http://www.Gutenberg.us - Project Gutenberg Consortia Center Collection, a member of the World eBook Library, bringing the world's eBook collections together.

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or full complete details are online at: http://gutenberg.net/license.

Here are 3 of the more major items to consider:

1. The eBooks on the PG sites are not 100% public domain, some of them are copyrighted and used by permission and thus you may charge for redistribution only via direct permission from the copyright holders.
2. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark [TM]. For any other purpose than to redistribute eBooks containing the entire Project Gutenberg file free of charge and with the headers intact, permission is required.
3. The public domain status is per U.S. copyright law. This eBook is from the Project Gutenberg Consortium Center of the United States.

The mission of the Project Gutenberg Consortia Center is to provide a similar framework for the collection of eBook collections as does Project Gutenberg for single eBooks, operating under the practices, and general guidelines of Project Gutenberg. The major additional function of Project Gutenberg Consortia Center is to manage the addition of large collections of eBooks from other eBook creation and collection centers around the world.

---

 

The Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley

Volume 1

October, 1996  [eBook #691]


PGCC Collection eBook: Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley
*eBook File: 01jwr10.htm or 01jwr10.pdf

Corrected EDITIONS, 01jwr11.htm.
Separate source VERSION, 01jwr10a.htm.




Ver.04.29.93*





Memorial Edition
The Complete Works of
James Whitcomb Riley
IN TEN VOLUMES
Including Poems and Prose Sketches, many
of which have not heretofore been
published; an authentic Biography, an
elaborate Index and numerous
Illustrations in color from Paintings
by Howard Chandler Christy
and Ethyl Franklin Betts

VOLUME I

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON


COPYRIGHT
1883, 1885, 1887, 1888, 1890, 1891, 189, 1893, 1894,
1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900, 1901, 190, 1903, 1904,
1905, 1906, 1907, 1908, 1909, 1910, 1911, 191, 1913,
BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
COPYRIGHT 1916
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY


TO
THE MEMORY OF
James Whitcomb Riley
AND
IN PLEASANT RECOLLECTION OF MORE THAN THIRTY-FIVE YEARS
OF BUSINESS AND PERSONAL ASSOCIATION
THESE FINAL VOLUMES
ARE AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED

BORN:                       DIED:
October 7, 1849,            July 22, 1916
Greenfield, Ind.            Indianapolis, Ind.



CONTENTS

                                                   
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY--A SKETCH
A BACKWARD LOOK
PHILIPER FLASH 
THE SAME OLD STORY 
TO A BOY WHISTLING 
AN OLD FRIEND
WHAT SMITH KNEW ABOUT FARMING
A POET'S WOOING
MAN'S DEVOTION 
A BALLAD 
THE OLD TIMES WERE THE BEST
A SUMMER AFTERNOON 
AT LAST
FARMER WHIPPLE--BACHELOR 
MY JOLLY FRIEND'S SECRET 
THE SPEEDING OF THE KING'S SPITE 
JOB WORK 
PRIVATE THEATRICAL
PLAIN SERMONS
"TRADIN' JOE"
DOT LEEDLE BOY 
I SMOKE MY PIPE
RED RIDING HOOD
IF I KNEW WHAT POETS KNOW
AN OLD SWEETHEART OF MINE
SQUIRE HAWKINS'S STORY 
A COUNTRY PATHWAY
THE OLD GUITAR 
"FRIDAY AFTERNOON" 
"JOHNSON'S BOY"
HER BEAUTIFUL HANDS
NATURAL PERVERSITIES 
THE SILENT VICTORS 
SCRAPS 
AUGUST 
DEAD IN SIGHT OF FAME
IN THE DARK
THE IRON HORSE 
DEAD LEAVES
OVER THE EYES OF GLADNESS
ONLY A DREAM 
OUR LlTTLE GIRL
THE FUNNY LITTLE FELLOW
SONG OF THE NEW YEAR 
A LETTER TO A FRIEND 
LINES FOR AN ALBUM 
TO ANNIE 
FAME 
AN EMPTY NEST
MY FATHER'S HALLS
THE HARP OF THE MINSTREL 
HONEY DRIPPING FROM THE COMB 
JOHN WALSH 
ORLIE WILDE
THAT OTHER MAUDE MULLER
A MAN OF MANY PARTS
THE FROG
DEAD SELVES
A DREAM OF LONG AGO
CRAQUEODOOM
JUNE 
WASH LOWRY'S REMINISCENCE
THE ANCIENT PRINTERMAN 
PRIOR TO MISS BELLE'S APPEARANCE 
WHEN MOTHER COMBED MY HAIR
A WRANGDILLION 
GEORGE MULLEN'S CONFESSION
"TIRED OUT"
HARLIE 
SAY SOMETHING TO ME
LEONAINIE
A TEST OF LOVE 
FATHER WILLIAM
WHAT THE WIND SAID 
MORTON 
AN AUTUMNAL EXTRAVAGANZA 
THE ROSE 
THE MERMAN 
THE RAINY MORNING
WE ARE NOT ALWAYS GLAD WHEN WE SMILE 
A SUMMER SUNRISE 
DAS KRIST KINDEL 
AN OLD YEAR'S ADDRESS
A NEW YEAR S PLAINT
LUTHER BENSON
DREAM
WHEN EVENING SHADOWS FALL
YLLADMAR 
A FANTASY
A DREAM
DREAMER, SAY
BRYANT 
BABYHOOD 
LIBERTY
TOM VAN ARDEN



JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY--A SKETCH


On Sunday morning, October seventh, 1849, Reuben A. Riley and his
wife, Elizabeth Marine Riley, rejoiced over the birth of their
second son.  They called him James Whitcomb.  This was in a shady
little street in the shady little town of Greenfield, which is in
the county of Hancock and the state of Indiana.  The young James
found a brother and a sister waiting to greet him--John Andrew
and Martha Celestia, and afterward came Elva May--Mrs. Henry
Eitel-- Alexander Humbolt and Mary Elizabeth, who, of all, alone
lives to see this collection of her brother's poems.

James Whitcomb was a slender lad, with corn-silk hair and wide
blue eyes.  He was shy and timid, not strong physically, dreading
the cold of winter, and avoiding the rougher sports of his
playmates.  And yet he was full of the spirit of youth, a spirit
that manifested itself in the performance of many ingenious
pranks.  His every-day life was that of the average boy in the
average country town of that day, but his home influences were
exceptional.  His father, who became a captain of cavalry in the
Civil War, was a lawyer of ability and an orator of more than
local distinction.  His mother was a woman of rare strength of
character combined with deep sympathy and a clear understanding. 
Together, they made home a place to remember with thankful heart.

When James was twenty years old, the death of his mother made a
profound impression on him, an impression that has influenced
much of his verse and has remained with him always.

At an early age he was sent to school and, "then sent back
again," to use his own words.  He was restive under what he
called the "iron discipline."  A number of years ago, he spoke
of these early educational beginnings in phrases so picturesque
and so characteristic that they are quoted in full:

"My first teacher was a little old woman, rosy and roly-poly, who
looked as though she might have just come tumbling out of a fairy
story, so lovable was she and so jolly and so amiable.  She kept
school in her little Dame-Trot kind of dwelling of three rooms,
with a porch in the rear, like a bracket on the wall, which was
part of the play-ground of her 'scholars,'--for in those days
pupils were called 'scholars' by their affectionate teachers. 
Among the twelve or fifteen boys and girls who were there I
remember particularly a little lame boy, who always got the first
ride in the locust-tree swing during recess.

"This first teacher of mine was a mother to all her 'scholars,'
and in every way looked after their comfort, especially when
certain little ones grew drowsy.  I was often, with others,
carried to the sitting-room and left to slumber on a small made-
down pallet on the floor.  She would sometimes take three or four
of us together; and I recall how a playmate and I, having been
admonished into silence, grew deeply interested in watching a
spare old man who sat at a window with its shade drawn down. 
After a while we became accustomed to this odd sight and would
laugh, and talk in whispers and give imitations, as we sat in a
low sewing-chair, of the little old pendulating blind man at the
window.  Well, the old man was the gentle teacher's charge, and
for this reason, possibly, her life had become an heroic one,
caring for her helpless husband who, quietly content, waited
always at the window for his sight to come back to him.  And
doubtless it is to-day, as he sits at another casement and sees
not only his earthly friends, but all the friends of the Eternal
Home, with the smiling, loyal, loving little woman forever at his
side.

"She was the kindliest of souls even when constrained to punish
us.  After a whipping she invariably took me into the little
kitchen and gave me two great white slabs of bread cemented
together with layers of butter and jam.  As she always whipped me
with the same slender switch she used for a pointer, and cried
over every lick, you will have an idea how much punishment I
could stand.  When I was old enough to be lifted by the ears out
of my seat that office was performed by a pedagogue whom I
promised to 'whip sure, if he'd just wait till I got big enough.'
He is still waiting!

"There was but one book at school in which I found the slightest
interest:  McGuffey's old leather-bound Sixth Reader.  It was the
tallest book known, and to the boys of my size it was a matter of
eternal wonder how I could belong to 'the big class in that
reader.'  When we were to read the death of 'Little Nell,' I
would run away, for I knew it would make me cry, that the other
boys would laugh at me, and the whole thing would become
ridiculous.  I couldn't bear that.  A later teacher, Captain Lee
O. Harris, came to understand me with thorough sympathy, took
compassion on my weaknesses and encouraged me to read the best
literature.  He understood that he couldn't get numbers into my
head.  You couldn't tamp them in!  History I also disliked as a
dry thing without juice, and dates melted out of my memory as
speedily as tin-foil on a red-hot stove.  But I always was ready
to declaim and took natively to anything dramatic or theatrical. 
Captain Harris encouraged me in recitation and reading and had
ever the sweet spirit of a companion rather than the manner of an
instructor."

But if there was "only one book at school in which he found the
slightest interest," he had before that time displayed an
affection for a book--simply as such and not for any printed word
it might contain.  And this, after all, is the true book-lover's
love.  Speaking of this incident--and he liked to refer to it
as his "first literary recollection," he said:  "Long
before I was old enough to read I remember buying a book at an
old auctioneer's shop in Greenfield.  I can not imagine what
prophetic impulse took possession of me and made me forego the
ginger cakes and the candy that usually took every cent of my
youthful income.  The slender little volume must have cost all of
twenty-five cents!  It was Francis Quarles' Divine Emblems,--a
neat little affair about the size of a pocket Testament.  I
carried it around with me all day long, delighted with the very
feel of it.

" 'What have you got there, Bub?' some one would ask.  'A book,'
I would reply.  'What kind of a book?'  'Poetry-book.'  'Poetry!'
would be the amused exclamation.  'Can you read poetry?' and,
embarrassed, I'd shake my head and make my escape, but I held on
to the beloved little volume."

Every boy has an early determination--a first one--to follow some
ennobling profession, once he has come to man's estate, such as
being a policeman, or a performer on the high trapeze.  The poet
would not have been the "Peoples' Laureate," had his fairy god-
mother granted his boy-wish, but the Greenfield baker.  For to
his childish mind it "seemed the acme of delight," using again
his own happy expression, "to manufacture those snowy loaves of
bread, those delicious tarts, those toothsome bon-bons.  And then
to own them all, to keep them in store, to watch over and
guardedly exhibit.  The thought of getting money for them was
to me a sacrilege.  Sell them?  No indeed.  Eat 'em--eat 'em, by
tray loads and dray loads!  It was a great wonder to me why the
pale-faced baker in our town did not eat all his good things. 
This I determined to do when I became owner of such a grand
establishment.  Yes, sir.  I would have a glorious feast.  Maybe
I'd have Tom and Harry and perhaps little Kate and Florry in to
help us once in a while.  The thought of these play-mates as
'grown-up folks' didn't appeal to me.  I was but a child, with
wide-open eyes, a healthy appetite and a wondering mind.  That
was all.  But I have the same sweet tooth to-day, and every time
I pass a confectioner's shop, I think of the big baker of our
town, and Tom and Harry and the youngsters all."

As a child, he often went with his father to the court-house
where the lawyers and clerks playfully called him "judge Wick." 
Here as a privileged character he met and mingled with the
country folk who came to sue and be sued, and thus early the
dialect, the native speech, the quaint expressions of his "own
people" were made familiar to him, and took firm root in the
fresh soil of his young memory.  At about this time, he made his
first poetic attempt in a valentine which he gave to his mother. 
Not only did he write the verse, but he drew a sketch to
accompany it, greatly to his mother's delight, who, according to
the best authority, gave the young poet "three big cookies and
didn't spank me for two weeks.  This was my earliest literary
encouragement."

Shortly after his sixteenth birthday, young Riley turned his back
on the little schoolhouse and for a time wandered through the
different fields of art, indulging a slender talent for painting
until he thought he was destined for the brush and palette, and
then making merry with various musical instruments, the banjo,
the guitar, the violin, until finally he appeared as bass drummer
in a brass band.  "In a few weeks," he said, "I had beat myself
into the more enviable position of snare drummer.  Then I wanted
to travel with a circus, and dangle my legs before admiring
thousands over the back seat of a Golden Chariot.  In a dearth of
comic songs for the banjo and guitar, I had written two or three
myself, and the idea took possession of me that I might be a
clown, introduced as a character-song-man and the composer of my
own ballads.

"My father was thinking of something else, however, and one day I
found myself with a 'five-ought' paint brush under the eaves of
an old frame house that drank paint by the bucketful, learning to
be a painter.  Finally, I graduated as a house, sign and
ornamental painter, and for two summers traveled about with a
small company of young fellows calling ourselves 'The Graphics,'
who covered all the barns and fences in the state with
advertisements."

At another time his, young man's fancy saw attractive
possibilities in the village print-shop, and later his
ambition was diverted to acting, encouraged by the good times he
had in the theatricals of the Adelphian Society of Greenfield. 
"In my dreamy way," he afterward said, "I did a little of a
number of things fairly well--sang, played the guitar and violin,
acted, painted signs and wrote poetry.  My father did not
encourage my verse-making for he thought it too visionary, and
being a visionary himself, he believed he understood the dangers
of following the promptings of the poetic temperament.  I doubted
if anything would come of the verse-writing myself.  At this time
it is easy to picture my father, a lawyer of ability, regarding
me, nonplused, as the worst case he had ever had.  He wanted me
to do something practical, besides being ambitious for me to
follow in his footsteps, and at last persuaded me to settle down
and read law in his office.  This I really tried to do
conscientiously, but finding that political economy and
Blackstone did not rhyme and that the study of law was
unbearable, I slipped out of the office one summer afternoon,
when all out-doors called imperiously, shook the last dusty
premise from my head and was away.

"The immediate instigator of my flight was a traveling medicine
man who appealed to me for this reason:  My health was bad, very
bad,--as bad as I was.  Our doctor had advised me to travel, but
how could I travel without money?  The medicine man needed an
assistant and I plucked up courage to ask if I could join the
party and paint advertisements for him.

