;
Not half so glad, or wise, or good:
Her words rebuked my secret self
And shamed me where I stood.

She never guessed her words reproved
A silent envy nursed within,
A selfish, souring discontent
Pride-born, the devil's sin.

I smiled, half bitter, half in jest:
"The wisest man of all the wise
Left for his summary of life
'Vanity of vanities.'

"Beneath the sun there's nothing new:
Men flow, men ebb, mankind flows on:
If I am wearied of my life,
Why, so was Solomon.

"Vanity of vanities he preached
Of all he found, of all he sought:
Vanity of vanities, the gist
Of all the words he taught.

"This in the wisdom of the world,
In Homer's page, in all, we find:
As the sea is not filled, so yearns
Man's universal mind.

"This Homer felt, who gave his men
With glory but a transient state:
His very Jove could not reverse
Irrevocable fate.

"Uncertain all their lot save this--
Who wins must lose, who lives must die:
All trodden out into the dark
Alike, all vanity."

She scarcely answered when I paused,
But rather to herself said: "One
Is here," low-voiced and loving, "Yea,
Greater than Solomon."

So both were silent, she and I:
She laid her work aside, and went
Into the garden-walks, like spring,
All gracious with content:

A little graver than her wont,
Because her words had fretted me;
Not warbling quite her merriest tune
Bird-like from tree to tree.

I chose a book to read and dream:
Yet half the while with furtive eyes
Marked how she made her choice of flowers
Intuitively wise,

And ranged them with instinctive taste
Which all my books had failed to teach;
Fresh rose herself, and daintier
Than blossom of the peach.

By birthright higher than myself,
Though nestling of the self-same nest:
No fault of hers, no fault of mine,
But stubborn to digest.

I watched her, till my book unmarked
Slid noiseless to the velvet floor;
Till all the opulent summer-world
Looked poorer than before.

Just then her busy fingers ceased,
Her fluttered colour went and came:
I knew whose step was on the walk,
Whose voice would name her name.

* * * * *