Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By Frances SargentOsgood

276 Calumny

A WHISPER woke the air,

A soft, light tone, and low,

Yet barbed with shame and woe.

Ah! might it only perish there,

Nor farther go!

But no! a quick and eager ear

Caught up the little, meaning sound;

Another voice has breathed it clear;

And so it wandered round

From ear to lip, from lip to ear,

Until it reached a gentle heart

That throbbed from all the world apart

And that—it broke!

It was the only heart it found,—

The only heart ’t was meant to find,

When first its accents woke.

It reached that gentle heart at last,

And that—it broke!