"I rode out of town with that glittering cavalcade without saying
good-by to any one, and though my patron was not a diplomaed
doctor, as I found out, he was a man of excellent habits, and the
whole company was made up of good straight boys, jolly chirping
vagabonds like myself.  It was delightful to bowl over the
country in that way.  I laughed all the time.  Miles and miles of
somber landscape were made bright with merry song, and when the
sun shone and all the golden summer lay spread out before us, it
was glorious just to drift on through it like a wisp, of
thistle-down, careless of how, or when, or where the wind should
anchor us. 'There's a tang of gipsy blood in my veins that pants
for the sun and the air.'

"My duty proper was the manipulation of two blackboards, swung at
the sides of the wagon during our street lecture and concert. 
These boards were alternately embellished with colored drawings
illustrative of the manifold virtues of the nostrum vended. 
Sometimes I assisted the musical olio with dialect recitations
and character sketches from the back step of the wagon.  These
selections in the main originated from incidents and experiences
along the route, and were composed on dull Sundays in lonesome
little towns where even the church bells seemed to bark at us."


On his return to Greenfield after this delightful but profitless
tour he became the local editor of his home paper and in a few
months "strangled the little thing into a change of ownership." 
The new proprietor transferred him to the literary department and
the latter, not knowing what else to put in the space allotted
him, filled it with verse.  But there was not room in his
department for all he produced, so he began, timidly, to offer
his poetic wares in foreign markets.  The editor of The
Indianapolis Mirror accepted two or three shorter verses but in
doing so suggested that in the future he try prose.  Being but an
humble beginner, Riley harkened to the advice, whereupon the
editor made a further suggestion; this time that he try poetry
again.  The Danbury (Connecticut) News, then at the height of its
humorous reputation, accepted a contribution shortly after The
Mirror episode and Mr. McGeechy, its managing editor, wrote the
young poet a graceful note of congratulation.  Commenting on
these parlous times, Riley afterward wrote, "It is strange how
little a thing sometimes makes or unmakes a fellow.  In these
dark days I should have been content with the twinkle of the
tiniest star, but even this light was withheld from me.  Just
then came the letter from McGeechy; and about the same time,
arrived my first check, a payment from Hearth and Home for a
contribution called A Destiny (now A Dreamer in A Child World). 
The letter was signed, 'Editor' and unless sent by an assistant
it must have come from Ik Marvel himself, God bless him!  I
thought my fortune made.  Almost immediately I sent off another
contribution, whereupon to my dismay came this reply:  'The
management has decided to discontinue the publication and hopes
that you will find a market for your worthy work elsewhere.' 
Then followed dark days indeed, until finally, inspired by my old
teacher and comrade, Captain Lee O. Harris, I sent some of my
poems to Longfellow, who replied in his kind and gentle manner
with the substantial encouragement for which I had long
thirsted."

In the year following, Riley formed a connection with The
Anderson (Indiana) Democrat and contributed verse and locals in
more than generous quantities.  He was happy in this work and had
begun to feel that at last he was making progress when evil
fortune knocked at his door and, conspiring with circumstances
and a friend or two, induced the young poet to devise what
afterward seemed to him the gravest of mistakes,--the Poe-poem
hoax.  He was then writing for an audience of county papers and
never dreamed that this whimsical bit of fooling would be carried
beyond such boundaries.  It was suggested by these circumstances.

He was inwardly distressed by the belief that his failure to get
the magazines to accept his verse was due to his obscurity, while
outwardly he was harassed to desperation by the junior editor of
the rival paper who jeered daily at his poetical pretensions. 
So, to prove that editors would praise from a known source what
they did not hesitate to condemn from one unknown, and to silence
his nagging contemporary, he wrote Leonainie in the style of
Poe, concocting a story, to accompany the poem, setting forth how
Poe came to write it and how all these years it had been lost to
view.  In a few words Mr. Riley related the incident and then
dismissed it.  "I studied Poe's methods.  He seemed to have a
theory, rather misty to be sure, about the use of 'm's' and 'n's'
and mellifluous vowels and sonorous words.  I remember that I was
a long time in evolving the name Leonainie, but at length the
verses were finished and ready for trial.

"A friend, the editor of The Kokomo Dispatch, undertook the
launching of the hoax in his paper; he did this with great
editorial gusto while, at the same time, I attacked the
authenticity of the poem in The Democrat.  That diverted all
possible suspicion from me.  The hoax succeeded far too well, for
what had started as a boyish prank became a literary discussion
nation-wide, and the necessary expose had to be made.  I was
appalled at the result.  The press assailed me furiously, and
even my own paper dismissed me because I had given the
'discovery' to a rival."

Two dreary and disheartening years followed this tragic event,
years in which the young poet found no present help, nor future
hope.  But over in Indianapolis, twenty miles away, happier
circumstances were shaping themselves.  Judge E. B. Martindale,
editor and proprietor of The Indianapolis Journal, had been
attracted by certain poems in various papers over the state and
at the very time that the poet was ready to confess himself
beaten, the judge wrote:  "Come over to Indianapolis and we'll
give you, a place on The Journal."  Mr. Riley went.  That was the
turning point, and though the skies were not always clear, nor
the way easy, still from that time it was ever an ascending
journey.  As soon as he was comfortably settled in his new
position, the first of the Benj. F. Johnson poems made its
appearance.  These dialect verses were introduced with editorial
comment as coming from an old Boone county farmer, and their
reception was so cordial, so enthusiastic, indeed, that the
business manager of The Journal, Mr. George C. Hitt, privately
published them in pamphlet form and sold the first edition of one
thousand copies in local bookstores and over The Journal office
counter.  This marked an epoch in the young poet's progress and
was the beginning of a friendship between him and Mr. Hitt that
has never known interruption.  This first edition of The Old
Swimmin' Hole and 'Leven More Poems has since become extremely
rare and now commands a high premium.  A second edition was
promptly issued by a local book dealer, whose successors, The
Bowen-Merrill Company--now The Bobbs-Merrill Company--have
continued, practically without interruption, to publish Riley's
work.

The call to read from the public platform had by this time become
so insistent that Riley could no longer resist it, although
modesty and shyness fought the battle for privacy.  He told
briefly and in his own inimitable fashion of these trying
experiences.  "In boyhood I had been vividly impressed with
Dickens' success in reading from his own works and dreamed that
some day I might follow his example.  At first I read at Sunday-
school entertainments and later, on special occasions such as
Memorial Days and Fourth of Julys.  At last I mustered up
sufficient courage to read in a city theater, where, despite the
conspiracy of a rainy night and a circus, I got encouragement
enough to lead me to extend my efforts.  And so, my native state
and then the country at large were called upon to bear with me
and I think I visited every sequestered spot north or south
particularly distinguished for poor railroad connections.  At
different times, I shared the program with Mark Twain, Robert J.
Burdette and George Cable, and for a while my gentlest and
cheeriest of friends, Bill Nye, joined with me and made the dusty
detested travel almost a delight.  We were constantly playing
practical jokes on each other or indulging in some mischievous
banter before the audience.  On one occasion, Mr. Nye, coming
before the foot-lights for a word of general introduction, said,
'Ladies and gentlemen, the entertainment to-night is of a dual
nature.  Mr. Riley and I will speak alternately.  First I come
out and talk until I get tired, then Mr. Riley comes out and
talks until YOU get tired!'  And thus the trips went merrily
enough at times and besides I learned to know in Bill Nye a man
blessed with as noble and heroic a heart as ever beat.  But the
making of trains, which were all in conspiracy to outwit me,
schedule or no schedule, and the rush and tyrannical pressure of
inviolable engagements, some hundred to a season and from Boston
to San Francisco, were a distress to my soul.  I am glad that's
over with.  Imagine yourself on a crowded day-long excursion;
imagine that you had to ride all the way on the platform of the
car; then imagine that you had to ride all the way back on the
same platform; and lastly, try to imagine how you would feel if
you did that every day of your life, and you will then get a
glimmer--a faint glimmer--of how one feels after traveling about
on a reading or lecturing tour.

"All this time I had been writing whenever there was any strength
left in me.  I could not resist the inclination to write.  It was
what I most enjoyed doing.  And so I wrote, laboriously ever,
more often using the rubber end of the pencil than the point.

"In my readings I had an opportunity to study and find out for
myself what the public wants, and afterward I would endeavor to
use the knowledge gained in my writing.  The public desires
nothing but what is absolutely natural, and so perfectly natural
as to be fairly artless.  It can not tolerate affectation, and it
takes little interest in the classical production.  It demands
simple sentiments that come direct from the heart.  While on the
lecture platform I watched the effect that my readings had on the
audience very closely and whenever anybody left the hall I knew
that my recitation was at fault and tried to find out why.  Once
a man and his wife made an exit while I was giving The Happy
Little Cripple--a recitation I had prepared with particular
enthusiasm and satisfaction.  It fulfilled, as few poems do, all
the requirements of length, climax and those many necessary
features for a recitation.  The subject was a theme of real
pathos, beautified by the cheer and optimism of the little
sufferer.  Consequently when this couple left the hall I was very
anxious to know the reason and asked a friend to find out.  He
learned that they had a little hunch-back child of their own. 
After this experience I never used that recitation again.  On the
other hand, it often required a long time for me to realize that
the public would enjoy a poem which, because of some blind
impulse, I thought unsuitable.  Once a man said to me, 'Why don't
you recite When the Frost Is on the Punkin?' The use of it had
never occurred to me for I thought it 'wouldn't go.'  He
persuaded me to try it and it became one of my most favored
recitations.  Thus, I learned to judge and value my verses by
their effect upon the public.  Occasionally, at first, I had
presumed to write 'over the heads' of the audience, consoling
myself for the cool reception by thinking my auditors were not of
sufficient intellectual height to appreciate my efforts.  But
after a time it came home to me that I myself was at fault in
these failures, and then I disliked anything that did not appeal
to the public and learned to discriminate between that which did
not ring true to my hearers and that which won them by virtue of
its truthfulness and was simply heart high."

As a reader of his own poems, as a teller of humorous stories, as
a mimic, indeed as a finished actor, Riley's genius was rare and
beyond question.  In a lecture on the Humorous Story, Mark Twain,
referring to the story of the One Legged Soldier and the
different ways of telling it, once said:

"It takes only a minute and a half to tell it in its comic form;
and it isn't worth telling after all.  Put into the
humorous-story form, it takes ten minutes, and is about the
funniest thing I have ever listened to--as James Whitcomb Riley
tells it.

"The simplicity and innocence and sincerity and unconsciousness
of Riley's old farmer are perfectly simulated, and the result is
a performance which is thoroughly charming and delicious.  This
is art--and fine and beautiful, and only a master can compass
it."

It was in  that The Old Swimmin' Hole and 'Leven More
Poems first appeared in volume form.  Four years afterward, Riley
made his initial appearance before a New York City audience.  The
entertainment was given in aid of an international copyright law,
and the country's most distinguished men of letters took part in
the program.  It is probably true that no one appearing at that
time was less known to the vast audience in Chickering Hall than
James Whitcomb Riley, but so great and so spontaneous was the
enthusiasm when he left the stage after his contribution to the
first day's program, that the management immediately announced a
place would be made for Mr. Riley on the second and last day's
program.  It was then that James Russell Lowell introduced him in
the following words:

"Ladies and gentlemen:  I have very great pleasure in presenting
to you the next reader of this afternoon, Mr. James Whitcomb
Riley, of Indiana.  I confess, with no little chagrin and sense
of my own loss, that when yesterday afternoon, from this
platform, I presented him to a similar assemblage, I was almost
completely a stranger to his poems.  But since that time I have
been looking into the volumes that have come from his pen, and in
them I have discovered so much of high worth and tender quality
that I deeply regret I had not long before made acquaintance with
his work.  To-day, in presenting Mr. Riley to you, I can say to
you of my own knowledge, that you are to have the pleasure of
listening to the voice of a true poet."


Two years later a selection from his poems was published in
England under the title Old Fashioned Roses and his
international reputation was established.  In his own country the
people had already conferred their highest degrees on him and now
the colleges and universities--seats of conservatism--gave him
scholastic recognition.  Yale made him an Honorary Master of Arts
in 1902; in 1903, Wabash and, a year later, the University of
Pennsylvania conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Letters,
and in 1907 Indiana University gave him his LL. D.  Still more
recently the Academy of Arts and Letters elected him to
membership, and in 1912 awarded him the gold medal for poetry. 
About this time a yet dearer, more touching tribute came to him
from school children.  On October 7, 1911, the schools of Indiana
and New York City celebrated his birthday by special exercises,
and one year later, the school children of practically every
section of the country had programs in his honor.

As these distinguished honors came they found him each time
surprised anew and, though proud that they who dwell in the high
places of learning should come in cap and gown to welcome him,
yet gently and sincerely protesting his own unworthiness.  And as
they found him when they came so they left him.

Mr. Riley made his home in Indianapolis from the time judge
Martindale invited him to join The Journal's forces, and no one
of her citizens was more devoted, nor was any so universally
loved and honored.  Everywhere he went the tribute of quick
recognition and cheery greeting was paid him, and his home was
the shrine of every visiting Hoosier.  High on a sward of velvet
grass stands a dignified middle-aged brick house.  A dwarfed
stone wall, broken by an iron gate, guards the front lawn, while
in the rear an old-fashioned garden revels in hollyhocks and wild
roses.  Here among his books and his souvenirs the poet spent his
happy andncontented days.  To reach this restful spot, the
pilgrim must journey to Lockerbie Street, a miniature
thoroughfare half hidden between two more commanding avenues.  It
is little more than a lane, shaded, unpaved and from end to end
no longer than a five minutes' walk, but its fame is for all
time.

 "Such a dear little street it is, nestled away
 From the noise of the city and heat of the day,
 In cool shady coverts of whispering trees,
 With their leaves lifted up to shake hands with the breeze
 Which in all its wide wanderings never may meet
 With a resting-place fairer than Lockerbie Street!"


Riley never married.  He lived with devoted, loyal and
understanding friends, a part of whose life he became many years
ago.  Kindly consideration, gentle affection, peace and order,--
all that go to make home home, were found here blooming with the
hollyhocks and the wild roses.  Every day some visitor knocked
for admittance and was not denied; every day saw the poet calling
for some companionable friend and driving with him through the
city's shaded streets or far out into the country.

And so his life drew on to its last and most beautiful year. 
Since his serious illness in 1910, the public had shown its love
for him more and more frequently.  On the occasion of his 
birthday in 1912, Greenfield had welcomed him home through a host
of children scattering flowers.  Anderson, where he was living
when he first gained public recognition, had a Riley Day in 1913.

The Indiana State University entertained him the same year, as
did also the city of Cincinnati.  In 1915 there was a Riley Day
at Columbus, Indiana, and during all this time each birthday and
Christmas was marked by "poetry-showers," and by thousands of
letters of affectionate congratulation and by many tributes in
the newspapers and magazines.

