HILLS OF ASHAM.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume I, Issue 66, 27 November 1880, Page 2 (Supplement)

HILLS OF ASHAM.

> Lies the Rlare of a blood-red farnaoe the August sun went down - Over the hills of Asham, with the drouth's > long-wasting brown,' And, shorn of the grace of / twilight, at one i step plunged the night Into the purple vapour that had drank the day's iast light. Dread Jell with* the dark on ABham, where teachings, mocked at fiißt, The slow and oruel summer into ripe belief 1 had nursed ; < [ The tramp of judgment to-morrow was to thrill with the solemn sound 1 The living amid their labours, the dead io 1 their graves ptolonnd ! , A»d bo, as the right raabM ;dawnmid> iv hie door eat Jasper Lee, And borne on v itsj lucid bosom, beheld , eternity. . " 'Tis thus," to himself he muttered, " that ■ the earth her Judge should meet, : With the olouds of heaven upgathered, to ; make a path for His feet." 1 Bat the oa)m on bis musing forehead broke into an' angry flame, "When Mb "lair-haired daughter Mice o'ei the 1 threshold faltering came. 1 Was it Benben Moore beside her— her lover of long ago, ' At his stern command relinquished— the i son of his bitter foe ? . From his chair old Jaeper started. "What \ brings you here ?" he cried. "Be 'off, ere my patience fails me 1 ' And you, girl, there at Mb side— 1 Do you stand ia the great doom's shadow, forgetful, undismayed? There's a curse denounced upon children 1 who have sohemed and disobeyed !" " Oh ! father, be kind," said iAlioe. "If it i be indeed aa you say, And this night bo black and awful, presage the last dread day, Shall we carry oar pride and passions alive to the Jndg&'s bflJf? Is there anything noforgiven where the saints and the angels are ? •• Oh ! father, dear father, tell me that tonight the old grudge dies !" She clung to his. arm, and pleaded with her sweet, dead mother's eyes. But the heart of Jasper was, hardened ; he pnt her roughly by. , „ There's a just and right resentment that never was meant to die ( " His father cheated me basely— l swear it Moreover I know He slandered me basely to hide it. What if it were years ago? • A wrong iB a wrong for ever." Then quietly Eeuben. said, . .. . v 1(J j «I come from him with a message for you, air— an& ht> is de'»a. v fr. " Does a penitent God has pardoned remain the same in your eyes'? Untouched, can you hear him speaking from the far-off grave where he ließ ? ! He bade me entreat you to measure, by your hope of a final graoe,. His sin, as your conscience should answer, \ what you would have done in his place. " 1 The face of Jasper was troubled, and tbrioe bis bard lips stixrad ' / To thrust baok the dead, man's challenge; * but ere he could choose a word , . ; The wrath of, the brooding tempest a readier voice had found,. ! And the mighty heart of the darkness was cloven with flame and sound. Mattering and menacing harshly, the thunder jarred to rest In ft deep, dead hollow of^eilenae, low down in the shrouded west. ; < The night seemed listening breathless ; and Jasper his grey head bent, < As if feared to be dazzled by the light of the Loxd'a descent..: i At last, like one awakened from the spell of a dreamful sleep, , ; He faced his daughter and Eeuben, with utterance broken and deep :, * ' "Be ye two witnesses for me, I take baok the words I said! ... The warning of God is between me and the ■ sin of him who is dead.' ,, "Out 01. the cloud He has spoken; in yon .brief moment's, space, . - - j As plain as the lighted hill-Bides, I looked; . .my aeal in the face ; - .- - - ,- And the dead years rose to judge it, as it > . stood in its stains alone. • . > • ' I have done with the deeds of othera, I go to plead for my own." The hand of Rtuben a moment he held in a pf 6I4TUQ StrOPK*— ' 4 i ' •> 9*WP flflJMHfid io long | ; '

He turned from the porch ia silence, and, under a grey old oak, They saw him stand like a shadow, as the wind with a wail outbroke, And the crash of the thunder, bursting in a wide, bine, blinding track ! "Father, oh, father 1" cried AUo«,, "com© out of the storm — come back I" Bab only an echo answered, for this lips of Jasoer were mute <'" With the lightning's seal on his forehead, he lay at the sifted oak's foot. - - v The morrow dawned upon Aaham in" a heaven o{ pearl and blue, And the heart of. the hills vibrated, as the great sun smothe it through ; i The brooks in their ohanneli quivered, the little leavu ltnghed their fill, | And the sins and sorrows of mortals' were ripening for judgment still. j —Jean BtojUlA in the Atlantic, i