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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/22692-h.zip b/22692-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7d42e6c --- /dev/null +++ b/22692-h.zip diff --git a/22692-h/22692-h.htm b/22692-h/22692-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2e3f8c0 --- /dev/null +++ b/22692-h/22692-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,5260 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rippling Rhymes, by Walt Mason</title> +<style type="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 20%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: medium; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: medium } + +P.letter {font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.salutation {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.closing {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.footnote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.transnote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.index {font-size: small ; + text-indent: -5% ; + margin-left: 5% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.intro {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.dedication { font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 25%; + text-align: justify } + +P.published {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 15% } + +P.quote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 4% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.report {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 4% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.report2 {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 4% ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.finis { text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +H3.h3left { margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 1%; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: left ; + clear: left ; + text-align: center } + +H3.h3right { margin-left: 1%; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: right ; + clear: right ; + text-align: center } + +H3.h3center { margin-left: 0; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: none ; + clear: both ; + text-align: center } + +H4.h4left { margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 1%; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: left ; + clear: left ; + text-align: center } + +H4.h4right { margin-left: 1%; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: right ; + clear: right ; + text-align: center } + +H4.h4center { margin-left: 0; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: none ; + clear: both ; + text-align: center } + +H5.h5left { margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 1%; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: left ; + clear: left ; + text-align: center } + +H5.h5right { margin-left: 1%; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: right ; + clear: right ; + text-align: center } + +H5.h5center { margin-left: 0; + margin-right: 0 ; + margin-bottom: .5% ; + margin-top: 0; + float: none ; + clear: both ; + text-align: center } + +IMG.imgleft { float: left; + clear: left; + margin-left: 0; + margin-bottom: 0; + margin-top: 1%; + margin-right: 1%; + padding: 0; + text-align: center } + +IMG.imgright {float: right; + clear: right; + margin-left: 1%; + margin-bottom: 0; + margin-top: 1%; + margin-right: 0; + padding: 0; + text-align: center } + +IMG.imgcenter { margin-left: auto; + margin-bottom: 0; + margin-top: 1%; + margin-right: auto; } + +.pagenum { position: absolute; + left: 1%; + font-size: 95%; + text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; + font-style: normal; + font-weight: normal; + font-variant: normal; } + +.sidenote { left: 0%; + font-size: 65%; + text-align: left; + text-indent: 0%; + width: 17%; + float: left; + clear: left; + padding-left: 0%; + padding-right: 2%; + padding-top: 2%; + padding-bottom: 2%; + font-style: normal; + font-weight: normal; + font-variant: normal; } + + hr.full { width: 100%; + height: 5px; } + a:link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:visited {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:hover {color:#ff0000; + text-decoration: underline; } + pre {font-size: 75%; } + +</style> +</head> +<body> +<h1 align="center">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Rippling Rhymes, by Walt Mason</h1> +<pre> +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 online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Rippling Rhymes</p> +<p>Author: Walt Mason</p> +<p>Release Date: September 21, 2007 [eBook #22692]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIPPLING RHYMES***</p> +<br><br><center><h3>E-text prepared by Al Haines</h3></center><br><br> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<p> </p> + +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="The Umpire" BORDER="2" WIDTH="393" HEIGHT="598"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 393px"> +The Umpire +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +RIPPLING RHYMES +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +To Suit The Times<BR> +All Sorts of Themes Embracin'<BR> +<BR> +Some Gay<BR> +Some Sad<BR> +Some not so Bad<BR> +</H2> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AS +<BR> +WRITTEN BY +</H3> + +<A NAME="img-walt"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-walt.jpg" ALT="Signature of Walt Mason" BORDER="0" WIDTH="227" HEIGHT="61"> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +Chicago +<BR> +A. C. McCLURG & CO. +<BR> +1913 +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Copyright +<BR> +A. C. McClurg & Co. +<BR> +1913 +<BR><BR> +Published October, 1913 +<BR><BR> +Copyrighted in Great Britain +</H5> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +For permission to use copyright prose poems in this book thanks are +extended to the editors and publishers of Harper's Magazine, Harper's +Weekly, The Ladies' Home Journal, System, The Magazine of Business, The +Popular Magazine, Collier's Weekly, The Smart Set Magazine, The +American Magazine and Lippincott's Magazine. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +To +<BR> +GEORGE MATTHEW ADAMS +</H3> + +<P CLASS="dedication"> +Who teaches poets how to win.<BR> +And helps to make the glad world grin,<BR> +And sticks to friends through thick and thin.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ONE MOMENT, PLEASE! +</H3> + +<P> +Walt Mason's poetry is in a class by itself. Although having the +appearance of prose the rhythm is perfect and the philosophy that runs +through his lines is illumined by an irresistible humor. There is a +quaintness about his style that makes his writings a continuing delight. +</P> + +<P> +I began to read Walt twenty-five years ago and although he has drawn +upon his intellectual store constantly for more than a quarter of a +century the fountain of his genius still is flowing with undiminished +volume and the waters are as pure as in the idealistic days of his +youth. +</P> + +<P> +I have shared the satisfaction that his increasing fame has brought him +and have encouraged him to publish this collection that his readers, +now numbering people of many lands, may have permanent companionship +with him. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-bryan"></A> +<IMG SRC="images/img-bryan.jpg" ALT="Signature of William Jennings Bryan" BORDER="0" WIDTH="253" HEIGHT="45"> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H3> + +<BR> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="50%"> +Title +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="50%"> +<I>First Published in</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap001">Morning in Kansas +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap003">Editorial Influence +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Newspaperdom</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap005">Farm Machinery +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap008">The Strong Men +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap010">The Snowy Day +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap011">The Poor Man's Club +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap013">Words and Deeds +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap015">A Day of Rest +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap016">Use Your Head +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>The Butler Way</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap018">The Gloomy Fan +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap021">The Purist +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Lippincott's Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap023">Qualifications +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap025">The Pompous Man +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap026">Inefficient Men +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap028">Life's Injustice +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap031">The Politician +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap032">Random Shots +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap033">Look Pleasant, Please +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Ladies Home Journal</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap035">Courage +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Harper's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap038">Play Ball +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap039">The Old Songs +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap041">Guessing vs. Knowing +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap043">When Women Vote +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Ladies Home journal</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap045">The Agent at the Door +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap047">Good and Bad Times +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap051">Buccaneers +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap053">St. Patrick's Day +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap054">Naming the Baby +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Harper's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap056">Won at Last +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap061">The Greatest Thing +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap063">The Umpire +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap066">The Two Merchants +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap068">Today's Motto +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap069">Some Protests +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap071">The Workers +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap073">The Utilitarian +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Harper's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap076">Fireside Adventures +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap079">Hunting a Job +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap081">Old and New +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap082">The Handy Editor +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Newspaperdom</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap084">The Sleeper Wakes +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap089">In Horseland +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap090">Inauguration Day, 1913 +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap093">Prayer of the Heathen +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap096">Theory and Practice +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap098">Fool and Sage +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap099">Then and Now +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap101">The Sleeper +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap102">Fooling Around +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>The Butler Way</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap104">Guess Who +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap105">Trying Again +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap107">Iconoclasm +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Harper's Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap110">Gathering Roses +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap111">The Future Sport +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap112">Taking Advice +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap114">Post-Mortem Industry +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap116">The Conqueror +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap120">The Truthful Merchant +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap122">Standing Pat +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap124">The Outcast +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap125">Ode to Kansas +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap126">Domestic Happiness +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap128">Celebrities +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap130">The Virtuous Editor +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap132">This Dismal Age +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap134">Boost Things +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap135">The Adventurer +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap137">They All Come Back +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap138">Home Builders +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap140">Failure and Success +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap143">The Open Road +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap146">The Millionaires +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap147">Little Mistakes +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>System Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap150">Easy Morality +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap151">The Critic +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Harper's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap154">The Old Timer +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap158">The Bright Face +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>The Butler Way</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap160">Ladies and Gents +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap161">Autumn Joys +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap162">The Land of Bores +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Smart Set Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap164">Skilled Labor +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap165">An Editorial Soliloquy +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Newspaperdom</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap167">Youthful Grievances +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap169">Sunday +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap170">John Barleycorn +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Collier's Weekly</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap172">Christmas Day +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>Popular Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap174">A Crank's Thanksgiving +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<I>American Magazine</I> +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap176">The Brief Visit +</A></TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> + +</TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ILLUSTRATIONS +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-front"> +The Umpire . . . . . . . . . <I>Frontispiece</I> +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-019"> +The Gloomy Fan +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-050"> +The Buccaneers +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-085"> +The Sleeper Wakes +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-117"> +The Conqueror +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-155"> +The Old Timer +</A> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap001"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +MORNING IN KANSAS +</H3> + +<P> +There are lands beyond the ocean which are gray beneath their years, +where a hundred generations learned to sow and reap and spin; where the +sons of Shem and Japhet wet the furrow with their tears—and the +noontide is departed, and the night is closing in. +</P> + +<P> +Long ago the shadows lengthened in the lands across the sea, and the +dusk is now enshrouding regions nearer home, alas! There are long +deserted homesteads in this country of the free—but it's morning here +in Kansas, and the dew is on the grass. +</P> + +<P> +It is morning here in Kansas, and the breakfast bell is rung! We are +not yet fairly started on the work we mean to do; we have all the day +before us, for the morning is but young, and there's hope in every +zephyr, and the skies are bright and blue. +</P> + +<P> +It is morning here in Kansas, and the dew is on the sod; as the +builders of an empire it is ours to do our best; with our hands at work +in Kansas, and our faith and trust in God, we shall not be counted idle +when the sun sinks in the West. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap003"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +EDITORIAL INFLUENCE +</H3> + +<P> +It is a solemn thing, to think when you sit down to splatter ink, that +what you write, in prose or verse, may be a blessing or a curse. The +gems of thought that you impart may upward guide some mind and heart; +some youth may read your Smoking Stuff, and say: "That logic's good +enough; the path of virtue must be fine; I'll have no wickedness in +mine." And some day, when you're old and gray, that youth may come +along your way, and say, in language ringing true: "All that I've won I +owe to you! When I was young I read your rot; it hit a most responsive +spot, encouraged me for stress and strife, and made me choose the best +in life." And this will warm your heart and brain; you'll know you +have not lived in vain. But if you write disgusting dope, that thrusts +at Truth, and Faith and Hope; if you apologize for vice, and show that +wickedness is nice, it well may chance, when you are old, and in your +veins the blood runs cold, there'll come your way some dismal wreck, +who'll roast you sore, and cry: "By heck! And also I might say, by +gum! 'Twas you that put me on the bum! Your writings got me headed +wrong; you threw it into Virtue strong; and in the prison that you see, +I'm convict No. 23!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap005"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FARM MACHINERY +</H3> + +<P> +We have things with cogs and pulleys that will stack and bale the hay, +we have scarecrows automatic that will drive the crows away; we have +riding cultivators, so we may recline at ease, as we travel up the corn +rows, to the tune of haws and gees; we have engines pumping water, +running churns and grinding corn, and one farmer that I know of has a +big steam dinner horn; all of which is very pleasant to reflect upon, I +think, but we need a good contrivance that will teach the calves to +drink. +</P> + +<P> +Now, as in the days of Noah, man must take a massive pail, loaded up +with milk denatured, with a dash of Adam's ale, and go down among the +calfkins as the lion tamer goes 'mong the monarchs of the jungle, at +the famous three-ring shows; and the calves are fierce and hungry, and +they haven't sense to wait, till he gets a good position and has got +his bucket straight; and they act as though they hadn't e'en a +glimmering of sense, for they climb upon his shoulders ere he is inside +the fence, and they butt him in the stomach, and they kick him +everywhere, till he thinks he'd give a nickel for a decent chance to +swear; then they all get underneath him and capsize him in the mud, and +the milk runs down his whiskers and his garments in a flood, and you +really ought to see him when he goes back to his home quoting divers +pagan authors and the bards of ancient Rome. And he murmurs while he's +washing mud off at the kitchen sink: "What we need is a contraption +that will teach the calves to drink!" +</P> + +<P> +We've machinery for planting, we've machines to reap and thrash, and +the housewife has an engine that will grind up meat for hash; we've +machines to do our washing and to wring the laundered duds, we've +machines for making cider and to dig the Burbank spuds; all about the +modern farmstead you may hear the levers clink, but we're shy of a +contrivance that will teach the calves to drink! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap008"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE STRONG MEN +</H3> + +<P> +Behold the man of muscle, who wears the victor's crown! In gorgeous +scrap and tussle he pinned the others down. His brawn stands out in +hummocks, he like a lion treads; he sits on foemen's stomachs and +stands them on their heads. The strong men of all regions, the mighty +men of note, come here in beefy legions to try to get his goat; with +cordial smiles he greets them, and when we've raised a pot, upon the +mat he meets them and ties them in a knot. From Russia's frozen acres, +from Grecian ports they sail, and Turkey sends her fakers to gather in +the kale; old brooding Europe breeds them, these mighty men of brawn; +our Strong Man takes and kneads them, and puts their hopes in pawn. +</P> + +<P> +Behold this puny fellow, this meek and humble chap! No doubt he'd show +up yellow if he got in a scrap. His face is pale and sickly, he's weak +of arm and knee; if trouble came he'd quickly shin up the nearest tree. +No hale man ever loves him; he stirs the sportsman's wrath; the whole +world kicks and shoves him and shoos him from the path. For who can +love a duffer so pallid, weak and thin, who seems resigned to suffer +and let folks rub it in? Yet though he's down to zero in fellow-men's +esteem, this fellow is a hero and that's no winter dream. Year after +year he's toiling, as toiled the slaves of Rome, to keep the pot +a-boiling in his old mother's home. Through years of gloom and +sickness he kept the wolf away; for him no tailored slickness, for him +no brave array; for him no cheerful vision of wife and kids a few; for +him no dreams Elysian—just toil, the long years through! Forever +trying, straining, to sidestep debtors' woes, unnoticed, uncomplaining, +the little Strong Man goes! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap010"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE SNOWY DAY +</H3> + +<P> +I like to watch the children play, upon a wintry, snowy day; like +little elves they run about, and leap and slide, and laugh and shout. +This side of heaven can there be such pure and unmixed ecstacy? I lean +upon ye rustic stile, and watch the children with a smile, and think +upon a vanished day, when I, as joyous, used to play, when all the +world seemed young and bright, and every hour had its delight; and, as +I brush away a tear, a snowball hits me in the ear. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap011"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE POOR MAN'S CLUB +</H3> + +<P> +The poor man's club is a genial place—if the poor man has the price; +there's a balmy smile on the barkeep's face, and bottles of goods on +ice; the poor man's club is a place designed to brighten our darkened +lives, and send us home, when we're halfway blind, in humor to beat our +wives. So hey for the wicker demi-john and the free-lunch brand of +grub! We'll wassail hold till the break of dawn, we friends of the +poor man's club! It's here we barter our bits of news in our sweat +stained hand-me-downs; it's here we swallow the children's shoes and +the housewives hats and gowns. It's here we mortgage the house and +lot, the horse and the muley cow; the poor man's club is a cheerful +spot, so open a bottle now! From brimming glasses we'll blow the foam +till the midnight hour arrives, when we'll gayly journey the long way +home and merrily beat our wives. We earn our dimes like the horse or +ox, we toil like the fabled steer, and then we journey a dozen blocks +to blow in the dimes for beer. While the women work at the washing tub +to add to our scanty hoard, we happily meet at the poor man's club, +where never a soul is bored. We recklessly squander our minted brawn, +and the clubhouse owner thrives; and we'll homeward go at the break of +dawn and joyously beat our wives. