Canice hies him home by the shine of the sun.
What to-day of those pallid wraiths of the night?
What of the woeful notes that had wailed and fled?
"Maria, ora pro illis!" Canice said.




"ALL THE LITTLE SIGHING SOULS"


MARY SHEPHERDESS: MARJORIE L.C. PICKTHALL

When the heron's in the high wood and the last long furrow's sown
With the herded cloud before her and her sea-sweet raiment blown
Comes Mary, Mary Shepherdess, a-seeking for her own.

Saint James he calls the righteous folk, Saint John he calls the kind,
Saint Peter seeks the valiant men all to loose or bind,
But Mary seeks the little souls that are so hard to find.

All the little sighing souls born of dust's despair,
They who fed on bitter bread when the world was bare,
Frighted of the glory gates and the starry stair.

All about the windy down, housing in the ling,
Underneath the alder-bough linnet-light they cling,
Frighted of the shining house where the martyrs sing.

Crying in the ivy-bloom, fingering at the pane,