His last birthday, October 7, 1915, was the most notable of all. 
Honorable Franklin K. Lane, Secretary of the Interior, suggested
to the various school superintendents that one of Riley's poems
be read in each schoolhouse, with the result that Riley
celebrations were general among the children of the entire
country.  In a proclamation by Governor Ralston the State of
Indiana designated the anniversary as Riley Day in honor of its
"most beloved citizen."  Thousands of letters and gifts from the
poet's friends poured in--letters from schools and organizations
and Riley Clubs as well as from individuals--while flowers came
from every section of the country.  Among them all, perhaps the
poet was most pleased with a bunch of violets picked from the
banks of the Brandywine by the children of a Riley school.

It was on this last birthday that an afternoon festival of Riley
poems set to music and danced in pantomime took place at
Indianapolis.  This was followed at night by a dinner in his
honor at which Charles Warren Fairbanks presided, and the
speakers were Governor Ralston, Doctor John Finley, Colonel
George Harvey, Young E. Allison, William Allen White, George Ade,
Ex-Senator Beveridge and Senator Kern.  That night Riley smiled
his most wonderful smile, his dimpled boyish smile, and when he
rose to speak it was with a perceptible quaver in his voice that
he said:  "Everywhere the faces of friends, a beautiful throng of
friends!"

The winter and spring following, Riley spent quietly at Miami,
Florida, where he had gone the two previous seasons to escape the
cold and the rain.  There was a Riley Day at Miami in February. 
In April, he returned home, feeling at his best, and, as if by
premonition, sought out many of his friends, new and old, and
took them for last rides in his automobile.  A few days before
the end, he visited Greenfield to attend the funeral of a dear
boyhood chum, Almon Keefer, of whom he wrote in A Child-World. 
All Riley's old friends who were still left in Greenfield were
gathered there and to them he spoke words of faith and good
cheer.  Almon Keefer had "just slipped out" quietly and
peacefully, he said, and "it was beautiful."

And as quietly and peacefully his own end came--as he had desired
it, with no dimming of the faculties even to the very close, nor
suffering, nor confronting death.  This was Saturday night, July
22, 1916.  On Monday afternoon and evening his body lay in state
under the dome of Indiana's capitol, while the people filed by,
thousands upon thousands.  Business men were there, and
schoolgirls, matrons carrying market baskets, mothers with little
children, here and there a swarthy foreigner, old folks, too, and
well-dressed youths, here a farmer and his wife, and there a
workman in a blue jumper with his hat in his band, silent,
inarticulate, yet bidding his good-by, too.  On the following
day, with only his nearest and dearest about him, all that was
mortal of the people's poet was quietly and simply laid to rest.



The Complete Works
of James Whitcomb Riley

A BACKWARD LOOK

As I sat smoking, alone, yesterday,
    And lazily leaning back in my chair,
Enjoying myself in a general way--
Allowing my thoughts a holiday
    From weariness, toil and care,--
My fancies--doubtless, for ventilation--
    Left ajar the gates of my mind,--
And Memory, seeing the situation,
    Slipped out in the street of "Auld Lang Syne."--


Wandering ever with tireless feet
    Through scenes of silence, and jubilee
Of long-hushed voices; and faces sweet
Were thronging the shadowy side of the street
    As far as the eye could see;
Dreaming again, in anticipation,
    The same old dreams of our boyhood's days
That never come true, from the vague sensation
    Of walking asleep in the world's strange ways.

Away to the house where I was born!
    And there was the selfsame clock that ticked
From the close of dusk to the burst of morn,
When life-warm hands plucked the golden corn
    And helped when the apples were picked.
And the "chany dog" on the mantel-shelf,
    With the gilded collar and yellow eyes,
Looked just as at first, when I hugged myself
    Sound asleep with the dear surprise.

And down to the swing in the locust-tree,
    Where the grass was worn from the trampled ground,
And where "Eck" Skinner, "Old" Carr, and three
Or four such other boys used to be
    "Doin' sky-scrapers," or "whirlin' round":
And again Bob climbed for the bluebird's nest,
    And again "had shows" in the buggy-shed
Of Guymon's barn, where still, unguessed,
    The old ghosts romp through the best days dead!

And again I gazed from the old schoolroom
    With a wistful look, of a long June day,
When on my cheek was the hectic bloom
Caught of Mischief, as I presume--
    He had such a "partial" way,
It seemed, toward me.--And again I thought
    Of a probable likelihood to be
Kept in after school--for a girl was caught
    Catching a note from me.

And down through the woods to the swimming-hole--
    Where the big, white, hollow old sycamore grows,--
And we never cared when the water was cold,
And always "ducked" the boy that told
    On the fellow that tied the clothes.--
When life went so like a dreamy rhyme,
    That it seems to me now that then
The world was having a jollier time
    Than it ever will have again.



PHILIPER FLASH

Young Philiper Flash was a promising lad,
His intentions were good--but oh, how sad
    For a person to think
    How the veriest pink
And bloom of perfection may turn out bad.
Old Flash himself was a moral man,
And prided himself on a moral plan,
    Of a maxim as old
    As the calf of gold,
Of making that boy do what he was told.

And such a good mother had Philiper Flash;
Her voice was as soft as the creamy plash
    Of the milky wave
    With its musical lave
That gushed through the holes of her patent churn-dash;--
And the excellent woman loved Philiper so,
She could cry sometimes when he stumped his toe,--
    And she stroked his hair
    With such motherly care
When the dear little angel learned to swear.

Old Flash himself would sometimes say
That his wife had "such a ridiculous way,--
    She'd, humor that child
    Till he'd soon be sp'iled,
And then there'd be the devil to pay!"
And the excellent wife, with a martyr's look,
Would tell old Flash himself "he took
    No notice at all
    Of the bright-eyed doll
Unless when he spanked him for getting a fall!"

Young Philiper Flash, as time passed by,
Grew into "a boy with a roguish eye":
    He could smoke a cigar,
    And seemed by far
The most promising youth.--"He's powerful sly,
Old Flash himself once told a friend,
"Every copper he gets he's sure to spend--
    And," said he, "don't you know
    If he keeps on so
What a crop of wild oats the boy will grow!"

But his dear good mother knew Philiper's ways
So--well, she managed the money to raise;
    And old Flash himself
    Was "laid on the shelf,"
(In the manner of speaking we have nowadays).
For "gracious knows, her darling child,
If he went without money he'd soon grow wild."
    So Philiper Flash
    With a regular dash
"Swung on to the reins," and went "slingin' the cash."

As old Flash himself, in his office one day,
Was shaving notes in a barberous way,
    At the hour of four
    Death entered the door
And shaved the note on his life, they say.
And he had for his grave a magnificent tomb,
Though the venturous finger that pointed "Gone Home,"
    Looked white and cold
    From being so bold,
As it feared that a popular lie was told.

Young Philiper Flash was a man of style
When he first began unpacking the pile
    Of the dollars and dimes
    Whose jingling chimes
Had clinked to the tune of his father's smile;
And he strewed his wealth with such lavish hand,
His rakish ways were the talk of the land,
    And gossipers wise
    Sat winking their eyes
(A certain foreboding of fresh surprise).

A "fast young man" was Philiper Flash,
And wore "loud clothes" and a weak mustache,
    And "done the Park,"
    For an "afternoon lark,"
With a very fast horse of "remarkable dash."
And Philiper handled a billiard-cue
About as well as the best he knew,
    And used to say
    "He could make it pay
By playing two or three games a day."

And Philiper Flash was his mother's joy,
He seemed to her the magic alloy
    That made her glad,
    When her heart was sad,
With the thought that "she lived for her darling boy."
His dear good mother wasn't aware
How her darling boy relished a "tare."--
    She said "one night
    He gave her a fright
By coming home late and ACTING tight."

Young Philiper Flash, on a winterish day,
Was published a bankrupt, so they say--
    And as far as I know
    I suppose it was so,
For matters went on in a singular way;
His excellent mother, I think I was told,
Died from exposure and want and cold;
    And Philiper Flash,
    With a horrible slash,
Whacked his jugular open and went to smash.



THE SAME OLD STORY

The same old story told again--
    The maiden droops her head,
The ripening glow of her crimson cheek
    Is answering in her stead.
The pleading tone of a trembling voice
    Is telling her the way
He loved her when his heart was young
    In Youth's sunshiny day:
The trembling tongue, the longing tone,
    Imploringly ask why
They can not be as happy now
    As in the days gone by.
And two more hearts, tumultuous
    With overflowing joy,
Are dancing to the music
    Which that dear, provoking boy
Is twanging on his bowstring,
    As, fluttering his wings,
He sends his love-charged arrows
    While merrily be sings:
"Ho! ho! my dainty maiden,
    It surely can not be
You are thinking you are master
    Of your heart, when it is me."
And another gleaming arrow
    Does the little god's behest,
And the dainty little maiden
    Falls upon her lover's breast.
"The same old story told again,"
    And listened o'er and o'er,
Will still be new, and pleasing, too,
    Till "Time shall be no more."



TO A BOY WHISTLING

The smiling face of a happy boy
    With its enchanted key
    Is now unlocking in memory
My store of heartiest joy.

And my lost life again to-day,
    In pleasant colors all aglow,
    From rainbow tints, to pure white snow,
Is a panorama sliding away.

The whistled air of a simple tune
    Eddies and whirls my thoughts around,
    As fairy balloons of thistle-down
Sail through the air of June.

O happy boy with untaught grace!
    What is there in the world to give
    That can buy one hour of the life you live
Or the trivial cause of your smiling face!



AN OLD FRIEND

Hey, Old Midsummer! are you here again,
    With all your harvest-store of olden joys,--
Vast overhanging meadow-lands of rain,
And drowsy dawns, and noons when golden grain
    Nods in the sun, and lazy truant boys
Drift ever listlessly adown the day,
Too full of joy to rest, and dreams to play.

The same old Summer, with the same old smile
    Beaming upon us in the same old way
We knew in childhood!  Though a weary while
Since that far time, yet memories reconcile
    The heart with odorous breaths of clover hay;
And again I hear the doves, and the sun streams through
The old barn door just as it used to do.

And so it seems like welcoming a friend--
    An old, OLD friend, upon his coming home
From some far country--coming home to spend
Long, loitering days with me:  And I extend
    My hand in rapturous glee:--And so you've come!--
Ho, I'm so glad!  Come in and take a chair:
Well, this is just like OLD times, I declare!



WHAT SMITH KNEW ABOUT FARMING

There wasn't two purtier farms in the state
Than the couple of which I'm about to relate;--
Jinin' each other--belongin' to Brown,
And jest at the edge of a flourishin' town.
Brown was a man, as I understand,
That allus had handled a good 'eal o' land,
And was sharp as a tack in drivin' a trade--
For that's the way most of his money was made.
And all the grounds and the orchards about
His two pet farms was all tricked out
With poppies and posies
And sweet-smellin' rosies;
And hundreds o' kinds
Of all sorts o' vines,
To tickle the most horticultural minds
And little dwarf trees not as thick as your wrist
With ripe apples on 'em as big as your fist:
And peaches,--Siberian crabs and pears,
And quinces--Well! ANY fruit ANY tree bears;
And th purtiest stream--jest a-swimmin' with fish,
And--JEST O'MOST EVERYTHING HEART COULD WISH!
The purtiest orch'rds--I wish you could see
How purty they was, fer I know it 'ud be
A regular treat!--but I'll go ahead with
My story!  A man by the name o' Smith--
(A bad name to rhyme,
But I reckon that I'm
Not goin' back on a Smith! nary time!)
'At hadn't a soul of kin nor kith,
And more money than he knowed what to do with,--
So he comes a-ridin' along one day,
And HE says to Brown, in his offhand way--
Who was trainin' some newfangled vines round a bay-
Winder--"Howdy-do--look-a-here--say:
What'll you take fer this property here?--
I'm talkin' o' leavin' the city this year,
And I want to be
Where the air is free,
And I'll BUY this place, if it ain't too dear!"--
Well--they grumbled and jawed aroun'--
"I don't like to part with the place," says Brown;
"Well," says Smith, a-jerkin' his head,
"That house yonder--bricks painted red--
Jest like this'n--a PURTIER VIEW--
Who is it owns it?"  "That's mine too,"
Says Brown, as he winked at a hole in his shoe,
"But I'll tell you right here jest what I KIN do:--
If you'll pay the figgers I'll sell IT to you.,"
Smith went over and looked at the place--
Badgered with Brown, and argied the case--
Thought that Brown's figgers was rather too tall,
But, findin' that Brown wasn't goin' to fall,
In final agreed,
So they drawed up the deed
Fer the farm and the fixtures--the live stock an' all.
And so Smith moved from the city as soon
As he possibly could--But "the man in the moon"
Knowed more'n Smith o' farmin' pursuits,
And jest to convince you, and have no disputes,
How little he knowed,
I'll tell you his "mode,"
As he called it, o' raisin' "the best that growed,"
In the way o' potatoes--
Cucumbers--tomatoes,
And squashes as lengthy as young alligators.
'Twas allus a curious thing to me
How big a fool a feller kin be
When he gits on a farm after leavin' a town!--
Expectin' to raise himself up to renown,
And reap fer himself agricultural fame,
By growin' of squashes--WITHOUT ANY SHAME--
As useless and long as a technical name.
To make the soil pure,
And certainly sure,
He plastered the ground with patent manure.
He had cultivators, and double-hoss plows,
And patent machines fer milkin' his cows;
And patent hay-forks--patent measures and weights,
And new patent back-action hinges fer gates,
And barn locks and latches, and such little dribs,
And patents to keep the rats out o' the cribs--
Reapers and mowers,
And patent grain sowers;
And drillers
And tillers
And cucumber hillers,
And horries;--and had patent rollers and scrapers,
And took about ten agricultural papers.
So you can imagine how matters turned out:
But BROWN didn't have not a shadder o' doubt
That Smith didn't know what he was about
When he said that "the OLD way to farm was played out."
But Smith worked ahead,
And when any one said
That the OLD way o' workin' was better instead
O' his "modern idees," he allus turned red,
And wanted to know
What made people so
INFERNALLY anxious to hear theirselves crow?
And guessed that he'd manage to hoe his own row.
Brown he come onc't and leant over the fence,
And told Smith that he couldn't see any sense
In goin' to such a tremendous expense
Fer the sake o' such no-account experiments
"That'll never make corn!
As shore's you're born
It'll come out the leetlest end of the horn!"
Says Brown, as he pulled off a big roastin'-ear
From a stalk of his own
That had tribble outgrown
Smith's poor yaller shoots, and says he, "Looky here!
THIS corn was raised in the old-fashioned way,
And I rather imagine that THIS corn'll pay
Expenses fer RAISIN' it!--What do you say?"
Brown got him then to look over his crop.--
HIS luck that season had been tip-top!
And you may surmise
Smith opened his eyes
And let out a look o' the wildest surprise
When Brown showed him punkins as big as the lies
He was stuffin' him with--about offers he's had
Fer his farm:  "I don't want to sell very bad,"
He says, but says he,
"Mr. Smith, you kin see
Fer yourself how matters is standin' with me,
I UNDERSTAND FARMIN' and I'd better stay,
You know, on my farm;--I'm a-makin' it pay--
I oughtn't to grumble!--I reckon I'll clear
Away over four thousand dollars this year."
And that was the reason, he made it appear,
Why he didn't care about sellin' his farm,
And hinted at his havin' done himself harm
In sellin' the other, and wanted to know
If Smith wouldn't sell back ag'in to him.--So
Smith took the bait, and says he, "Mr. Brown,
I wouldn't SELL out but we might swap aroun'--
How'll you trade your place fer mine?"
(Purty sharp way o' comin' the shine
Over Smith!  Wasn't it?) Well, sir, this Brown
Played out his hand and brought Smithy down--
Traded with him an', workin' it cute,
Raked in two thousand dollars to boot
As slick as a whistle, an' that wasn't all,--
He managed to trade back ag'in the next fall,--
And the next--and the next--as long as Smith stayed
He reaped with his harvests an annual trade.--
Why, I reckon that Brown must 'a' easily made--
On an AVERAGE--nearly two thousand a year--
Together he made over seven thousand--clear.--
Till Mr. Smith found he was losin' his health
In as big a proportion, almost, as his wealth;
So at last he concluded to move back to town,
And sold back his farm to this same Mr. Brown
At very low figgers, by gittin' it down.
Further'n this I have nothin' to say
Than merely advisin' the Smiths fer to stay
In their grocery stores in flourishin' towns
And leave agriculture alone--and the Browns.



