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| AY, Oliver! I was but seven, and he was eleven; | |
| He looked at me pouting and rosy. I blushed where I stood. | |
| They had told us to play in the orchard (and I only seven! | |
| A small guest at the farm); but he said ‘Oh, a girl was no good!’ | |
| So he whistled and went, he went over the stile to the wood. | 5 |
| It was sad, it was sorrowful! Only a girl—only seven! | |
| At home in the dark London smoke I had not found it out. | |
| The pear-trees looked on in their white, and blue birds flash’d about, | |
| And they too were angry as Oliver. Were they eleven? | |
| I thought so. Yes, every one else was eleven—eleven! | 10 |
| |
| So Oliver went, but the cowslips were tall at my feet, | |
| And all the white orchard with fast-falling blossom was litter’d; | |
| And under and over the branches those little birds twitter’d, | |
| While hanging head downwards they scolded because I was seven. | |
| A pity. A very great pity. One should be eleven. | 15 |
| But soon I was happy, the smell of the world was so sweet, | |
| And I saw a round hole in an apple-tree rosy and old. | |
| Then I knew! for I peeped, and I felt it was right they should scold! | |
| Eggs small and eggs many. For gladness I broke into laughter; | |
| And then some one else—oh, how softly!—came after, came after | 20 |
| With laughter—with laughter came after. | |
| |
| And no one was near us to utter that sweet mocking call, | |
| That soon very tired sank low with a mystical fall. | |
| But this was the country—perhaps it was close under heaven; | |
| Oh, nothing so likely; the voice might have come from it even. | 25 |
| I knew about heaven. But this was the country, of this | |
| Light, blossom, and piping, and flashing of wings not at all. | |
| Not at all. No. But one little bird was an easy forgiver: | |
| She peeped, she drew near as I moved from her domicile small, | |
| Then flashed down her hole like a dart—like a dart from the quiver. | 30 |
| And I waded atween the long grasses and felt it was bliss. | |
| |
| —So this was the country; clear dazzle of azure and shiver | |
| And whisper of leaves, and a humming all over the tall | |
| White branches, a humming of bees. And I came to the wall— | |
| A little low wall—and looked over, and there was the river, | 35 |
| The lane that led on to the village, and then the sweet river | |
| Clear shining and slow, she had far far to go from her snow; | |
| But each rush gleamed a sword in the sunlight to guard her long flow, | |
| And she murmur’d, methought, with a speech very soft—very low. | |
| ‘The ways will be long, but the days will be long,’ quoth the river, | 40 |
| ‘To me a long liver, long, long!’ quoth the river—the river. | |
| |
| I dreamed of the country that night, of the orchard, the sky, | |
| The voice that had mocked coming after and over and under. | |
| But at last—in a day or two namely—Eleven and I | |
| Were very fast friends, and to him I confided the wonder. | 45 |
| He said that was Echo. ‘Was Echo a wise kind of bee | |
| That had learned how to laugh: could it laugh in one’s ear and then fly | |
| And laugh again yonder?’ ‘No; Echo’—he whispered it low—— | |
| ‘Was a woman, they said, but a woman whom no one could see | |
| And no one could find; and he did not believe it, not he, | 50 |
| But he could not get near for the river that held us asunder. | |
| Yet I that had money—a shilling, a whole silver shilling— | |
| |
| We might cross if I thought I would spend it.’ ‘Oh yes, I was willing’— | |
| And we ran hand in hand, we ran down to the ferry, the ferry, | |
| And we heard how she mocked at the folk with a voice clear and merry | 55 |
| When they called for the ferry; but oh! she was very—was very | |
| Swift-footed. She spoke and was gone; and when Oliver cried, | |
