The Prayer Seeker

Along tho aisle whero prayer was made A woman all in black arrayad, Close-veiled, between the kneeling host, Witli gliding motion of a ghost, Passed to the desk and laid thereon A scroll, which bore these words aloue - Pray for me ! Back from the place of worshipping She glided like a guilty thing ; The rustle of her draperies stirred By hurrying feet alone was heard ; While, full of awe, the preacher read, As out into the dark she sped ; Pray for me ! Back to the night from whence she came, To unimagined grief and shame ! Across the threshold of that door None knew the burden that she bore ; Alone she left the written scroll, The legend of the troubled soul - Pray for me ! Glido on, poor ghost of v.'oe or sin ! Thou leav'st a common need within, Each bears liko thee, some nameless weight, Some misery inarticulate, Some secret sin, some shrouded dread, Some household sorrow, all unsaid, Pray for us ! Pass on ! the type of all thou art, Sad witness to the commou heart ! With face in veil and seal on lip, In ïnute and strange companionship, Like thee we wander to and iro, Dumbly iinploring as we go: Pray for us ! Ah, who shall pray, since he who pleads Our want perhauce hath greater need'r1 Yet they who make their loss the gain Of others shall not ask in vain, And Heaven bends low to hear their prayor Of love from Ups of solf-despair : Pray for us ! In vain remorse and fear and hate Beat with bruised hands against a fate, Whose walls of iron only move, And open to the touch of love, He only feels his burdens fall Who, taught by suffermg, pities all. Pray for us ! He prayeth the best who leaves unguessed The mystery of another's breast, Why cheeks grow pale, why eyes o'erflow, Or heads are white, thou need'st not know. Enough to note by many a sign That every heart hath needs like thinc. Pray for us !