 A POET'S WOOING

    I woo'd a woman once,
But she was sharper than an eastern wind.
                        --TENNYSON.

"What may I do to make you glad,
To make you glad and free,
    Till your light smiles glance
    And your bright eyes dance
Like sunbeams on the sea?
    Read some rhyme that is blithe and gay
    Of a bright May morn and a marriage day?"
And she sighed in a listless way she had,--
"Do not read--it will make me sad!"

"What shall I do to make you glad--
To make you glad and gay,
    Till your eyes gleam bright
    As the stars at night
When as light as the light of day
    Sing some song as I twang the strings
    Of my sweet guitar through its wanderings?"
And she sighed in the weary way she had,--
"Do not sing--it will make me sad!"

"What can I do to make you glad--
As glad as glad can be,
    Till your clear eyes seem
    Like the rays that gleam
And glint through a dew-decked tree?--
    Will it please you, dear, that I now begin
    A grand old air on my violin?"
And she spoke again in the following way,--
    "Yes, oh yes, it would please me, sir;
I would be so glad you'd play
    Some grand old march--in character,--
And then as you march away
I will no longer thus be sad,
But oh, so glad--so glad--so glad!"



MAN'S DEVOTION

A lover said, "O Maiden, love me well,
For I must go away:
And should ANOTHER ever come to tell
Of love--What WILL you say?"

And she let fall a royal robe of hair
That folded on his arm
And made a golden pillow for her there;
Her face--as bright a charm

As ever setting held in kingly crown--
Made answer with a look,
And reading it, the lover bended down,
And, trusting, "kissed the book."

He took a fond farewell and went away.
And slow the time went by--
So weary--dreary was it, day by day
To love, and wait, and sigh.

She kissed his pictured face sometimes, and said:
    "O Lips, so cold and dumb,
I would that you would tell me, if not dead,
    Why, why do you not come?"

The picture, smiling, stared her in the face
    Unmoved--e'en with the touch
Of tear-drops--HERS--bejeweling the case--
    'Twas plain--she loved him much.

And, thus she grew to think of him as gay
    And joyous all the while,
And SHE was sorrowing--"Ah, welladay!"
    But pictures ALWAYS smile!

And years--dull years--in dull monotony
    As ever went and came,
Still weaving changes on unceasingly,
    And changing, changed her name.

Was she untrue?--She oftentimes was glad
    And happy as a wife;
But ONE remembrance oftentimes made sad
    Her matrimonial life.--

Though its few years were hardly noted, when
    Again her path was strown
With thorns--the roses swept away again,
    And she again alone!

And then--alas! ah THEN!--her lover came:
    "I come to claim you now--
My Darling, for I know you are the same,
    And I have kept my vow

Through these long, long, long years, and now no more
    Shall we asundered be!"
She staggered back and, sinking to the floor,
    Cried in her agony:

"I have been false!" she moaned, "I am not true--
    I am not worthy now,
Nor ever can I be a wife to YOU--
    For I have broke my vow!"

And as she kneeled there, sobbing at his feet,
    He calmly spoke--no sign
Betrayed his inward agony--"I count you meet
    To be a wife of mine!"

And raised her up forgiven, though untrue;
    As fond he gazed on her,
She sighed,--"SO HAPPY!"  And she never knew
    HE was a WIDOWER.



A BALLAD

WITH A SERIOUS CONCLUSION

Crowd about me, little children--
    Come and cluster 'round my knee
While I tell a little story
    That happened once with me.

My father he had gone away
    A-sailing on the foam,
Leaving me--the merest infant--
    And my mother dear at home;

For my father was a sailor,
    And he sailed the ocean o'er
For full five years ere yet again
    He reached his native shore.

And I had grown up rugged
    And healthy day by day,
Though I was but a puny babe
    When father went away.

Poor mother she would kiss me
    And look at me and sigh
So strangely, oft I wondered
    And would ask the reason why.

And she would answer sadly,
    Between her sobs and tears,--
"You look so like your father,
    Far away so many years!"

And then she would caress me
    And brush my hair away,
And tell me not to question,
    But to run about my play.

Thus I went playing thoughtfully--
    For that my mother said,--
"YOU LOOK SO LIKE YOUR FATHER!"
    Kept ringing in my head.

So, ranging once the golden sands
    That looked out on the sea,
I called aloud, "My father dear,
    Come back to ma and me!"

Then I saw a glancing shadow
    On the sand, and heard the shriek
Of a sea-gull flying seaward,
    And I heard a gruff voice speak:--

"Ay, ay, my little shipmate,
    I thought I heard you hail;
Were you trumpeting that sea-gull,
    Or do you see a sail?"

And as rough and gruff a sailor
    As ever sailed the sea
Was standing near grotesquely
    And leering dreadfully.

I replied, though I was frightened,
    "It was my father dear
I was calling for across the sea--
    I think he didn't hear."

And then the sailor leered again
    In such a frightful way,
And made so many faces
    I was little loath to stay:

But he started fiercely toward me--
    Then made a sudden halt
And roared, "I think he heard you!"
    And turned a somersault.

Then a wild fear overcame me,
    And I flew off like the wind,
Shrieking "MOTHER!"--and the sailor
    Just a little way behind!

And then my mother heard me,
    And I saw her shade her eyes,
Looking toward me from the doorway,
    Transfixed with pale surprise

For a moment--then her features
    Glowed with all their wonted charms
As the sailor overtook me,
    And I fainted in her arms.

When I awoke to reason
    I shuddered with affright
Till I felt my mother's presence
    With a thrill of wild delight--

Till, amid a shower of kisses
    Falling glad as summer rain,
A muffled thunder rumbled,--
    "Is he coming 'round again?"

Then I shrieked and clung unto her,
    While her features flushed and burned
As she told me it was father
    From a foreign land returned.

.     .     .     .     .     .     .

I said--when I was calm again,
    And thoughtfully once more
Had dwelt upon my mother's words
    Of just the day before,--

"I DON'T look like my father,
    As you told me yesterday--
I know I don't--or father
    Would have run the other way."




THE OLD TIMES WERE THE BEST

Friends, my heart is half aweary
    Of its happiness to-night:
Though your songs are gay and cheery,
    And your spirits feather-light,
There's a ghostly music haunting
    Still the heart of every guest
And a voiceless chorus chanting
    That the Old Times were the best.


        CHORUS

All about is bright and pleasant
    With the sound of song and jest,
Yet a feeling's ever present
    That the Old Times were the best.



A SUMMER AFTERNOON

A languid atmosphere, a lazy breeze,
    With labored respiration, moves the wheat
From distant reaches, till the golden seas
    Break in crisp whispers at my feet.

My book, neglected of an idle mind,
    Hides for a moment from the eyes of men;
Or lightly opened by a critic wind,
    Affrightedly reviews itself again.

Off through the haze that dances in the shine
    The warm sun showers in the open glade,
The forest lies, a silhouette design
    Dimmed through and through with shade.

A dreamy day; and tranquilly I lie
    At anchor from all storms of mental strain;
With absent vision, gazing at the sky,
    "Like one that hears it rain."

The Katydid, so boisterous last night,
    Clinging, inverted, in uneasy poise,
Beneath a wheat-blade, has forgotten quite
    If "Katy DID or DIDN'T" make a noise.

The twitter, sometimes, of a wayward bird
    That checks the song abruptly at the sound,
And mildly, chiding echoes that have stirred,
    Sink into silence, all the more profound.

And drowsily I hear the plaintive strain
    Of some poor dove . . . Why, I can scarcely keep
My heavy eyelids--there it is again--
    "Coo-coo!"--I mustn't--"Coo-coo!"--fall asleep!



AT LAST

A dark, tempestuous night; the stars shut in
    With shrouds of fog; an inky, jet-black blot
The firmament; and where the moon has been
    An hour agone seems like the darkest spot.
The weird wind--furious at its demon game--
Rattles one's fancy like a window-frame.

A care-worn face peers out into the dark,
    And childish faces--frightened at the gloom--
Grow awed and vacant as they turn to mark
    The father's as he passes through the room:
The gate latch clatters, and wee baby Bess
Whispers, "The doctor's tummin' now, I dess!"

The father turns; a sharp, swift flash of pain
    Flits o'er his face: "Amanda, child! I said
A moment since--I see I must AGAIN--
    Go take your little sisters off to bed!
There, Effie, Rose, and CLARA MUSTN'T CRY!"
"I tan't he'p it--I'm fyaid 'at mama'll die!"

What are his feelings, when this man alone
    Sits in the silence, glaring in the grate
That sobs and sighs on in an undertone
    As stoical--immovable as Fate,
While muffled voices from the sick one's room
Come in like heralds of a dreaded doom?

The door-latch jingles: in the doorway stands
    The doctor, while the draft puffs in a breath--
The dead coals leap to life, and clap their hands,
    The flames flash up.  A face as pale as death
Turns slowly--teeth tight clenched, and with a look
The doctor, through his specs, reads like a book.

"Come, brace up, Major!"--"Let me know the worst!"
    "W'y you're the biggest fool I ever saw--
Here, Major--take a little brandy first--
    There!  She's a BOY--I mean HE is--hurrah!"
"Wake up the other girls--and shout for joy--
Eureka is his name--I've found A BOY!"



FARMER WHIPPLE--BACHELOR

It's a mystery to see me--a man o' fifty-four,
Who's lived a cross old bachelor fer thirty year' and more--
A-lookin' glad and smilin'!  And they's none o' you can say
That you can guess the reason why I feel so good to-day!

I must tell you all about it!  But I'll have to deviate
A little in beginnin', so's to set the matter straight
As to how it comes to happen that I never took a wife--
Kindo' "crawfish" from the Present to the Springtime of my life!

I was brought up in the country:  Of a family of five--
Three brothers and a sister--I'm the only one alive,--
Fer they all died little babies; and 'twas one o' Mother's ways,
You know, to want a daughter; so she took a girl to raise.

The sweetest little thing she was, with rosy cheeks, and fat--
We was little chunks o' shavers then about as high as that!
But someway we sort a' SUITED-like! and Mother she'd declare
She never laid her eyes on a more lovin' pair

Than WE was!  So we growed up side by side fer thirteen year',
And every hour of it she growed to me more dear!--
W'y, even Father's dyin', as he did, I do believe
Warn't more affectin' to me than it was to see her grieve!

I was then a lad o' twenty; and I felt a flash o' pride
In thinkin' all depended on ME now to pervide
Fer Mother and fer Mary; and I went about the place
With sleeves rolled up--and workin', with a mighty smilin'
face.--

Fer SOMEPIN' ELSE was workin'! but not a word I said 
Of a certain sort o' notion that was runnin' through my head,--
"Some day I'd maybe marry, and a BROTHER'S love was one
Thing--a LOVER'S was another!" was the way the notion run!

I remember onc't in harvest, when the "cradle-in' " was done,
(When the harvest of my summers mounted up to twenty-one),
I was ridin' home with Mary at the closin' o' the day--
A-chawin' straws and thinkin', in a lover's lazy way!

And Mary's cheeks was burnin' like the sunset down the lane:
I noticed she was thinkin', too, and ast her to explain.
Well--when she turned and KISSED ME, WITH HER ARMS AROUND
ME--LAW!
I'd a bigger load o' Heaven than I had a load o' straw!

I don't p'tend to learnin', but I'll tell you what's a fac',
They's a mighty truthful sayin' somers in a' almanac--
Er SOMERS--'bout "puore happiness"--perhaps some folks'll laugh
At the idy--"only lastin' jest two seconds and a half."--

But it's jest as true as preachin'!--fer that was a SISTER'S
kiss,
And a sister's lovin' confidence a-tellin' to me this:--
"SHE was happy, BEIN' PROMISED TO THE SON O' FARMER BROWN."--
And my feelin's struck a pardnership with sunset and went down!

I don't know HOW I acted, and I don't know WHAT I said,--
Fer my heart seemed jest a-turnin' to an ice-cold lump o' lead;
And the hosses kind o'glimmered before me in the road,
And the lines fell from my fingers--And that was all I knowed--

Fer--well, I don't know HOW long--They's a dim rememberence
Of a sound o' snortin' horses, and a stake-and-ridered fence
A-whizzin' past, and wheat-sheaves a-dancin' in the air,
And Mary screamin' "Murder!" and a-runnin' up to where

I was layin' by the roadside, and the wagon upside down
A-leanin' on the gate-post, with the wheels a-whirlin' roun'!
And I tried to raise and meet her, but I couldn't, with a vague
Sort o' notion comin' to me that I had a broken leg.

Well, the women nussed me through it; but many a time I'd sigh
As I'd keep a-gittin' better instid o' goin' to die,
And wonder what was left ME worth livin' fer below,
When the girl I loved was married to another, don't you know!

And my thoughts was as rebellious as the folks was good and kind
When Brown and Mary married--Railly must 'a' been my MIND
Was kind o' out o' kilter!--fer I hated Brown, you see,
Worse'n PIZEN--and the feller whittled crutches out fer ME--

And done a thousand little ac's o' kindness and respec'--
And me a-wishin' all the time that I could break his neck!
My relief was like a mourner's when the funeral is done
When they moved to Illinois in the Fall o' Forty-one.

Then I went to work in airnest--I had nothin' much in view
But to drownd out rickollections--and it kep' me busy, too!
But I slowly thrived and prospered, tel Mother used to say
She expected yit to see me a wealthy man some day.

Then I'd think how little MONEY was, compared to happiness--
And who'd be left to use it when I died I couldn't guess!
But I've still kep' speculatin' and a-gainin' year by year,
Tel I'm payin' half the taxes in the county, mighty near!

Well!--A year ago er better, a letter comes to hand
Astin' how I'd like to dicker fer some Illinois land--
"The feller that had owned it," it went ahead to state,
"Had jest deceased, insolvent, leavin' chance to speculate,"--

And then it closed by sayin' that I'd "better come and see."--
I'd never been West, anyhow--a'most too wild fer ME,
I'd allus had a notion; but a lawyer here in town
Said I'd find myself mistakend when I come to look around.