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap013"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WORDS AND DEEDS +</H3> + +<P> +A fire broke out in Bildad's shack and burned it to the ground; and +Bildad, with his roofless pack, sent up a doleful sound. And I, who +lived the next door west, hard by the county jail, went over there and +beat my breast, and helped poor Bildad wail. Around the ruined home I +stepped, and viewed the shaking walls, and people say the way I wept +would beat Niagara Falls. Then words of sympathy I dealt to Bildad and +his wife; such kindly words, I've always felt, nerve people for the +strife. If I can kill with words your fears, or argue grief away, or +drown your woe by shedding tears, call on me any day. I have a +sympathetic heart that bleeds for others' aches, and I will ease your +pain and smart unless the language breaks. And so to Bildad and his +mate I made a helpful talk, with vital truths that elevate and break +disasters' shock; I pointed out that stricken men should not yield to +the worst, but from the wreckage rise again like flame from torch +reversed. +</P> + +<P> +Then Johnson interrupted me as I was growing hoarse. A rude, offensive +person he, a tactless man and coarse. +</P> + +<P> +He said to Bildad, "Well, old pard! You are burned out I see! You +can't keep house here in your yard, so come and live with me!" +</P> + +<P> +The neighbors who had gathered round applauded Johnson then, declaring +that at last they'd found the kindliest of men; not one appreciative +voice for me, who furnished tears, who made the sad man's heart +rejoice, and drove way his fears! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap015"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A DAY OF REST +</H3> + +<P> +I'm glad there is a day of rest, one day in every seven, when worldly +cares cannot molest, and we may dream of heaven. The week day labor +that we do, is highly necessary, but if our tasks were never through, +if they should never vary, we'd soon be covered o'er with mold, from +bridle-bits to breeching; so let the Sabbath bells be tolled, and let +us hear the preaching! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap016"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +USE YOUR HEAD +</H3> + +<P> +If a man would be a winner, whether he's a clerk or tinner, whether +he's a butcher, banker, or a dealer in rye bread, he must show his +brains are bully, he must understand it fully that a man can't be an +Eli if he doesn't use his head. +</P> + +<P> +There was old man Hiram Horner, once located on the corner, where he +sold his prunes and codfish and dried apples by the pound; he was +always mighty busy; it would fairly make you dizzy just to watch old +Uncle Hiram as he chased himself around. He got down when day was +breaking, always ready to be raking in the pennies of the people if +they chanced to come that way; he was evermore on duty till the +midnight whistles, tooty, sent him home, where he'd be fussing to begin +another day. Yet old Hiram soon was busted, and you'll see him now, +disgusted, whacking mules in worthy effort to attain his daily bread; +he was diligent, deserving, from good morals never swerving but he lost +his grip in business for he didn't use his head. He was always +overloaded with a lot of junk corroded, he was always short of goodlets +that the people seem to need; he would trust the dead beat faker till +he'd bad bills by the acre, and he's now at daily labor, with his +whiskers gone to seed. +</P> + +<P> +There is Theodore P. Tally in his store across the alley; you will see +he takes it easy, not a button does he shed; you can hear the wheels +revolving in his brow while he's resolving to get rich by drawing +largely on the contents of his head. +</P> + +<P> +It is well to use your fingers blithely while the daylight lingers, it +is well to use your trilbys with a firm and active tread; it is good to +rustle daily, doing all your duties gaily, but in all your divers +doings, never fail to use your head. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap018"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE GLOOMY FAN +</H3> + +<P> +O the gloomy fan is a mournful man, and he fills my soul with sorrow; +he watched the play with a frown today, and he'll scowl at the game +tomorrow. He ambles in when the games begin, a soul by the gods +forgotten; and he eyes the play in his morbid way, and he yells out +"punk!" and "rotten!" No player yet, be he colt or vet, won praise +from this critic gloomy; he'll sit and scowl like a poisoned owl, and +his eyes are red and rheumy; and his blood is thin and his heart is +tin, and his head is stuffed with cotton; and he merely sits, throwing +frequent fits, and he calls out "punk!" and "rotten!" He casts a pall +on the bleachers all, and he breaks the hearts of players; he gives the +dumps to his nibs the umps, who would spread him out in layers; he +queers the game and he chills the frame of the man on the bases +trottin', with his fish-like eyes and his mournful sighs, and his cries +of "punk!" and "rotten!" +</P> + +<A NAME="img-019"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-019.jpg" ALT="The Gloomy Fan" BORDER="2" WIDTH="396" HEIGHT="593"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 396px"> +The Gloomy Fan +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap021"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE PURIST +</H3> + +<P> +"William Henry," said the parent, and his voice was sad and stern, "I +detest the slang you're using; will you never, never learn that correct +use of our language is a thing to be desired? All your common bughouse +phrases make the shrinking highbrow tired. There is nothing more +delightful than a pure and careful speech, and the man who weighs his +phrases always stacks up as a peach, while the guy who shoots his +larynx in a careless slipshod way looms up as a selling plater, people +brand him for a jay. In my youth my father soaked me if I entered his +shebang handing out a line of language that he recognized as slang. He +would take me to the cellar, down among the mice and rats, and with +nice long sticks of stovewood he'd play solos on my slats. Thus I +gained a deep devotion for our language undented, and it drives me +nearly batty when I hear my only child springing wads of hard boiled +language such as dips and yegg-men use, and I want a reformation or +I'll stroke you with my shoes. Using slang is just a habit, just a +cheap and dopey trick; if you hump yourself and try to, you can shake +it pretty quick. Watch my curves and imitate them, weigh your words +before they're sprung, and in age you'll bless the habit that you +formed when you were young." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap023"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +QUALIFICATIONS +</H3> + +<P> +I went around to Thompson's store and asked him if he'd give me +work—for Thompson, in the Daily Roar, was advertising for a clerk. He +looked me over long and well, and then enquired: "What can you do? Do +you in anything excel? If you've strong points, just name a few." His +manner dashed my sunny smile, I seemed to feel my courage fall; I had +to ponder for a while my strongest features to recall. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I a motor boat can sail, and I a 4-horse team can tool; and I +can tell a funny tale and play a splendid game of pool. I'm good at +going into debt and counting chicks before they hatch, and I can roll a +cigarette or referee a wrestling match. +</P> + +<P> +"There was a time," the merchant said, "when qualities like those were +fine; alas, those good old days are dead! The mixer's fallen out of +line! The business houses turn him down, and customers no longer sigh +for one to show them through the town, and open pints of Extra Dry! +The salesman of these modern days must study things he wants to sell, +instead of haunting Great White Ways and painting cities wildly well. +He must be sober as a judge, he must be genial and polite, from +virtue's path he'll never budge, he'll keep his record snowy white. +Into the world of commerce go and mark the ways of business men; forget +the list of things you know and then come here and try again." +</P> + +<P> +In his remarks there was no bile; with sympathy he gently laughed, and +dropped me, with a kindly smile, adown the elevator shaft. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap025"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE POMPOUS MAN +</H3> + +<P> +I do not like the pompous man; I do not wish him for a friend; he's +built on such a gorgeous plan, that he can only condescend; and when he +bows his neck is sprained; he walks as though he owned the earth—as +though his vest and shirt contained all that there is of Sterling +Worth. With sacred joy I see him tread, upon a stray banana rind, and +slide a furlong on his head and leave a trail of smoke behind. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap026"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +INEFFICIENT MEN +</H3> + +<P> +King Alfred, in a rude disguise, was resting in the cowherd's cot; the +cowherd's wife was baking pies, and had her oven smoking hot. +</P> + +<P> +"You watch these pies," exclaimed the frau; "I have to chase myself +outdoors, and see what ails the spotted cow, the way she bawls around +and roars." +</P> + +<P> +King Alfred said he'd watch the pies; then started thinking of the +Danes, who fooled him with their tricks and lies, and put his bleeding +realm in chains. He studied plans to gain his own, fair visions rose +before his eyes; he'd hew a pathway to his throne—and he forgot the +matron's pies. And then the cowherd's wife came in; she smelled the +smoke, she gave a shout; she biffed him with the rolling pin, and +cried: "Ods fish, you useless lout! You are not worth the dynamite +'twould take to blow you off the map! Your head is not upholstered +right—you are a worthless trifling chap!" +</P> + +<P> +When on his throne King Alfred sat, that woman had an inward ache; she +chewed the feathers from her hat because she'd made so bad a break. +</P> + +<P> +It isn't safe, my friends, to say that any man's a failure flat because +he cannot shovel hay, or climb a tree, or skin a cat. The man who's +awkward with a saw, who cannot hammer in a nail, may in the future +practice law and fill his bins with shining kale. The ne'er-do-well +who cannot cook the luscious egg his hen has laid, may yet sit down and +write a book that makes the big best sellers fade. The man who blacks +your boots today, and envies you your rich cigar, next year may have +the right of way while touring in his private car. +</P> + +<P> +It isn't safe at men to jeer however awkwardly they tread; they yet may +find their proper sphere—no man's a failure till he's dead. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap028"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +LIFE'S INJUSTICE +</H3> + +<P> +The learned man labors in his lair, and trains his telescope across a +million leagues of air, among the stars to grope. He would increase +the little store of knowledge we possess, and so he toils forever more, +and often in distress. His whiskers and his hair are long, and in the +zephyrs wave, because—alas! such things are wrong—he can't afford a +shave. His trousers bag about the knees, his ancient coat's a botch; +his shoes allow his feet to freeze, he bears a dollar watch. And when +the grocer's store he seeks to buy a can of hash, in frigid tones the +merchant speaks: "I'll have to have the cash!" And when he's dead a +hundred years the people will arise, and praise the man who found new +spheres cavorting through the skies. The children in the public +schools will learn to bless his name, and guide their studies by his +rules, and glory in his fame. And in the graveyard, where he went +unhonored by the town, a big fat marble monument will hold the wise man +down. +</P> + +<P> +The low-brow spars a dozen rounds, before an audience, and he is loaded +down with pounds, and shillings, crowns and pence. Where'er he goes +the brawny Goth is lionized by all, like Caesar, when he cut a swath +along the Lupercal. Promoters grovel at his feet, and offer heaps of +scads, if he will condescend to meet some other bruising lads. The +daily journals print his face some seven columns wide, call him the +glory of the race, the nation's hope and pride. And having thus become +our boast, the wonder of our age, he battles with his larynx most, and +elevates the stage. In fifty years when people speak the savant's name +with pride, the pug's renown you'll vainly seek—it with its owner died. +</P> + +<P> +There may be consolation there for him who bravely tries to solve great +problems in his lair, and make the world more wise; but when the world +is really wise—may that day come eftsoons!—we'll give the men of +learning pies, and give the fighters prunes. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap031"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE POLITICIAN +</H3> + +<P> +I will not say that blade is black, nor yet that white is white; for +rash assertions oft come back, and put us in a plight. Some people +hold that black is white, and some that white is black; to me the +neutral course looks right; I take the middle track. If I should say +that black is white, and white is black, today, some one would mix the +two tonight—tomorrow they'd be gray. In politics I wish to thrive, +and swiftly forge ahead, so dare not say that I'm alive, nor swear that +I am dead. You say that fishes climb the trees, that cows on wings do +fly, I can't dispute such facts as these, so patent to the eye; with +any man I will agree, no odds what he defends, if he will only vote for +me, and boom me to his friends. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap032"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +RANDOM SHOTS +</H3> + +<P> +I shot an arrow into the air, it fell in the distance, I knew not +where, till a neighbor said that it killed his calf, and I had to pay +him six and a half ($6.50). I bought some poison to slay some rats, +and a neighbor swore that it killed his cats; and, rather than argue +across the fence, I paid him four dollars and fifty cents ($4.50). One +night I set sailing a toy balloon, and hoped it would soar till it +reached the moon; but the candle fell out, on a farmer's straw, and he +said I must settle or go to law. And that is the way with the random +shot; it never hits in the proper spot; and the joke you spring, that +you think so smart, may leave a wound in some fellow's heart. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +LOOK PLEASANT, PLEASE! +</P> + +<P> +"Look pleasant, please!" the photo expert told me, for I had pulled a +long and gloomy face; and then I let a wide, glad smile enfold me and +hold my features in its warm embrace. +</P> + +<P> +"Look pleasant, please!" My friends, we really ought to cut out these +words and put them in a frame; long, long we'd search to find a better +motto to guide and help us while we play the game. Look pleasant, +please, when you have met reverses, when you beneath misfortune's +stroke are bent, when all your hopes seem riding round in hearses—a +scowling brow won't help you worth a cent. Look pleasant, please, when +days are dark and dismal and all the world seems in a hopeless fix; the +clouds won't go because your grief's abysmal, the sun won't shine the +sooner for your kicks. Look pleasant, please, when Grip—King of +diseases, has filled your system with his microbes vile; I know it's +hard, but still, between your sneezes, you may be able to produce a +smile. Look pleasant, please, whatever trouble galls you; a gloomy +face won't cure a single pain. Look pleasant, please, whatever ill +befalls you, for gnashing teeth is weary work and vain. +</P> + +<P> +Look pleasant, please, and thus inspire your brothers to raise a smile +and pass the same along; forget yourself and think a while of others, +and do your stunt with gladsome whoop and song. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +COURAGE +</P> + +<P> +Brave men are they who set their faces toward the polar bergs and +floes, who roam the wild, unpeopled places, perchance to find among the +snows a resting-place remote and lonely; a winding-sheet of deathless +white, where elemental voices only disturb the brooding year-long night. +</P> + +<P> +Brave souls are they whose man-made pinions have borne them over plains +and seas, who conquered wide and new dominions, and strapped a saddle +on the breeze. Their engine-driven wings are wearing new pathways +through the realm of clouds; they play with death, with dauntless +daring, to please the breathless, fickle crowds. +</P> + +<P> +Brave men go forth to distant regions, forsaking luxury and ease; +through all the years they've gone in legions, to unknown lands, o'er +stormy seas; and when, by sword or fever smitten, they blithely +journeyed to the grave, full well they knew their names were written +down in the annals of the brave. +</P> + +<P> +I am as brave as any rover described in gay, romantic screeds, but, +when my fitful life is over, no epic will narrate my deeds. Condemned +to silent heroism, I go my unmarked way alone, and no one hands me +prune or prism, as token that my deeds are known. But yesterday my +teeth were aching, and to the painless dentist's lair I took my way, +unawed, unquaking, and sat down in the fatal chair. He dug around my +rumbling molars with drawing-knives and burglars' tools, and cross-cut +saws and patent rollers, and marlinspikes and two-foot rules. He +climbed upon my lap and prodded with crowbar and with garden spade, to +see that I was not defrauded of all the agony that's made. He pulled +and yanked and pried and twisted, and uttered oft his battle shout, and +now and then his wife assisted—till finally the teeth came out. And +never once while thus he pottered around my torn and mangled jowl—not +once, while I was being slaughtered, did I let out a single howl! No +brass-bands played, none sang a ditty of triumph as I took my way; no +signs of "Welcome to Our City" were hung across the street that day! +</P> + +<P> +Thus you and I and plain, plug mortals may show a courage high and +fine, and be obscure, while some jay chortles in triumph where the +limelights shine. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +PLAY BALL +</P> + +<P> +"Play ball!" you hear the fans exclaim, when weary of a dragging game, +when all the players pause to state their theories in a joint debate, +or when they go about their biz as though they had the rheumatiz. And +if they do not heed the hunch that's given by the bleachers bunch, they +find, when next they start to play, that all the fans have stayed away. +The talking graft is all in vain, and loafers give the world a pain. +The fans who watch the game of life despise the sluggard in the strife. +They'll have but little use for you, who tell what you intend to do, +and hand out promises galore, but, somehow, never seem to score. No +matter what your stunt may be, in this the country of the free, you'll +find that loafing never pays; cut out the flossy grand stand plays; put +in your hardest licks and whacks, and get right down to Old Brass +Tacks, and, undismayed by bruise or fall, go right ahead—in short, +play ball! +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +THE OLD SONGS +</P> + +<P> +The modern airs are cheerful, melodious and sweet; we hear them sung +and whistled all day upon the street. Some lilting ragtime ditty +that's rollicking and gay will gain the public favor and hold it—for a +day. But when the day is ended, and we are tired and worn, and more +than half persuaded that man was made to mourn, how soothing then the +music our fathers used to know! The songs of sense and feeling, the +songs of long ago! The "Jungle Joe" effusions and kindred roundelays +will do to hum and whistle throughout our busy days; and in the garish +limelight the yodelers may yell, and Injun songs may flourish—and all +is passing well, but when to light the heavens the shining stars +return, and in the cottage windows the lights begin to burn, when +parents and their children are seated by the fire, remote from worldly +clamor and all the world's desire, when eyes are soft and shining, and +hearths with love aglow, how pleasant is the sinking of songs of long +ago! +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +GUESSING VS. KNOWING +</P> + +<P> +If I were selling nails or glass, or pills or shoes or garden sass, or +honey from the bee—whatever line of goods were mine, I'd study up that +special line and know its history. +</P> + +<P> +If I a stock of rags should keep, I'd read up sundry books on sheep and +wool and how it grows. Beneath my old bald, freckled roof, I'd store +some facts on warp and woof and other things like those. I'd try to +know a spinning-jack from patent churn or wagon rack, a loom from +hog-tight fence; and if a man came in to buy, and asked some leading +question, I could answer with some sense. +</P> + +<P> +If I were selling books, I'd know a Shakespeare from an Edgar Poe, a +Carlyle from a Pope; and I would know Fitzgerald's rhymes from Laura +Libbey's brand of crimes, or Lillian Russell's dope. +</P> + +<P> +If I were selling shoes, I'd seize the fact that on gooseberry trees, +good leather doesn't grow; that shoe pegs do not grow like oats, that +cowhide doesn't come from goats—such things I'd surely know. +</P> + +<P> +And if I were a grocer man. I'd open now and then a can to see what +stuff it held; 'twere better than to writhe in woe and make reply, "I +didn't know," when some mad patron yelled. +</P> + +<P> +I hate to hear a merchant say: "I think that this is splendid hay," "I +guess it's first class tea." He ought to know how good things are, if +he would sell his silk or tar or other goods to me. Oh, knowledge is +the stuff that wins; the man without it soon begins to get his trade in +kinks. No matter where a fellow goes, he's valued for the things he +knows, not for the things he thinks. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +WHEN WOMEN VOTE +</P> + +<P> +"Jane Samantha," said the husband, as he donned his hat and coat, "I +would offer a suggestion ere you go to cast your vote. We have had a +bitter struggle through this strenuous campaign, and the issues are +important, and they stand out clear and plain. Colonel Whitehead +stands for progress—for the uplift that we need: he invites +investigation of his every word and deed. He's opposed to all the +ringsters and to graft of every kind; he's a man of spotless record, +clean and pure in heart and mind. His opponent, Major Bounder, stands +for all that I abhor; plunder, ring rule and corruption you will see +him working for; all the pluggers and the heelers stood by him in this +campaign—so I ask your vote for Whitehead and the uplift, dearest +Jane." +</P> + +<P> +"William Henry," said the housewife, "I am sorry to decline, but the +wife of Colonel Whitehead never was a friend of mine. Last July she +gave a party—you recall her Purple Tea?—and invited all the +neighbors, but she said no word to me. I don't care about your issues +or your uplift or your ring, but I won't support the husband of that +silly, stuck-up thing!" +</P> + +<P> +Major Bounder was the victor on that day of stress and strife, for it +seemed that many women didn't like the Colonel's wife. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +THE AGENT AT THE DOOR +</P> + +<P> +"Away with you, stranger!" exclaimed Mrs. Granger, "avaunt and +skedaddle! Come here never more! You agents are making me crazy and +breaking my heart, and I beg that you'll trot from my door! I've +bought nutmeg graters, shoelaces and gaiters, I've bought everything +from a lamp to a lyre; I've bought patent heaters and saws and egg +beaters and stoves that exploded and set me afire." +</P> + +<P> +"You're laboring under a curious blunder," the stranger protested; "I +know very well that agents are trying, and dames tired of buying; but +be not uneasy—I've nothing to sell." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm used to that story—it's whiskered and hoary," replied Mrs. +Granger, "you want to come in, and then when you enter, in tones of a +Stentor you'll brag of your polish for silver and tin. Or maybe you're +dealing in unguents healing, or dye for the whiskers, or salve for the +corns, or something that quickens egg-laying in chickens, or knobs for +the cattle to wear on their horns. It's no use your talking, you'd +better be walking, and let me go on with my housework, I think; you +look dissipated, if truth must be stated, and if you had money you'd +spend it for drink." +</P> + +<P> +"My name," said the stranger, who backed out of danger—the woman had +reached for the broom by the wall—"is Septimus Beecher; I am the new +preacher; I just dropped around for a pastoral call." +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +GOOD AND BAD TIMES +</P> + +<P> +"Times are so bad I have the blues," says Bilderbeck, who deals in +shoes. "All day I loaf around my store, and folks don't come here any +more; I reckon they have barely cash to buy cigars and corn beef hash, +and when they've bought the grub to eat, they can't afford to clothe +their feet. +</P> + +<P> +"There's something wrong when trade's thus pinched," says he, "and +someone should be lynched. The cost of living is so high that it's +economy to die; and death is so expensive, then, that corpses want to +live again. The trusts have robbed us left and right, and there's no +remedy in sight; the government is out of plumb and should be knocked +to Kingdom Come." +</P> + +<P> +And Ganderson, across the street, is selling furniture for feet. "All +day he hands out boots and shoes with cheerful cockadoodledoos. I have +no reason to complain," says Ganderson; all kicks are vain; my +customers don't come to hear me raising thunder by the year. +</P> + +<P> +"They have some troubles of their own, and do not care to hear me +groan. And so I beam around my place, and wear a smile that splits my +face, and gather in the shining dime—trade's getting better all the +time!" +</P> + +<P> +Though days be dark and trade be tough, it's always well to make a +bluff, to face the world with cheerful eye, as though the goose were +hanging high. No merchant ever made a friend by dire complainings +without end. And people never seek a store to hear a grouchy merchant +roar; they'll patronize the wiser gent who doesn't air his discontent. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap033"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +LOOK PLEASANT, PLEASE! +</H3> + +<P> +"Look pleasant, please!" the photo expert told me, for I had pulled a +long and gloomy face; and then I let a wide, glad smile enfold me and +hold my features in its warm embrace. +</P> + +<P> +"Look pleasant, please!" My friends, we really ought to cut out these +words and put them in a frame; long, long we'd search to find a better +motto to guide and help us while we play the game. Look pleasant, +please, when you have met reverses, when you beneath misfortune's +stroke are bent, when all your hopes seem riding round in hearses—a +scowling brow won't help you worth a cent. Look pleasant, please, when +days are dark and dismal and all the world seems in a hopeless fix; the +clouds won't go because your grief's abysmal, the sun won't shine the +sooner for your kicks. Look pleasant, please, when Grip—King of +diseases, has filled your system with his microbes vile; I know it's +hard, but still, between your sneezes, you may be able to produce a +smile. Look pleasant, please, whatever trouble galls you; a gloomy +face won't cure a single pain. Look pleasant, please, whatever ill +befalls you, for gnashing teeth is weary work and vain. +</P> + +<P> +Look pleasant, please, and thus inspire your brothers to raise a smile +and pass the same along; forget yourself and think a while of others, +and do your stunt with gladsome whoop and song. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap035"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +COURAGE +</H3> + +<P> +Brave men are they who set their faces toward the polar bergs and +floes, who roam the wild, unpeopled places, perchance to find among the +snows a resting-place remote and lonely; a winding-sheet of deathless +white, where elemental voices only disturb the brooding year-long night. +</P> + +<P> +Brave souls are they whose man-made pinions have borne them over plains +and seas, who conquered wide and new dominions, and strapped a saddle +on the breeze. Their engine-driven wings are wearing new pathways +through the realm of clouds; they play with death, with dauntless +daring, to please the breathless, fickle crowds. +</P> + +<P> +Brave men go forth to distant regions, forsaking luxury and ease; +through all the years they've gone in legions, to unknown lands, o'er +stormy seas; and when, by sword or fever smitten, they blithely +journeyed to the grave, full well they knew their names were written +down in the annals of the brave. +</P> + +<P> +I am as brave as any rover described in gay, romantic screeds, but, +when my fitful life is over, no epic will narrate my deeds. Condemned +to silent heroism, I go my unmarked way alone, and no one hands me +prune or prism, as token that my deeds are known. But yesterday my +teeth were aching, and to the painless dentist's lair I took my way, +unawed, unquaking, and sat down in the fatal chair. He dug around my +rumbling molars with drawing-knives and burglars' tools, and cross-cut +saws and patent rollers, and marlinspikes and two-foot rules. He +climbed upon my lap and prodded with crowbar and with garden spade, to +see that I was not defrauded of all the agony that's made. He pulled +and yanked and pried and twisted, and uttered oft his battle shout, and +now and then his wife assisted—till finally the teeth came out. And +never once while thus he pottered around my torn and mangled jowl—not +once, while I was being slaughtered, did I let out a single howl! No +brass-bands played, none sang a ditty of triumph as I took my way; no +signs of "Welcome to Our City" were hung across the street that day! +</P> + +<P> +Thus you and I and plain, plug mortals may show a courage high and +fine, and be obscure, while some jay chortles in triumph where the +limelights shine. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap038"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PLAY BALL +</H3> + +<P> +"Play ball!" you hear the fans exclaim, when weary of a dragging game, +when all the players pause to state their theories in a joint debate, +or when they go about their biz as though they had the rheumatiz. And +if they do not heed the hunch that's given by the bleachers bunch, they +find, when next they start to play, that all the fans have stayed away. +The talking graft is all in vain, and loafers give the world a pain. +The fans who watch the game of life despise the sluggard in the strife. +They'll have but little use for you, who tell what you intend to do, +and hand out promises galore, but, somehow, never seem to score. No +matter what your stunt may be, in this the country of the free, you'll +find that loafing never pays; cut out the flossy grand stand plays; put +in your hardest licks and whacks, and get right down to Old Brass +Tacks, and, undismayed by bruise or fall, go right ahead—in short, +play ball! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap039"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE OLD SONGS +</H3> + +<P> +The modern airs are cheerful, melodious and sweet; we hear them sung +and whistled all day upon the street. Some lilting ragtime ditty +that's rollicking and gay will gain the public favor and hold it—for a +day. But when the day is ended, and we are tired and worn, and more +than half persuaded that man was made to mourn, how soothing then the +music our fathers used to know! The songs of sense and feeling, the +songs of long ago! The "Jungle Joe" effusions and kindred roundelays +will do to hum and whistle throughout our busy days; and in the garish +limelight the yodelers may yell, and Injun songs may flourish—and all +is passing well, but when to light the heavens the shining stars +return, and in the cottage windows the lights begin to burn, when +parents and their children are seated by the fire, remote from worldly +clamor and all the world's desire, when eyes are soft and shining, and +hearths with love aglow, how pleasant is the singing of songs of long +ago! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap041"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GUESSING VS. KNOWING +</H3> + +<P> +If I were selling nails or glass, or pills or shoes or garden sass, or +honey from the bee—whatever line of goods were mine, I'd study up that +special line and know its history. +</P> + +<P> +If I a stock of rags should keep, I'd read up sundry books on sheep and +wool and how it grows. Beneath my old bald, freckled roof, I'd store +some facts on warp and woof and other things like those. I'd try to +know a spinning-jack from patent churn or wagon rack, a loom from +hog-tight fence; and if a man came in to buy, and asked some leading +question, I could answer with some sense. +</P> + +<P> +If I were selling books, I'd know a Shakespeare from an Edgar Poe, a +Carlyle from a Pope; and I would know Fitzgerald's rhymes from Laura +Libbey's brand of crimes, or Lillian Russell's dope. +</P> + +<P> +If I were selling shoes, I'd seize the fact that on gooseberry trees, +good leather doesn't grow; that shoe pegs do not grow like oats, that +cowhide doesn't come from goats—such things I'd surely know. +</P> + +<P> +And if I were a grocer man, I'd open now and then a can to see what +stuff it held; 'twere better than to writhe in woe and make reply, "I +didn't know," when some mad patron yelled. +</P> + +<P> +I hate to hear a merchant say: "I think that this is splendid hay," "I +guess it's first class tea." He ought to know how good things are, if +he would sell his silk or tar or other goods to me. Oh, knowledge is +the stuff that wins; the man without it soon begins to get his trade in +kinks. No matter where a fellow goes, he's valued for the things he +knows, not for the things he thinks. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap043"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WHEN WOMEN VOTE +</H3> + +<P> +"Jane Samantha," said the husband, as he donned his hat and coat, "I +would offer a suggestion ere you go to cast your vote. We have had a +bitter struggle through this strenuous campaign, and the issues are +important, and they stand out clear and plain. Colonel Whitehead +stands for progress—for the uplift that we need: he invites +investigation of his every word and deed. He's opposed to all the +ringsters and to graft of every kind; he's a man of spotless record, +clean and pure in heart and mind. His opponent, Major Bounder, stands +for all that I abhor; plunder, ring rule and corruption you will see +him working for; all the pluggers and the heelers stood by him in this +campaign—so I ask your vote for Whitehead and the uplift, dearest +Jane." +</P> + +<P> +"William Henry," said the housewife, "I am sorry to decline, but the +wife of Colonel Whitehead never was a friend of mine. Last July she +gave a party—you recall her Purple Tea?—and invited all the +neighbors, but she said no word to me. I don't care about your issues +or your uplift or your ring, but I won't support the husband of that +silly, stuck-up thing!" +</P> + +<P> +Major Bounder was the victor on that day of stress and strife, for it +seemed that many women didn't like the Colonel's wife. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap045"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE AGENT AT THE DOOR +</H3> + +<P> +"Away with you, stranger!" exclaimed Mrs. Granger, "avaunt and +skedaddle! Come here never more! You agents are making me crazy and +breaking my heart, and I beg that you'll trot from my door! I've +bought nutmeg graters, shoelaces and gaiters, I've bought everything +from a lamp to a lyre; I've bought patent heaters and saws and egg +beaters and stoves that exploded and set me afire." +</P> + +<P> +"You're laboring under a curious blunder," the stranger protested; "I +know very well that agents are trying, and dames tired of buying; but +be not uneasy—I've nothing to sell." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm used to that story—it's whiskered and hoary," replied Mrs. +Granger, "you want to come in, and then when you enter, in tones of a +Stentor you'll brag of your polish for silver and tin. Or maybe you're +dealing in unguents healing, or dye for the whiskers, or salve for the +corns, or something that quickens egg-laying in chickens, or knobs for +the cattle to wear on their horns. It's no use your talking, you'd +better be walking, and let me go on with my housework, I think; you +look dissipated, if truth must be stated, and if you had money you'd +spend it for drink." +</P> + +<P> +"My name," said the stranger, who backed out of danger—the woman had +reached for the broom by the wall—"is Septimus Beecher; I am the new +preacher; I just dropped around for a pastoral call." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap047"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GOOD AND BAD TIMES +</H3> + +<P> +"Times are so bad I have the blues," says Bilderbeck, who deals in +shoes. "All day I loaf around my store, and folks don't come here any +more; I reckon they have barely cash to buy cigars and corn beef hash, +and when they've bought the grub to eat, they can't afford to clothe +their feet. +</P> + +<P> +"There's something wrong when trade's thus pinched," says he, "and +someone should be lynched. The cost of living is so high that it's +economy to die; and death is so expensive, then, that corpses want to +live again. The trusts have robbed us left and right, and there's no +remedy in sight; the government is out of plumb and should be knocked +to Kingdom Come." +</P> + +<P> +And Ganderson, across the street, is selling furniture for feet. "All +day he hands out boots and shoes with cheerful cockadoodledoos. I have +no reason to complain," says Ganderson; all kicks are vain; my +customers don't come to hear me raising thunder by the year. +</P> + +<P> +"They have some troubles of their own, and do not care to hear me +groan. And so I beam around my place, and wear a smile that splits my +face, and gather in the shining dime—trade's getting better all the +time!" +</P> + +<P> +Though days be dark and trade be tough, it's always well to make a +bluff, to face the world with cheerful eye, as though the goose were +hanging high. No merchant ever made a friend by dire complainings +without end. And people never seek a store to hear a grouchy merchant +roar; they'll patronize the wiser gent who doesn't air his discontent. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap051"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BUCCANEERS +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +(The Pirate of 1612) +</H3> + +<P> +Oh, once again my merry men and I are on the water with prospects fair, +with hearts to dare, and souls athirst for slaughter! Before the +breeze we scour the seas, our vessel low and raking, and men who find +our ship behind in mortal fear are quaking. We love the fight and our +delight grows as the strife increases; we slash and slay and hew our +way to win the golden pieces. To hear, to feel the clang of steel! +Ah, that, my men, is rapture! Our hearts are stern, we sink, we burn, +we kill the men we capture! Why mercy show when well we know that when +our course is ended, we all must die—they'll hang us high, unshaven, +undefended! Ah, wolves are we that roam the sea, and rend with savage +fury; as soft our mind, our hearts as kind will be judge and jury! To +rob and slay we go our way, our vessel low and raking; and men who hail +our ebon sail may well be chilled and quaking! +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +(The Pirate of 1912) +</H3> + +<P> +My heart is light and glad tonight, and life seems good and merry; my +coffer groans with golden bones I've pulled from the unwary. Ah, +raiment fine and gems are mine, and costly bibs and tuckers; I got my +rocks for mining stocks—I worked the jays and suckers. What though my +game is going lame—a jolt the courts just gave me—my lawyers gay will +find a way to beat the law and save me. I'll just lie low a year or so +until the row blows over, then I'll come back to my old shack and be +again in clover! I've fifty ways to work the jays and there's a +fortune in it! The sucker crop will never stop, for one is born each +minute. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-050"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-050.jpg" ALT="Buccaneers" BORDER="2" WIDTH="390" HEIGHT="594"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 390px"> +Buccaneers +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap053"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ST. PATRICK'S DAY +</H3> + +<P> +Away with tears and sordid fears, no trouble will we borrow, but shed +our woes like winter clothes—it's Patrick's day tomorrow. With clubs +and rakes we'll chase the snakes, and send the toads a-flying, and +we'll be seen with ribbons green, all other hues decrying. In +grass-green duds we'll plant the spuds, where they can do no growing; +with flat and sharp we'll play the harp, and keep the music going. +Then let us yell, for all is well, the world's devoid of sorrow; the +toads are snared, the snakes are scared, it's Patrick's day tomorrow. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap054"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +NAMING THE BABY +</H3> + +<P> +First I thought I'd call him Caesar; but my Uncle Ebenezer said that +name was badly hoodoed—wasn't Julius Caesar slain? Then I said, "I'll +call him Homer"; but my second cousin Gomer answered; "Homer was a +pauper, and he wrote his rhymes in vain." Long I pondered, worried +greatly seeking names both sweet and stately, something proud and high +and noble, such as ancient heroes bore. "I shall call him Alexander—" +but an innocent bystander muttered, "Aleck was a tyrant, and he +splashed around in gore." And my aunts said: "Only trust us, and we'll +name him Charles Augustus, which is princely and becoming, and will end +this foolish fuss." But my Cousin James objected: "Nothing else can be +expected, if you give him such a handle, but that folks will call him +Gus." "Let us call the darling Reggie," said my cheerful sister Peggy, +"which is short for Rex or Roland or some other kingly name." But my +Uncle George protested. "Surely," said he, "you but jested: never yet +did youth named Reggie scale the shining height of fame." Thus it was +for weeks together, and I often wondered whether other parents ever +suffered as I did upon the rack. All my uncles and my cousins and my +aunts gave tips by dozens, so I named the babe John Henry, and for +short we call him Jack. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap056"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WON AT LAST +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I. +</H3> + +<P> +"Rise, Charles De Jones, rise, if you please; you don't look well upon +your knees. You say that I must be your bride; in all the whole blamed +countryside no other girl could fill your life with joy and sunshine, +as your wife. What can you offer—you who seek my hand? You draw ten +bucks a week. Shall I your Cheap John wigwam share, the daughter of a +millionaire, who early learned in wealth to bask? Shall I get down to +menial task? Go chase yourself! My hand shall go to one who has a +roll of dough!" +</P> + +<P> +Thus spake Letitia Pinkham Brown, the fairest girl in all the town. +Her lover, crushed beneath the weight of blows from an unkindly fate, +rended his garments and his hair and turned away in dumb despair. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II. +</H3> + +<P> +Our hero's feet, of course, were cold, and yet his heart was strong and +bold. "It will not heal this wound of mine," he said, "to murmur and +repine. Though sad my heart, I'll sing and smile, and try to earn a +princely pile; and having got the bullion, then I'll ask her for her +hand again." +</P> + +<P> +He quenched the yearnings of his heart and plunged into the clanging +mart as agent for a handsome book instructing women how to cook. His +volume sold to beat the band and wealth came in hand over hand; but +ever, as he scoured the town, he thought of 'Titia Pinkham Brown, and +scalding tears anon would rise and almost cook his steely eyes. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III. +</H3> + +<P> +Once more a lover knelt before Letitia Pinkham Brown and swore to +cherish her while life endures, "Come out of it," she said, "I'm yours." +</P> + +<P> +He rose, a man of stately frame; J. Roland Percival his name. He had a +high, commanding mien, and seemed possessed of much long green; in +costly fabrics he was dressed, and diamonds flashed upon his breast. +</P> + +<P> +"And so you're mine!" J. Roland cried. "You'll be my own and only +bride! Oh, joy, oh, rapture! I am It! Excuse me while I throw a fit. +Come to my arms, my precious dear! My darling love—but who comes +here?" +</P> + +<P> +De Jones stood in the arbor door, and deadly was the smile he wore. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV. +</H3> + +<P> +J. Roland cried in abject fear: "Great Scott! What are you doing here! +</P> + +<P> +"Well may you ask," said Charles De Jones, in bitter, caustic, scathing +tones. "You've dodged me for a dozen weeks, but now—'tis the avenger +speaks—you'll have to pay up what you owe, or to the county jug you'll +go." +</P> + +<P> +Then turning to the maiden fair, De Jones went on: "That villain there! +Four months ago I sold that man a cook book on th' installment plan. +He gave his solemn pledge to pay, for seven years, two cents a day. He +made two payments, then he flunked. I've hung around the place he +bunked, I've chased him through the rain and sleet, I've boned him on +the public street, I've shadowed him by night and day, but not a kopeck +would he pay. I'm weary of these futile sprints; I'll roast him in the +public prints, and give him such a bum renown he'll be a byword in the +town." +</P> + +<P> +She viewed her lover in amaze, and cold and scornful was her gaze. +</P> + +<P> +"And so the book you handed me, to plight our troth," with ire said +she, "you bought from Charlie here on tick? Skidoo! A deadbeat makes +me sick! I'll never marry any jay who can't dig up two cents a day!" +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V. +</H3> + +<P> +"I have a bundle in the bank," said Charles, as on his knee he sank, +"and all of it is yours to blow, so let us to the altar go." +</P> + +<P> +"I've learned some things," said L. P. Brown, "and now I would not turn +you down if you were busted flat, my dear; I've learned that love's the +one thing here that's worth a continental dam*; you ask for me—well, +here I am!" +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +* Dam—A former copper coin.—Dictionary. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap061"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE GREATEST THING +</H3> + +<P> +The orator shrieks and clamors, and kicks up a lot of dust, and larrups +and whacks and hammers the weary old sinful Trust; the congressman +chirps and chatters, pursuing his dream of fame; but there's only one +thing that matters, and that is the baseball game. The pessimist rails +and wrangles, and takes up a lot of room and tells, in a voice that +jangles, his view of the nation's doom; we shy at his why and +wherefore, and balk at his theories lame; for there's only one thing we +care for, and that is the baseball game. The rakers of muck are busy, +with shovels and spades and screens, a-dishing up stuff that's dizzy, +in the popular magazines; these fellows are ever present, with stories +of graft and shame, and there's only one thing that's pleasant, and +that is the baseball game. Some people are in a passion, and have +been, for many weeks, because the decrees of fashion make women look +much like freaks; why worry about the dress of the frivolous modern +dame? There's only one thing impressive, and that is the baseball game. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap063"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE UMPIRE +</H3> + +<P> +Be kind to the umpire who bosses the game, whose doom is too frequently +sealed; it serves no good purpose to camp on his frame, and strew him +all over the field. +</P> + +<P> +The umpire is human—which fact you may doubt—a creature of tissues +and blood; he pales at the sound of your bloodthirsty shout, and +shrinks from the sickening thud. He may have a vine covered cottage +like yours, a home where a loving wife dwells; and when he's on duty +the fear she endures is something no chronicler tells. She hears from +the bleachers a thunderous roar, and thinks it announces his fate. "I +reckon," she sighs, "he'll come home on a door, or perhaps in a basket +or crate." +</P> + +<P> +Be kind to the umpire; his hopes are your own; he's doing the best that +he can; his head isn't elm and his heart isn't stone; he's just like +the neighboring man. Don't call him a bonehead or say his work's punk, +or that he's a robber insist; don't pelt him with castings or vitrified +junk, or smite him with bludgeon or fist. +</P> + +<P> +Suppose you are doing the best you know how, and striving your +blamedest to please, and bystanders throw at your head a dead cow, or +break your legs off at the knees. Suppose you are trying your best to +be fair, and critics come up in a crowd, set fire to your whiskers, and +pull out your hair, and put you in shape for a shroud. If people +refused to believe that you try to give them their fifty cents' worth, +you'd be so discouraged you'd sit down and cry, and say there's no +justice on earth. +</P> + +<P> +Be kind to the umpire and give him a chance to live to a happy old age; +reward him with praise and encouraging glance when he does his devoir +on his stage. Save up your dead cats for the scavenger man, your +cabbage for cigarette smoke; the umpire is doing the best that he +can—he shouldn't be killed as a joke. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap066"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE TWO MERCHANTS +</H3> + +<P> +Methinks that clerics, the whole world through, will do much as their +bosses do, for which they're not to blame; for emulation is a part, in +office, drawing room and mart, of this weird human game. +</P> + +<P> +I often go to Jimpson's store; I blow in twice a day or more to buy my +prunes and things. Old Jimpson is a joyous jay; he hustles around the +livelong day, he whistles and he sings. I like to watch the blamed old +chump; I like to see him on the jump, he is so full of steam; and all +his clerks have caught his style; they hump around with cheerful smile, +and do not loaf or dream. +</P> + +<P> +When I blow into Jimpson's lair they all seem glad to see me there and +anxious for my trade; they give me brisk attention then, and sing the +chorus, "Come again!" when from the shop I fade. +</P> + +<P> +Jim Clinker has another store. Jim Clinker's head seem always sore, he +grumbles and he scowls; and all his clerks have caught that trick; they +gloom around the store like sick or broken-hearted owls. When I go in +to buy some tea, a languid salesman waits on me as though it were a +crime to rouse him from his sour repose, his brooding over secret woes, +and occupy his time. +</P> + +<P> +If Clinker's clerks to Jimpson went, they soon would shake their +discontent, and carol like the birds; if Jimpson's clerks for Clinker +toiled their optimism would be spoiled; they'd hand out doleful words. +</P> + +<P> +And so I say, and say some more, that all the salesmen in a store will +emulate their boss; if he is sour on all the works, you may be sure his +string of clerks will be a total loss. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap068"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TODAY'S MOTTO +</H3> + +<P> +"Love your neighbor as yourself," was a motto famed of yore; now it's +placed upon the shelf, with about a thousand more; now the child on +mother's knee, sees the lovelight in her eyes, while she says: +"Where'er you be, boil the germs and swat the flies!" In the olden +golden days, preachers told the sacred tale of poor Jonah's erring +ways, and his journey in the whale; of the lions in their den, and of +Daniel, good and wise; now they preach this creed to men: "Boil the +germs and swat the flies!" When my dying eyelids close, and the world +is growing dim, while I'm turning up my toes, I may ask to hear a hymn; +and the people by my bed, they will sing, with streaming eyes, while +each humbly bows his head: "Boil the germs and swat the flies!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap069"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SOME PROTESTS +</H3> + +<P> +I sit in my cushioned motor, indulging in wise remarks, concerning the +outraged voter crushed down by the money sharks. We burdened and weary +toilers are ground by the iron wheels of soulless, despotic spoilers, +and bruised by the tyrants' heels. They're flaunting their corsair +mottoes while treading upon our toes, and some of us can't have autos +or trotters or things like those. I know of a worthy neighbor who +lives in a humble cot, and after long years of labor he hasn't a single +yacht! +</P> + +<P> +While eating my dinner humble—of porterhouse steak and peas, and honey +from bees that bumble, and maybe imported cheese—I think, with a +bitter feeling, of insolent money kings, who, drunk with their wealth +and reeling, condemn me to eat such things. The pirate and banknote +monger still gloat o'er their golden stacks, while I must appease my +hunger with oysters and canvasbacks. The plutocrat has his chuffer, a +minion of greed and pelf; the poor man must weep and suffer, and drive +his own car himself. +</P> + +<P> +The plutocrat homeward totters with diamonds to load his girls, and +meanwhile my wife and daughters must struggle along with pearls. In +silk, with a trademark Latin, the plutocrat's wife appears, and I can +afford but satin to tog out my dimpled dears. The plute has a splendid +palace, with pictures and Persian rugs; he drinks from a silver chalice +and laughs at the poor men's jugs, and I, in my lowly cottage, that's +shadowed by tree and vine, fill up on mock turtle pottage, with only +three kinds of wine! +</P> + +<P> +It's time for a revolution, to punish the wealthy ones! I'll furnish +the elocution if you'll bring the bombs and guns! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap071"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE WORKERS +</H3> + +<P> +Here's to the man who labors and does it with a song! He stimulates +his neighbors and helps the world along! +</P> + +<P> +I like the men who do things, who hustle and achieve; the men who saw +and glue things, and spin and dig and weave. +</P> + +<P> +Man earns his bread in sweat or in blood since Adam sinned; and bales +of hay are better than are your bales of wind. +</P> + +<P> +Man groans beneath his burden, beneath the chain he wears; and still +the toiler's guerdon is worth the pain he bears. +</P> + +<P> +For there's no satisfaction beneath the bending sky like that the man +of action enjoys when night is nigh. +</P> + +<P> +To look back o'er the winding and dark and rocky road, and know you +bore your grinding and soul-fatiguing load— +</P> + +<P> +As strong men ought to bear it, through all the stress and +strife—that's the reward of merit—that is the balm of life! +</P> + +<P> +I like the men who do things, who plow and sow and reap, who build and +delve and hew things while dreamers are asleep. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap073"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE UTILITARIAN +</H3> + +<P> +We sat around the stove discoursing of mighty deeds that we had done; +of struggling up the Alps and forcing our way to summits then unwon; of +fights with lions and hyenas, of facing grim and ghostly shapes, of +dodging bailiffs and subpoenas, and many perilous escapes. +</P> + +<P> +And one sat by, distraught and gloomy, and listened to each stirring +tale; his beard was long, his eyes were rheumy, his nose was red, his +aspect stale. And this old pilgrim, dour and hoary, on all our +pleasure drew the noose; for, at the end of every story, he'd sadly +ask: "What was the use?" +</P> + +<P> +I told of how I went a-sailing to Europe in an open boat; the billows +raved, the winds were wailing till I could scarcely keep afloat. The +salt sea spray was on my features; I heard King Neptune's angry shouts; +I fought with whales and other creatures, and was pursued by +waterspouts. I sailed those seas for weeks together, and bore my life +in either hand, and very often doubted whether I'd ever bring my boat +to land. But still, resolved on winning glory, I sailed along like +Captain Loose. The old man broke into my story, and mildly asked: +"What was the use?" +</P> + +<P> +Jones told of how, appareled thinly (the thirst for glory warmed his +breast), he scaled the heights of Mount McKinley and placed our flag +upon its crest. He placed the flag to thwart the scorner, the doubter, +and the man obtuse; and then the old man in the corner looked up and +asked: "What was the use?" +</P> + +<P> +Brown told of how a cask he entered and floated o'er the Horseshoe +Falls, and how all eyes for months were centered on him; in cottages +and halls the people joined to sing his praises or level at his head +abuse; the old man heard his burning phrases, and sadly asked: "What +was the use?" +</P> + +<P> +We smote him roundly in our anger, resolved to cook his ancient goose, +and still, above the din and clangor, we heard him ask, "What is the +use?" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap076"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FIRESIDE ADVENTURES +</H3> + +<P> +It is not mine the world to roam; when I was born the Fates decreed +that I should always stay at home, and deal in hay and bran and feed. +For mighty deeds I have no chance while I am rustling in my store; and +yet my life has its romance, and I've adventures by the score. +</P> + +<P> +For evening comes, and then, serene, to my abode I take my way, and +grab this good old magazine, and leave the world of bran and hay. +Through Arctic wildernesses cold, I follow the explorers' train, or +seeking go for pirate's gold along the storied Spanish Main. Oft, by +the miner's struggling lamp, I count the nuggets I have won; or in the +cowboys' wind-swept camp indulge in wild athletic fun. The big round +world is all for me, brought to me by the sprightly tale; o'er every +strange and distant sea my phantom ship has learned to sail, I travel +in all neighborhoods where daring man has left his tracks; I am the +hunter in the woods, I am the woodman with his ax. I am the grim, +effective sleuth who goes forth in a rare disguise, and quickly drags +the shining truth from out a mountain range of lies. I am the watcher +of the roads, the highwayman of wold and moor, relieving rich men of +their loads, to give a rakeoff to the poor. I am the hero of the +crowds, as, on my trusty aeroplane, I cleave a pathway through the +clouds, to Milky Way and Charles's Wain. I am the pitcher known to +fame; I pitch as though I worked by Steam, and in the last and crucial +game I win the pennant for my team. I am the white man's final hope, +on whom his aspirations hinge, and, notwithstanding all the dope, I +knock the daylights from the dinge. +</P> + +<P> +I am the man of action when, with lamplight gloating o'er the scene, I +bask at leisure in my den, and read my fav'rite magazine. And so all +day I stay at home attending to the treadmill grind; but when night +comes afar I roam, and leave the workday world behind. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap079"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +HUNTING A JOB +</H3> + +<P> +"I would like a situation. I have hunted for it long," said a youth +who looked discouraged; "everything that is is wrong; there is no +demand for labor, no respect for willing hands, hence the people who +are idle are as frequent as the sands. I have waited in the pool hall +through the long and weary day, and no lucrative position seemed to +come along that way; I have stood upon the corner, smoking at my trusty +cob, but no merchant came to hire me, though all knew I had no job; I +have sat on every doorstep that against me wasn't fenced, you could +scarcely find a building that I haven't leaned against; I have smoked a +thousand stogies, I have chewed a cord of plug, I have shaken dice with +dozens, I have touched each cider jug, to sustain my drooping spirits +while I waited for a berth, with some up-to-date employer who'd +appreciate my worth. But the world is out of kilter and the country's +out of plumb, and the poor downtrodden voter finds that things are on +the bum." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap081"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +OLD AND NEW +</H3> + +<P> +New songs are made in long array; we learn and sing them,—for a day, +and then they fade and die away. But when the long, sad day is +through, refreshing as the evening dew, are those old songs our fathers +knew. New books, in rich and gorgeous dress, are coming hourly from +the press, and charm by all their lovliness. But when from bench or +desk we roam, to find the resting place at home, we read the old, old +treasured tome. New friends are made at every reach of our long road +to Styx's beach; new friends of warm and pleasant speech. But when +life's sun is in the West, and feet are tired and hearts oppressed, the +old time friend seems always best. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap082"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE HANDY EDITOR +</H3> + +<P> +When a man has got a grievance that is keeping him awake, some old +moldy, tiresome trouble that has made his innards ache, then he comes +a-callyhooting to the printing-office door, for he wants to share his +trouble with the humble editore. +</P> + +<P> +When a man has got a hobby that has put him on the bum, then the people +flee a-shrieking when they chance to see him come; but he knows one +weary mortal who must suffer and endure, so he comes to share his +theories with the lowly editure. +</P> + +<P> +When a man has got a story that with age was stiff and stark when old +Father Noah told it to the people in the ark, then he comes, a-bubbling +over, to the Weekly Bugle's lair, for he wants to share his gladness +with the soulful editaire. +</P> + +<P> +O, he's always freely giving of the things that make us tired, and he's +often pretty stingy with the things that are desired; he might bring a +ray of sunlight to a life that's sad and drear, if he'd give the absent +treatment to the heartsick editeer. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap084"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE SLEEPER WAKES +</H3> + +<P> +Perhaps you've heard of old Tom Tinkle, who went to sleep like Rip Van +Winkle, and slept for thirty years; he woke the other day, and gazing +around him on the sights amazing, his soul was filled with fears. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-085"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-085.jpg" ALT="The Sleeper Wakes" BORDER="2" WIDTH="402" HEIGHT="594"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 402px"> +The Sleeper Wakes +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P> +"What world is this?" he asked, in terror; "what life, of which I'm now +a sharer? What globe do we infest? Oh, is it Saturn, Mars or Venus? +How many planets are between us and good old Mother Earth? What mighty +bird is that a-soaring—I seem to hear its pinions roaring, it scoots +along so fast? Old Earth, with all her varied features, had no such +big, outlandish creatures around, from first to last." +</P> + +<P> +"It is an airship, Thomas Tinkle," I answered him; "a modern wrinkle, +just one of many score which were by scientists invented to make the +people more contented since you began to snore." +</P> + +<P> +I told him of the wireless system and other wonders—he had missed 'em, +since he was sound asleep; of submarines which sink and travel serenely +o'er the mud and gravel beneath the raging deep. +</P> + +<P> +"You can't convince me," said the waker, "that 'tis the earth—you are +a faker, and deal in fairy tales; no man could soar away up yonder, +like some blamed albatross or condor on metal wings or sails. And as +for sending long dispatches from Buffalo clear down to Natchez, the +same not being wired, if that's done here it's not the planet whereon I +lived when mortals ran it; your stories make me tired. But what are +these rip-snorting wagons? We must be in the land of dragons! I never +saw the like! So riotously are they scooting, so wildly are they +callyhooting they fairly burn the pike!" +</P> + +<P> +I told him they were merely autos whose drivers lived up to their +mottoes that speed laws are in vain; and other miracles amazing with +delicate and pointed phrasing I started to explain. I told of triumphs +most astounding, of things which should be quite confounding to +resurrected men; but in the middle of my soaring I heard old Thomas +Tinkle snoring—he'd gone to sleep again. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap089"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IN HORSELAND +</H3> + +<P> +A well-fed horse drove into town, behind a span of ancient men, whose +knees were sore from falling down and striving to get up again; their +poor old ribs were bare of meat, and they had sores upon their necks; +there wasn't, on the village street, a tougher looking pair of wrecks. +And so they shambled up the street, a spectre harnessed with a ghost; +the horse descended from his seat, and left them standing by a post. +And there they stood through half the night, and shook and shivered in +the tugs, the while their master, in delight, was shaking dice with +other plugs. And there they died, of grief and cold—no more they'll +haul the heavy plow; their master said, when he was told: "They cost +blamed little, anyhow!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap090"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +INAUGURATION DAY, 1913 +</H3> + +<P> +Now Washington is swarming with men of sterling worth, all bent upon +reforming the heaven and the earth; they come from far Savannah, they +come from Texarkana, and points in Indiana, with loud yet seemly mirth. +They're come from far Alaska, where show is heaped on snow; they've +journeyed from Nebraska where commoners do grow; the famed, the wise, +the witty, the timid, and the gritty have come from Kansas City and +also Broken Bow. Their battle shout is thrilling as they go marching +by, and every man is willing at once to bleed and die; to guarantee +this nation a fine Administration he'd take a situation or kill himself +with pie. The editors of journals are marching in the throng; and old +and war-worn colonels are teetering along; and friends of Andrew +Jackson and Jefferson, now waxin' a trifle old, are taxin' their dusty +throats with song. No wonder Woodrow Wilson, as this great crowd +appears, his silken kerchief spills on some proud and grateful tears; +the ranks of colonels face him—such loyalty must brace him, and from +dejection chase him in future pregnant years. No office need go +begging before this mighty host; he need not go a-legging for masters +of the post; he has to do no pleading; they bring the help he's +needing; of dying and of bleeding they make a modest boast. And so he +views the strangers from Maryland and Maine, the tall, bewhiskered +grangers who till the Western plain; the men from desks and foyers, the +sheepmen and the sawyers, the lumberjacks and lawyers, all come to ease +the strain; he views the dusty millers from Minnesota land; the shining +social pillars from Boston's sacred strand; the men of hill and valley +around his standard rally (and on the snaps keep tally), each with a +helping hand. "My fears are in the distance," is Woodrow's grateful +song; "what foe can make resistance against this mighty throng? So let +us, lawyer, farmer, ex-plute, and social charmer, gird on our +snow-white armor, and paralyze each wrong!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap093"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PRAYER OF THE HEATHEN +</H3> + +<P> +Before a wooden idol two heathen knelt and prayed; it was their day of +bridal, the savage and the maid. "We two have come together, to +journey through the years, in calm and stormy weather, in sunshine and +in tears. O idol most exalted, protect us on our way, and may our feet +be halted from going far astray. This maid," the bridegroom muttered, +"is fresh from Nature's hands; her boudoir is not cluttered with +strings and pins and bands; she does not paint her features, or wear +rings on her paws; she's one of Nature's creatures, and lives by +Nature's laws. Her foot, she does not force it into a misfit shoe; nor +does she wear a corset to squeeze her frame in two. That frame has got +upon it no clothes she does not need; she wears no bughouse bonnet that +makes man's bosom bleed. This maid, this weaker vessel, has movements +swift and free, and she can run and wrestle, and she can climb a tree. +And it she shows a yearning to emulate the whites, our good old customs +spurning, pursuing vain delights, O idol stern and oaken, take thou thy +sceptre dread, and may the same be broken upon her silly head." +</P> + +<P> +"This bridegroom," said the maiden, "untutored is and rude, but still +he is not laden with habits vain and lewd. I hope to see him trundle +each evening to his kraal, and not blow in his bundle for long cold +pints of ale. With my consent he'll never get next the slot machine, +or use his best endeavor to burn up gasoline. No tailor hath arrayed +him, no valet hath defaced! He stands as Nature made him, +broad-chested, slim of waist! And he can swim the Niger, or rob a +lion's lair, or whip a full-grown tiger at Reno or elsewhere! And if +he would abandon our simple heathen ways, and learn to place his hand +on some foolish white men's craze, O idol, in your dudgeon, obey his +bride's behest! Take up your big spiked bludgeon, and swat him +galley-west!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap096"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THEORY AND PRACTICE +</H3> + +<P> +In public I talk of Milton and give him ecstatic praise, and say that I +love to ponder for hours o'er his living lays; I speak of his noble +epic, that jewel which proudly shines, and quote from his splendid +sonnets (I know maybe twenty lines); but when I am home John Milton is +left on the bookcase shelf; he's rather too dull for reading—you know +how it is yourself; to lighten the weight of sorrow that over my spirit +hangs, I dig up the works of Irwin or Nesbit or Kendrick Bangs. +</P> + +<P> +I talk much of Thomas Hardy when I'm with the cultured crowd, and say +that few modern writers so richly have been endowed; I speak of his +subtle treatment of life and its grim distress, and quote from "The +Trumpet Major" or spiel a few lines from "Tess." But when I am in my +chamber, where no one can see me read, remote from the highbrow people +and all that the highbrows need, I never have known a longing to reach +for the Hardy tomes; I put in a joyous evening with Watson and Sherlock +Holmes. +</P> + +<P> +I talk a good deal of Wagner in parlor and drawing room, and speak of +the gorgeous fabrics he wove on his wondrous loom, the fabrics of sound +and beauty, the wonderful scroll of tone, and say that this mighty +genius remains in a class alone. I whistle "The Pilgrims' Chorus," and +chortle of "Lohengrin," and say that all other music is merely a venial +sin. But when at my own piano Susannah sits down to play, I beg her to +cut out Wagner and shoo all his noise away. "I'm weary and worn and +beaten; my spirits," I say, "are low; so give us some helpful music—a +few bars of Jungle Joe!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap098"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FOOL AND SAGE +</H3> + +<P> +The fool and his money are parted, not long did they stay in cahoots; +but the fool is the cheeriest-hearted and gladdest of human galoots. +His neighbor is better and wiser, six figures might tell what he's +worth; but O how folks wish the old miser would fall off the edge of +the earth! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap099"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THEN AND NOW +</H3> + +<P> +In olden times the gifted bard found life a pathway rough and hard. +Starvation often was his goad, and some dark garret his abode, and +there, when nights were long and chill, he sadly plied his creaking +quill. He wrote of shepherds and their crooks, of verdant vales and +babbling brooks, displaying artfully his lore—while bailiffs +threatened at the door. And having wrought his best, he took with +trembling hands his little book to lay before some haughty lord, and +cringe around for a reward. Some times, perchance, he got a purse; +anon he only drew a curse; and often in a prison yard the weary, +debt-incumbered bard was herded with the squalid throng, and damned the +shining peaks of song. +</P> + +<P> +The world moves on. The bard today finds life a soft and easy way. If +he elects to cut his hair he has the price and some to spare. Attired +in purple, he goes by with hard boiled shirt and scrambled tie, and you +can hear his bullion clank as he goes prancing to the bank. He writes +no tame, insipid books of dairy maids or shepherds' crooks, of singing +birds or burbling streams, or any other worn-out themes. Anon he +touches up his lyre to boost a patent rubber tire, or sings a noble +song that thrills concerning someone's beeswax pills. His lyre's a +wonder to behold; its frame is pearl, its strings are gold. His +sheetiron laurels never fade; the grocer's glad to get his trade. +While he can make the muses sweat he'll never go to jail for debt. +</P> + +<P> +He calmly puts his harp away, when he has toiled a 10-hour day, and +softly sighs: "There's nothing wrong with this old graft of deathless +song!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap101"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE SLEEPER +</H3> + +<P> +They have planted him deep in a grave by the fence, where the sand burs +are thick and the jimson is dense; he's sleeping at last, and as still +as a mouse, held down by a boulder as big as a house, and the +whangdoodle mourns in a neighboring tree, with a voice that's as sad as +the sorrowing sea. They have planted him deep in the silt and the +sand, with appropriate airs by the fife and drum band, and they +joyfully yell when the sad rites are o'er: "Gosh ding him, he's taking +his straw votes no more." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap102"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FOOLING AROUND +</H3> + +<P> +Old Griggins the grocer, has gone to the dump, and people who knew him +say he was a chump; his prospects were fine when he opened his store, +and customers brought him their bullion and ore, and bought his +potatoes and pumpkins and peas, his milk and molasses, his chicory, +cheese. But soon they went elsewhere to blow in their plunks, for +Griggins turned out such a foolish old hunks; while others were +rustling for shilling and pound, old Griggins the grocer kept fooling +around. +</P> + +<P> +He stood in the alley and ranted and tore, debating the tariff with +some one next door; he roasted the tariff on spigots and spoons while +customers waited to purchase some prunes; he argued that congress is +out for the pelf, and left his trade palace to wait on itself. And +patrons got huffy, their molars they ground, while Griggins the grocer +was fooling around. +</P> + +<P> +Old Griggins kept cases on sprinters and pugs, and talked of their +records, while people with jugs were wishing he'd fill them with syrup +or oil, and cut out his yarns, which were starting to spoil; he'd talk +about Jeffries or Johnsing or Gotch for forty-five minutes or more by +the watch, while customers jingled their coin in his store, and waited +and waited, and sweated and swore. At last they would leave his old +joint on the bound, while Griggins the grocer was fooling around. +</P> + +<P> +The man who would win in these strenuous days must tend to his knitting +in forty-five ways, be eager and hustling, with vim all athrob, his +mind not afield, but intent on his job. The sheriff will come with his +horse and his hound to talk with the man who keeps fooling around. