A little graver than her wont,
  Because her words had fretted me;
Not warbling quite her merriest tune
    Bird-like from tree to tree.

I chose a book to read and dream: 
  Yet half the while with furtive eyes 210
Marked how she made her choice of flowers
    Intuitively wise,

And ranged them with instinctive taste
  Which all my books had failed to teach;
Fresh rose herself, and daintier
    Than blossom of the peach.

By birthright higher than myself,
  Tho’ nestling of the self-same nest: 
No fault of hers, no fault of mine,
    But stubborn to digest. 220

I watched her, till my book unmarked
  Slid noiseless to the velvet floor;
Till all the opulent summer-world
    Looked poorer than before.

Just then her busy fingers ceased,
  Her fluttered colour went and came;
I knew whose step was on the walk,
    Whose voice would name her name.

* * * * * * *

Well, twenty years have passed since then: 
  My sister now, a stately wife 230
Still fair, looks back in peace and sees
    The longer half of life—­

The longer half of prosperous life,
  With little grief, or fear, or fret: 
She loved, and, loving long ago,
    Is loved and loving yet.

A husband honourable, brave,
  Is her main wealth in all the world: 
And next to him one like herself,
    One daughter golden-curled; 240

Fair image of her own fair youth,
  As beautiful and as serene,
With almost such another love
    As her own love has been.

Yet, tho’ of world-wide charity,
  And in her home most tender dove,
Her treasure and her heart are stored
    In the home-land of love: 

She thrives, God’s blessed husbandry;
  She like a vine is full of fruit; 250
Her passion-flower climbs up toward heaven
    Tho’ earth still binds its root.

I sit and watch my sister’s face: 
  How little altered since the hours
When she, a kind, light-hearted girl,
    Gathered her garden flowers;

Her song just mellowed by regret
  For having teased me with her talk;
Then all-forgetful as she heard
    One step upon the walk. 260

While I?  I sat alone and watched
  My lot in life, to live alone,
In mine own world of interests,
    Much felt but little shown.

Not to be first:  how hard to learn
  That lifelong lesson of the past;
Line graven on line and stroke on stroke;
    But, thank God, learned at last.

So now in patience I possess
  My soul year after tedious year, 270
Content to take the lowest place,
    The place assigned me here.