XXVI.

The babe has awakened from sleep And unto the gaze of its mother, Bent over it, lifted another-- Not the baby-looks that go Unaimingly to and fro, But an earnest gazing deep Such as soul gives soul at length When by work and wail of years It winneth a solemn strength And mourneth as it wears. A strong man could not brook, With pulse unhurried by fears, To meet that baby's look O'erglazed by manhood's tears, The tears of a man full grown, With a power to wring our own, In the eyes all undefiled Of a little three-months' child-- To see that babe-brow wrought By the witnessing of thought To judgment's prodigy, And the small soft mouth unweaned, By mother's kiss o'erleaned, (Putting the sound of loving Where no sound else was moving Except the speechless cry) Quickened to mind's expression, Shaped to articulation, Yea, uttering words, yea, naming woe, In tones that with it strangely went Because so baby-innocent, As the child spake out to the mother, so:--