To shame and ruin, beggary and death.
But judgment came, and overshadowed us;
And one quick bolt shot from the awful cloud
Severed the tie that bound two worthless lives.
What God hath joined together, God may part:--
Grace, have you thought of that?

_Grace_.

You scare me, Mary!
Nay! Do not turn on me with such a look!
Its dread suggestion gives my heart a pang
That stops its painful beating.

_Mary_.

Let it pass!
One morn we woke with the first flush of light,
Our windows jarring with the cannonade
That ushered in the nation's festal day.
The village streets were full of men and boys,
And resonant with rattling mimicry
Of the black-throated monsters on the hill,--
A crashing, crepitating war of fire,--
And as we listened to the fitful feud,
Dull detonations came from far away,
Pulsing along the fretted atmosphere,
To tell that in the ruder villages
The day had noisy greeting, as in ours.