a short laugh: "Oh, come, come! None of that!" She drank her glass of tea feverishly, threw herself back in the chair, and was silent.
 
Polunin also took his, warming himself after his cold drive.
 
She spoke again after a while in a quiet dreamy tone: "In this stove, flames will suddenly flare up, then die away, and it will become cold. You and I have always had broken conversations. Perhaps the Arkhipovs are right—when it seems expedient, kill! When it seems expedient, breed! That is wise, prudent, honest…." Suddenly she sat erect, pouring out quick, passionate, uneven words:
 
"Do you love me? Do you desire me … as a woman?… to kiss, to caress?… You understand? No, be silent! I am purged…. I come to you as you came to me that June…. You didn't understand about the mice?… Or perhaps you did.
 
"Have you noticed, have you ever reflected on that which does not change in man's life, but for ever remains the same? No, no, wait!… There have been hundreds of religions, ethics, aesthetics, sciences, philosophical systems: they have all changed and are still changing— only one law remains unaltered, that all living things—whether men, mice, or rye—are born, breed, and die.
 
"I was packing up for Nice, where a lover expected me, when suddenly I felt an overwhelming desire for a babe, a dear, sweet, little babe of my own, and I remembered you …. Then I travelled here, to Russia so as to bear it in reverence…. I am able to do so now!…"
 
Polunin rose and stood close to Kseniya Ippolytovna: his expression was serious and alarmed.
 
"Don't beat me," she murmured.
 
"You are innocent, Kseniya," he replied.
 
"Oh, there you go again!" she cried impatiently. "Always sin and innocence! I am a stupid woman, full of beliefs and superstitions— nothing more—like all women. I want to conceive here, to breed and bear a child here. Do you wish to be the father?"
 
She stood up, looking intently into Polunin's eyes.
 
"What are you saying, Kseniya?" he asked in a low, grave, pained tone.
 
"I have told you what I want. Give me a child and then go—anywhere— back to your Alena! I have not forgotten that June and July."
 
"I cannot," Polunin replied firmly; "I love Alena."
 
"I do not want love," she persisted; "I have no need of it. Indeed I have not, for I do not even love you!" She spoke in a low, faint voice, and passed her hand over her face.
 
"I must go," the man said at last.
 
She looked at him sharply. "Where to?"
 
"How do you mean 'where to'? I must go away altogether!"
 
"Ah, those tragedies, duties, and sins again!" she cried, her eyes burning into his with hatred and contempt. "Isn't it all perfectly simple? Didn't you make a contract with me?"
 
"I have never made one without love. And I love only Alena. I must go."
 
"Oh, what cruel, ascetical egoism!" she cried violently. Then suddenly all her rage died down, and she sat quietly in the chair, covering her face with her hands.
 
Polunin stood by, his shoulders bowed, his arms hanging limply. His face betrayed grief and anxiety.
 
Kseniya looked up at him with a wan smile: "It is all right—there is no need to go… It was only my nonsense…. I was merely venting my anger…. Don't mind me …. I am tired and harassed. Of course I have not been purged. I know that is impossible… We are the 'heisha-girls of lantern-light'…. You remember Annensky? … Give me your hand."
 
Polunin stretched out his large hand, took her yielding one in his and pressed its delicate fingers.
 
"You have forgiven me?" she murmured.
 
He looked at her helplessly, then muttered: "I cannot either forgive or not forgive. But … I cannot!"
 
"Never mind; we shall forget. We shall be cheerful and happy. You remember: 'Where beauty shines amidst mire and baseness there is only torment'…. You need not mind, it is all over!"
 
She uttered the last few words with a cry, raised herself erect, and laughed aloud with forced gaiety.
 
"We shall tell fortunes, jest, drink, be merry—like our grandfathers … you remember! …Had not our grandmothers their coachmen friends?"
 
She rang the bell and the butler came in.
 
"Bring in more tea. Light the fire and the lamps."
 
The fire burnt brightly and illuminated the leather-covered chairs.
The portrait frames on the walls shone golden through the darkness.
Polunin paced up and down the room, his hands behind his back; his
footsteps were muffled in the thick carpet.
Sleigh bells began to ring outside.
 
It was just ten o'clock as the guests assembled from the town and the neighbouring estates. They were received in the drawing-room.
 
Taper, the priest's son, commenced playing a polka, and the ladies went into the ballroom; the old butler and two footmen brought wax candles and basins of water, and the old ladies began to tell fortunes. A troupe of mummers tumbled in, a bear performed tricks, a Little Russian dulcimer-player sang songs.
 