So I bids good-by to Mother, and I jumps aboard the train,
A-thinkin' what I'd bring her when I come back home again--
And ef she'd had an idy what the present was to be,
I think it's more'n likely she'd 'a' went along with me!

Cars is awful tejus ridin', fer all they go so fast!
But finally they called out my stoppin'-place at last:
And that night, at the tavern, I dreamp' I was a train
O' cars, and SKEERED at somepin', runnin' down a country lane!

Well, in the morning airly--after huntin' up the man--
The lawyer who was wantin' to swap the piece o' land--
We started fer the country; and I ast the history
Of the farm--its former owner--and so forth, etcetery!

And--well--it was interESTin'--I su'prised him, I suppose,
By the loud and frequent manner in which I blowed my nose!--
But his su'prise was greater, and it made him wonder more,
When I kissed and hugged the widder when she met us at the
door!--

IT WAS MARY: . . . They's a feelin' a-hidin' down in here--
Of course I can't explain it, ner ever make it clear.--
It was with us in that meetin', I don't want you to fergit!
And it makes me kind o'nervous when I think about it yit!

I BOUGHT that farm, and DEEDED it, afore I left the town
With "title clear to mansions in the skies," to Mary Brown!
And fu'thermore, I took her and the CHILDERN--fer you see,
They'd never seed their Grandma--and I fetched 'em home with me.

So NOW you've got an idy why a man o' fifty-four,
Who's lived a cross old bachelor fer thirty year' and more
Is a-lookin' glad and smilin'!--And I've jest come into town
To git a pair o' license fer to MARRY Mary Brown.



MY JOLLY FRIEND'S SECRET

Ah, friend of mine, how goes it,
    Since you've taken you a mate?--
Your smile, though, plainly shows it
    Is a very happy state!
Dan Cupid's necromancy!
    You must sit you down and dine,
And lubricate your fancy
    With a glass or two of wine.

And as you have "deserted,"
    As my other chums have done,
While I laugh alone diverted,
    As you drop off one by one--
And I've remained unwedded,
    Till--you see--look here--that I'm,
In a manner, "snatched bald-headed"
    By the sportive hand of Time!

I'm an "old 'un!" yes, but wrinkles
    Are not so plenty, quite,
As to cover up the twinkles
    Of the BOY--ain't I right?
Yet, there are ghosts of kisses
    Under this mustache of mine
My mem'ry only misses
    When I drown 'em out with wine.

From acknowledgment so ample,
    You would hardly take me for
What I am--a perfect sample
    Of a "jolly bachelor";
Not a bachelor has being
    When he laughs at married life
But his heart and soul's agreeing
    That he ought to have a wife!

Ah, ha I old chum, this claret,
    Like Fatima, holds the key
Of the old Blue-Beardish garret
    Of my hidden mystery!
Did you say you'd like to listen?
    Ah, my boy! the "SAD NO MORE!"
And the tear-drops that will glisten--
    TURN THE CATCH UPON THE DOOR,

And sit you down beside me,
    And put yourself at ease--
I'll trouble you to slide me
    That wine decanter, please;
The path is kind o' mazy
    Where my fancies have to go,
And my heart gets sort o' lazy
    On the journey--don't you know?

Let me see--when I was twenty--
    It's a lordly age, my boy,
When a fellow's money's plenty,
    And the leisure to enjoy--
And a girl--with hair as golden
    As--THAT; and lips--well--quite
As red as THIS I'm holdin'
    Between you and the light.

And eyes and a complexion--
    Ah, heavens!--le'-me-see--
Well,--just in this connection,--
    DID YOU LOCK THAT DOOR FOR ME?
Did I start in recitation
    My past life to recall?
Well, THAT'S an indication
    I am purty tight--that's all!



THE SPEEDING OF THE KING'S SPITE

A king--estranged from his loving Queen
    By a foolish royal whim--
Tired and sick of the dull routine
    Of matters surrounding him--
Issued a mandate in this wise.--
    "THE DOWER OF MY DAUGHTER'S HAND
I WILL GIVE TO HIM WHO HOLDS THIS PRIZE,
    THE STRANGEST THING IN THE LAND."

But the King, sad sooth! in this grim decree
    Had a motive low and mean;--
'Twas a royal piece of chicanery
    To harry and spite the Queen;
For King though he was, and beyond compare,
    He had ruled all things save one--
Then blamed the Queen that his only heir
    Was a daughter--not a son.

The girl had grown, in the mother's care,
    Like a bud in the shine and shower
That drinks of the wine of the balmy air
    Till it blooms into matchless flower;
Her waist was the rose's stem that bore
    The flower--and the flower's perfume--
That ripens on till it bulges o'er
    With its wealth of bud and bloom.

And she had a lover--lowly sprung,--
    But a purer, nobler heart
Never spake in a courtlier tongue
    Or wooed with a dearer art:
And the fair pair paled at the King's decree;
    But the smiling Fates contrived
To have them wed, in a secrecy
    That the Queen HERSELF connived--

While the grim King's heralds scoured the land
    And the countries roundabout,
Shouting aloud, at the King's command,
    A challenge to knave or lout,
Prince or peasant,--"The mighty King
    Would have ye understand
That he who shows him the strangest thing
    Shall have his daughter's hand!"

And thousands flocked to the royal throne,
    Bringing a thousand things
Strange and curious;--One, a bone--
    The hinge of a fairy's wings;
And one, the glass of a mermaid queen,
    Gemmed with a diamond dew,
Where, down in its reflex, dimly seen,
    Her face smiled out at you.

One brought a cluster of some strange date,
    With a subtle and searching tang
That seemed, as you tasted, to penetrate
    The heart like a serpent's fang;
And back you fell for a spell entranced,
    As cold as a corpse of stone,
And heard your brains, as they laughed and danced
    And talked in an undertone.

One brought a bird that could whistle a tune
    So piercingly pure and sweet,
That tears would fall from the eyes of the moon
    In dewdrops at its feet;
And the winds would sigh at the sweet refrain,
    Till they swooned in an ecstacy,
To waken again in a hurricane
    Of riot and jubilee.

One brought a lute that was wrought of a shell
    Luminous as the shine
Of a new-born star in a dewy dell,--
    And its strings were strands of wine
That sprayed at the Fancy's touch and fused,
    As your listening spirit leant
Drunken through with the airs that oozed
    From the o'ersweet instrument.

One brought a tablet of ivory
    Whereon no thing was writ,--
But, at night--and the dazzled eyes would see
    Flickering lines o'er it,--
And each, as you read from the magic tome,
    Lightened and died in flame,
And the memory held but a golden poem
    Too beautiful to name.

Till it seemed all marvels that ever were known
    Or dreamed of under the sun
Were brought and displayed at the royal throne,
    And put by, one by one
Till a graybeard monster came to the King--
    Haggard and wrinkled and old--
And spread to his gaze this wondrous thing,--
    A gossamer veil of gold.--

Strangely marvelous--mocking the gaze
    Like a tangle of bright sunshine,
Dipping a million glittering rays
    In a baptism divine:
And a maiden, sheened in this gauze attire--
    Sifting a glance of her eye--
Dazzled men's souls with a fierce desire
    To kiss and caress her and--die.

And the grim King swore by his royal beard
    That the veil had won the prize,
While the gray old monster blinked and leered
    With his lashless, red-rimmed eyes,
As the fainting form of the princess fell,
    And the mother's heart went wild,
Throbbing and swelling a muffled knell
    For the dead hopes of her child.

But her clouded face with a faint smile shone,
    As suddenly, through the throng,
Pushing his way to the royal throne,
    A fair youth strode along,
While a strange smile hovered about his eyes,
    As he said to the grim old King:--
"The veil of gold must lose the prize;
    For I have a stranger thing."

He bent and whispered a sentence brief;
    But the monarch shook his head,
With a look expressive of unbelief--
    "It can't be so," he said;
"Or give me proof; and I, the King,
    Give you my daughter's hand,--
For certes THAT IS a stranger thing--
    THE STRANGEST THING IN THE LAND!"

Then the fair youth, turning, caught the Queen
    In a rapturous caress,
While his lithe form towered in lordly mien,
    As he said in a brief address:--
"My fair bride's mother is this; and, lo,
    As you stare in your royal awe,
By this pure kiss do I proudly show
    A LOVE FOR A MOTHER-IN-LAW!"

Then a thaw set in the old King's mood,
    And a sweet Spring freshet came
Into his eyes, and his heart renewed
    Its love for the favored dame:
But often he has been heard to declare
    That "he never could clearly see
How, in the deuce, such a strange affair
    Could have ended so happily!"


JOB WORK

"Write me a rhyme of the present time".
    And the poet took his pen
And wrote such lines as the miser minds
    Hide in the hearts of men.

He grew enthused, as the poets used
    When their fingers kissed the strings
Of some sweet lyre, and caught the fire
    True inspiration brings,

And sang the song of a nation's wrong--
    Of the patriot's galling chain,
And the glad release that the angel, Peace,
    Has given him again.

He sang the lay of religion's sway,
    Where a hundred creeds clasp hands
And shout in glee such a symphony
    That the whole world understands.

He struck the key of monopoly,
    And sang of her swift decay,
And traveled the track of the railway back
    With a blithesome roundelay--

Of the tranquil bliss of a true love kiss;
    And painted the picture, too,
Of the wedded life, and the patient wife,
    And the husband fond and true;

And sang the joy that a noble boy
    Brings to a father's soul,
Who lets the wine as a mocker shine
    Stagnated in the bowl.

And he stabbed his pen in the ink again,
    And wrote with a writhing frown,
"This is the end."  "And now, my friend,
    You may print it--upside down!"


PRIVATE THEATRICALS

A quite convincing axiom
    Is, "Life is like a play";
For, turning back its pages some
    Few dog-eared years away,
        I find where I
        Committed my
Love-tale--with brackets where to sigh.

I feel an idle interest
    To read again the page;
I enter, as a lover dressed,
    At twenty years of age,
        And play the part
        With throbbing heart,
And all an actor's glowing art.

And she who plays my Lady-love
    Excels!--Her loving glance
Has power her audience to move--
    I am her audience.--
        Her acting tact,
        To tell the fact,
"Brings down the house" in every act.

And often we defy the curse
    Of storms and thunder-showers,
To meet together and rehearse
    This little play of ours--
        I think, when she
        "Makes love" to me,
She kisses very naturally!

    .    .    .    .    .    .

Yes; it's convincing--rather--
    That "Life is like a play":
I am playing "Heavy Father"
    In a "Screaming Farce" to-day,
        That so "brings down
        The house," I frown,
And fain would "ring the curtain down."


PLAIN SERMONS

I saw a man--and envied him beside--
    Because of this world's goods he had great store;
But even as I envied him, he died,
    And left me envious of him no more.

I saw another man--and envied still--
    Because he was content with frugal lot;
But as I envied him, the rich man's will
    Bequeathed him all, and envy I forgot.

Yet still another man I saw, and he
    I envied for a calm and tranquil mind
That nothing fretted in the least degree--
    Until, alas! I found that he was blind.

What vanity is envy! for I find
    I have been rich in dross of thought, and poor 
In that I was a fool, and lastly blind
    For never having seen myself before!


"TRADIN' JOE"

I'm one o' these cur'ous kind o' chaps
You think you know when you don't, perhaps!
I hain't no fool--ner I don't p'tend
To be so smart I could rickommend
Myself fer a CONGERSSMAN my friend!--
But I'm kind o' betwixt-and-between, you know,--
One o' these fellers 'at folks call "slow."
And I'll say jest here I'm kind o' queer
Regardin' things 'at I SEE and HEAR,--
Fer I'm THICK o' hearin' SOMETIMES, and
It's hard to git me to understand;
But other times it hain't, you bet!
Fer I don't sleep with both eyes shet!

I've swapped a power in stock, and so
The neighbers calls me "Tradin' Joe"--
And I'm goin' to tell you 'bout a trade,--
And one o' the best I ever made:

Folks has gone so fur's to say
'At I'm well fixed, in a WORLDLY way,
And BEIN' so, and a WIDOWER,
It's not su'prisin', as you'll infer,
I'm purty handy among the sect--
Widders especially, rickollect!
And I won't deny that along o' late
I've hankered a heap fer the married state--
But some way o' 'nother the longer we wait
The harder it is to discover a mate.

Marshall Thomas,--a friend o' mine,
Doin' some in the tradin' line,
But a'most too YOUNG to know it all--
On'y at PICNICS er some BALL!--
Says to me, in a banterin' way,
As 'we was a-loadin' stock one day,--
"You're a-huntin' a wife, and I want you to see
My girl's mother, at Kankakee!--
She hain't over forty--good-lookin' and spry,
And jest the woman to fill your eye!
And I'm a-goin' there Sund'y,--and now," says he,
"I want to take you along with ME;
And you marry HER, and," he says, "by 'shaw I
You'll hev me fer yer son-in-law!"
I studied a while, and says I, "Well, I'll
First have to see ef she suits my style;
And ef she does, you kin bet your life
Your mother-in-law will be my wife!"

Well, Sundy come; and I fixed up some--
Putt on a collar--I did, by gum!--
Got down my "plug," and my satin vest--
(You wouldn't know me to see me dressed!--
But any one knows ef you got the clothes
You kin go in the crowd wher' the best of 'em goes!)
And I greeced my boots, and combed my hair
Keerfully over the bald place there;
And Marshall Thomas and me that day
Eat our dinners with Widder Gray
And her girl Han'!  *  *  *


            Well, jest a glance
O' the widder's smilin' countenance,
A-cuttin' up chicken and big pot-pies,
Would make a man hungry in Paradise!
And passin' p'serves and jelly and cake
'At would make an ANGEL'S appetite ACHE!--
Pourin' out coffee as yaller as gold--
Twic't as much as the cup could hold--
La! it was rich!--And then she'd say,
"Take some o' THIS!' in her coaxin' way,
Tell ef I'd been a hoss I'd 'a' FOUNDERED, shore,
And jest dropped dead on her white-oak floor!

Well, the way I talked would 'a' done you good,
Ef you'd 'a' been there to 'a' understood;
Tel I noticed Hanner and Marshall, they
Was a-noticin' me in a cur'ous way;
So I says to myse'f, says I, "Now, Joe,
The best thing fer you is to jest go slow!"
And I simmered down, and let them do
The bulk o' the talkin' the evening through.

And Marshall was still in a talkative gait
When he left, that evening--tolable late.
"How do you like her?" he says to me;
Says I, "She suits, to a 'T-Y-TEE'!
And then I ast how matters stood
With him in the OPPOSITE neighberhood?
"Bully!" he says; "I ruther guess
I'll finally git her to say the 'yes.'
I named it to her to-night, and she
Kind o' smiled, and said 'SHE'D SEE'--
And that's a purty good sign!" says he:
"Yes" says I, "you're ahead o' ME!"
And then he laughed, and said, "GO IN!
And patted me on the shoulder ag'in.

