A story based on Whittier’s beautiful poem, “Maud Muller,” in which the pretty pastoral atmosphere is preserved, and the spirit that moved the great poet finds expression again in a simple, sweet story. “Maud Muller, on a summer’s day, raked the meadow, sweet with hay.” Maud Muller, beautiful and pure, a model of the rugged New England lass of Whittier’s day, works with her brothers in, the hayfield, singing blithely as she rakes into little windrows the sweet-smelling, new-mown hay. Nothing to allure her from the pure-hearted love of the green meadows, she labors diligently for her father, unambitious and satisfied with her lot in life. While at her work a horseman rides into view. He is the Judge, a handsome and courtly gentleman, and a wealthy aristocrat in the village. He is attracted by Maud’s rustic beauty and draws rein as he approaches her to pass the time of day. Their eyes meet and the message they bear is only too evident: “I love you.” Yet, he merely asks for a drink of water, which the girl brings him from the spring nearby. Then the Judge, bidding her good-bye, mounts his horse and rides away, the girl looks after him, her heart beating fast. So different is he from the rough men of her acquaintance, so kindly courteous, so straight and handsome, that: “The sweet song died and a vague unrest, and a nameless longing filled her breast.” It is her first desire for something better than her lot, a peep into the other side of life. A newborn ambition conjures up vague dreams of “stately halls” and we hear her murmur, “Ah me! That I the Judge’s wife might be!” On the other hand the Judge, though he feels he could give all his wealth to work in the hayfield with Maud Muller, realizes the social gulf which separates them. So “He wedded a wife of richest dower who lived for fashion as he for power.” “She married a man, unlearned and poor, and many children played around their door.” Maud Muller is forced into an unhappy union by a scheming and avaricious mother. She is married to a rough, boorish country fellow, who spends most of their little earnings over the bar of the village tavern. Striving hard to clothe and feed the many hungry little urchins. Maud finds happiness in sweet dreams of the past and of “what might have been” had the Judge but spoken the word. “Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls stretched away into stately halls. And for him who sat by the chimney log, dozing and grumbling o’er pipe and mug, a manly form at her side she saw and joy was duty and love was law.” The drunkard husband goes from bad to worse. Finally, under the influence of liquor he commits a serious crime and is haled before the Judge. He is tried by the Judge, who, when he hears Maud’s pitiful story, is shocked and horrified and removes the wicked husband. When she is left a poor, struggling widow, the Judge is able to befriend her. Ever a kind and indulgent husband to his ambitious wife, the Judge sighs and lives in dreams of the past, of the sweet-faced Maud in the hayfield, and the message of love her eyes spoke when he foolishly turned away, “find pity them both! and pity us all, who vainly the dreams of youth recall. For the saddest words of tongue or pen. The saddest are these: ‘It might have been!’”