The mummers brought in with them the smell of frost, furs, and napthaline. One of them emitted a cock's crow, and they danced a Russian dance. It was all merry and bright, a tumultuous, boisterous revel, as in the old Russian aristocracy days. There was a smell of burning wax, candle-grease, and burning paper.
 
Kseniya Ippolytovna was the soul of gaiety; she laughed and jested cheerfully as she waltzed with a Lyceum student, a General's son. She had re-dressed her hair gorgeously, and wore a pearl necklace round her throat. The old men sat round card-tables in the lounge, talking on local topics.
 
At half past eleven a footman opened the door leading into the dining-room and solemnly announced that supper was served. They supped and toasted, ate and drank amid the clatter of knives, forks, dishes, and spoons. Kseniya made Arkhipov, Polunin, a General and a Magistrate sit beside her.
 
At midnight, just as they were expecting the clock to chime, Kseniya Ippolytovna rose to propose a toast; in her right hand was a glass; her left was flung back behind her plaited hair; she held her head high. All the guests at once rose to their feet.
 
"I am a woman," she cried aloud. "I drink to ourselves, to women, to the gentle, to the homely, to happiness and purity! To motherhood! I drink to the sacred—" she broke off abruptly, sat down and hung her head.
 
Somebody cried: "Hurrah!" To someone else it seemed that Kseniya was weeping. The clock began to chime, the guests shouted "Hurrah!" clinked glasses, and drank.
 
Then they sang, while some rose and carried round glasses to those of the guests who were still sober and those who were only partially intoxicated. They bowed. They sang The Goblets, and the basses thundered:
 
"Drink to the dregs! Drink to the dregs!" Kseniya Ippolytovna offered her first glass to Polunin. She stood in front of him with a tray, curtseyed without lifting her eyes and sang. Polunin rose, colouring with embarrassment:
 
"I never drink wine," he protested.
 
But the basses thundered: "Drink to the dregs! Drink to the dregs!"
 
His face darkened, he raised a silencing arm, and firmly repeated:
 
"I never drink wine, and I do not intend to."
 
Kseniya gazed into the depths of his eyes and said softly:
 
"I want you to, I beg you…. Do you hear?"
 
"I will not," Polunin whispered back.
 
Then she cried out:
 
"He doesn't want to! We mustn't make him against his will!" She turned away, offered her glass to the Magistrate, and after him to the Lyceum student; then excused herself and withdrew, quietly returning later looking sad and as if she had suddenly aged.
 
They lingered a long while over supper; then went into the ball-room to dance, and sing, and play old fashioned games. The men went to the buffets to drink, the older ones then sat in the drawing-room playing whist, and talked.
 
It was nearly five o'clock when the guests departed. Only the Arkhipovs and Polunin remained. Kseniya Ippolytovna ordered coffee, and all four sat down at a small table feeling worn out. The house was now wrapt in silence. The dawn had just broken.
 
Kseniya was tired to death, but endeavoured to appear fresh and cheerful. She passed the coffee round, and then fetched a bottle of liqueur. They sat almost in silence; what talk they exchanged was desultory.
 
"One more year dropped into Eternity," Arkhipov said, sombrely.
 
"Yes, a year nearer to death, a year further from birth," rejoined
Polunin.
Kseniya Ippolytovna was seated opposite him. Her eyes were veiled. She rose now to her feet, leaned over the table and spoke to him in slow, measured accents vibrating with malice:
 
"Well, pious one! Everything here is mine. I asked you to-day to give me a baby, because I am merely a woman and so desire motherhood…. I asked you to take wine… You refused. The nearer to death the further from birth, you say? Well then, begone!"
 
She broke into tears, sobbing loudly and plaintively, covering her face with her hands; then leant against the wall, still sobbing. The Arkhipovs ran to her; Polunin stood at the table dumbfounded, then left the room.
 
"I didn't ask him for passion or caresses. … I have no husband!" Kseniya cried, sobbing and shrieking like a hysterical girl. They calmed her after a time, and she spoke to them in snatches between her sobs, which were less violent for a while. Then she broke out weeping afresh, and sank into an armchair.
 
The dawn had now brightened; the room was filled with a faint, flickering light. Misty, vaporous, tormenting shadows danced and twisted oddly in the shifting glimmer: in the tenebrous half-light the occupants looked grey, weary, and haggard, their faces strangely distorted by the alternate rise and fall of the shadows. Arkhipov's bald head with its tightly stretched skin resembled a greatly elongated skull.
 
