THE WORKING WOMAN.

Waikato Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2137, 20 March 1886, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE WORKING WOMAN.

—Annie M. Libby.

With a whip of many stinging strands, Need drove her to the mart, Where Toil's rude chains enslaved her hands, But could not bind her heart. When the winds outside her casement called As they went roaming by, The prison walls her life enthralled, She looked on with a sigh. Yet flowers of word and deed she wreathod About the bonds she wore, Forgot *t times what air she breathed, What heavy weights she bore. When thickening dust filled all the streets, And choked the blinded day, Her fancy fled when wild seas beat; She felt the cool, salt spray, flung by the billows' fluttering hands Across the weary space That held her from the shining sands Drop kisses on her face. Dark, flower-lit woods she wandered through, She heard the wild bird sing, In sunny haunts where violets blue Look up to greet the spring. The city's harsh and deafening sounds Unheeded round her fell, When thought o'erstopped the narrow bounds Of Labour's citadel. With a Woman's tender loving guile, She bid her captive mark, Covered her bruises with a smile, And s<tng songs in the dark. O world, still slumbering, while Wrong reigns, Thou art the King, arise ! Release her from her slavish chains, The Princess in disguise. Her wanderings long from realm and crown Leave desolate thy throne; Receive thy Queen, to her bow down, And bring her to her own.