LE CONVOI D'UNE PAUVRE FILLE.
When poor Louise died in her fifteenth year,
A wood-flower killed by the wind and the rain,
No numerous cortège followed her bier,
A priest and a boy composed all the train.
From time to time the acolyte replied
To the prayers with responses soft and low.
Louise was friendless, and nobody cried,
And Louise was poor, so none made a show.
A simple cross of box, an old, old pall,
This was the pomp around her funeral bed;
And when the sexton bore her past the hall
Unto the lowly dwellings of the dead,
Hardly the village from the bell could learn
Its sweetest virgin had retired from earth.
So died she humble.—By the hills where fern
Abundant grew, 'neath trees of ample girth,
By balmy vales and corn-fields rich and green,
And through the broom, at dawn of glorious day
The convoy winded. April, like a queen,
In all her splendour, made a proud display
And on the virgin bier in tenderness
Snowed down her flowers, and bathed it with her tears;