Well, ever sense then I've been ridin' a good
Deal through the Kankakee neighberhood;
And I make it convenient sometimes to stop
And hitch a few minutes, and kind o' drop
In at the widder's, and talk o' the crop
And one thing o' 'nother.  And week afore last
The notion struck me, as I drove past,
I'd stop at the place and state my case--
Might as well do it at first as last!

I felt first-rate; so I hitched at the gate,
And went up to the house; and, strange to relate,
MARSHALL THOMAS had dropped in, TOO.--
"Glad to see you, sir, how do you do?"
He says, says he!  Well--it SOUNDED QUEER:

And when Han' told me to take a cheer,
Marshall got up and putt out o' the room--
And motioned his hand fer the WIDDER to come.
I didn't say nothin' fer quite a spell,
But thinks I to myse'f, "There's a dog in the well!"
And Han' SHE smiled so cur'ous at me--
Says I, "What's up?"  And she says, says she,
"Marshall's been at me to marry ag'in,
And I told him 'no,' jest as you come in."
Well, somepin' o' 'nother in that girl's voice
Says to me, "Joseph, here's your choice!"
And another minute her guileless breast
Was lovin'ly throbbin' ag'in my vest!--
And then I kissed her, and heerd a smack
Come like a' echo a-flutterin' back,
And we looked around, and in full view
Marshall was kissin' the widder, too!
Well, we all of us laughed, in our glad su'prise,
Tel the tears come A-STREAMIN' out of our eyes!
And when Marsh said "'Twas the squarest trade
That ever me and him had made,"
We both shuck hands, 'y jucks! and swore
We'd stick together ferevermore.
And old Squire Chipman tuck us the trip:
And Marshall and me's in pardnership!


DOT LEEDLE BOY

Ot's a leedle Gristmas story
    Dot I told der leedle folks--
Und I vant you stop dot laughin'
    Und grackin' funny jokes!--
So help me Peter-Moses!
    Ot's no time for monkey-shine,
Ober I vast told you somedings
    Of dot leedle boy of mine!

Ot vas von cold Vinter vedder,
    Ven der snow vas all about--
Dot you have to chop der hatchet
    Eef you got der sauerkraut!
Und der cheekens on der hind leg
    Vas standin' in der shine
Der sun shmile out dot morning
    On dot leedle boy of mine.

He vas yoost a leedle baby
    Not bigger as a doll
Dot time I got acquaintet--
    Ach! you ought to heard 'im squall!--
I grackys! dot's der moosic
    Ot make me feel so fine
Ven first I vas been marriet--
    Oh, dot leedle boy of mine!

He look yoost like his fader!--
    So, ven der vimmen said,
"Vot a purty leedle baby!"
    Katrina shake der head. . . .
I dink she must 'a' notice
    Dot der baby vas a-gryin',
Und she cover up der blankets
    Of dot leedle boy of mine.

Vel, ven he vas got bigger,
    Dot he grawl und bump his nose,
Und make der table over,
    Und molasses on his glothes--
Dot make 'im all der sveeter,--
    So I say to my Katrine,
"Better you vas quit a-shpankin'
    Dot leedle boy of mine!"

No more he vas older
    As about a dozen months
He speak der English language
    Und der German--bote at vonce!
Und he dringk his glass of lager
    Like a Londsman fon der Rhine--
Und I klingk my glass togeder
    Mit dot leedle boy of mine!

I vish you could 'a' seen id--
    Ven he glimb up on der chair
Und shmash der lookin'-glasses
    Ven he try to comb his hair
Mit a hammer!--Und Katrina
    Say, "Dot's an ugly sign!"
But I laugh und vink my fingers
    At dot leedle boy of mine.

But vonce, dot Vinter morning,
    He shlip out in der snow
Mitout no stockin's on 'im.--
    He say he "vant to go
Und fly some mit der birdies!"
    Und ve give 'im medi-cine
Ven he catch der "parrygoric"--
    Dot leedle boy of mine!

Und so I set und nurse 'im,
    Vile der Gristmas vas come roun',
Und I told 'im 'bout "Kriss Kringle,"
    How he come der chimbly down:
Und I ask 'im eef he love 'im
    Eef he bring 'im someding fine?
"Nicht besser as mein fader,"
    Say dot leedle boy of mine.--

Und he put his arms aroun' me
    Und hug so close und tight,
I hear der gclock a-tickin'
    All der balance of der night! .  .  .
Someding make me feel so funny
    Ven I say to my Katrine,
"Let us go und fill der stockin's
    Of dot leedle boy of mine."

Vell.--Ve buyed a leedle horses
    Dot you pull 'im mit a shtring,
Und a leedle fancy jay-bird--
    Eef you vant to hear 'im sing
You took 'im by der topknot
    Und yoost blow in behine--
Und dot make much spectakel
    For dot leedle boy of mine!

Und gandies, nuts und raizens--
    Und I buy a leedle drum
Dot I vant to hear 'im rattle
    Ven der Gristmas morning come!
Und a leedle shmall tin rooster
    Dot vould crow so loud und fine
Ven he sqveeze 'im in der morning,
    Dot leedle boy of mine!

Und--vile ve vas a-fixin'--
    Dot leedle boy vake out!
I t'ought he been a-dreamin'
    "Kriss Kringle" vas about,--
For he say--"DOT'S HIM!--I SEE 'IM
    MIT DER SHTARS DOT MAKE DER SHINE!"
Und he yoost keep on a-gryin'--
    Dot leedle boy of mine,--
Und gottin' vorse und vorser--
    Und tumble on der bed!
So--ven der doctor seen id,
    He kindo' shake his head,
Und feel his pulse--und visper,
    "Der boy is a-dyin'."
You dink I could BELIEVE id?--
    DOT LEEDLE BOY OF MINE?

I told you, friends--dot's someding,
    Der last time dot he speak
Und say, "GOOT-BY, KRISS KRINGLE!"
    --Dot make me feel so veak
I yoost kneel down und drimble,
    Und bur-sed out a-gryin',
"MEIN GOTT, MEIN GOTT IN HIMMEL!--
    DOT LEEDLE BOY OF MINE!"
.   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .


Der sun don't shine DOT Gristmas!
    . . . Eef dot leedle boy vould LIFF'D--
No deefer-en'! for HEAVEN vas
    His leedle Gristmas gift!
Und der ROOSTER, und der GANDY,
    Und me--und my Katrine--
Und der jay-bird--is awaiting
    For dot leedle boy of mine.


I SMOKE MY PIPE

I can't extend to every friend
    In need a helping hand--
No matter though I wish it so,
    'Tis not as Fortune planned;
But haply may I fancy they
    Are men of different stripe
Than others think who hint and wink,--
    And so--I smoke my pipe!

A golden coal to crown the bowl--
    My pipe and I alone,--
I sit and muse with idler views
    Perchance than I should own:--
It might be worse to own the purse
    Whose glutted bowels gripe
In little qualms of stinted alms;
    And so I smoke my pipe.

And if inclined to moor my mind
    And cast the anchor Hope,
A puff of breath will put to death
    The morbid misanthrope
That lurks inside--as errors hide
    In standing forms of type
To mar at birth some line of worth;
    And so I smoke my pipe.

The subtle stings misfortune flings
    Can give me little pain
When my narcotic spell has wrought
    This quiet in my brain:
When I can waste the past in taste
    So luscious and so ripe
That like an elf I hug myself;
    And so I smoke my pipe.

And wrapped in shrouds of drifting clouds,
    I watch the phantom's flight,
Till alien eyes from Paradise
    Smile on me as I write:
And I forgive the wrongs that live,
    As lightly as I wipe
Away the tear that rises here;
    And so I smoke my pipe.



RED RIDING-HOOD

Sweet little myth of the nursery story--
    Earliest love of mine infantile breast,
Be something tangible, bloom in thy glory
    Into existence, as thou art addressed!
Hasten! appear to me, guileless and good--
    Thou are so dear to me, Red Riding-Hood!

Azure-blue eyes, in a marvel of wonder,
    Over the dawn of a blush breaking out;
Sensitive nose, with a little smile under
    Trying to hide in a blossoming pout--
Couldn't be serious, try as you would,
    Little mysterious Red Riding-Hood!

Hah! little girl, it is desolate, lonely,
    Out in this gloomy old forest of Life!--
Here are not pansies and buttercups only--
    Brambles and briers as keen as a knife;
And a Heart, ravenous, trails in the wood
For the meal have he must,--Red Riding-Hood!


IF I KNEW WHAT POETS KNOW

If I knew what poets know,
    Would I write a rhyme
Of the buds that never blow
    In the summer-time?
Would I sing of golden seeds
Springing up in ironweeds?
And of rain-drops turned to snow,
If I knew what poets know?

Did I know what poets do,
    Would I sing a song
Sadder than the pigeon's coo
    When the days are long?
Where I found a heart in pain,
I would make it glad again;
And the false should be the true,
Did I know what poets do.

If I knew what poets know,
    I would find a theme
Sweeter than the placid flow
    Of the fairest dream:
I would sing of love that lives
On the errors it forgives;
And the world would better grow
If I knew what poets know.


AN OLD SWEETHEART OF MINE

An old sweetheart of mine!--Is this her presence here with me,
Or but a vain creation of a lover's memory?
A fair, illusive vision that would vanish into air
Dared I even touch the silence with the whisper of a prayer?

Nay, let me then believe in all the blended false and true--
The semblance of the OLD love and the substance of the NEW,--
The THEN of changeless sunny days--the NOW of shower and shine--
But Love forever smiling--as that old sweetheart of mine.

This ever-restful sense of HOME, though shouts ring in the
hall.--
The easy chair--the old book-shelves and prints along the wall;
The rare HABANAS in their box, or gaunt church-warden-stem
That often wags, above the jar, derisively at them.

As one who cons at evening o'er an album, all alone,
And muses on the faces of the friends that he has known,
So I turn the leaves of Fancy, till, in shadowy design,
I find the smiling features of an old sweetheart of mine.

The lamplight seems to glimmer with a flicker of surprise,
As I turn it low--to rest me of the dazzle in my eyes,
And light my pipe in silence, save a sigh that seems to yoke
Its fate with my tobacco and to vanish with the smoke.

'Tis a FRAGRANT retrospection,--for the loving thoughts that
start
Into being are like perfume from the blossom of the heart;
And to dream the old dreams over is a luxury divine--
When my truant fancies wander with that old sweetheart of mine.

Though I hear beneath my study, like a fluttering of wings,
The voices of my children and the mother as she sings--
I feel no twinge of conscience to deny me any theme
When Care has cast her anchor in the harbor of a dream--

In fact, to speak in earnest, I believe it adds a charm
To spice the good a trifle with a little dust of harm,--
For I find an extra flavor in Memory's mellow wine
That makes me drink the deeper to that old sweetheart of mine.

O Childhood-days enchanted!  O the magic of the Spring!--
With all green boughs to blossom white, and all bluebirds to
sing!
When all the air, to toss and quaff, made life a jubilee
And changed the children's song and laugh to shrieks of ecstasy.

With eyes half closed in clouds that ooze from lips that taste,
as well,
The peppermint and cinnamon, I hear the old School bell,
And from "Recess" romp in again from "Black-man's" broken line,
To smile, behind my "lesson," at that old sweetheart of mine.

A face of lily-beauty, with a form of airy grace,
Floats out of my tobacco as the Genii from the vase;
And I thrill beneath the glances of a pair of azure eyes
As glowing as the summer and as tender as the skies.

I can see the pink sunbonnet and the little checkered dress
She wore when first I kissed her and she answered the caress
With the written declaration that, "as surely as the vine
Grew 'round the stump," she loved me--that old sweetheart of
mine.

Again I made her presents, in a really helpless way,--
The big "Rhode Island Greening"--I was hungry, too, that day!--
But I follow her from Spelling, with her hand behind her--so--
And I slip the apple in it--and the Teacher doesn't know!

I give my TREASURES to her--all,--my pencil--blue-and-red;--
And, if little girls played marbles, MINE should all be HERS,
instead!
But SHE gave me her PHOTOGRAPH, and printed "Ever Thine"
Across the back--in blue-and-red--that old sweet-heart of mine!

And again I feel the pressure of her slender little hand,
As we used to talk together of the future we had planned,--
When I should be a poet, and with nothing else to do
But write the tender verses that she set the music to . . .

When we should live together in a cozy little cot
Hid in a nest of roses, with a fairy garden-spot,
Where the vines were ever fruited, and the weather ever fine,
And the birds were ever singing for that old sweetheart of mine.

When I should be her lover forever and a day,
And she my faithful sweetheart till the golden hair was gray;
And we should be so happy that when either's lips were dumb
They would not smile in Heaven till the other's kiss had come.

But, ah! my dream is broken by a step upon the stair,
And the door is softly opened, and--my wife is standing there:
Yet with eagerness and rapture all my visions I resign,--
To greet the LIVING presence of that old sweetheart of mine.


SQUIRE HAWKINS'S STORY

I hain't no hand at tellin' tales,
Er spinnin' yarns, as the sailors say;
Someway o' 'nother, language fails
To slide fer me in the oily way
That LAWYERS has; and I wisht it would,
Fer I've got somepin' that I call good;
But bein' only a country squire,
I've learned to listen and admire,
Ruther preferrin' to be addressed
Than talk myse'f--but I'll do my best:--

Old Jeff Thompson--well, I'll say,
Was the clos'test man I ever saw!--
Rich as cream, but the porest pay,
And the meanest man to work fer--La!
I've knowed that man to work one "hand"--
Fer little er nothin', you understand--
From four o'clock in the morning light
Tel eight and nine o'clock at night,
And then find fault with his appetite!
He'd drive all over the neighberhood 
To miss the place where a toll-gate stood,
And slip in town, by some old road
That no two men in the county knowed,
With a jag o' wood, and a sack o' wheat,
That wouldn't burn and you couldn't eat!
And the trades he'd make, 'll I jest de-clare,
Was enough to make a preacher swear!
And then he'd hitch, and hang about
Tel the lights in the toll-gate was blowed out,
And then the turnpike he'd turn in
And sneak his way back home ag'in!

Some folks hint, and I make no doubt,
That that's what wore his old wife out--
Toilin' away from day to day
And year to year, through heat and cold,
Uncomplainin'--the same old way
The martyrs died in the days of old;
And a-clingin', too, as the martyrs done,
To one fixed faith, and her ONLY one,--
Little Patience, the sweetest child
That ever wept unrickonciled,
Er felt the pain and the ache and sting
That only a mother's death can bring.

Patience Thompson!--I think that name
Must 'a' come from a power above,
Fer it seemed to fit her jest the same
As a GAITER would, er a fine kid glove!
And to see that girl, with all the care
Of the household on her--I de-clare
It was OUDACIOUS, the work she'd do,
And the thousand plans that she'd putt through;

And sing like a medder-lark all day long,
And drowned her cares in the joys o' song;
And LAUGH sometimes tel the farmer's "hand,"
Away fur off in the fields, would stand
A-listenin', with the plow half drawn,
Tel the coaxin' echoes called him on;
And the furries seemed, in his dreamy eyes,
Like foot-paths a-leadin' to Paradise,
As off through the hazy atmosphere
The call fer dinner reached his ear.