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap104"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GUESS WHO! +</H3> + +<P> +He is the press and the people, the sultan who rules the Turks; he is +the bell in the steeple, and he is the whole blamed works. He is the +hill and valley, the dawning, the dusk, the moon; he is the large white +alley, he is the man in the moon. He is the soothing slumber, he is +the soul awake, he is the big cucumber, that gives us the bellyache. +He is the fire that quickens, the company that insures; he is the ill +that sickens, and he is the thing that cures. He is the ruling +Russian, and we are the groveling skates; he is the constitution, and +he's the United States. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap105"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TRYING AGAIN +</H3> + +<P> +No boarding house, tavern or inn was in sight; so into a cavern went +Bruce, in sore plight. By enemies hunted, a price on his head, and all +his schemes shunted, he wished he was dead. "In vain my endeavor, +repulsed my demands; I'll try again never—I throw up my hands!" And +so he lay sighing and cussing his fate, and wished he was lying stone +dead in a crate. A spider was spinning its web by the wall; now +losing, now winning, now taking a fall; though often it tumbled, it +breathed not a sob, nor crawfished nor grumbled, but stuck to its job. +Then Bruce opened wider his eyes and exclaimed: "That dodgasted spider +has made me ashamed! I'm but a four-flusher to sit here and whine! +This morning must usher in triumphs of mine!" +</P> + +<P> +He canned all his wailing and cut out the frown, and went forth +a-smiling, and won a large crown! +</P> + +<P> +And legions of fellows with tears in their eyes, who wear out their +bellows with groaning and sighs, who think they are goners, ordained to +the dump, would harvest some honors if they would just hump! The +spiders are teaching, the same as of old; the spiders are preaching a +gospel of gold: "Though baffled and broken, O children of men, let +grief be unspoken—go at it again!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap107"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ICONOCLASM +</H3> + +<P> +King Skeptic wears his modern crown, his stern, destructive law +prevails; he's tearing all our idols down, disproving all our fav'rite +tales. Is there a legend you hold dear, some legend of the long ago? +King Skeptic hears it with a sneer, and digs up history to show that +things of that sort never chanced, and never could, and never will. +"We have," he says, "so much advanced, that fairy tales don't fill the +bill. No faked-up tales of knightly acts, no Robin Hood romance for +me; the only things worth while are Facts, Statistics, and the Rule of +Three." +</P> + +<P> +With diagrams he shows full well that old-time tales are things to +scorn; that such a man as William Tell, in liklihood, was never born. +If Gessler lived and had a hat, he didn't hang it on a pole; the rules +of Euclid show us that—so goes King Skeptic's rigmarole. But, +granting that he had a lid, and hung it on a pole awhile, and granting +that the people did bow down to reverence that tile, this does not +prove that William shot an apple through an apple's core, and so the +anecdote is rot—don't let us hear it any more. +</P> + +<P> +One-eyed Horatius never held the bridge beside his comrades bold, while +Sextus and his foemen yelled—because there was no bridge to hold. +With Fact King Skeptic pounds your head, and prods you with it to the +hilt, and shows Horatius had been dead ten years before the bridge was +built. "He fell not in the Tiber's foam, performed no feats of arms +sublime. I know! The city clerk of Rome sent me the records of that +time!" +</P> + +<P> +Mazeppa's ride was all a joke, as all the statisticians know; the horse +he rode was city broke, and stopped whene'er he whispered "whoa." Most +luckily, the village vet wrote down the facts with rugged power; +Mazeppa simply made a bet the horse could go three miles an hour; he +wasn't strapped upon its back, no perils dire did him befall; he rode +around a kite-shaped track, and lost his bet, and that was all. +</P> + +<P> +And so it goes; you can't relate a legend of heroic acts but that the +Skeptic then will state objections based on Deadly Facts. Romance is +but a total loss, and all the joy of life departs; we've nothing left +but Charlie Ross, and he'll turn up, to break our hearts. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap110"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GATHERING ROSES +</H3> + +<P> +I've gathered roses and the like, in many glad and golden Junes; but +now, as down the world I hike, my weary hands are filled with prunes. +I've gathered roses o'er and o'er, and some were white, and some were +red; but when I took them to the store, the grocer wanted eggs instead. +I gathered roses long ago, in other days, in other scenes; and people +said: "You ought to go, and dig the weeds out of your beans." A +million roses bloomed and died, a million more will die today; that man +is wise who lets them slide, and gathers up the bales of hay. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap111"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE FUTURE SPORT +</H3> + +<P> +The airship is a thing achieved; it has its rightful place, as well as +any autocart that ever ran a race. The farmer, in the coming years, +when eggs to town he brings, will flop along above the trees, upon his +rusty wings. The doctor, when he has a call, from patients far or +near, will quickly strap his pinions on, and hit the atmosphere. And +airship racing then will be the sport to please the crowds; there'll be +racecourses overhead, and grandstands in the clouds. The umpire, on +his patent wings, will hover here and there; the fans, with rented +parachutes, will prance along the air; the joyous shrieks of flying +sports will keep the welkin hot, and soaring cops will blithely chase +the scorching aeronaut. We'll soon be living overhead, our families +and all; and then we'll only need the earth to land on when we fall. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap112"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TAKING ADVICE +</H3> + +<P> +A forty-foot constrictor once was swallowing a goat, and having lots of +trouble, for the horns stuck in his throat. And then a warthog came +along, and said: "Oh, foolish snake! To swallow all your victuals +whole is surely a mistake. It puts your stomach out of plumb, your +liver out of whack, and gives you all the symptoms in the latest +almanac. If serpents for abundant health would have a fair renown, +they'll chew a mouthful half an hour before they take it down. Eat +slowly, with a tranquil mind and heart serene beneath, and always use a +finger bowl, and always pick your teeth. I'm reading up Woods +Hutchinson and Fletcher and those guys, and following the rules they +make, which are extremely wise, and oh, it pains me to the quick, and +jars my shrinking soul, to see a foolish snake like you absorbing +dinners whole!" +</P> + +<P> +The serpent got his dinner down, with whiskers, horns and feet, then +slept three weeks; then looked around for something more to eat. And, +having killed a jabberwock, and found it fat and nice, he thought he'd +eat according to the warthog's sage advice. +</P> + +<P> +Ah, never more that snake is seen upon his native heath! The little +serpents tell the tale of how he starved to death! +</P> + +<P> +Moral: +</P> + +<P> +The counsel of the great may help the man next door, 'tis true, and yet +turn out to be a frost when followed up by you. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap114"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +POST-MORTEM INDUSTRY +</H3> + +<P> +You've heard of Richard Randle Rox? He died; they put him in a box, +and lowered him into a grave, and said: "He'll surely now behave." +</P> + +<P> +For years this fertile Richard penned books, rhymes and essays without +end. His helpful, moral dope was seen in every uplift magazine, and +people used to wonder how the wheels within that bulging brow produced +such countless bales of thought, such wondrous wealth of tomyrot; and +folks chewed cloves and cotton waste to try to take away the taste. +</P> + +<P> +At last he died before his time—killed off by an ingrowing rhyme. The +mourners laid him on his pall, his three assorted names and all, and +said: "Doggone him! Now he'll stop this thing of writing helpful +slop." He got the finest grave in town, and marble things to hold him +down. +</P> + +<P> +Long years have passed since R. R. Rox was placed in silver-mounted +box; and does he rest in peace? Instead, he's working harder now he's +dead. New books are coming from his pen until the chastened sons of +men look round, their eyelids red with grief—look round, imploring for +relief. "Is there no way," so wails the host, "to lay this Richard +Randle's ghost?" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap116"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE CONQUEROR +</H3> + +<P> +The pugilist, tall and majestic, and proud of his numerous scars, was +telling of foreign, domestic, and all kinds of Homeric wars. His +hearers were standing before him in attitudes speaking of awe, for what +could they do but adore him, the man with the prognathous jaw? +</P> + +<P> +"My make-up," he said, "rather queer is, I've never seen others that +way; I simply don't know what a fear is; I really rejoice in the fray, +I guess I'm the champion glarer, my glance seems to wilt all my foes; +I've seen fellows crumple with terror before we had got down to blows. +This made me so often the victor; no qualms in my bosom I feel; I don't +fear a boa constrictor—my heart is an engine of steel." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-117"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-117.jpg" ALT="The Conqueror" BORDER="2" WIDTH="395" HEIGHT="601"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 395px"> +The Conqueror +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P> +And so of his feats superhuman he talked in a voice ringing loud, until +a small, fiery-eyed woman came elbowing up through the crowd. Her +voice, like her person, was spindling, but Hercules heard when she +called: "Come home, now, and cut up some kindling, or I will be +snatching you bald!" No more of his triumphs he lilted, like Spartacus +spieling in Rome; the steel hearted warrior wilted, and followed his +conquerer home. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap120"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE TRUTHFUL MERCHANT +</H3> + +<P> +If Ananias lived today and ran the corner store, he couldn't keep the +wolf away from his old creaking door. For men who spend their +hard-earned rocks won't patronize the man who must forever, when he +talks, make truth an also ran. +</P> + +<P> +I bought a whole new suit of clothes from Bilks, across the street. He +said to me: "Such rags as those just simply can't be beat. They +ornament the clothier's trade, and eke the tailor's shears; they will +not shrink, they will not fade, they'll last a hundred years. Go +forth," said Bilks, "upon the street, in all your pomp and pride, and +every pretty girl you meet will wish she was your bride." +</P> + +<P> +So I went forth in brave array, the city's one best bet. There was a +little shower that day, and I got slightly wet. And then the truth was +driven in that my new rags were punk. Alas, my friends, it was a sin +the way those trousers shrunk! The buttons from my waistcoat flew with +dull and sickening crack; my coat soon changed from brown to blue and +then split up the back. +</P> + +<P> +Old Bilks gold-bricked me in that deal, but does his system pay? He'll +never get another wheel from me till Judgment Day. The kopeck that you +win by guile may swell your roll today, but in the clammy afterwhile it +melts that roll away. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap122"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +STANDING PAT +</H3> + +<P> +Your arguments for modern things with me cannot avail; my father reaped +his grain by hand and thrashed it with a flail; then who am I to strike +new paths and buy machinery? The methods good enough for dad are good +enough for me! I want no hydrant by my house—such doodads I won't +keep! My father drew the water from a well three furlongs deep, and +skinned his hands and broke his back a-pulling at the rope, and methods +that my father used will do for me, I hope! Don't talk of your +electric light; a candle's all I need; my father always went to bed +when 'twas too dark to read; I want no books or magazines to clutter up +my shack; my father never read a thing but Johnson's almanac. A +bathroom? Blowing wealth for that ridiculous appears; my father never +used to bathe, and lived for ninety years. I care not for your +"progress" talk, "reform" or other tricks; my father never used to vote +or fuss with politics; he never cared three whoops in Troy which side +should win or lose, and I'm content to go his gait, and wear my +father's shoes. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap124"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE OUTCAST +</H3> + +<P> +You ask me why I weep and moan, like some lost spirit in despair, and +why I wonder [Transcriber's note: wander?] off alone, and paw the +ground and tear my hair? You ask me why I pack this gun, all loaded +up, prepared to shoot? Alas! my troubles have begun—the women folk +are canning fruit! There is no place for me to eat, unless I eat upon +the floor; and peelings get beneath my feet, and make me fall a block +or more; the odors from the boiling jam, all day assail my weary snoot; +you find me, then, the wreck I am—the women folk are canning fruit! +O, they have peaches on the chairs, and moldy apples on the floor, and +wormy plums upon the stairs, and piles of pears outside the door; and +they are boiling pulp and juice, and you may hear them yell and hoot; a +man's existence is the deuce—the women folk are canning fruit! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap125"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ODE TO KANSAS +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Kansas: Where we've torn the shackles<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">From the farmer's leg;</SPAN><BR> +Kansas: Where the hen that cackles,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Always lays an egg;</SPAN><BR> +Where the cows are fairly achin'<BR> +To go on with record breakin',<BR> +And the hogs are raising bacon<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">By the keg!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap126"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DOMESTIC HAPPINESS +</H3> + +<P> +It is good to watch dear father as he blithely skips along, on his face +no sign of bother, on his lips a cheerful song; peeling spuds and +scraping fishes, putting doilies on the chairs, sweeping floors and +washing dishes, busy with his household cares. Now the kitchen fire is +burning; to get supper he will start—mother soon will be returning +from her labors in the mart. +</P> + +<P> +Poor tired mother! Daily toiling to provide our meat and bread! Where +the eager crowd is moiling, struggling on with weary tread! Battling +with stockjobbing ladies, meeting all their wiles and tricks, or +embarking in the Hades of the city's politics! But forgotten is the +pother, all the work day cares are gone, when she comes home to dear +father with his nice clean apron on! There's your chair, he says; "sit +in it; supper will be cooked eftsoons: I will dish it in a +minute—scrambled eggs and shredded prunes." It is good to watch him +moving round the stove with eager zeal, in his every action proving +that his love goes with the meal. +</P> + +<P> +When the evening meal is eaten and the things are cleared away, then we +sit around repeatin' cares and triumphs of the day; and the high +resounding rafter echoes to our harmless jokes, to our buoyant peals of +laughter, while tired mother sits and smokes. Thus her jaded mind +relaxes in an atmosphere so gay, and she thinks no more of taxes or of +bills that she must pay; smiles are soon her face adorning, in our nets +of love enmeshed, and she goes to work next morning like a giantess +refreshed. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap128"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CELEBRITIES +</H3> + +<P> +He had written lovely verses, touching hollyhocks and hearses, +lotus-eaters, ladies, lilies, porcupines and pigs and pies, nothing +human was beyond him, and admiring people conned him, adoration in +their bosoms and a rapture in their eyes. He had sung of figs and +quinces in the tents of Bedouin princes, he'd embalmed the Roman Forum +and the Parthenon of Greece; many of his odes were written in the +shrouding fogs of Britain, while he watched the suffrage ladies mixing +things with the police. +</P> + +<P> +So we met to do him honor; worshipper and eager fawner begged a tassel +of his whiskers, or his autograph in ink; never was there so much +sighin' round a pallid human lion, as he stood his lines explaining, +taking out the hitch and kink! +</P> + +<P> +All were in a joyous flutter, till we heard some fellow mutter: "Here +comes Griggs, the southpaw pitcher, fairly burdened with his fame! He +it was who beat the Phillies—gave the Quaker bugs the willies—he it +was who saved our bacon in that 'leven-inning game!" +</P> + +<P> +Then we crowded round the pitcher, making that great man the richer by +a ton of adulation, in a red-hot fervor flung; and the poet, in a +pickle, mused upon the false and fickle plaudits of the heartless +rabble, till the dinner gong was rung! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap130"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE VIRTUOUS EDITOR +</H3> + +<P> +I use my Trenchant, fertile pen to help along the cause of men and make +the sad world brighter, to give all good ambitions wings, to help the +poor to better things and make their burdens lighter. The page whereon +my screeds appear envoys a sacred atmosphere; it's helpful and +uplifting; it hands out morals by the ton, and shows the people how to +shun the rocks to which they're drifting. +</P> + +<P> +You say my other pages reek with filthy "cures for cancer"? +Impertinently, sir, you speak, and I refuse to answer. +</P> + +<P> +All causes good and true and pure, and everything that should endure +I'm always found supporting; and in my lighter moments I to heights of +inspiration fly, the soft-eyed muses courting. To those who wander far +astray I, like a shepherd, point the way to paths and fields Elysian; +no sordid motives soil my pen as I assist my fellow men, no meanness +mars my vision. +</P> + +<P> +You say I print too many ads, unfit for youths' perusal, of fakers' +pills and liver pads? I gave you one refusal to argue that, so quit +your fuss and cease your foolish chatter; it is beneath me to discuss a +purely business matter. +</P> + +<P> +I point out all the shabby tricks which now disgrace our politics, +those tricks which shame the devil; I ask the voters to deface +corruption and our country place upon a higher level. Through endless +wastes of words I roam to make the Fireside and the Home the nation's +shrine and glory; and Purity must ring again in every offspring of my +pen, in every screed and story. +</P> + +<P> +You say my paper isn't fit for aught but toughs and muckers? That all +the fakers come to it when they would fleece the suckers? Your +criticism takes the buns! It's surely most surprising! You'll have to +see the man who runs the foreign advertising. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap132"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THIS DISMAL AGE +</H3> + +<P> +"It is a humdrum world," he said, "in which we now abide! alas! the +good old times are dead when brave knights used to ride to war upon +their armored steeds; then bloodshed was in style; then men could do +heroic deeds, and life was worth the while. If I should go with lance +and sword to enemy of mine—to one by whom I've long been bored, and +cleave him to the chine, there'd be no plaudits long and loud, no +wreaths from ladies pale; the cops would seek me in a crowd, and hustle +me to jail. If down the highway I should press, beneath the summer +skies, to rescue damsels in distress and wipe their weeping eyes, I'd +win no praises from the sports; they'd call me a galoot; I'd have to +answer in the courts to breach-of-promise suit. Adventure is a thing +that's dead, we've reached a low estate, and I was born, alas!" he +said, "five hundred years too late." +</P> + +<P> +He took the morning paper then, which reeked with thrilling things, +with tales of fighting modern men; the strife of money kings; the +eager, busy, human streams throughout this mundane hive; the struggle +of the baseball teams, which for the pennant strive; the polar hero and +his sled; the race of motor cars; the flight of aernauts o'erhead, +outlined against the stars. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a humdrum age," he sighed, "of avarice the fruit. Upon a steed +I'd like to ride, and wear a cast iron suit, and live as lived the +knights of old, the heroes of romance; I'd like to carry spurs of gold +and wield a sword and lance; but in this drear and pallid age, from +Denver to Des Moines, there's naught to stir a noble rage—there's +nothing counts but coin!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap134"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BOOST THINGS +</H3> + +<P> +Don't sit supinely on your roost, but come along and help us boost, for +better things of every kind, and leave your kicking clothes behind. O +let us boost for better streets, and softer beds, and longer sheets; +for smoother lawns and better lights, and shorter-winded blatherskites; +for finer homes, and larger trees, for bats and boots and bumble bees; +for shorter hours and longer pay, and fewer thistles in our hay, for +better grub, and bigger pies, for two more moons to light the skies. +And let the wolves of war be loosed on every man who doesn't boost! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap135"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE ADVENTURER +</H3> + +<P> +He had braved the hungry ocean when the same was in commotion, he had +floated on the wreckage of his tempest-shattered bark; he had flirted +in deep waters with the merman's wives and daughters, he had scrapped +through seven sessions with a large man-eating shark. +</P> + +<P> +He had roamed in regions polar, where there's no effulgence solar, he +had slain the festive walrus and the haughty arctic bear; and his +watchword had been spoken in the wastes by whites unbroken, and he +shelled out many gumdrops to the natives living there. +</P> + +<P> +In the jungles, dark and fearful, where the tiger, fat and cheerful, +gnaws the bones of foreign hunters, he had gone, unscathed, his way; he +had whipped a big constrictor, and emerged the smiling victor from a +scrimmage with a hippo, which was fond of deadly fray. +</P> + +<P> +He was shot with poisoned arrows and his tale of anguish harrows up the +bosom of the reader, but he lived to journey home; he was chased by +wolves in Russia, thrown in prison cell in Prussia, and was captured by +fierce bandits in the neighborhood of Rome. He had lived where dwells +the savage whose ambition is to ravage and to fill his cozy wigwam with +a handsome line of scalps; he had lived with desert races, sought the +strange and distant places, he had stood upon the summit of the +loftiest of Alps. +</P> + +<P> +To his home at last returning, filled with sentimental yearning, "Now," +he cried, "farewell to danger—I have left its stormy track!" Far from +scenes of strife and riot he desired long years of quiet, but a casting +from an airship fell three miles and broke his back. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap137"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THEY ALL COME BACK +</H3> + +<P> +The stars will come back to the azure vault when the clouds are all +blown away; and the sun will come back when the night is done, and give +us another day; the cows will come back from the meadows lush, and the +birds to their trysting tree, but the money I paid to a mining shark +will never come back to me! The leaves will come back to the naked +boughs, the flowers to the frosty brae; the spring will come back like +a blooming bride, and the breezes that blow in May; and joy will come +back to the stricken heart, and laughter and hope and glee, but the +money I blew for some mining stock will never come back to me! