46 The Rice Institute Pamphlet
And the barn’s brown length, and the cattle-yard
And the white horns tossing above the wall.
The details are plain and unelaborated: the poplars are
merely “tall,” the barn just “brown,” and the cattle are de-
picted only by “white horns.” A series of “ands” connects
one detail to the next in almost childlike fashion.17 Then, as
if pausing in this trip with the reader, Whittier notes that,
although a year has passed, everything is still the same;
And the same rose blows, and the same sun glows,
And the same brook sings of a year ago.
The reiteration of the adjective “same” and the definiteness
and confidence of the repeated “there is” intensify the mood
of assurance as the poet recalls how carefully he had prepared
for his former visit. Then excitedly, reliving that past mo-
ment, he exclaims, “I can see it all now . . . just the same”;
and by repeating the description of the opening stanzas, the
poet emphasizes the “sameness” of the scene. Yet, the mood
shifts when the poet, coming closer to the house, almost
casually notes: “Nothing changed but the hives of bees.”
This one small detail breaks the continuity and with increas-
ing tension he hears the drearily singing chore girl and sees
the ominous shreds of black on the hives. The warm June sun
of an earlier stanza now chills like snow as the eventual dis-
covery is foreshadowed. Still, the poet refuses to abandon
his former confidence and assumes that Mary’s grandfather
must be dead. Suddenly, he sees the old man sitting on the
porch and is now close enough to understand the song of
the chore girl:
“Stay at home, pretty bees, fly not hence!
Mistress Mary is dead and gone!”
Whittier concludes the poem with the surprise revelation of
her death and allows the reader’s imagination to supply the