Bowed by the weight of fourscore years,
And blinded by her widow's tears,
The daughter of a patriot sire,
This earnest sends of fond desire,
Her loving-kidness to attest
For brothers, stretched in sore unrest,
Along the battle's crimsoned path,
When the wild storm has spent its wrath.
She hath done what she could—how few
Have better done, may better do?
As viewed by Him, in whose clear light
The offering of the widow's mite
Appeared more precious, being hers,
Than gifts of grandest alimoners.
And Pity asks, with pleading tone,
Who'll make the hallowed prize his own?
For the dear sake of those who pine
With bitter wounds, that thou and thine,
Walled by their breasts, might never feel
The fierce edge of the traitors' steel.
O wedded pair! whose cradled love
Charms like a presence from above,
What brighter smiles your eyes shall trace
Upon your slumberlug cherub's face,
If, when the angels gather acar
To whisper in his dreaming car
The dear Christ's tender benison,
They mark the sinless little one,
Invested in these tissud dyes
Lent from their own resplendent skies!