The Poetry Corner

The Daughter Of Jephthah Among The Mountains.

By Mary Gardiner Horsford

Night bent o'er the mountains With aspect serene; The deep waters slept 'Neath the moon's pallid sheen, And the stars in their courses Moved noiseless on high, As a soul, when it cleaveth In thought the blue sky. The low winds were spent With the fever of day, And stirred scarce a leaf Of the green wood's array; And the white, fleecy clouds Hovered light on the air, Like an angel's wing, bent For a penitent prayer. Sleep hushed in the city The tumult and strife, And calmed in the spirit The unrest of life: But one, where Mount Lebanon Lifted its snow, Slumbered not till the morn Wakened earth with its glow. Beneath the dark cedars, Majestic, sublime, That for ages had mocked Both at tempest and Time, In whose tops the wild eagle His eyrie had made, She knelt with pale cheek In the damp, mossy glade. The small hands were folded In worship divine, And the silent leaves thrilled. In that lone forest shrine, With the voice of the pleader, That, earnest and low, Was sad as the sea-shell's And plaintive with woe. She prayed not for life, Though Youth's early bloom Glowed on her fair cheek, And recoiled from the tomb; But a heart pure and strong, Sublimed by its pain, - A spirit attuned To the seraph's bright strain. She saw not the dark boughs That, spectral and hoar, With lattice-work rude Arched her wide temple o'er; She marked not their shadows Gigantic and dim; Her soul was communing In triumph with Him; - With the Ancient of Days, Who from mercy-seat high Beheld the pale pleader With vigilant eye; And Peace with white pinion Came down from His throne, And the gleam of her wing On that fair forehead shone. O Thou that upholdest The feeble and frail, And leadest the pilgrim Through Life's narrow vale! When the days that are measured My spirit below Shall have ceased to the past From the future to flow, - May the Summoner find me As placid and strong, As meet for endurance Of agony long, With a faith as divine And vision as clear, As the watchers who wept On the hills of Juda!