For it was so sweet my childhood home was painted in my sight.

’Twas the same old frame house, father, hidden by the same old trees,

Apple, cherry, quince and locust, talking in the same old breeze.

On the walk I found the cowslip, stolen from “The Old Ravine,”

And the blue-bell, and the columbine—how near my heart they lean.

Roses, red as any furnace flame, about me seemed to grow.

Roses pink as maiden blushes, roses pure and white as snow.

All around the yard I wandered, oh! so long I can not tell,

Then I paused beneath the apple tree and drank from the old well.

Through my veins I felt the water coursing like a happy thought,

And a thousand recollections to my memory then it brought.

Recollections rushing to me swifter than an angel’s wing,

Recollections slipping from me as a pearl slips from a string.

Recollections that transfigured me into a little child,

And the halo shed around me was my father’s happy smile.

It was such a pretty picture Fancy held before my view,

I will turn the magic lantern so that you may see it, too.

It is springtime and the sugar trees have pitched their shady tent,

Tiny leaves like tiny parasols reach toward the firmament.

Restless swings a childish figure to and fro upon the gate,

Some one’s coming down the highway—’tis for him she there doth wait.

Ah! you recognize the picture, I can tell it by your smile;

You have recognized the sugar trees, and recognized your child.

Through the pasture now we’re strolling, looking down the avenue,

See you not another picture? Yes; the figures there are two.

Mother sits upon the portico her knitting in her hand,

And my brother talks beside her of that wild and Western land

Where he raced his Indian ponies and lassoed the buffaloes

Then I led you up the hillside and we sat upon the “mound.”

Oh! there never was before or since so pretty a view spread ’round.

Just below, the tranquil water of the clear pond seemed to win

Every cloud that floated over, and the heavens lay within.

Then the meadow, where the clover bloomed, and where you stacked the hay,

Like a field within a picture book, before us there it lay;

Then beyond, the barn and orchard, and the valley that I love—

Oh! it all seemed like a painting let down by the Hand above.

But a thought came rushing to me of a fairy that you know;

For she lived there in the valley and her name it was Echo.

So I laughed and called unto her just as loud as I could call,

But the voice that she threw back to me was not a child’s at all.

No; it was a woman’s voice; I awoke then with a start,

And I found the king beside me that dethroned you in my heart.

Then a tear fell on the pillow, not a briny, bitter tear,

Why? you ask—because the dream was gone that I have copied here.