"Listen to me, you Arkhipovs," Kseniya cried brokenly. "Supposing a distracted woman who desired to be pure were to come and ask you for a baby—would you give her the same answer as Polunin? He said it was impossible, that it was sin, that he loved someone else. Would you answer like that, Arkhipov, knowing it was the woman's last—her only—chance of salvation—her only love?" She looked eagerly from one to the other.
 
"No, certainly not—I should answer in a different way," Arkhipov replied quietly.
 
"And you, Vera Lvovna, a wife … do you hear? I speak in front of you?"
 
Vera Lvovna nodded, laid her hand gently on Kseniya's forehead, and answered softly and tenderly:
 
"I understand you perfectly."
 
Again Kseniya wept.
 
 
The dawn trod gently down the lanes of darkness. The light grew clearer and the candles became dim and useless. The outlines of the furniture crept out of the net of shadows. Through the blue mist outside the snow, valley, forest, and fields were faintly visible. From the right of the horizon dawn's red light flushed the heavens with a cold purple.
 
Polunin drove along by the fields, trotting smoothly behind his stallion. The earth was blue and cold and ghostly, a land carved out of dreams, seemingly unsubstantial and unreal. A harsh, bitter wind blew from the north, stirring the telegraph-wires by the roadside to a loud, humming refrain. A silence as of death reigned over the land, yet life thrilled through it; and now and then piping goldfinches appeared from their winter nests in the moist green ditches, and flew ahead of Polunin; then suddenly turned aside and perched lightly on the wayside brambles.
 
Night still lingered amid the calm splendour of the vast, primeval forest. As he drove through the shadowed glades the huge trees gently swayed their giant boughs, softly brushing aside the shroud of encompassing darkness.
 
A golden eagle darted from its mist-wreathed eyrie and flew over the fields; then soared upwards in ever-widening circles towards the east—where, like a pale rose ribbon stretched across the sky, the light from the rising sun shed a delicate opalescent glow on the snow, which it transformed to an exquisite lilac, and the shadows, to which it lent a wonderful, mysterious, quivering blue tint.
 
Polunin sat in his seat, huddled together, brooding morosely, deriving a grim satisfaction from the fact that—all the same—he had not broken the law. Henceforth, he never could break it; the thought of Kseniya Ippolytovna brought pain, but he would not condemn her.
 
At home, Alena was already up and about; he embraced her fondly, clasped her in his arms, kissed her forehead; then he took up the infant and gazed lingeringly, with infinite tenderness, upon her innocent little face.
 
The day was glorious; the golden sunlight streamed in through the windows in a shining cataract, betokening the advent of spring, and made pools of molten gold upon the floor. But the snow still lay in all its virgin whiteness over the earth.
A YEAR OF THEIR LIVES I
 To the north, south, east, and west—in all directions for hundreds of miles—stretched forests and bogs enveloped in a wide-spread veil of lichen. Brown-trunked cedars and pines towered on high. Beneath there was a thick, impenetrable jungle of firs, alders, wild-berries, junipers, and low-hanging birches. Pungent, deep-sunken, lichen- covered springs of reddish water were hidden amidst undergrowth in little glades, couched in layers of turf bordered by red bilberries and huckleberries.
 
With September came the frosts—fifty degrees below zero. The snow lay everywhere—crisp and dazzling. There was daylight for three or four hours only; the remainder of the time it was night. The sky was lowering, and brooded darkly over the earth. There was a tense hush and stillness, only broken in September by the lowing of mating elks. In December came the mournful, sinister howling of the wolves; for the rest of the time—a deep, dreadful, overpowering silence! A silence that can be found only in the wastelands of the world.
 
A village stood on the hill by the river.
 
The bare slope descended to the water's edge, a grey-brown granite, and white slatey clay, steep, beaten by wind and rain. Clumsy discoloured boats were anchored to the bank. The river was broad, dark, and cold, its surface broken by sombre, choppy, bluish waves. Here and there the grey silhouettes of huts were visible; their high, projecting, boarded roofs were covered by greenish lichen. The windows were shuttered. Nets dried close by. It was the abode of hunters who went long excursions into the forests in winter, to fight the wild beasts.
CHAPTER II.
 In the spring the rivers—now broad, free and mighty—overflowed their banks. Heavy waves broke up the face of the waters, which sent forth a deep, hoarse, subdued murmur, as restless and disquieting as the season itself. The snow thawed. The pine-trees showed resinous lights, and exhaled a strong, pungent odour.
 
In the day-time the sky was a broad expanse of blue; at dusk it had a soft murky hue and a melancholy attraction. In the heart of the woods, now that winter was over, the first deed of the beasts was being accomplished—birth. Eider-ducks, swans, and geese were crying noisily on the river.
 
