Chapter III

Dead is the glycin and the hawthorne flower;
But now is the time when heather-bloom is seen,
And on this so calm eve the rustling wind
Brings you the fragrance of the starved Campine.

Love and breathe them, thinking of its fate;
Over that rugged soil the storm-wind lives;
Sand and sea have made of it their prey,
Yet of the little left, it ever gives.

Of old, though autumn came, we dwelled with it,
With plain and forest, with the storm and light,
Until the angels of the Christmas time
Inscribed its legend with their winged flight.

Your heart became more simple and more sure;
We loved the villagers and the forlorn
Old women who would speak of their great age
And of old spinning-wheels their hands had worn.

Our quiet house upon the misty heath
Was frank and welcoming to all who came;
Its roof was dear to us, its door and sill,
And hearth long blackened by familiar flame.

When over vast, pale, measureless repose
The total splendour of the night was set,
A lesson of deep silence we received,
Whose ardour never shall our souls forget.

Since we were more alone amid the plain,
The dawn and evening entered more our thought,
Our eyes were franker and our hearts more sweet
And with the world's desire more fully fraught.

We found content in not exacting it;
The sadness, even, of the days was kind,
And the rare sunlight of the autumn's end
Charmed us the more that it seemed weak and blind.

Dead is the glycin and the hawthorne flower;
But now are the days when heather-bloom is seen,
Remember these, and let the rustling wind
Bring you the fragrance of the starved Campine.