Moral songs :: :: University of Virginia Library

The mountain children know it well,
And oft their blackened lips will tell,
And fingers purple died,
How many bilberries they found,
On bushes growing near the ground,
Along the dark hill side.

Far up the mountain solitude,
Within a cabin lone and rude,
The last low dwelling wild
That lies along that upland road,—
Poor tenant of a poor abode,
There lives a sickly child.

His little cheek is sunk and white,
But every day an hour ere night
It colours like the rose;
And then his very heart is sick,
And ever painfully and quick
His breathing comes and goes.

The wild broom blossoms every May,
It withers in the summer's day,
And ere it come again,
I think that flower as bright and lone,
As short a lifetime will have known,
And God will ease his pain.

A lady wandered by the place;
She marked his wan and wasted face,

And oft would thither walk,
And read good books beside his bed,
And bring him apples rosy red,
And cheer him with sweet talk;

Till in the bosom of the boy,
An impulse strong of love and joy,
And gratitude did stir;
And to himself he said half sad,
“She maketh me so very glad,
What could I do for her?”

His sister from the mountain brought,
Where in the moss all day she wrought,
Of that wild fruit a store,
And smiling as she poured them in
His little hand so small and thin,
She kissed him o'er and o'er.

The poor child paused with glistening eye
Ere to his pale lip shrunk and dry,
The fruit he lifted up;
Then from the rows upon the shelf,
Of white, and blue, and yellow delf,
He took his own small cup.

He hides his hoarded berries there,
“And they are for a gift most rare,”
(He to his mother tells,)
“For such, I'm told, do never grow
Where yon broad river runs below,
Round where my lady dwells.

“She comes, she comes, her step I know,”—
With what a bright and kindling glow
Light up his sunken eyes;
In his young heart what quick delight,
As fast outpoured, her hand so white
His purple present dies.

Ah precious gift! love sweetly shown,
Since not by costly things alone,
Is grateful thought expressed;
The motive, not the means we scan,
And he who giveth all he can,
Hath surely given best.