At dusk the sky became greenish and murky, merging into a vast tent of deepest blue studded with a myriad of shining golden stars. Then the eider-ducks and swans grew silent and went to roost for the night, and the soft warm air was thrilled by the whines of bear-cubs and the cries of land-rails. It was then that the maidens assembled on the slope to sing of Lada and to dance their ancient dances, while strapping youths came forth from their winter dwellings in the woods and listened.
 
The slope down to the river was steep; below was the rustling sound of water among the reeds. Everything was wrapt in stillness, yet everywhere the throb and flow of life could be heard. The maidens sat huddled together on the top of the slope, where the granite and slate were covered with scanty moss and yellow grass.
 
They were dressed in gaily-coloured dresses: all of them strong and robust; they sang their love-songs—old and sad and free—and gazed into the gathering opalescent mists. Their songs seemed to overflow from their hearts, and were sung to the youths who stood around them like sombre, restive shadows, ogling and lustful, like the beasts in their forest-haunts.
 
This festive coupling-time had its law.
 
The youths came here to choose their wives; they quarrelled and fought, while the maidens remained listless, yielding to them in all. The young men ogled and fought and he who triumphed first chose his wife. Then he and she together retired from the festival.
 
III
CHAPTER III.
 Marina was twenty when she proceeded to the river-bank.
 
Her tall, somewhat heavy body was wonderfully moulded, with strong muscles and snowy skin. Her chest, back, hips, and limbs were sharply outlined; she was strong, supple, and well developed. Her round, broad breast rose high; her hair, eye-brows and eye-lashes were thick and dark. The pupils of her eyes were deep and liquid; her cheeks showed a flush of red. Her lips were soft—like a beast's—large, sensuous and rosy. She walked slowly, moving her long straight legs evenly, and slightly swaying from her hips….
 
She joined the maidens on the river slope.
 
They were singing their mysterious, alluring and illusive songs.
 
Marina mingled among the crowd of maidens, lay down upon her back, closed her dreamy eyes, and joined in the festive chorus. The maidens' souls became absorbed in the singing, and their song spread far and wide through all the shadowy recesses of the woods, like shining rays of sunlight. Their eyes closed in langour, their full- blooded bodies ached with a delicious sensation. Their hearts seemed to grow benumbed, the numbness spreading through their blood to their limbs; it deprived them of strength, and their thoughts became chaotic.
 
Marina stretched her limbs sensuously; then became absorbed in the singing, and she also sang. She felt strangely inert; only quivering at the sound of the lusty, excited voices of the youths.
 
Afterwards she lay on a couch in her suffocatingly close room; her hands were clasped behind her head; her bosom swelled. She stretched, opened her dark pensive eyes wide, compressed her lips, then sank again into the drowsy langour, lying thus for many hours.
 
She was twenty, and had grown up free and solitary—with the hunters, the woods, and the steep and the river—from her birth.
CHAPTER IV.
 Demid lived on his own plot of ground, which, like the village, stood on a hill above the river. But here the hill was higher and steeper, sweeping the edge of the horizon. The wood was nearer, and its grey- trunked cedars and pines rose from their beds of golden moss to shake their crests to the stars and stretch their dark-green forest hands right up to the house. The view was wide and sweeping from here: the dark, turbulent river, the marsh beyond, the deep-blue billowing woods fringing the horizon, the heavy lowering sky—all were clearly visible.
 
The house, made of huge pines, with timbered walls, plain white- washed ceilings and floors, was bestrewn with pelts of bears, elks, wolves, foxes, and ermines. Gunpowder and grape-shot lay on the tables. In the corners was a medley of lassoes, snares, and wolftraps. Some rifles hung round the walls. There was a strong pungent odour, as though all the perfumes of the woods were collected here. The house contained two rooms and a kitchen.
 
In the centre of one of the rooms stood a large, rough-hewn table; round it were some low wooden stools covered with bear-skin. This was Demid's own room; in the other was the young bear, Makar.
 
Demid lay motionless for a long time on his bear-skin bed, listening to the vibrations of his great body—how it lived and throbbed, how the rich blood coursed through its veins. Makar, the bear, approached, laid his heavy paws on his chest, and amicably sniffed at his body. Demid stroked the beast on its ear, and it seemed as if the man and animal understood each other. Outside the window loomed the wood.
 
Demid was rugged and broad-shouldered, a large, quiet, dark-eyed, good man. He smelt of the woods, and was strong and healthy. Like all the hunters, he dressed in furs and a rough, home-woven fabric streaked with red. He wore high, heavy boots made of reindeer hide, and his coarse, broad hands were covered with broken chilblains.
 
