Who were these young ladies, and what was the cause of their deaths? And the owner of this book, Robector(?) Perry, were you given this while upon a bed of recovery from the Philippine-American War?
Questions that still go uncovered. My friend Carmelo Echevarria did some research and thinks the girls lived in Cedar Key and Jacksonville. I am not certain. Again, I enlist any help from genealogy buffs in helping to find the two sisters who died so young, only four days apart.
From the book:
Life is a leaf of paper white
Whereon each one of us may write
His word or two, and then comes night.
"Lo! time and space enough," we cry,
"To write an epic!" so we try
Our nibs upon the edge, and die.
Gently begin! though thou have time
But for a line, be that sublime,---
Not failure, but low aim, is crime.
J.R.Lowell
Near this Place
by John Clare
Yesterday word arrived of your long time passing,
Your sister just four days before you passing on.
I wish there was something we could have done,
How did we know your lives were so short lasting?
Twenty-one and eighteen were your young years,
Called on before the wedding gowns were worn.
We would have come before your final morning,
But so far was the journey and many the tears.
No time to drink from the deep wells of love!
Know the blushing rush springing from inside.
To one another your sweetest secrets confide,
Sharing between you things not spoken of.
Or was it the fevered brow that took you from us?
Two sisters confined to beds just feet apart?
Sharing their last longings with weakening hearts,
Had we but known we would have come.
A century from now will they turn the old page,
To discover the yellow clipping tucked away?
Will they wonder who dwelt in Near This Place?
And why you passed at such a tender age?
On this day two bouquets for the sisters gone
Forgotten until the page was opened again
Anna and Jessie at last these flowers we send
Someday we too shall come, the story known.
