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| THE COLD winds swept the mountain’s height, | |
| And pathless was the dreary wild, | |
| And mid the cheerless hours of night | |
| A mother wandered with her child: | |
| As through the drifting snow she pressed, | 5 |
| The babe was sleeping on her breast. | |
| |
| And colder still the winds did blow, | |
| And darker hours of night came on, | |
| And deeper grew the drifting snow: | |
| Her limbs were chilled, her strength was gone. | 10 |
| “O God!” she cried in accents wild, | |
| “If I must perish, save my child!” | |
| |
| She stripped her mantle from her breast, | |
| And bared her bosom to the storm, | |
| And round the child she wrapped the vest, | 15 |
| And smiled to think her babe was warm. | |
| With one cold kiss, one tear she shed, | |
| And sunk upon her snowy bed. | |
| |
| At dawn a traveller passed by, | |
| And saw her ’neath a snowy veil; | 20 |
| The frost of death was in her eye, | |
| Her cheek was cold and hard and pale. | |
| He moved the robe from off the child,— | |
| The babe looked up and sweetly smiled! | |
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