Now LOVE'S as cunnin'a little thing
As a hummin'-bird upon the wing,
And as liable to poke his nose
Jest where folks would least suppose,--
And more'n likely build his nest
Right in the heart you'd leave unguessed,
And live and thrive at your expense--
At least, that's MY experience.
And old Jeff Thompson often thought,
In his se'fish way, that the quiet John
Was a stiddy chap, as a farm-hand OUGHT
To always be,--fer the airliest dawn
Found John busy--and "EASY," too,
Whenever his wages would fall due!--
To sum him up with a final touch,
He EAT so little and WORKED so much,
That old Jeff laughed to hisse'f and said,
"He makes ME money and airns his bread!--

But John, fer all of his quietude,
Would sometimes drap a word er so
That none but PATIENCE understood,
And none but her was MEANT to know!--
Maybe at meal-times John would say,
As the sugar-bowl come down his way,
"Thanky, no; MY coffee's sweet
Enough fer ME!" with sich conceit,
SHE'D know at once, without no doubt,
HE meant because she poured it out;
And smile and blush, and all sich stuff,
And ast ef it was "STRONG enough?"
And git the answer, neat and trim,
"It COULDN'T be too 'strong' fer HIM!"

And so things went fer 'bout a year,
Tel John, at last, found pluck to go
And pour his tale in the old man's ear--
And ef it had been HOT LEAD, I know
It couldn't 'a' raised a louder fuss,
Ner 'a' riled the old man's temper wuss!
He jest LIT in, and cussed and swore,
And lunged and rared, and ripped and tore,
And told John jest to leave his door,
And not to darken it no more!
But Patience cried, with eyes all wet,
"Remember, John, and don't ferget,
WHATEVER comes, I love you yet!"
But the old man thought, in his se'fish way,
"I'll see her married rich some day;
And THAT," thinks he, "is money fer ME--
And my will's LAW, as it ought to be!"

So when, in the course of a month er so,
A WIDOWER, with a farm er two,
Comes to Jeff's, w'y, the folks, you know,
Had to TALK--as the folks'll do:
It was the talk of the neighberhood--
PATIENCE and JOHN, and THEIR affairs;--
And this old chap with a few gray hairs
Had "cut John out," it was understood.
And some folks reckoned "Patience, too,
Knowed what SHE was a-goin' to do--
It was LIKE her--la! indeed!--
All she loved was DOLLARS and CENTS--
Like old JEFF--and they saw no need
Fer JOHN to pine at HER negligence!"

But others said, in a KINDER way,
They missed the songs she used to sing--
They missed the smiles that used to play
Over her face, and the laughin' ring
Of her glad voice--that EVERYthing
Of her OLD se'f seemed dead and gone,
And this was the ghost that they gazed on!

Tel finally it was noised about
There was a WEDDIN' soon to be
Down at Jeff's; and the "cat was out"
Shore enough!--'Ll the JEE-MUN-NEE!
It RILED me when John told me so,--
Fer I WAS A FRIEND O' JOHN'S, you know;
And his trimblin' voice jest broke in two--
As a feller's voice'll sometimes do.--
And I says, says I, "Ef I know my biz--
And I think I know what JESTICE is,--
I've read SOME law--and I'd advise
A man like you to wipe his eyes
And square his jaws and start AGIN,
FER JESTICE IS A-GOIN' TO WIN!"
And it wasn't long tel his eyes had cleared
As blue as the skies, and the sun appeared
In the shape of a good old-fashioned smile
That I hadn't seen fer a long, long while.

So we talked on fer a' hour er more,
And sunned ourselves in the open door,--
Tel a hoss-and-buggy down the road
Come a-drivin' up, that I guess John KNOWED,--
Fer he winked and says, "I'll dessappear--
THEY'D smell a mice ef they saw ME here!"
And he thumbed his nose at the old gray mare,
And hid hisse'f in the house somewhere.

Well.--The rig drove up: and I raised my head
As old Jeff hollered to me and said
That "him and his old friend there had come
To see ef the squire was at home."
. . . I told 'em "I was; and I AIMED to be
At every chance of a weddin'-fee!"
And then I laughed--and they laughed, too,--
Fer that was the object they had in view.
"Would I be on hands at eight that night?"
They ast; and 's-I, "You're mighty right,
I'LL be on hand!"  And then I BU'ST
Out a-laughin' my very wu'st,--
And so did they, as they wheeled away
And drove to'rds town in a cloud o' dust.
Then I shet the door, and me and John
Laughed and LAUGHED, and jest LAUGHED on,
Tel Mother drapped her specs, and BY
JEEWHILLIKERS!  I thought she'd DIE!--
And she couldn't 'a' told, I'll bet my hat,
What on earth she was laughin' at!

But all o' the fun o' the tale hain't done!--
Fer a drizzlin' rain had jest begun,
And a-havin' 'bout four mile' to ride,
I jest concluded I'd better light
Out fer Jeff's and save my hide,--
Fer IT WAS A-GOIN' TO STORM, THAT NIGHT!
So we went down to the barn, and John
Saddled my beast, and I got on;
And he told me somepin' to not ferget,
And when I left, he was LAUGHIN' yet.

And, 'proachin' on to my journey's end,
The great big draps o' the rain come down,
And the thunder growled in a way to lend
An awful look to the lowerin' frown
The dull sky wore; and the lightnin' glanced
Tel my old mare jest MORE'N pranced,
And tossed her head, and bugged her eyes
To about four times their natchurl size,
As the big black lips of the clouds 'ud drap
Out some oath of a thunderclap,
And threaten on in an undertone
That chilled a feller clean to the bone!

But I struck shelter soon enough
To save myse'f.  And the house was jammed
With the women-folks, and the weddin'stuff:--
A great, long table, fairly CRAMMED
With big pound-cakes--and chops and steaks--
And roasts and stews--and stumick-aches
Of every fashion, form, and size,
From twisters up to punkin-pies!
And candies, oranges, and figs,
And reezins,--all the "whilligigs"
And "jim-cracks" that the law allows
On sich occasions!--Bobs and bows
Of gigglin' girls, with corkscrew curls,
And fancy ribbons, reds and blues,
And "beau-ketchers" and "curliques"
To beat the world!  And seven o'clock
Brought old Jeff;-and brought--THE GROOM,--
With a sideboard-collar on, and stock
That choked him so, he hadn't room
To SWALLER in, er even sneeze,
Er clear his th'oat with any case
Er comfort--and a good square cough
Would saw his Adam's apple off!

But as fer PATIENCE--MY! Oomh-OOMH!--
I never saw her look so sweet!--
Her face was cream and roses, too;
And then them eyes o' heavenly blue
Jest made an angel all complete!
And when she split 'em up in smiles
And splintered 'em around the room,
And danced acrost and met the groom,
And LAUGHED OUT LOUD--It kind o' spiles
My language when I come to that--
Fer, as she laid away his hat,
Thinks I, "THE PAPERS HID INSIDE
OF THAT SAID HAT MUST MAKE A BRIDE
A HAPPY ONE FER ALL HER LIFE,
Er else a WRECKED AND WRETCHED WIFE!"
And, someway, then, I thought of JOHN,--
Then looked towards PATIENCE. . . .  She was GONE!--
The door stood open, and the rain
Was dashin' in; and sharp and plain
Above the storm we heerd a cry--
A ringin', laughin', loud "Good-by!"
That died away, as fleet and fast
A hoss's hoofs went splashin' past!
And that was all.  'Twas done that quick! . . .
You've heerd o' fellers "lookin' sick"?
I wisht you'd seen THE GROOM jest then--
I wisht you'd seen them two old men,
With starin' eyes that fairly GLARED
At one another, and the scared
And empty faces of the crowd,--
I wisht you could 'a' been allowed
To jest look on and see it all,--
And heerd the girls and women bawl
And wring their hands; and heerd old Jeff
A-cussin' as he swung hisse'f
Upon his hoss, who champed his bit
As though old Nick had holt of it:
And cheek by jowl the two old wrecks
Rode off as though they'd break their necks.

And as we all stood starin' out
Into the night, I felt the brush
Of some one's hand, and turned about,
And heerd a voice that whispered, "HUSH!--
THEY'RE WAITIN' IN THE KITCHEN, AND
YOU'RE WANTED.  DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND?"
Well, ef my MEMORY serves me now,
I think I winked.--Well, anyhow,
I left the crowd a-gawkin' there,
And jest slipped off around to where
The back door opened, and went in,
And turned and shet the door ag'in,
And maybe LOCKED it--couldn't swear,--
A woman's arms around me makes
Me liable to make mistakes.--
I read a marriage license nex',
But as I didn't have my specs
I jest INFERRED it was all right,
And tied the knot so mortal-tight
That Patience and my old friend John
Was safe enough from that time on!

Well, now, I might go on and tell
How all the joke at last leaked out,
And how the youngsters raised the yell
And rode the happy groom about
Upon their shoulders; how the bride
Was kissed a hunderd times beside
The one I give her,--tel she cried
And laughed untel she like to died!
I might go on and tell you all
About the supper--and the BALL.--
You'd ought to see me twist my heel
Through jest one old Furginny reel
Afore you die! er tromp the strings
Of some old fiddle tel she sings
Some old cowtillion, don't you know,
That putts the devil in yer toe!

We kep' the dancin' up tel FOUR
O'clock, I reckon--maybe more.--
We hardly heerd the thunders roar,
ER THOUGHT about the STORM that blowed--
AND THEM TWO FELLERS ON THE ROAD!
Tel all at onc't we heerd the door
Bu'st open, and a voice that SWORE,--
And old Jeff Thompson tuck the floor.
He shuck hisse'f and looked around
Like some old dog about half-drowned--
HIS HAT, I reckon, WEIGHED TEN POUND
To say the least, and I'll say, SHORE,
HIS OVERCOAT WEIGHED FIFTY more--
THE WETTEST MAN YOU EVER SAW,
TO HAVE SO DRY A SON-IN-LAW!

He sized it all; and Patience laid
Her hand in John's, and looked afraid,
And waited.  And a stiller set
O' folks, I KNOW, you never met
In any court room, where with dread
They wait to hear a verdick read.

The old man turned his eyes on me:
"And have you married 'em?" says he.
I nodded "Yes."  "Well, that'll do,"
He says, "and now we're th'ough with YOU,--
YOU jest clear out, and I decide
And promise to be satisfied!"
He hadn't nothin' more to say.
I saw, of course, how matters lay,
And left.  But as I rode away
I heerd the roosters crow fer day.


A COUNTRY PATHWAY

I come upon it suddenly, alone--
    A little pathway winding in the weeds
That fringe the roadside; and with dreams my own,
    I wander as it leads.

Full wistfully along the slender way,
    Through summer tan of freckled shade and shine,
I take the path that leads me as it may--
    Its every choice is mine.

A chipmunk, or a sudden-whirring quail,
    Is startled by my step as on I fare--
A garter-snake across the dusty trail
    Glances and--is not there.

Above the arching jimson-weeds flare twos
    And twos of sallow-yellow butterflies,
Like blooms of lorn primroses blowing loose
    When autumn winds arise.

The trail dips--dwindles--broadens then, and lifts
    Itself astride a cross-road dubiously,
And, from the fennel marge beyond it, drifts
    Still onward, beckoning me.

And though it needs must lure me mile on mile
    Out of the public highway, still I go,
My thoughts, far in advance in Indian file,
    Allure me even so.

Why, I am as a long-lost boy that went
    At dusk to bring the cattle to the bars,
And was not found again, though Heaven lent
    His mother all the stars

With which to seek him through that awful night
    O years of nights as vain!--Stars never rise
But well might miss their glitter in the light
    Of tears in mother-eyes!

So--on, with quickened breaths, I follow still--
    My avant-courier must be obeyed!
Thus am I led, and thus the path, at will,
    Invites me to invade

A meadow's precincts, where my daring guide
    Clambers the steps of an old-fashioned stile,
And stumbles down again, the other side,
    To gambol there a while.

In pranks of hide-and-seek, as on ahead
    I see it running, while the clover-stalks
Shake rosy fists at me, as though they said--
    "You dog our country walks

"And mutilate us with your walking-stick!--
    We will not suffer tamely what you do,
And warn you at your peril,--for we'll sick
    Our bumblebees on you!"

But I smile back, in airy nonchalance,--
    The more determined on my wayward quest,
As some bright memory a moment dawns
    A morning in my breast--

Sending a thrill that hurries me along
    In faulty similes of childish skips,
Enthused with lithe contortions of a song
    Performing on my lips.

In wild meanderings o'er pasture wealth--
    Erratic wanderings through dead'ning lands,
Where sly old brambles, plucking me by stealth,
    Put berries in my hands:

Or the path climbs a boulder--wades a slough--
    Or, rollicking through buttercups and flags,
Goes gaily dancing o'er a deep bayou
    On old tree-trunks and snags:

Or, at the creek, leads o'er a limpid pool
    Upon a bridge the stream itself has made,
With some Spring-freshet for the mighty tool
    That its foundation laid.

I pause a moment here to bend and muse,
    With dreamy eyes, on my reflection, where
A boat-backed bug drifts on a helpless cruise,
    Or wildly oars the air,

As, dimly seen, the pirate of the brook--
    The pike, whose jaunty hulk denotes his speed--
Swings pivoting about, with wary look
    Of low and cunning greed.

Till, filled with other thought, I turn again
    To where the pathway enters in a realm
Of lordly woodland, under sovereign reign
    Of towering oak and elm.

A puritanic quiet here reviles
    The almost whispered warble from the hedge,
And takes a locust's rasping voice and files
    The silence to an edge.

In such a solitude my somber way
    Strays like a misanthrope within a gloom
Of his own shadows--till the perfect day
    Bursts into sudden bloom,

And crowns a long, declining stretch of space,
    Where King Corn's armies lie with flags unfurled,
And where the valley's dint in Nature's face
    Dimples a smiling world.

And lo! through mists that may not be dispelled,
    I see an old farm homestead, as in dreams,
Where, like a gem in costly setting held,
    The old log cabin gleams.

    .   .   .   .   .   .   .

O darling Pathway! lead me bravely on
    Adown your valley-way, and run before
Among the roses crowding up the lawn
    And thronging at the door,--

And carry up the echo there that shall
    Arouse the drowsy dog, that he may bay
The household out to greet the prodigal
    That wanders home to-day.


THE  OLD  GUITAR

Neglected now is the old guitar
    And moldering into decay;
Fretted with many a rift and scar
    That the dull dust hides away,
While the spider spins a silver star
    In its silent lips to-day.

The keys hold only nerveless strings--
    The sinews of brave old airs
Are pulseless now; and the scarf that clings
    So closely here declares
A sad regret in its ravelings
    And the faded hue it wears.

But the old guitar, with a lenient grace,
    Has cherished a smile for me;
And its features hint of a fairer face
    That comes with a memory
Of a flower-and-perfume-haunted place
    And a moonlit balcony.

Music sweeter than words confess,
    Or the minstrel's powers invent,
Thrilled here once at the light caress
    Of the fairy hands that lent
This excuse for the kiss I press
    On the dear old instrument.

