Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Africa: Vol. XXIV. 1876–79.
Moses on the Nile
By James Grahame (1765–1811)S
Closed in a bulrush-ark the babe is left,—
Left by a mother’s hand. His sister waits
Far off; and pale, ’tween hope and fear, beholds
The royal maid, surrounded by her train,
Approach the river-bank; approach the spot
Where sleeps the innocent. She sees them stoop
With meeting plumes: the rushy lid is oped,
And wakes the infant, smiling in his tears,—
As when along a little mountain lake
The summer south-wind breathes a gentle sigh,
And parts the reeds, unveiling, as they bend,
A water-lily floating on the wave.