AN AUTHOR'S MIND: THE WIFE
Behold, how fair of eye, and mild of mien,
Walks forth of marriage yonder gentle
queen:
What chaste sobriety whene’er she
speaks,
What glad content sits smiling on her
cheeks,
What plans of goodness in that bosom glow,
What prudent care is throned upon her
brow,
What tender truth in all she does or says,
What pleasantness and peace in all her
ways!
For ever blooming on that cheerful face
Home’s best affections grow divine
in grace;
Her eyes are ray’d with love, serene
and bright;
Charity wreathes her lips with smiles
of light;
Her kindly voice hath music in its notes;
And heav’n’s own atmosphere
around her floats!
Thus, wife-like, for better or worse,
is the above portrait charmant consigned to
the dingy digits of an unidistinguishing printer’s-devil;
so doth Caesar’s dust come to stop a bung-hole.
One morsel more, about children, blessed children,
and for this bout I shall have tilted sufficiently
in the Muses’ court; or, if it must be so said,
unhandsome critic, stilted to satiety in false heroics:
stay not false; judge me, my heart.
Suppose then an imaginary parent thus to speak about
his