The rose of pearl with the jeweled stem
    Still blooms; and the tiny sets
In the circle all are here; the gem
    In the keys, and the silver frets;
But the dainty fingers that danced o'er them--
    Alas for the heart's regrets!--

Alas for the loosened strings to-day,
    And the wounds of rift and scar
On a worn old heart, with its roundelay
    Enthralled with a stronger bar
That Fate weaves on, through a dull decay
    Like that of the old guitar!


"FRIDAY AFTERNOON"

TO WILLIAM MORRIS PIERSON

[1868-1870]

Of the wealth of facts and fancies
    That our memories may recall,
The old school-day romances
    Are the dearest, after all!--.
When some sweet thought revises
    The half-forgotten tune
That opened "Exercises"
    On "Friday Afternoon."

We seem to hear the clicking
    Of the pencil and the pen,
And the solemn, ceaseless ticking
    Of the timepiece ticking then;
And we note the watchful master,
    As he waves the warning rod,
With our own heart beating faster
    Than the boy's who threw the wad.

Some little hand uplifted,
    And the creaking of a shoe:--
A problem left unsifted
    For the teacher's hand to do:
The murmured hum of learning--
    And the flutter of a book;
The smell of something burning,
    And the school's inquiring look.

The bashful boy in blushes;
    And the girl, with glancing eyes,
Who hides her smiles, and hushes
    The laugh about to rise,--
Then, with a quick invention,
    Assumes a serious face,
To meet the words, "Attention!
    Every scholar in his place!"

The opening song, page 20.--
    Ah! dear old "Golden Wreath,"
You willed your sweets in plenty;
    And some who look beneath
The leaves of Time will linger,
    And loving tears will start,
As Fancy trails her finger
    O'er the index of the heart.

"Good News from Home"--We hear it
    Welling tremulous, yet clear
And holy as the spirit
    Of the song we used to hear--
"Good news for me" (A throbbing
    And an aching melody)--
"Has come across the"--(sobbing,
    Yea, and salty) "dark blue sea!"

Or the paean "Scotland's burning!"
    With its mighty surge and swell
Of chorus, still returning
    To its universal yell--
Till we're almost glad to drop to
    Something sad and full of pain--
And "Skip verse three," and stop, too,
    Ere our hearts are broke again.

Then "the big girls'" compositions,
    With their doubt, and hope, and glow
Of heart and face,--conditions
    Of "the big boys"--even so,--
When themes of "Spring," and "Summer"
    And of "Fall," and "Winter-time"
Droop our heads and hold us dumber
    Than the sleigh-bell's fancied chime.

Elocutionary science--
    (Still in changeless infancy!)--
With its "Cataline's Defiance,"
    And "The Banner of the Free":
Or, lured from Grandma's attic,
    A ramshackle "rocker" there,
Adds a skreek of the dramatic
    To the poet's "Old Arm-Chair."

Or the "Speech of Logan" shifts us
    From the pathos, to the fire;
And Tell (with Gessler) lifts us
    Many noble notches higher.--
Till a youngster, far from sunny,
    With sad eyes of watery blue,
Winds up with something "funny,"
    Like "Cock-a-doodle-do!"

Then a dialogue--selected
    For its realistic worth:--
The Cruel Boy detected
    With a turtle turned to earth
Back downward; and, in pleading,
    The Good Boy--strangely gay
At such a sad proceeding--
    Says, "Turn him over, pray!"

So the exercises taper
    Through gradations of delight
To the reading of "The Paper,"
    Which is entertaining--quite!
For it goes ahead and mentions
    "If a certain Mr. O.
Has serious intentions
    That he ought to tell her so."

It also "Asks permission
    To intimate to 'John'
The dubious condition
    Of the ground he's standing on";
And, dropping the suggestion
    To "mind what he's about,"
It stuns him with the question:
    "Does his mother know he's out?"

And among the contributions
    To this "Academic Press"
Are "Versified Effusions"
    By--"Our lady editress"--
Which fact is proudly stated
    By the CHIEF of the concern,--
"Though the verse communicated
    Bears the pen-name 'Fanny Fern.' "

    .   .   .   .   .   .
When all has been recited,
    And the teacher's bell is heard,
And visitors, invited,
    Have dropped a kindly word,
A hush of holy feeling
    Falls down upon us there,
As though the day were kneeling,
    With the twilight for the prayer.

    .   .   .   .   .   .
Midst the wealth of facts and fancies
    That our memories may recall,
Thus the old school-day romances
    Are the dearest, after all!--
When some sweet thought revises
    The half-forgotten tune
That opened "Exercises,"
    On "Friday Afternoon."


"JOHNSON'S BOY"

The world is turned ag'in' me,
    And people says, "They guess
That nothin' else is in me
    But pure maliciousness!"
I git the blame for doin'
    What other chaps destroy,
And I'm a-goin' to ruin
    Because I'm "Johnson's boy."

THAT ain't my name--I'd ruther
    They'd call me IKE or PAT--
But they've forgot the other--
    And so have I, for that!
I reckon it's as handy,
    When Nibsy breaks his toy,
Or some one steals his candy,
    To say 'twas "JOHNSON'S BOY!"

You can't git any water
    At the pump, and find the spout
So durn chuck-full o' mortar
    That you have to bore it out;
You tackle any scholar
    In Wisdom's wise employ,
And I'll bet you half a dollar
    He'll say it's "Johnson's boy!"

Folks don't know how I suffer
    In my uncomplainin' way--
They think I'm gittin' tougher
    And tougher every day.
Last Sunday night, when Flinder
    Was a-shoutin' out for joy,
And some one shook the winder,
    He prayed for "Johnson's boy."

I'm tired of bein' follered
    By farmers every day,
And then o' bein' collared
    For coaxin' hounds away;
Hounds always plays me double--
    It's a trick they all enjoy--
To git me into trouble,
    Because I'm "Johnson's boy."

But if I git to Heaven,
    I hope the Lord'll see
SOME boy has been perfect,
    And lay it on to me;
I'll swell the song sonorous,
    And clap my wings for joy,
And sail off on the chorus--
    "Hurrah for 'Johnson's boy!'"


HER BEAUTIFUL HANDS

Your hands--they are strangely fair!
O Fair--for the jewels that sparkle there,--
Fair--for the witchery of the spell
That ivory keys alone can tell;
But when their delicate touches rest
Here in my own do I love them best,
As I clasp with eager, acquisitive spans
My glorious treasure of beautiful hands!

Marvelous--wonderful--beautiful hands!
They can coax roses to bloom in the strands
Of your brown tresses; and ribbons will twine,
Under mysterious touches of thine,
Into such knots as entangle the soul
And fetter the heart under such a control
As only the strength of my love understands--
My passionate love for your beautiful hands.

As I remember the first fair touch
Of those beautiful hands that I love so much,
I seem to thrill as I then was thrilled,
Kissing the glove that I found unfilled--
When I met your gaze, and the queenly bow,
As you said to me, laughingly, "Keep it now!" . . .
And dazed and alone in a dream I stand,
Kissing this ghost of your beautiful hand.

When first I loved, in the long ago,
And held your hand as I told you so--
Pressed and caressed it and gave it a kiss
And said "I could die for a hand like this!"
Little I dreamed love's fullness yet
Had to ripen when eyes were wet
And prayers were vain in their wild demands
For one warm touch of your beautiful hands.

.   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .
Beautiful Hands!--O Beautiful Hands!
Could you reach out of the alien lands
Where you are lingering, and give me, to-night,
Only a touch--were it ever so light--
My heart were soothed, and my weary brain
Would lull itself into rest again;
For there is no solace the world commands
Like the caress of your beautiful hands.


NATURAL PERVERSITIES

I am not prone to moralize
    In scientific doubt
On certain facts that Nature tries
    To puzzle us about,--
For I am no philosopher
    Of wise elucidation,
But speak of things as they occur,
    From simple observation.

I notice LITTLE things--to wit:--
    I never missed a train
Because I didn't RUN for it;
    I never knew it rain
That my umbrella wasn't lent,--
    Or, when in my possession,
The sun but wore, to all intent,
    A jocular expression.

I never knew a creditor
    To dun me for a debt
But I was "cramped" or "bu'sted"; or
    I never knew one yet,
When I had plenty in my purse,
    To make the least invasion,--
As I, accordingly perverse,
    Have courted no occasion.

Nor do I claim to comprehend
    What Nature has in view
In giving us the very friend
    To trust we oughtn't to.--
But so it is:  The trusty gun
    Disastrously exploded
Is always sure to be the one
    We didn't think was loaded.

Our moaning is another's mirth,--
    And what is worse by half,
We say the funniest thing on earth
    And never raise a laugh:
'Mid friends that love us over well,
    And sparkling jests and liquor,
Our hearts somehow are liable
    To melt in tears the quicker.

We reach the wrong when most we seek
    The right; in like effect,
We stay the strong and not the weak--
    Do most when we neglect.--
Neglected genius--truth be said--
    As wild and quick as tinder,
The more you seek to help ahead
    The more you seem to hinder.

I've known the least the greatest, too--
    And, on the selfsame plan,
The biggest fool I ever knew
    Was quite a little man:
We find we ought, and then we won't--
    We prove a thing, then doubt it,--
Know EVERYTHING but when we don't
    Know ANYTHING about it.


THE SILENT VICTORS

MAY 30, 1878, 

Dying for victory, cheer on cheer
Thundered on his eager ear.
            --CHARLES L. HOLSTEIN.

I

Deep, tender, firm and true, the Nation's heart
    Throbs for her gallant heroes passed away,
Who in grim Battle's drama played their part,
    And slumber here to-day.--

Warm hearts that beat their lives out at the shrine
    Of Freedom, while our country held its breath
As brave battalions wheeled themselves in line
    And marched upon their death:

When Freedom's Flag, its natal wounds scarce healed,
    Was torn from peaceful winds and flung again
To shudder in the storm of battle-field--
    The elements of men,--

When every star that glittered was a mark
    For Treason's ball, and every rippling bar
Of red and white was sullied with the dark
    And purple stain of war:

When angry guns, like famished beasts of prey,
    Were howling o'er their gory feast of lives,
And sending dismal echoes far away
    To mothers, maids, and wives:--

The mother, kneeling in the empty night,
    With pleading hands uplifted for the son
Who, even as she prayed, had fought the fight--
    The victory had won:

The wife, with trembling hand that wrote to say
    The babe was waiting for the sire's caress--
The letter meeting that upon the way,--
    The babe was fatherless:

The maiden, with her lips, in fancy, pressed
    Against the brow once dewy with her breath,
Now lying numb, unknown, and uncaressed
    Save by the dews of death.

II

What meed of tribute can the poet pay
    The Soldier, but to trail the ivy-vine
Of idle rhyme above his grave to-day
    In epitaph design?--

Or wreathe with laurel-words the icy brows
    That ache no longer with a dream of fame,
But, pillowed lowly in the narrow house,
    Renowned beyond the name.

The dewy tear-drops of the night may fall,
    And tender morning with her shining hand
May brush them from the grasses green and tall
    That undulate the land.--

Yet song of Peace nor din of toil and thrift,
    Nor chanted honors, with the flowers we heap,
Can yield us hope the Hero's head to lift
    Out of its dreamless sleep:

The dear old Flag, whose faintest flutter flies
    A stirring echo through each patriot breast,
Can never coax to life the folded eyes
    That saw its wrongs redressed--

That watched it waver when the fight was hot,
    And blazed with newer courage to its aid,
Regardless of the shower of shell and shot
    Through which the charge was made;--

And when, at last, they saw it plume its wings,
    Like some proud bird in stormy element,
And soar untrammeled on its wanderings,
    They closed in death, content.

III

O Mother, you who miss the smiling face
    Of that dear boy who vanished from your sight,
And left you weeping o'er the vacant place
    He used to fill at night,--

Who left you dazed, bewildered, on a day
    That echoed wild huzzas, and roar of guns
That drowned the farewell words you tried to say
    To incoherent ones;--

Be glad and proud you had the life to give--
    Be comforted through all the years to come,--
Your country has a longer life to live,
    Your son a better home.

O Widow, weeping o'er the orphaned child,
    Who only lifts his questioning eyes to send
A keener pang to grief unreconciled,--
    Teach him to comprehend

He had a father brave enough to stand
    Before the fire of Treason's blazing gun,
That, dying, he might will the rich old land
    Of Freedom to his son.

And, Maiden, living on through lonely years
    In fealty to love's enduring ties,--
With strong faith gleaming through the tender tears
    That gather in your eyes,

Look up! and own, in gratefulness of prayer,
    Submission to the will of Heaven's High Host:--
I see your Angel-soldier pacing there,
    Expectant at his post.--

I see the rank and file of armies vast,
    That muster under one supreme control;
I hear the trumpet sound the signal-blast--
    The calling of the roll--

The grand divisions falling into line
    And forming, under voice of One alone
Who gives command, and joins with tongue divine
    The hymn that shakes the Throne.

IV

And thus, in tribute to the forms that rest
    In their last camping-ground, we strew the bloom
And fragrance of the flowers they loved the best,
    In silence o'er the tomb.

With reverent hands we twine the Hero's wreath
    And clasp it tenderly on stake or stone
That stands the sentinel for each beneath
    Whose glory is our own.

While in the violet that greets the sun,
    We see the azure eye of some lost boy;
And in the rose the ruddy cheek of one
    We kissed in childish joy,--

Recalling, haply, when he marched away,
    He laughed his loudest though his eyes were wet.--
The kiss he gave his mother's brow that day
    Is there and burning yet:

And through the storm of grief around her tossed,
    One ray of saddest comfort she may see,--
Four hundred thousand sons like hers were lost
    To weeping Liberty.

    .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .
But draw aside the drapery of gloom,
    And let the sunshine chase the clouds away
And gild with brighter glory every tomb
    We decorate to-day:

And in the holy silence reigning round,
    While prayers of perfume bless the atmosphere,
Where loyal souls of love and faith are found,
    Thank God that Peace is here!

And let each angry impulse that may start,
    Be smothered out of every loyal breast;
And, rocked within the cradle of the heart,
    Let every sorrow rest.

 
SCRAPS

There's a habit I have nurtured,
    From the sentimental time
When my life was like a story,
    And my heart a happy rhyme,--
Of clipping from the paper,
    Or magazine, perhaps,
The idle songs of dreamers,
    Which I treasure as my scraps.

They hide among my letters,
    And they find a cozy nest
In the bosom of my wrapper,
    And the pockets of my vest;
They clamber in my fingers
    Till my dreams of wealth relapse
In fairer dreams than Fortune's
    Though I find them only scraps.

Sometimes I find, in tatters
    Like a beggar, form as fair
As ever gave to Heaven
    The treasure of a prayer;
And words all dim and faded,
    And obliterate in part,
Grow into fadeless meanings
    That are printed on the heart.

Sometimes a childish jingle
    Flings an echo, sweet and clear,
And thrills me as I listen
    To the laughs I used to hear;
And I catch the gleam of faces,
    And the glimmer of glad eyes
That peep at me expectant
    O'er the walls of Paradise.

O syllables of m