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap138"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +HOME BUILDERS +</H3> + +<P> +Old Bullion has a stack of rich things in his shack; of Persian rugs +and antique jugs and costly bric-a-brac. There's art work in the hall, +fine paintings on the wall; and yet a gloom as of the tomb is hanging +over all. Here costly books abound. "This cost a thousand pound; that +trade-mark blur means Elzivir—I've nothing cheap around. Here's Venus +in the foam; the statue came from Rome; I bought the best the world +possessed when I built up this home." Thus proudly Bullion talks, as +through his home he walks, and tells the cost of things embossed, of +vases, screens and crocks. No children's laughter rings, among those +costly things; no sounds of play by night or day; no happy housewife +sings. For romping girl or boy might easily destroy a priceless jug, +or stain a rug, and ruin Bullion's joy. The guests of Bullion yawn, +impatient to be gone, afraid they'll mar some lacquered jar, or tread +some fan upon. +</P> + +<P> +Down here where Tiller dwells you hear triumphant yells of girls and +boys who play with toys, with hoops and horns and bells. There are no +costly screens; no relics of dead queens; but on the stand, close to +your hand, cheap books and magazines. There's no Egyptian crock, or +painted jabberwock, but by the wall there stands a tall and loud +six-dollar clock. Old Tiller can't impart much lore concerning art, or +tell the price of virtu nice until he breaks your heart. But in his +home abide those joys which seem denied to stately halls upon whose +walls are works of pomp and pride. That pomp which smothers joy, and +chills a girl or boy, may have and hold the hue of gold, but it has +base alloy. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap140"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FAILURE AND SUCCESS +</H3> + +<P> +He was selling tacks and turnips in a gloomy corner store, and he never +washed his windows and he never swept the floor, and he let the cobwebs +gather on the ceiling and the walls, and he let his whiskers flourish +till they brushed his overalls. So his customers forsook him—for his +patrons were not chumps—and the sheriff came and got him and that +merchant bumped the bumps. +</P> + +<P> +He was selling hens and hammocks, as he'd done since days of youth, and +he queered himself with many, for he never told the truth. Oh, he +thought it rather cunning if he sold a rooster old as a young and +tender pullet through the artful lies he told; and he'd sell a shoddy +hammock as a thing of silken thread, and the customer would bust it and +fall out upon his head; so his customers forsook him, and he sadly +watched them flit, and the sheriff came and got him, and that merchant +hit the grit. +</P> + +<P> +He was selling shoes and sugar—sugar from the sunny South—and he'd +roast the opposition when he should have shut his mouth. He would +stand and rant and rumble by the hour of Mr. Tweet, who was selling +shoes and sugar in the shack across the street; and he'd vow all kinds +of vengeance, and he'd tell all kinds of tales, till his wearied +patrons sometimes rose and smote him with his scales; for they cared +about his troubles and his sorrows not three whoops, and the sheriff +came and got him, and that merchant looped the loops. +</P> + +<P> +He was selling books and beeswax, and his store was neat and clean, and +the place was bright and cheerful, and the atmosphere serene. He was +tidy in his person, and his clerks were much the same, and no precious +time was wasted, in the tiresome knocking game. And the customer who +entered was with courtesy received, and he felt quite proud and happy +when of cash he was relieved. And the merchant's word was golden, what +he said was always true, and he sold no moldy beeswax, saying it was +good as new. And his trade kept on increasing till his bank account +was fat, and the sheriff, when he met him, always bowed and tipped his +hat. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap143"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE OPEN ROAD +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Romance +</H3> + +<P> +To walk again the open road I have a springtime longing; I yearn to +leave my town abode, the jostling and the thronging, and tread again +the quiet lanes, among the woodland creatures; where birds are singing +joyous strains to beat the music teachers. Afar from honks of motor +cars, and all the city's clamor, I'd like to sleep beneath the stars, +and feel no katzenjammer when in the vernal dawn I wake, as chipper as +the foxes, to eat my frugal oatmeal cake put up in paper boxes. I fain +would revel in the breeze that blows across the clover, and drink from +brooks, with stately trees, like Druids, bending over. I'd leave the +pavement and the wall, the too persistent neighbor, and hear the +rooster's early call that wakes the world to labor. I'd seek the +hayfields whose perfume the jaded heart doth nourish, I'd go where +wayside roses bloom and johnny-jump-ups flourish. I'd see the pasture +flecked with sheep and mule and colt and heifer, and let my spirit lie +asleep upon the twilight zephyr. Oh, town, I leave you for a week, +your burdens and your duties! The country calls me—I must seek its +glories and its beauties! +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Reality +</H3> + +<P> +Gee whiz! I'd give a million bones to be back home a-sleeping! My +shoes are full of burs and stones, and I am tired of weeping. Last +night I sought a stack of hay, where slumber's fetters bound me, and at +the cold, bleak break of day a husky farmer found me. I tried to +pacify his nibs when he stood there and blessed me; alas, his pitchfork +smote my ribs, his cowhide shoes caressed me. The dogs throughout this +countryside all seem to think they need me; they've gathered samples of +my hide, and many times they've treed me. And when I roamed the +woodland path to see the wild-flowers' tinting, a bull pursued me in +its wrath and broke all records sprinting. At noontide I sat down to +rest, and rose depressed and dizzy; I'd sat upon a hornet's nest, and +all the birds got busy. My whiskers now are full of hay, my legs are +lame and weary; it's been a-raining every day, and all the world is +dreary. The road will do for those who like a pathway rough and +gritty; I've had enough—just watch me hike back to the good old city. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap146"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE MILLIONAIRES +</H3> + +<P> +They like to make the people think that all their piles of yellow +chink, are weary burdens, to be borne, with eyes that weep and hearts +that mourn; but as you jog along the road, you see no millionaires +unload. They like to talk and drone and drool, to growing youths in +Sunday school, and tell them that the poor man's lot is just the thing +that hits the spot; to warn them of ambition's goad—they talk, and +talk, but don't unload. They like to talk of days long gone, when life +for them was at its dawn, and they were poor and bent with toil, and +drew their living from the soil, and lived in some obscure abode—and +so they dream, but don't unload. They like to take a check in hand, +and, headed by the village band, present it to some charity—'twould +mean five cents to you or me; then they're embalmed in song and ode; +they smirk and smile, but don't unload. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap147"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +LITTLE MISTAKES +</H3> + +<P> +I used to trade at Grocer Gregg's and paid him heaps of cash for flour +and cheese and germ-proof eggs, and cans of succotash. But now he +doesn't get my trade—that's why his bosom aches; I had to quit him, +for he made so many small mistakes. +</P> + +<P> +He'd send me stale and wilted greens when I had ordered fresh; he's +send me gutta percha beans, all string and little flesh. And when I +journeyed to his store to read the riot act, three score apologies or +more he'd offer for the fact. That doggone clerk of his, he'd say, had +got the order wrong; and always, in the same old way, he'd sing the +same old song. He seemed to think apologies were all I should desire, +when he had sent me moldy cheese or herrings made of wire. +</P> + +<P> +And when his bill came in, by jings, it always made me hot; he'd have +me charged with divers things I knew I never bought. Then I would call +on Grocer Gregg in wrath and discontent, and seize him firmly by the +leg and ask him what he meant. Then grief was in the grocer's looks, +frowns came, his eyes betwixt; "The idiot who keeps my books," he'd +say, "has got things mixed. I wouldn't have such breaks as these for +forty million yen; I offer my apologies and hope you'll come again." +</P> + +<P> +He'd often send the things I bought to Colonel Jones, up town, and I +would get a bunch of rot that should have gone to Brown. And oft at +home I'd wait and wait, in vain for Sweitzer cheese; instead of that +I'd get a crate of codfish, prunes or peas. And then I'd go to Grocer +Gregg, and mutter as I went; "I'll take that merchant down a peg, and +in him make a dent." He'd spring the same old platitudes when I had +reached his den: "That vampire who delivers goods has balled things up +again." +</P> + +<P> +Apologies are good enough, excuses are the same; but forty-seven are +enough to tire one of that game. It's better far to shun mistakes, and +do things right at first, than to explain your dizzy breaks till your +suspenders burst. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap150"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +EASY MORALITY +</H3> + +<P> +When things are moving slick as grease, it's easy to be moral then, to +wear a gentle smile of peace, and talk about good will to men. Such +virtue doesn't greatly weigh, in making up the books of life; the man +who cheerful is and gay, in times of sorrow and of strife, is better +worth a word of praise, than all the gents of smiling mien, who swear +in forty different ways when life has ceased to be serene. This +morning, as I ambled down, a neighbor fell (the walk was slick) and +slid half-way across the town, and landed on a pile of brick. He slid +along at such a rate the ice was melted as he went; his shins were +barked, and on his pate there was a large unsightly dent. And when +he'd breath enough to talk, he didn't cave around and swear, or blank +the blanked old icy walk; he merely cried: "Well, I declare!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap151"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE CRITIC +</H3> + +<P> +Some years ago I wrote a book, and no one read it save myself; it +occupies a dusty nook, all sad and lonesome, on the shelf. And having +found I couldn't write such stories as would please the mob, I sternly +said, "I'll wreak my spite on those who can hold down the job." So now +I sit in gloomy state and roast an author every day, and show he's a +misguided skate who should be busy baling hay. The people read me as I +cook my victims, and exclaim with glee, "If he would only write a book, +oh where would Scott and Dickens be?" +</P> + +<P> +I used to think that I could sing, but when a few sweet trills I'd +shed, the people would arise and fling dead cats and cabbage at my +head. Then, realizing that my throat was modeled on the foghorn plan, +I said, "If I can't sing a note, I'll surely roast the folks who can!" +I go to concerts and look wise, and shudder as in misery; in vain the +prima donna tries to win approving smiles from me; in vain the tenor or +the bass, to gain from me admiring looks, pours floods of music through +his face—I squirm as though on tenderhooks. And people watch my +curves and sigh; "He has it all by heart, by jing! What melody would +reach the sky if he would but consent to sing!" +</P> + +<P> +When I was young I painted signs, but not a soul my work would buy, for +all my figures and my lines were out of drawing and awry. And so I +said; "It breaks my heart that I can't sell a single sign; but in the +noble realms of art as critic I shall surely shine!" And so I grew a +Vandyke beard, and let my hair grow long as grass, and studied up a +jargon weird, and learned to wear a single glass. Then to the +galleries I went and looked at paintings with a frown, and wept in +dismal discontent that art's so crushed and beaten down. And people +followed in my tracks to ascertain my point of view; whenever I applied +the ax they gaily swung the cleaver, too. And often, through a solemn +hush, I'd hear my rapt admirers say: "If he would only use the brush, +Mike Angelo would fade away!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap154"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE OLD TIMER +</H3> + +<P> +You've built up quite a city here, with stately business blocks, and +wires a-running far and near, and handsome concrete walks. The trolley +cars go whizzing by, and smoke from noisy mills is trailing slowly to +the sky, and blotting out the hills. And thirty years ago I stood upon +this same old mound, with not a house of brick or wood for twenty miles +around! I'm mighty glad to be alive, to see the change you've made; +it's good to watch this human hive, and hear the hum of trade! +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I list to the moans and wails<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of your town, with its toiling hands,</SPAN><BR> +But O for the lonely trails<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That led to the unknown lands!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<A NAME="img-155"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-155.jpg" ALT="The Old Timer" BORDER="2" WIDTH="403" HEIGHT="595"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 403px"> +The Old Timer +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P> +I used to camp right where we stand, among these motor cars, and +silence brooded o'er the land, as I lay 'neath the stars, save when the +drowsy cattle lowed, or when a broncho neighed; and now you have an +asphalt road, and palaces of trade! We hear the clamor of the host on +every wind that blows, when people take the time to boast of how their +city grows! I do not doubt that you will rise to greater heights of +fame, and maybe paint across the skies your city's lustrous name! +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I list to the ceaseless tramp<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of the host, with its hopes and fears;</SPAN><BR> +But O for the midnight camp<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the sound of the milling steers!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap158"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE BRIGHT FACE +</H3> + +<P> +Things are moving slowly? Business seems unholy? Better things are +coming, though they seem delayed! Sitting down and scowling, standing +up and growling, fussing round complaining will not bring the trade! +Here comes Mr. Perkins for a quart of gherkins—don't begin to tell him +all about your woes; you will only bore him, laying griefs before him, +and he'll be disgusted when he ups and goes. Show him that you're +cheerful, for the merchant tearful always jars his patrons, always +makes them groan; they don't want to hearken to the ills that darken +over you for they have troubles of their own. +</P> + +<P> +Here comes Mrs. Twutter for three yards of butter—let her see you +smiling, let her find you gay; be as bright and chipper as a new tin +dipper, show you're optimistic, in the good old way! If you mope and +mumble this good dame will tumble, and she'll tell her neighbors that +your head is sore; no one likes a dealer who's a dismal squealer, so +your friends will toddle to some other store. When the luck seems +balky, and the trade is rocky, that's the time to whistle, that's the +time to grin! Time to make a showing that your trade is growing, time +to show your grit and rustle round like sin. +</P> + +<P> +Here comes Mr. Bunyan for a shredded onion, bullion in his trousers, +checkbook in his coat; give him no suspicion that the dull condition in +the world of commerce has destroyed your goat! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap160"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +LADIES AND GENTS +</H3> + +<P> +When I was younger kids were kids, in Kansas or in Cadiz; now all the +boys are gentlemen, and all the girls are ladies. Where are the kids +who climbed the trees, the tousled young carousers, who got their faces +black with dirt, and tore their little trousers? Where are the lads +who scrapped by rounds, while other lads kept tallies? The maids who +made their pies of mud, and danced in dirty alleys? They're making +calf-love somewhere now, exchanging cards and kisses, they're all fixed +up in Sunday togs, and they are Sirs and Misses. Real kids have +vanished from the world—which fact is surely hades; and all the boys +are gentlemen, and all the girls are ladies. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap161"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AUTUMN JOYS +</H3> + +<P> +The summer days have gone their ways, to join the days of summers +olden; the eager air is making bare the trees, the leaves are red and +golden; the flowers that bloomed are now entombed, the morn is chill, +the night is dreary; and I confront the same old stunt that all my life +has made me weary. Hard by yon grove our heating stove is standing red +and fierce and rusty; and I must black its front and back, and get +myself all scratched and dusty. And I must pack it on my back, about a +mile, up to our shanty, and work with wire and pipes and fire, the +while I quote warm things from Dante. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap162"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE LAND OF BORES +</H3> + +<P> +In the country of the bores people never shut the doors, and they leave +the windows open, so you're always catching cold; and they lean against +your breast while relating moldy jest that had long and flowing +whiskers when by Father Adam told. In the country of the bores people +carry sample ores, and they talk of mines prolific till you buy ten +thousand shares; and they sell you orange groves and revolving fireless +stoves, while they loll upon your divan with their feet upon your +chairs. In the country of the bores every other fellow roars of the +sins of public servants and the need of better things; in a nation full +of vice he alone is pure and nice, he alone has got a halo and a flossy +pair of wings. In the country of the bores men who wish to do their +chores are disturbed by agitators who declaim of iron heels, urging +toiling men to rise, with chain lightning in their eyes and do +something to the tyrant and his car with bloody wheels. In the country +of the bores evermore the talksmith pours floods of language on the +people, who were better left alone. But that land is far away, and we +should rejoice today that we're living in a country where no bores were +ever known. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap164"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SKILLED LABOR +</H3> + +<P> +The pumpmaker came to my humble abode, for the pump was in need of +repair; his auto he left by the side of the road, and his diamonds he +placed on a chair. And he said that the weather was really too cold, +for comfort, this time of the year; and he thought from Japan—though +she's haughty and bold—this country has nothing to fear. He thought +that our navy should equal the best, for a navy's a warrant of peace; +and he said when a man has a cold on his chest, there's nothing as good +as goose grease. He thought that the peach crop is ruined for good, +and the home team is playing good ball; and the currency question is +not understood, by the voters he said, not at all. Then he looked at +the pump and he gave it a whack and he kicked at the spout and said +"Shucks!" And he joggled the handle three times up and back, and +soaked me for seventeen bucks. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap165"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN EDITORIAL SOLILOQUY +</H3> + +<P> +I sit all day in my gorgeous den and I am the boss of a hundred men; my +enemies shake at my slightest scowl, I make the country sit up and +howl; to the farthest ends of this blooming land men feel the weight of +my iron hand. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, oh, for the old, old shop,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where I printed the Punktown Dirk,</SPAN><BR> +And the toil and stress with the darned old press<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That always refused to work!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P> +I soothe my face with a rich cigar and ride around in a motor car; I go +to a swell cafe to dine and soak my works in the rarest wine. Oh, +nothing's too rich for your Uncle Jones, whose check is good for a heap +of bones! +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, oh, for the old, old shop,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where I set up the auction bills,</SPAN><BR> +And printed an ad of a liver pad,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And took out the pay in pills!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P> +I've won the prize in the worldly game, my name's inscribed on the roll +of fame; my home is stately, in stately grounds, I have my yacht and I +ride to hounds; nothing I've longed for has been denied; is it any +wonder I point with pride? +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, oh, for the old, old shop,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In the dusty Punktown street!</SPAN><BR> +I was full of hope as I wrote my dope,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Though I hadn't enough to eat!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap167"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +YOUTHFUL GRIEVANCES +</H3> + +<P> +"My lads," quoth the father, "come forth to the garden, and merrily +work in the glow of the sun; to loiter about is a crime beyond pardon, +when there's so much hoeing that has to be done! It pains me to mark +that you'd fain be retreating away from the hoes and such weapons as +these; you're diligent, though, when the time comes for eating the +turnips and lettuce and cabbage and peas." +</P> + +<P> +"Alas," sigh the boys, "that our father must work us like galley +slaves, thus, at the hoe and the spade! More fortunate lads all have +gone to the circus, they revel in peanuts and pink lemonade! Oh, what +is the profit of pruning and trimming, and sowing the radish, and +planting the yam, when everyone knows there is excellent swimming two +miles up the creek at the foot of the dam? +</P> + +<P> +"Sail in!" cries the parent, "the daytime is speeding, the night will +be here in the space of three shakes! Oh, this is the season for +digging and seeding, for doing great deeds with the long-handled rakes! +Consider the maxims of Franklin, the printer, the rede of the prophets, +of poets who sing; in comfort they live through the stress of the +winter, who toil like the ants or the bees in the spring!" +</P> + +<P> +"For maxims and proverbs it's little we're wishing," the boys mutter +low, as they wearily delve; "the neighbor boy says there is elegant +fishing—he went after catfish and came home with twelve. We have to +stay here doing labors that cramp us, while others are pulling out fish +by the pound! They're playing baseball every day on the campus, and +down in the grove there's a merry-go-round!" +</P> + +<P> +Alack! If the parents could see with the vision of boys and if boys +used the eyes of their sires, then fun would be labor, with rapture +elysian, and toil would be play, to the music of lyres! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap169"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SUNDAY +</H3> + +<P> +Now the day is fading slowly and the week is near its close; comes the +Sabbath, calm and holy, with its quiet and repose; then the wheels no +more are driven, and the noise no longer swells and like whisperings of +heaven, sound the far-off Sabbath bells. Are we striving, are we +reaching, for the life serene and sweet? Not by platitudes and +preaching, not by praying on the street, but by doing deeds of +kindness, comforting some heart that's sore, helping those who grope in +blindness, giving something from our store. If it be our strong +endeavor to make others' lives less hard, then forever and forever +Sunday brings a rich reward. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap170"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +JOHN BARLEYCORN +</H3> + +<P> +I like to find the gifted youth, the youth of brains and virtue, and +whisper in his ears: "In truth, one flagon will not hurt you. He who +eschews the painted breath is nothing but a fossil; just try a drink of +liquid death—just join me in high wassail." At first my words may not +avail, they but offend and fret him, but I keep camping on his trail +until at last I get him. +</P> + +<P> +And having marked him for my own, I glory in the reaping; I feel that +death, and death alone, can take him from my keeping. He's mine to do +with as I will, he's mine, both soul and body; his one ambition is to +fill his outcast form with toddy. At first I take away his pride, +destroy his sense of honor, and when I see these things have died, I +know he is a goner. I house him in a squalid den, and take his decent +garments, and entertain him now and then with rats and other varmints. +I place a mortgage on his shack, despite his feeble ravings, I put old +rags upon his back, and confiscate his savings. And thus I take what +is a man, here in your Christian city, and make him, by my ancient +plan, a thing to scorn and pity. +</P> + +<P> +My victims lie in Potter's Fields in regiments and legions; John +Barleycorn his scepter wields o'er all these smiling regions. I find +new victims every day as I go blithely roaming; a million feet I lead +astray between the dawn and gloaming. With sparkling beer and foaming +ale I am my friends befriending, and to the poorhouse and the jail my +followers are wending. You hear the pageant's dreary song as down the +road it ambles; I wonder, oftentimes, how long you'll stand my cheerful +gambols? +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap172"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHRISTMAS DAY +</H3> + +<P> +It is the day of kindness, and for this day we're freed from all the +sordid blindness of selfishness and greed; we have a thought for +others, we'd ease their load of care; and all men are our brothers, and +all the world is fair. +</P> + +<P> +This is the day of laughter, wherein no shadows fall; and 'neath the +cottage rafter, and in the mullioned hall, are happy cries ascending, +and songs of joy and peace; why should they have an ending? Why should +the music cease? The music! When we hear it, we old men softly sigh; +"Could but the Christmas spirit live on, and never die!" +</P> + +<P> +This is the day of giving, and giving with a smile makes this gray life +we're living seem doubly worth the while. When giving we're forgetting +the counting-room and mart, and all the work-day fretting—and this +improves the heart; forgetting bonds and leases, and every sordid +goal—this sort of thing increases the stature of the soul! +</P> + +<P> +This is the day of smiling, and faces stern and drear, on which few +smiles beguiling are seen throughout the year, are lighted up with +pleasure and eyes are soft today, and old men trip a measure with +children in their play. And graybeards laugh when pelted with snow by +springalds flung, and frozen hearts are melted, and ancient hearts are +young. +</P> + +<P> +It is a day for singing old songs our fathers knew, while gladsome +bells are ringing a message sweet to you; a day that brings us nearer +to heaven's neighborhood, that makes our vision clearer for all that's +true and good. +</P> + +<P> +On with the Christmas revels in cottage and in hall! While from the +starry levels smiles Christ, who loves us all! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap174"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A CRANK'S THANKSGIVING +</H3> + +<P> +Like others, I'm grateful for plenty to eat; I'm fond of a plateful of +rich turkey meat. For pies in the cupboard, and coal in the bin, for +tires that are rubbered, and motors that spin; for all of my treasures, +for all that I earn, for comforts and pleasures, my thanks I return. +I'm glad that the nation is greasy and rich, acquiring high station +with nary a hitch; her barns are a-bursting with mountains of grain; +her people are thirsting for glory and gain. She'll ne'er backward +linger, this land of our dads, for she is a dinger at nailing the +scads. I'm glad that our vessels bring cargoes across, while counting +rooms wrestle with profit and loss; that men know the beauties of +figures and dates, and tariffs and duties and railway rebates. +</P> + +<P> +I'm glad there are dreamers not industry-drunk, surrounded by schemers +whose god is the plunk. I'm glad we've remaining incompetent jays, not +always a-straining, in four hundred ways, to run down and collar one +big rouble more, to add to the dollar they nailed just before. I'm +glad there are writers more proud of their screeds than board of trade +fighters of options and deeds. I'm glad there are preachers who tell +of a shore where wealth-weary creatures need scheme never more. +</P> + +<P> +For books that were written by masters of thought; for harps that were +smitten with Homeric swat; for canvases painted by monarchs of art; for +all things untainted by tricks of the mart; for hearts that are kindly, +with virtue and peace, and not seeking blindly a hoard to increase; for +those who are grieving o'er life's sordid plan; for souls still +believing in heaven and man; for homes that are lowly with love at the +board; for things that are holy, I thank thee, O Lord! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap176"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE BRIEF VISIT +</H3> + +<P> +I won't be long in this vale of tears; my works may run for a few more +years, but even that is a risky bet, and the sports are hedging already +yet. At morning a gent feels gay and nice; and evening finds him upon +the ice, with his folded hands and his long white gown, and his toes +turned up and his plans turned down. So, viewing this sad uncertainty, +and hearing the wash of the Dead Man's sea, I want to chortle the best +I can, and try to cheer up my fellow man; to make a fellow forget his +care, and make him laugh when he wants to swear, is as much as a poet +can hope to do, whose lyre is twisted and broke in two. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> +<hr class="full" noshade> + +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIPPLING RHYMES***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 22692-h.txt or 22692-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/6/9/22692">http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/6/9/22692</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Rippling Rhymes + + +Author: Walt Mason + + + +Release Date: September 21, 2007 [eBook #22692] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIPPLING RHYMES*** + + +E-text prepared by Al Haines + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 22692-h.htm or 22692-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/6/9/22692/22692-h/22692-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/6/9/22692/22692-h.zip) + + + + + +RIPPLING RHYMES + + + To Suit The Times + All Sorts of Themes Embracin' + + Some Gay + Some Sad + Some not so Bad + +AS + +WRITTEN BY + +(Signature of) + +WALT MASON + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: The Umpire] + + + +Chicago +A. C. McClurg & Co. +1913 +Copyright +A. C. McClurg & Co. +1913 +Published October, 1913 +Copyrighted in Great Britain + +For permission to use copyright prose poems in this book thanks are +extended to the editors and publishers of Harper's Magazine, Harper's +Weekly, The Ladies' Home Journal, System, The Magazine of Business, The +Popular Magazine, Collier's Weekly, The Smart Set Magazine, The +American Magazine and Lippincott's Magazine. + + + + +To + +GEORGE MATTHEW ADAMS + + Who teaches poets how to win. + And helps to make the glad world grin, + And sticks to friends through thick and thin. + + + + +ONE MOMENT, PLEASE! + +Walt Mason's poetry is in a class by itself. Although having the +appearance of prose the rhythm is perfect and the philosophy that runs +through his lines is illumined by an irresistible humor. There is a +quaintness about his style that makes his writings a continuing delight. + +I began to read Walt twenty-five years ago and although he has drawn +upon his intellectual store constantly for more than a quarter of a +century the fountain of his genius still is flowing with undiminished +volume and the waters are as pure as in the idealistic days of his +youth. + +I have shared the satisfaction that his increasing fame has brought him +and have encouraged him to publish this collection that his readers, +now numbering people of many lands, may have permanent companionship +with him. + + +(Signature of) + +William Jennings Bryan + + + + + CONTENTS + + + Title _First Published in_ + + Morning in Kansas + Editorial Influence . . . . . _Newspaperdom_ + Farm Machinery + The Strong Men . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + The Snowy Day + The Poor Man's Club . . . . . _Collier's Weekly_ + Words and Deeds + A Day of Rest + Use Your Head . . . . . . . . _The Butler Way_ + The Gloomy Fan + The Purist . . . . . . . . . . _Lippincott's Magazine_ + Qualifications . . . . . . . . _System Magazine_ + The Pompous Man + Inefficient Men . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + Life's Injustice + The Politician + Random Shots + Look Pleasant, Please . . . . _Ladies Home Journal_ + Courage . . . . . . . . . . . _Harper's Weekly_ + Play Ball + The Old Songs + Guessing vs. Knowing . . . . . _System Magazine_ + When Women Vote . . . . . . . _Ladies Home journal_ + The Agent at the Door + Good and Bad Times . . . . . . _System Magazine_ + Buccaneers . . . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + St. Patrick's Day + Naming the Baby . . . . . . . _Harper's Weekly_ + Won at Last . . . . . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + The Greatest Thing + The Umpire . . . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + The Two Merchants . . . . . . _System Magazine_ + Today's Motto + Some Protests + The Workers . . . . . . . . . _Collier's Weekly_ + The Utilitarian . . . . . . . _Harper's Weekly_ + Fireside Adventures . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + Hunting a Job + Old and New + The Handy Editor . . . . . . . _Newspaperdom_ + The Sleeper Wakes + In Horseland + Inauguration Day, 1913 . . . . _Collier's Weekly_ + Prayer of the Heathen + Theory and Practice . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + Fool and Sage + Then and Now . . . . . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + The Sleeper + Fooling Around . . . . . . . . _The Butler Way_ + Guess Who + Trying Again . . . . . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + Iconoclasm . . . . . . . . . . _Harper's Magazine_ + Gathering Roses + The Future Sport + Taking Advice + Post-Mortem Industry . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + The Conqueror + The Truthful Merchant . . . . _System Magazine_ + Standing Pat . . . . . . . . . _Collier's Magazine_ + The Outcast + Ode to Kansas + Domestic Happiness . . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + Celebrities . . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + The Virtuous Editor . . . . . _Collier's Weekly_ + This Dismal Age . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + Boost Things + The Adventurer . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + They All Come Back + Home Builders + Failure and Success + The Open Road . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + The Millionaires + Little Mistakes . . . . . . . _System Magazine_ + Easy Morality + The Critic . . . . . . . . . . _Harper's Weekly_ + The Old Timer . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + The Bright Face . . . . . . . _The Butler Way_ + Ladies and Gents + Autumn Joys + The Land of Bores . . . . . . _Smart Set Magazine_ + Skilled Labor + An Editorial Soliloquy . . . . _Newspaperdom_ + Youthful Grievances + Sunday + John Barleycorn . . . . . . . _Collier's Weekly_ + Christmas Day . . . . . . . . _Popular Magazine_ + A Crank's Thanksgiving . . . . _American Magazine_ + The Brief Visit + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + +The Umpire . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_ + +The Gloomy Fan + +The Buccaneers + +The Sleeper Wakes + +The Conqueror + +The Old Timer + + + + +MORNING IN KANSAS + +There are lands beyond the ocean which are gray beneath their years, +where a hundred generations learned to sow and reap and spin; where the +sons of Shem and Japhet wet the furrow with their tears--and the +noontide is departed, and the night is closing in. + +Long ago the shadows lengthened in the lands across the sea, and the +dusk is now enshrouding regions nearer home, alas! There are long +deserted homesteads in this country of the free--but it's morning here +in Kansas, and the dew is on the grass. + +It is morning here in Kansas, and the breakfast bell is rung! We are +not yet fairly started on the work we mean to do; we have all the day +before us, for the morning is but young, and there's hope in every +zephyr, and the skies are bright and blue. + +It is morning here in Kansas, and the dew is on the sod; as the +builders of an empire it is ours to do our best; with our hands at work +in Kansas, and our faith and trust in God, we shall not be counted idle +when the sun sinks in the West. + + + + +EDITORIAL INFLUENCE + +It is a solemn thing, to think when you sit down to splatter ink, that +what you write, in prose or verse, may be a blessing or a curse. The +gems of thought that you impart may upward guide some mind and heart; +some youth may read your Smoking Stuff, and say: "That logic's good +enough; the path of virtue must be fine; I'll have no wickedness in +mine." And some day, when you're old and gray, that youth may come +along your way, and say, in language ringing true: "All that I've won I +owe to you! When I was young I read your rot; it hit a most responsive +spot, encouraged me for stress and strife, and made me choose the best +in life." And this will warm your heart and brain; you'll know you +have not lived in vain. But if you write disgusting dope, that thrusts +at Truth, and Faith and Hope; if you apologize for vice, and show that +wickedness is nice, it well may chance, when you are old, and in your +veins the blood runs cold, there'll come your way some dismal wreck, +who'll roast you sore, and cry: "By heck! And also I might say, by +gum! 'Twas you that put me on the bum! Your writings got me headed +wrong; you threw it into Virtue strong; and in the prison that you see, +I'm convict No. 23!" + + + + +FARM MACHINERY + +We have things with cogs and pulleys that will stack and bale the hay, +we have scarecrows automatic that will drive the crows away; we have +riding cultivators, so we may recline at ease, as we travel up the corn +rows, to the tune of haws and gees; we have engines pumping water, +running churns and grinding corn, and one farmer that I know of has a +big steam dinner horn; all of which is very pleasant to reflect upon, I +think, but we need a good contrivance that will teach the calves to +drink. + +Now, as in the days of Noah, man must take a massive pail, loaded up +with milk denatured, with a dash of Adam's ale, and go down among the +calfkins as the lion tamer goes 'mong the monarchs of the jungle, at +the famous three-ring shows; and the calves are fierce and hungry, and +they haven't sense to wait, till he gets a good position and has got +his bucket straight; and they act as though they hadn't e'en a +glimmering of sense, for they climb upon his shoulders ere he is inside +the fence, and they butt him in the stomach, and they kick him +everywhere, till he thinks he'd give a nickel for a decent chance to +swear; then they all get underneath him and capsize him in the mud, and +the milk runs down his whiskers and his garments in a flood, and you +really ought to see him when he goes back to his home quoting divers +pagan authors and the bards of ancient Rome. And he murmurs while he's +washing mud off at the kitchen sink: "What we need is a contraption +that will teach the calves to drink!" + +We've machinery for planting, we've machines to reap and thrash, and +the housewife has an engine that will grind up meat for hash; we've +machines to do our washing and to wring the laundered duds, we've +machines for making cider and to dig the Burbank spuds; all about the +modern farmstead you may hear the levers clink, but we're shy of a +contrivance that will teach the calves to drink! + + + + +THE STRONG MEN + +Behold the man of muscle, who wears the victor's crown! In gorgeous +scrap and tussle he pinned the others down. His brawn stands out in +hummocks, he like a lion treads; he sits on foemen's stomachs and +stands them on their heads. The strong men of all regions, the mighty +men of note, come here in beefy legions to try to get his goat; with +cordial smiles he greets them, and when we've raised a pot, upon the +mat he meets them and ties them in a knot. From Russia's frozen acres, +from Grecian ports they sail, and Turkey sends her fakers to gather in +the kale; old brooding Europe breeds them, these mighty men of brawn; +our Strong Man takes and kneads them, and puts their hopes in pawn. + +Behold this puny fellow, this meek and humble chap! No doubt he'd show +up yellow if he got in a scrap. His face is pale and sickly, he's weak +of arm and knee; if trouble came he'd quickly shin up the nearest tree. +No hale man ever loves him; he stirs the sportsman's wrath; the whole +world kicks and shoves him and shoos him from the path. For who can +love a duffer so pallid, weak and thin, who seems resigned to suffer +and let folks rub it in? Yet though he's down to zero in fellow-men's +esteem, this fellow is a hero and that's no winter dream. Year after +year he's toiling, as toiled the slaves of Rome, to keep the pot +a-boiling in his old mother's home. Through years of gloom and +sickness he kept the wolf away; for him no tailored slickness, for him +no brave array; for him no cheerful vision of wife and kids a few; for +him no dreams Elysian--just toil, the long years through! Forever +trying, straining, to sidestep debtors' woes, unnoticed, uncomplaining, +the little Strong Man goes! + + + + +THE SNOWY DAY + +I like to watch the children play, upon a wintry, snowy day; like +little elves they run about, and leap and slide, and laugh and shout. +This side of heaven can there be such pure and unmixed ecstacy? I lean +upon ye rustic stile, and watch the children with a smile, and think +upon a vanished day, when I, as joyous, used to play, when all the +world seemed young and bright, and every hour had its delight; and, as +I brush away a tear, a snowball hits me in the ear. + + + + +THE POOR MAN'S CLUB + +The poor man's club is a genial place--if the poor man has the price; +there's a balmy smile on the barkeep's face, and bottles of goods on +ice; the poor man's club is a place designed to brighten our darkened +lives, and send us home, when we're halfway blind, in humor to beat our +wives. So hey for the wicker demi-john and the free-lunch brand of +grub! We'll wassail hold till the break of dawn, we friends of the +poor man's club! It's here we barter our bits of news in our sweat +stained hand-me-downs; it's here we swallow the children's shoes and +the housewives hats and gowns. It's here we mortgage the house and +lot, the horse and the muley cow; the poor man's club is a cheerful +spot, so open a bottle now! From brimming glasses we'll blow the foam +till the midnight hour arrives, when we'll gayly journey the long way +home and merrily beat our wives. We earn our dimes like the horse or +ox, we toil like the fabled steer, and then we journey a dozen blocks +to blow in the dimes for beer. While the women work at the washing tub +to add to our scanty hoard, we happily meet at the poor man's club, +where never a soul is bored. We recklessly squander our minted brawn, +and the clubhouse owner thrives; and we'll homeward go at the break of +dawn and joyously beat our wives. + + + + +WORDS AND DEEDS + +A fire broke out in Bildad's shack and burned it to the ground; and +Bildad, with his roofless pack, sent up a doleful sound. And I, who +lived the next door west, hard by the county jail, went over there and +beat my breast, and helped poor Bildad wail. Around the ruined home I +stepped, and viewed the shaking walls, and people say the way I wept +would beat Niagara Falls. Then words of sympathy I dealt to Bildad and +his wife; such kindly words, I've always felt, nerve people for the +strife. If I can kill with words your fears, or argue grief away, or +drown your woe by shedding tears, call on me any day. I have a +sympathetic heart that bleeds for others' aches, and I will ease your +pain and smart unless the language breaks. And so to Bildad and his +mate I made a helpful talk, with vital truths that elevate and break +disasters' shock; I pointed out that stricken men should not yield to +the worst, but from the wreckage rise again like flame from torch +reversed. + +Then Johnson interrupted me as I was growing hoarse. A rude, offensive +person he, a tactless man and coarse. + +He said to Bildad, "Well, old pard! You are burned out I see! You +can't keep house here in your yard, so come and live with me!" + +The neighbors who had gathered round applauded Johnson then, declaring +that at last they'd found the kindliest of men; not one appreciative +voice for me, who furnished tears, who made the sad man's heart +rejoice, and drove way his fears! + + + + +A DAY OF REST + +I'm glad there is a day of rest, one day in every seven, when worldly +cares cannot molest, and we may dream of heaven. The week day labor +that we do, is highly necessary, but if our tasks were never through, +if they should never vary, we'd soon be covered o'er with mold, from +bridle-bits to breeching; so let the Sabbath bells be tolled, and let +us hear the preaching! + + + + +USE YOUR HEAD + +If a man would be a winner, whether he's a clerk or tinner, whether +he's a butcher, banker, or a dealer in rye bread, he must show his +brains are bully, he must understand it fully that a man can't be an +Eli if he doesn't use his head. + +There was old man Hiram Horner, once located on the corner, where he +sold his prunes and codfish and dried apples by the pound; he was +always mighty busy; it would fairly make you dizzy just to watch old +Uncle Hiram as he chased himself around. He got down when day was +breaking, always ready to be raking in the pennies of the people if +they chanced to come that way; he was evermore on duty till the +midnight whistles, tooty, sent him home, where he'd be fussing to begin +another day. Yet old Hiram soon was busted, and you'll see him now, +disgusted, whacking mules in worthy effort to attain his daily bread; +he was diligent, deserving, from good morals never swerving but he lost +his grip in business for he didn't use his head. He was always +overloaded with a lot of junk corroded, he was always short of goodlets +that the people seem to need; he would trust the dead beat faker till +he'd bad bills by the acre, and he's now at daily labor, with his +whiskers gone to seed. + +There is Theodore P. Tally in his store across the alley; you will see +he takes it easy, not a button does he shed; you can hear the wheels +revolving in his brow while he's resolving to get rich by drawing +largely on the contents of his head. + +It is well to use your fingers blithely while the daylight lingers, it +is well to use your trilbys with a firm and active tread; it is good to +rustle daily, doing all your duties gaily, but in all your divers +doings, never fail to use your head. + + + + +THE GLOOMY FAN + +O the gloomy fan is a mournful man, and he fills my soul with sorrow; +he watched the play with a frown today, and he'll scowl at the game +tomorrow. He ambles in when the games begin, a soul by the gods +forgotten; and he eyes the play in his morbid way, and he yells out +"punk!" and "rotten!" No player yet, be he colt or vet, won praise +from this critic gloomy; he'll sit and scowl like a poisoned owl, and +his eyes are red and rheumy; and his blood is thin and his heart is +tin, and his head is stuffed with cotton; and he merely sits, throwing +frequent fits, and he calls out "punk!" and "rotten!" He casts a pall +on the bleachers all, and he breaks the hearts of players; he gives the +dumps to his nibs the umps, who would spread him out in layers; he +queers the game and he chills the frame of the man on the bases +trottin', with his fish-like eyes and his mournful sighs, and his cries +of "punk!" and "rotten!" + +[Illustration: The Gloomy Fan] + + + + +THE PURIST + +"William Henry," said the parent, and his voice was sad and stern, "I +detest the slang you're using; will you never, never learn that correct +use of our language is a thing to be desired? All your common bughouse +phrases make the shrinking highbrow tired. There is nothing more +delightful than a pure and careful speech, and the man who weighs his +phrases always stacks up as a peach, while the guy who shoots his +larynx in a careless slipshod way looms up as a selling plater, people +brand him for a jay. In my youth my father soaked me if I entered his +shebang handing out a line of language that he recognized as slang. He +would take me to the cellar, down among the mice and rats, and with +nice long sticks of stovewood he'd play solos on my slats. Thus I +gained a deep devotion for our language undented, and it drives me +nearly batty when I hear my only child springing wads of hard boiled +language such as dips and yegg-men use, and I want a reformation or +I'll stroke you with my shoes. Using slang is just a habit, just a +cheap and dopey trick; if you hump yourself and try