Makar was young, and, like all young things, he was foolish. He liked to roll about, and was often destructive—he would gnaw the nets and skins, break the traps, and lick up the gunpowder. Then Demid punished him, whereupon Makar would turn on his heel, make foolish grimaces, and whine plaintively.
CHAPTER V.
Demid went to the maidens on the slope and took Marina to his plot of land. She became his wife.
CHAPTER VI.
 The dark-green, wind-swept grass grew sweet and succulent in summer. The sun seemed to shine from out a deep blue ocean of light. The nights were silvery, the sky seemed dissolved into a pale, pellucid mist; sunset and dawn co-mingled, and a white wavering haze crept over the earth. Here life was strong and swift, for it knew that its days were brief.
 
Marina was installed in Makar's room, and he was transferred to
Demid's.
Makar greeted Marina with an inhospitable snarl when he saw her for the first time; then, showing his teeth, he struck her with his paw. Demid beat him for this behaviour, and he quieted down. Then Marina made friends with him.
 
Demid went into the woods in the daytime, and Marina was left alone.
 
She decorated her room in her own fashion, with a crude, somewhat exaggerated, yet graceful, taste. She hung round in symmetrical order the skins and cloth hangings, brightly embroidered with red and blue cocks and reindeers. She placed an image of the God-Mother in the corner; she washed the floor; and her multi-coloured room—smelling as before of the woods—began to resemble a forest-chapel, where the forest folk pray to their gods.
 
In the pale-greenish twilight of the illimitable night, when only horn-owls cried in the woods and bear-cubs snarled by the river, Demid went in to Marina. She could not think—her mind moved slowly and awkwardly like a great lumbering animal—she could only feel, and in those warm, voluptuous, star-drenched nights she yielded herself to Demid, desiring to become one with him, his strength, and his passion.
 
The nights were pale, tremulous, and mysterious. There was a deep, heavy, nocturnal stillness. White spirals of mist drifted along the ground. Night-owls and wood spirits hooted. In the morning was a red blaze of glory as the great orb of day rose from the east into the azure vault of heaven.
 
The days flew by and summer passed.
CHAPTER VII.
 It snowed in September.
 
It had been noticeable, even in August, how the days drew in and darkened, how the nights lengthened and deepened. The wood all at once grew still and dumb; it seemed as though it were deserted. The air grew cold, and the river became locked in ice. The twilight was slow and lingering, its deepening shadows turning the snow and ice on the river to a keen, frosty blue.
 
Through the nights rang the loud, strange, fierce bellowing of the elks as they mated; the walls shook, and the hills re-echoed with their terrible roar.
 
Marina was with child in the autumn.
 
One night she woke before dawn. The room was stifling from the heat of the stove, and she could smell the bear. There was a faint glimmer of dawn, and the dark walls showed the window frames in a wan blue outline. Somewhere close by an old elk was bellowing: you could tell it was old by the hoarse, hissing notes of its hollow cries.
 
Marina sat up in bed. Her head swam, and she felt nauseated. The bear lay beside her; he was already awake and was watching her. His eyes shone with quiet, greenish lights; from outside, the thin crepuscular light crept into the room through little crevices.
 
Again Marina felt the nausea, and her head swam; the lights in Makar's eyes were re-enkindled in Marina's soul into a great, overwhelming joy that made her body quiver with emotion . . . Her heart beat like a snared bird—all was wavering and misty, like a summer morn.
 
She rose from her bed of bear-skin furs, and naked, with swift, awkward, uncertain steps, went in to Demid. He was still asleep—she put her burning arms about him and drew his head to her deep bosom, whispering to him softly:
 
"A child … it is the child…."
 
Little by little, the night lifted and in through the windows came the daylight. The elk ceased his bellowing The room filled with glancing morning shadows. Makar approached, sniffed, and laid his paws on the bed. Demid seized his collar with his free hand and patting him fondly said:
 
"That is right, Makar Ivanych—you know, don't you?" Then turning to
Marina, he added: "What do you think, Marinka? Doesn't he know?
Doesn't the old bear know, Marinka?"
Makar licked Demid's hand, and laid his head knowingly on his forepaws. The night had gone; rays of lilac-coloured light illumined the snow and entered the house. Round, red, and distant rose the sun. Below the hill lay the blue, ice-bound river, and away beyond it stretched the ribbed outline of the vast, marshy Siberian forest. Demid did not enter it that day, nor on many of the following days.