| ‘Hie over! hie over! you man of the ferry—the ferry!’ | |
| By the still water’s side she was heard far and wide—she replied | |
| And she mocked in her voice sweet and merry, ‘You man of the ferry, | 60 |
| You man of—you man of the ferry!’ | |
| |
| ‘Hie over!’ he shouted. The ferryman came at his calling, | |
| Across the clear reed-bordered river he ferried us fast;— | |
| Such a chase! Hand in hand, foot to foot, we ran on; it surpass’d | |
| All measure her doubling—so close, then so far away falling, | 65 |
| Then gone, and no more. Oh! to see her but once unaware, | |
| And the mouth that had mocked, but we might not (yet sure she was there!), | |
| Nor behold her wild eyes and her mystical countenance fair. | |
| |
| We sought in the wood, and we found the wood-wren in her stead; | |
| In the field, and we found but the cuckoo that talked overhead; | 70 |
| By the brook, and we found the reed-sparrow deep-nested, in brown— | |
| Not Echo, fair Echo! for Echo, sweet Echo! was flown. | |
| |
| So we came to the place where the dead people wait till God call. | |
| The church was among them, grey moss over roof, over wall. | |
| Very silent, so low. And we stood on a green grassy mound | 75 |
| And looked in at a window, for Echo, perhaps, in her round | |
| Might have come in to hide there. But no; every oak-carven seat | |
| Was empty. We saw the great Bible—old, old, very old, | |
| And the parson’s great Prayer-book beside it; we heard the slow beat | |
| Of the pendulum swing in the tower; we saw the clear gold | 80 |
| Of a sunbeam float down the aisle and then waver and play | |
| On the low chancel step and the railing, and Oliver said, | |
| ‘Look, Katie! look, Katie! when Lettice came here to be wed | |
| She stood where that sunbeam drops down, and all white was her gown; | |
| And she stepped upon flowers they strew’d for her.’ Then quoth small Seven: | 85 |
| ‘Shall I wear a white gown and have flowers to walk upon ever?’ | |
| All doubtful: ‘It takes a long time to grow up,’ quoth Eleven; | |
| ‘You’re so little, you know, and the church is so old, it can never | |
| Last on till you’re tall.’ And in whispers—because it was old | |
| And holy, and fraught with strange meaning, half felt, but not told, | 90 |
| Full of old parsons’ prayers, who were dead, of old days, of old folk, | |
| Neither heard nor beheld, but about us, in whispers we spoke. | |
| Then we went from it softly and ran hand in hand to the strand, | |
| While bleating of flocks and birds piping made sweeter the land. | |
| And Echo came back e’en as Oliver drew to the ferry, | 95 |
| ‘O Katie!’ ‘O Katie!’ ‘Come on, then!’ ‘Come on, then!’ ‘For, see, | |
| The round sun, all red, lying low by the tree’—‘by the tree.’ | |
| ‘By the tree.’ Ay, she mocked him again, with her voice sweet and merry: | |
| ‘Hie over!’ ‘Hie over!’ ‘You man of the ferry’—‘the ferry.’ | |
| |
| ‘You man of the ferry— | 100 |
| You man of—you man of—the ferry.’ | |
| |
| Ay, here—it was here that we woke her, the Echo of old; | |
| All life of that day seems an echo, and many times told. | |
| Shall I cross by the ferry to-morrow, and come in my white | |
| To that little low church? and will Oliver meet me anon? | 105 |
| Will it all seem an echo from childhood pass’d over—pass’d on? | |
| Will the grave parson bless us? Hark, hark! in the dim failing light | |
| I hear her! As then the child’s voice clear and high, sweet and merry | |
| Now she mocks the man’s tone with ‘Hie over! Hie over the ferry!’ | |
| ‘And Katie.’ ‘And Katie.’ ‘Art out with the glow-worms to-night, | 110 |
| My Katie?’ ‘My Katie!’ For gladness I break into laughter | |
| And tears. Then it all comes again as from far-away years; | |
| Again, some one else—oh, how softly! with laughter comes after, | |
| Comes after—with laughter comes after. | |
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