AND BY ADALINE TALCOTT EMERSON PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY BRESS CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS MDCCCXCIV COPYRIGHT 1894 BY AD ALINE TALCOTT EMERSON TO MY BLESSED HUSBAND, THE INSPIRATION OF MY LIFE, AND THE DEAR CHILDREN, THE FRUIT OF OUR LOVE, I DEDICATE THIS VOLUME, THE OUTCOME OF MANY EXPERIENCES, THE RIPENING THOUGHT OF MANY YEARS. A FORE-WORD AND FOR-WORD. POETRY is, among other things, the universal ex pression of individual emotion. This gives verse its importance and its audacity There is a sense in which each essay in verse challenges all the past, and enters the list with the great of all time. But there comes a season, both early and late, in all tongues, when verse is common to alL Once early, when speech is still fluid, in the days of the ballad, and once late, as in our own day, when the field of verse is once more open to all, because the seeds of rhyme have been sown in every souL At such a time in each tongue, verse becomes the frequent resource of per 4 A FORE-WORD AND FOR-WORD. sonal emotion, in utterance, strictly personal, and owing its interest to personal relations. Such verse deserves record and revelation, not for the outer world, but for those by whom it was prompted and to whom it was addressed. Too often such volumes are given the hard stress of the market, the critics table, and by sad fate at length reach the book-stall Among the lesser pathetics of letters, there is perhaps none which so touches a heart to which books live, as the sight of the slender volume which once held the record of a heart and the hope of fame, among the culls of the stalL But this is a sign, not that such verse, which has its own home charm, should not reach print, but proof rather that it should keep in print to the silent and sequestered path where only friends can greet its page. In this spirit, and to this end, the verse which succeeds has been given the form in which it A FORE-WORD AND POR-WORD. 5 appears, to satisfy and gratify the dear desire of friends. To them, this rede of love tells of a life dear in all its relations, the dearer for what is said and what is left unsaid in these pages. The best of each heart is never said, and has its own hid, still voice. But it is well when a life has left the print of love on every heart its hand has touched, that its utterances should be set forth, so love may know what love has said. To love, this verse will be plain. To those with out the circle of this lifes love, these loves of its life neither challenge criticism nor ask for atten tion. They tell in the common speech of verse the daily love and life and thought which well in a life led in the happy activity of an American woman, wife, mother, friend, Christian, and citizen. Each of these relatioiis has its duty, and the fit hour of each duty strikes its lyric note in every heart, some silent, some speaking, as does A FORE-WORD AND FOR-WORD. this verse to a special circle, and some, now and then one in a century, to the world. In the Just weight of worth, the last does not still the second. One Sings to the wide world, and she to her nest In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best TALCOTT WILLIAMS, PHILADELPHIA, September the Seventh, 1S94-. A TABLE OF THE CONTENTS OF LOVE-BOUND LOVE-BOUND, II TO MY LOVE, 14 THE OFFICE, 1 6 LOVES DREAM, 17 BONDAGE, 2O COUNT THE WEEKS BY SUNDAYS, 23 SUNSHINE ON THE CHAMBER CEILING, 2J SUMMER CLOUDS, 30 SNOW-FLAKES, 31 THE SONG OF THE OCEAN, 34 ANSWER TO H. H. S QUESTION, 38 THE ENGADINE VILLAGES, 4 SMOKE OF THE CITY, 42 THE THUNDER, 44 AUTUMN, 45 NOVEMBER, 46 TO-MORROW, 47 PICTURES, 49 THE OCEANS LULLABY, 51 SUNRISE ON LAKE SUPERIOR, 53 THE NIGHT WINDS, 55 STORM IN CALIFORNIA, 58 COMING SNOW-STORM, 6l SEA-SHELLS, 63 OHO YE WINDS, 65 MOTHERHOOD, 69 THE FIRST BABY, 72 HELEN, 74 CHILDHOOD PASSING, 79 INTO YOUTH, 8l TO A YOUNG CHILD, 83 COUNT LIFE BY DEEDS, 85 FRIENDSHIP, 87 REVERIES, 88 SAVED, 89 REMEMBRANCE, 92 DREAMS, 94 A FRAGMENT, 95 1776-1876, 99 JAMES A. GARFIELD, IO2 --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.