 | Wood-notes and Church-bells |  |
233
A HUSBAND'S LOVE.
Lower and lower he beholds her sinkIn mortal weakness, till life's dragging wheels
Refuse to move; and in despair he feels
Her all but lost—on danger's utmost brink.
From love's forlornest hope he does not shrink;
Out of his own warm veins the blood he steals,
Pouring it into hers, while his brain reels:
'Twixt wife and husband, oh, how dear a link!
He gave his blood and saved his darling wife;
Great was the love, the self-devotion rare;
Dim shadow of His love beyond compare,
Who not for friends poured forth the purple life,
But enemies, and made of them His Bride,
To walk in white for ever at His side!
The touching incident recorded in this sonnet recently occurred within the knowledge of my friend and neighbour, the Rev. J. M. Williams, Rector of Burnby, who communicated it to me. The young wife of a barrister, in the extremity of weakness, was only saved from death by the “transfusion” of her husband's blood into her veins. He fainted twice, but she recovered.
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