Original Poetry.

Hawke's Bay Weekly Times, Volume 1, Issue 42, 14 October 1867, Page 255

Original Poetry.

CHARADE. fIr.HE Brethren of St. Anthony had watched since xv break of day Within the lonely chamber wnere their dying Abbot lay, And round his bed all solemnly they knelt in fer- '; ' vent prayer; , :, ': j.i Bat a cloud was on the sick man’s brow, my first was absent there. It was my second led him on to sin so heavily, And with that sin upon his soul in peace he could not diet “Joseph! Father Joseph! I would speak with thee alone; ” And silently as shadows pass the other monks are gone. They never knew the words he poured in his confessor’s ear, And happier far, for they were words they would have grieved to hear; . So holy, righteous, had he seemed, so well beloved by all, It would have proved their surest grief had they but known his fall. * Again the monks are summoned, and he turned upon his bed, Lest the marks of that last agony should on his brow he read; He uttered hut one word—that one word was my whole, — And. with it passed away his deeply erring soul.

Within twelve months from that sad day The convent richer grew, But whence the wealth arrived, hut one ■ Of all those Brethren knew.

Answers are requested.