Author Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1869 Excerpt:... A BLIND MAN'S LOVE. BY KOBERT BUCHANAN. IHEARD the humming of the streets for ever, As in a sleep--the people came and went Around my seat unseen, like shapes that pas3 Unseen, but heard, in haunted lands; and oft Light laughter and a motion close around me, And gentle speech, disturb'd me. What to me Was beauteous interchange of day and night--The coming and the going of the sun, Gathering grayness, and the rising moon--And what to me was light of sun or stars, Since light and darkness came and went around, TJnmark'd by weary eyes that could not see, That had not seen the day for seven years; Only, when sunlight daily went away, My world grew stiller, colder--that was all. And I was hard and dull at twenty-three, Dull with my grief, hard to the core from dwelling, Sleeping or waking, in the dark so long; One, and one pleasure only had the power to stir And trouble all my soul, until it felt A sunshine of its own. A light foot-fall, A tender greeting, fluttering of a dress, A touch as soft as is a rose's leaf, That flutters to the grass and makes no sound. These were the intimations of a world Beyond my sorrow, the admonishings Which sweeten'd that dull gloom wherein I dwelt. O, sweeter far than any beauteous thing The eye could look upon, one little name, One little soft sweet name, I murmur'd o'er, Softly, to keep my heart still: ah! the name, The little living name I murmur'd o'er, And saw in golden letters in the dark! May! May! May! May!--it brought me back the time When I could see the roses and the leaves, The silver splash of water, the blue hills Netted in sunny weather! May! May! May! I murmur'd it for ever to my heart, For joy, for joy of it!... Sweeter than all To sit within my shadow-land, and hear A Blind Man's Love. That one voice singing, wh...