to, you can shake +it pretty quick. Watch my curves and imitate them, weigh your words +before they're sprung, and in age you'll bless the habit that you +formed when you were young." + + + + +QUALIFICATIONS + +I went around to Thompson's store and asked him if he'd give me +work--for Thompson, in the Daily Roar, was advertising for a clerk. He +looked me over long and well, and then enquired: "What can you do? Do +you in anything excel? If you've strong points, just name a few." His +manner dashed my sunny smile, I seemed to feel my courage fall; I had +to ponder for a while my strongest features to recall. + +"Well, I a motor boat can sail, and I a 4-horse team can tool; and I +can tell a funny tale and play a splendid game of pool. I'm good at +going into debt and counting chicks before they hatch, and I can roll a +cigarette or referee a wrestling match. + +"There was a time," the merchant said, "when qualities like those were +fine; alas, those good old days are dead! The mixer's fallen out of +line! The business houses turn him down, and customers no longer sigh +for one to show them through the town, and open pints of Extra Dry! +The salesman of these modern days must study things he wants to sell, +instead of haunting Great White Ways and painting cities wildly well. +He must be sober as a judge, he must be genial and polite, from +virtue's path he'll never budge, he'll keep his record snowy white. +Into the world of commerce go and mark the ways of business men; forget +the list of things you know and then come here and try again." + +In his remarks there was no bile; with sympathy he gently laughed, and +dropped me, with a kindly smile, adown the elevator shaft. + + + + +THE POMPOUS MAN + +I do not like the pompous man; I do not wish him for a friend; he's +built on such a gorgeous plan, that he can only condescend; and when he +bows his neck is sprained; he walks as though he owned the earth--as +though his vest and shirt contained all that there is of Sterling +Worth. With sacred joy I see him tread, upon a stray banana rind, and +slide a furlong on his head and leave a trail of smoke behind. + + + + +INEFFICIENT MEN + +King Alfred, in a rude disguise, was resting in the cowherd's cot; the +cowherd's wife was baking pies, and had her oven smoking hot. + +"You watch these pies," exclaimed the frau; "I have to chase myself +outdoors, and see what ails the spotted cow, the way she bawls around +and roars." + +King Alfred said he'd watch the pies; then started thinking of the +Danes, who fooled him with their tricks and lies, and put his bleeding +realm in chains. He studied plans to gain his own, fair visions rose +before his eyes; he'd hew a pathway to his throne--and he forgot the +matron's pies. And then the cowherd's wife came in; she smelled the +smoke, she gave a shout; she biffed him with the rolling pin, and +cried: "Ods fish, you useless lout! You are not worth the dynamite +'twould take to blow you off the map! Your head is not upholstered +right--you are a worthless trifling chap!" + +When on his throne King Alfred sat, that woman had an inward ache; she +chewed the feathers from her hat because she'd made so bad a break. + +It isn't safe, my friends, to say that any man's a failure flat because +he cannot shovel hay, or climb a tree, or skin a cat. The man who's +awkward with a saw, who cannot hammer in a nail, may in the future +practice law and fill his bins with shining kale. The ne'er-do-well +who cannot cook the luscious egg his hen has laid, may yet sit down and +write a book that makes the big best sellers fade. The man who blacks +your boots today, and envies you your rich cigar, next year may have +the right of way while touring in his private car. + +It isn't safe at men to jeer however awkwardly they tread; they yet may +find their proper sphere--no man's a failure till he's dead. + + + + +LIFE'S INJUSTICE + +The learned man labors in his lair, and trains his telescope across a +million leagues of air, among the stars to grope. He would increase +the little store of knowledge we possess, and so he toils forever more, +and often in distress. His whiskers and his hair are long, and in the +zephyrs wave, because--alas! such things are wrong--he can't afford a +shave. His trousers bag about the knees, his ancient coat's a botch; +his shoes allow his feet to freeze, he bears a dollar watch. And when +the grocer's store he seeks to buy a can of hash, in frigid tones the +merchant speaks: "I'll have to have the cash!" And when he's dead a +hundred years the people will arise, and praise the man who found new +spheres cavorting through the skies. The children in the public +schools will learn to bless his name, and guide their studies by his +rules, and glory in his fame. And in the graveyard, where he went +unhonored by the town, a big fat marble monument will hold the wise man +down. + +The low-brow spars a dozen rounds, before an audience, and he is loaded +down with pounds, and shillings, crowns and pence. Where'er he goes +the brawny Goth is lionized by all, like Caesar, when he cut a swath +along the Lupercal. Promoters grovel at his feet, and offer heaps of +scads, if he will condescend to meet some other bruising lads. The +daily journals print his face some seven columns wide, call him the +glory of the race, the nation's hope and pride. And having thus become +our boast, the wonder of our age, he battles with his larynx most, and +elevates the stage. In fifty years when people speak the savant's name +with pride, the pug's renown you'll vainly seek--it with its owner died. + +There may be consolation there for him who bravely tries to solve great +problems in his lair, and make the world more wise; but when the world +is really wise--may that day come eftsoons!--we'll give the men of +learning pies, and give the fighters prunes. + + + + +THE POLITICIAN + +I will not say that blade is black, nor yet that white is white; for +rash assertions oft come back, and put us in a plight. Some people +hold that black is white, and some that white is black; to me the +neutral course looks right; I take the middle track. If I should say +that black is white, and white is black, today, some one would mix the +two tonight--tomorrow they'd be gray. In politics I wish to thrive, +and swiftly forge ahead, so dare not say that I'm alive, nor swear that +I am dead. You say that fishes climb the trees, that cows on wings do +fly, I can't dispute such facts as these, so patent to the eye; with +any man I will agree, no odds what he defends, if he will only vote for +me, and boom me to his friends. + + + + +RANDOM SHOTS + +I shot an arrow into the air, it fell in the distance, I knew not +where, till a neighbor said that it killed his calf, and I had to pay +him six and a half ($6.50). I bought some poison to slay some rats, +and a neighbor swore that it killed his cats; and, rather than argue +across the fence, I paid him four dollars and fifty cents ($4.50). One +night I set sailing a toy balloon, and hoped it would soar till it +reached the moon; but the candle fell out, on a farmer's straw, and he +said I must settle or go to law. And that is the way with the random +shot; it never hits in the proper spot; and the joke you spring, that +you think so smart, may leave a wound in some fellow's heart. + + + + +LOOK PLEASANT, PLEASE! + +"Look pleasant, please!" the photo expert told me, for I had pulled a +long and gloomy face; and then I let a wide, glad smile enfold me and +hold my features in its warm embrace. + +"Look pleasant, please!" My friends, we really ought to cut out these +words and put them in a frame; long, long we'd search to find a better +motto to guide and help us while we play the game. Look pleasant, +please, when you have met reverses, when you beneath misfortune's +stroke are bent, when all your hopes seem riding round in hearses--a +scowling brow won't help you worth a cent. Look pleasant, please, when +days are dark and dismal and all the world seems in a hopeless fix; the +clouds won't go because your grief's abysmal, the sun won't shine the +sooner for your kicks. Look pleasant, please, when Grip--King of +diseases, has filled your system with his microbes vile; I know it's +hard, but still, between your sneezes, you may be able to produce a +smile. Look pleasant, please, whatever trouble galls you; a gloomy +face won't cure a single pain. Look pleasant, please, whatever ill +befalls you, for gnashing teeth is weary work and vain. + +Look pleasant, please, and thus inspire your brothers to raise a smile +and pass the same along; forget yourself and think a while of others, +and do your stunt with gladsome whoop and song. + + + + +COURAGE + +Brave men are they who set their faces toward the polar bergs and +floes, who roam the wild, unpeopled places, perchance to find among the +snows a resting-place remote and lonely; a winding-sheet of deathless +white, where elemental voices only disturb the brooding year-long night. + +Brave souls are they whose man-made pinions have borne them over plains +and seas, who conquered wide and new dominions, and strapped a saddle +on the breeze. Their engine-driven wings are wearing new pathways +through the realm of clouds; they play with death, with dauntless +daring, to please the breathless, fickle crowds. + +Brave men go forth to distant regions, forsaking luxury and ease; +through all the years they've gone in legions, to unknown lands, o'er +stormy seas; and when, by sword or fever smitten, they blithely +journeyed to the grave, full well they knew their names were written +down in the annals of the brave. + +I am as brave as any rover described in gay, romantic screeds, but, +when my fitful life is over, no epic will narrate my deeds. Condemned +to silent heroism, I go my unmarked way alone, and no one hands me +prune or prism, as token that my deeds are known. But yesterday my +teeth were aching, and to the painless dentist's lair I took my way, +unawed, unquaking, and sat down in the fatal chair. He dug around my +rumbling molars with drawing-knives and burglars' tools, and cross-cut +saws and patent rollers, and marlinspikes and two-foot rules. He +climbed upon my lap and prodded with crowbar and with garden spade, to +see that I was not defrauded of all the agony that's made. He pulled +and yanked and pried and twisted, and uttered oft his battle shout, and +now and then his wife assisted--till finally the teeth came out. And +never once while thus he pottered around my torn and mangled jowl--not +once, while I was being slaughtered, did I let out a single howl! No +brass-bands played, none sang a ditty of triumph as I took my way; no +signs of "Welcome to Our City" were hung across the street that day! + +Thus you and I and plain, plug mortals may show a courage high and +fine, and be obscure, while some jay chortles in triumph where the +limelights shine. + + + + +PLAY BALL + +"Play ball!" you hear the fans exclaim, when weary of a dragging game, +when all the players pause to state their theories in a joint debate, +or when they go about their biz as though they had the rheumatiz. And +if they do not heed the hunch that's given by the bleachers bunch, they +find, when next they start to play, that all the fans have stayed away. +The talking graft is all in vain, and loafers give the world a pain. +The fans who watch the game of life despise the sluggard in the strife. +They'll have but little use for you, who tell what you intend to do, +and hand out promises galore, but, somehow, never seem to score. No +matter what your stunt may be, in this the country of the free, you'll +find that loafing never pays; cut out the flossy grand stand plays; put +in your hardest licks and whacks, and get right down to Old Brass +Tacks, and, undismayed by bruise or fall, go right ahead--in short, +play ball! + + + + +THE OLD SONGS + +The modern airs are cheerful, melodious and sweet; we hear them sung +and whistled all day upon the street. Some lilting ragtime ditty +that's rollicking and gay will gain the public favor and hold it--for a +day. But when the day is ended, and we are tired and worn, and more +than half persuaded that man was made to mourn, how soothing then the +music our fathers used to know! The songs of sense and feeling, the +songs of long ago! The "Jungle Joe" effusions and kindred roundelays +will do to hum and whistle throughout our busy days; and in the garish +limelight the yodelers may yell, and Injun songs may flourish--and all +is passing well, but when to light the heavens the shining stars +return, and in the cottage windows the lights begin to burn, when +parents and their children are seated by the fire, remote from worldly +clamor and all the world's desire, when eyes are soft and shining, and +hearths with love aglow, how pleasant is the sinking of songs of long +ago! + + + + +GUESSING VS. KNOWING + +If I were selling nails or glass, or pills or shoes or garden sass, or +honey from the bee--whatever line of goods were mine, I'd study up that +special line and know its history. + +If I a stock of rags should keep, I'd read up sundry books on sheep and +wool and how it grows. Beneath my old bald, freckled roof, I'd store +some facts on warp and woof and other things like those. I'd try to +know a spinning-jack from patent churn or wagon rack, a loom from +hog-tight fence; and if a man came in to buy, and asked some leading +question, I could answer with some sense. + +If I were selling books, I'd know a Shakespeare from an Edgar Poe, a +Carlyle from a Pope; and I would know Fitzgerald's rhymes from Laura +Libbey's brand of crimes, or Lillian Russell's dope. + +If I were selling shoes, I'd seize the fact that on gooseberry trees, +good leather doesn't grow; that shoe pegs do not grow like oats, that +cowhide doesn't come from goats--such things I'd surely know. + +And if I were a grocer man. I'd open now and then a can to see what +stuff it held; 'twere better than to writhe in woe and make reply, "I +didn't know," when some mad patron yelled. + +I hate to hear a merchant say: "I think that this is splendid hay," "I +guess it's first class tea." He ought to know how good things are, if +he would sell his silk or tar or other goods to me. Oh, knowledge is +the stuff that wins; the man without it soon begins to get his trade in +kinks. No matter where a fellow goes, he's valued for the things he +knows, not for the things he thinks. + + + + +WHEN WOMEN VOTE + +"Jane Samantha," said the husband, as he donned his hat and coat, "I +would offer a suggestion ere you go to cast your vote. We have had a +bitter struggle through this strenuous campaign, and the issues are +important, and they stand out clear and plain. Colonel Whitehead +stands for progress--for the uplift that we need: he invites +investigation of his every word and deed. He's opposed to all the +ringsters and to graft of every kind; he's a man of spotless record, +clean and pure in heart and mind. His opponent, Major Bounder, stands +for all that I abhor; plunder, ring rule and corruption you will see +him working for; all the pluggers and the heelers stood by him in this +campaign--so I ask your vote for Whitehead and the uplift, dearest +Jane." + +"William Henry," said the housewife, "I am sorry to decline, but the +wife of Colonel Whitehead never was a friend of mine. Last July she +gave a party--you recall her Purple Tea?--and invited all the +neighbors, but she said no word to me. I don't care about your issues +or your uplift or your ring, but I won't support the husband of that +silly, stuck-up thing!" + +Major Bounder was the victor on that day of stress and strife, for it +seemed that many women didn't like the Colonel's wife. + + + + +THE AGENT AT THE DOOR + +"Away with you, stranger!" exclaimed Mrs. Granger, "avaunt and +skedaddle! Come here never more! You agents are making me crazy and +breaking my heart, and I beg that you'll trot from my door! I've +bought nutmeg graters, shoelaces and gaiters, I've bought everything +from a lamp to a lyre; I've bought patent heaters and saws and egg +beaters and stoves that exploded and set me afire." + +"You're laboring under a curious blunder," the stranger protested; "I +know very well that agents are trying, and dames tired of buying; but +be not uneasy--I've nothing to sell." + +"I'm used to that story--it's whiskered and hoary," replied Mrs. +Granger, "you want to come in, and then when you enter, in tones of a +Stentor you'll brag of your polish for silver and tin. Or maybe you're +dealing in unguents healing, or dye for the whiskers, or salve for the +corns, or something that quickens egg-laying in chickens, or knobs for +the cattle to wear on their horns. It's no use your talking, you'd +better be walking, and let me go on with my housework, I think; you +look dissipated, if truth must be stated, and if you had money you'd +spend it for drink." + +"My name," said the stranger, who backed out of danger--the woman had +reached for the broom by the wall--"is Septimus Beecher; I am the new +preacher; I just dropped around for a pastoral call." + + + + +GOOD AND BAD TIMES + +"Times are so bad I have the blues," says Bilderbeck, who deals in +shoes. "All day I loaf around my store, and folks don't come here any +more; I reckon they have barely cash to buy cigars and corn beef hash, +and when they've bought the grub to eat, they can't afford to clothe +their feet. + +"There's something wrong when trade's thus pinched," says he, "and +someone should be lynched. The cost of living is so high that it's +economy to die; and death is so expensive, then, that corpses want to +live again. The trusts have robbed us left and right, and there's no +remedy in sight; the government is out of plumb and should be knocked +to Kingdom Come." + +And Ganderson, across the street, is selling furniture for feet. "All +day he hands out boots and shoes with cheerful cockadoodledoos. I have +no reason to complain," says Ganderson; all kicks are vain; my +customers don't come to hear me raising thunder by the year. + +"They have some troubles of their own, and do not care to hear me +groan. And so I beam around my place, and wear a smile that splits my +face, and gather in the shining dime--trade's getting better all the +time!" + +Though days be dark and trade be tough, it's always well to make a +bluff, to face the world with cheerful eye, as though the goose were +hanging high. No merchant ever made a friend by dire complainings +without end. And people never seek a store to hear a grouchy merchant +roar; they'll patronize the wiser gent who doesn't air his discontent. + + + + +LOOK PLEASANT, PLEASE! + +"Look pleasant, please!" the photo expert told me, for I had pulled a +long and gloomy face; and then I let a wide, glad smile enfold me and +hold my features in its warm embrace. + +"Look pleasant, please!" My friends, we really ought to cut out these +words and put them in a frame; long, long we'd search to find a better +motto to guide and help us while we play the game. Look pleasant, +please, when you have met reverses, when you beneath misfortune's +stroke are bent, when all your hopes seem riding round in hearses--a +scowling brow won't help you worth a cent. Look pleasant, please, when +days are dark and dismal and all the world seems in a hopeless fix; the +clouds won't go because your grief's abysmal, the sun won't shine the +sooner for your kicks. Look pleasant, please, when Grip--King of +diseases, has filled your system with his microbes vile; I know it's +hard, but still, between your sneezes, you may be able to produce a +smile. Look pleasant, please, whatever trouble galls you; a gloomy +face won't cure a single pain. Look pleasant, please, whatever ill +befalls you, for gnashing teeth is weary work and vain. + +Look pleasant, please, and thus inspire your brothers to raise a smile +and pass the same along; forget yourself and think a while of others, +and do your stunt with gladsome whoop and song. + + + + +COURAGE + +Brave men are they who set their faces toward the polar bergs and +floes, who roam the wild, unpeopled places, perchance to find among the +snows a resting-place remote and lonely; a winding-sheet of deathless +white, where elemental voices only disturb the brooding year-long night. + +Brave souls are they whose man-made pinions have borne them over plains +and seas, who conquered wide and new dominions, and strapped a saddle +on the breeze. Their engine-driven wings are wearing new pathways +through the realm of clouds; they play with death, with dauntless +daring, to please the breathless, fickle crowds. + +Brave men go forth to distant regions, forsaking luxury and ease; +through all the years they've gone in legions, to unknown lands, o'er +stormy seas; and when, by sword or fever smitten, they blithely +journeyed to the grave, full well they knew their names were written +down in the annals of the brave. + +I am as brave as any rover described in gay, romantic screeds, but, +when my fitful life is over, no epic will narrate my deeds. Condemned +to silent heroism, I go my unmarked way alone, and no one hands me +prune or prism, as token that my deeds are known. But yesterday my +teeth were aching, and to the painless dentist's lair I took my way, +unawed, unquaking, and sat down in the fatal chair. He dug around my +rumbling molars with drawing-knives and burglars' tools, and cross-cut +saws and patent rollers, and marlinspikes and two-foot rules. He +climbed upon my lap and prodded with crowbar and with garden spade, to +see that I was not defrauded of all the agony that's made. He pulled +and yanked and pried and twisted, and uttered oft his battle shout, and +now and then his wife assisted--till finally the teeth came out. And +never once while thus he pottered around my torn and mangled jowl--not +once, while I was being slaughtered, did I let out a single howl! No +brass-bands played, none sang a ditty of triumph as I took my way; no +signs of "Welcome to Our City" were hung across the street that day! + +Thus you and I and plain, plug mortals may show a courage high and +fine, and be obscure, while some jay chortles in triumph where the +limelights shine. + + + + +PLAY BALL + +"Play ball!" you hear the fans exclaim, when weary of a dragging game, +when all the players pause to state their theories in a joint debate, +or when they go about their biz as though they had the rheumatiz. And +if they do not heed the hunch that's given by the bleachers bunch, they +find, when next they start to play, that all the fans have stayed away. +The talking graft is all in vain, and loafers give the world a pain. +The fans who watch the game of life despise the sluggard in the strife. +They'll have but little use for you, who tell what you intend to do, +and hand out promises galore, but, somehow, never seem to score. No +matter what your stunt may be, in this the country of the free, you'll +find that loafing never pays; cut out the flossy grand stand plays; put +in your hardest licks and whacks, and get right down to Old Brass +Tacks, and, undismayed by bruise or fall, go right ahead--in short, +play ball! + + + + +THE OLD SONGS + +The modern airs are cheerful, melodious and sweet; we hear them sung +and whistled all day upon the street. Some lilting ragtime ditty +that's rollicking and gay will gain the public favor and hold it--for a +day. But when the day is ended, and we are tired and worn, and more +than half persuaded that man was made to mourn, how soothing then the +music our fathers used to know! The songs of sense and feeling, the +songs of long ago! The "Jungle Joe" effusions and kindred roundelays +will do to hum and whistle throughout our busy days; and in the garish +limelight the yodelers may yell, and Injun songs may flourish--and all +is passing well, but when to light the heavens the shining stars +return, and in the cottage windows the lights begin to burn, when +parents and their children are seated by the fire, remote from worldly +clamor and all the world's desire, when eyes are soft and shining, and +hearths with love aglow, how pleasant is the singing of songs of long +ago! + + + + +GUESSING VS. KNOWING + +If I were selling nails or glass, or pills or shoes or garden sass, or +honey from the bee--whatever line of goods were mine, I'd study up that +special line and know its history. + +If I a stock of rags should keep, I'd read up sundry books on sheep and +wool and how it grows. Beneath my old bald, freckled roof, I'd store +some facts on warp and woof and other things like those. I'd try to +know a spinning-jack from patent churn or wagon rack, a loom from +hog-tight fence; and if a man came in to buy, and asked some leading +question, I could answer with some sense. + +If I were selling books, I'd know a Shakespeare from an Edgar Poe, a +Carlyle from a Pope; and I would know Fitzgerald's rhymes from Laura +Libbey's brand of crimes, or Lillian Russell's dope. + +If I were selling shoes, I'd seize the fact that on gooseberry trees, +good leather doesn't grow; that shoe pegs do not grow like oats, that +cowhide doesn't come from goats--such things I'd surely know. + +And if I were a grocer man, I'd open now and then a can to see what +stuff it held; 'twere better than to writhe in woe and make reply, "I +didn't know," when some mad patron yelled. + +I hate to hear a merchant say: "I think that this is splendid hay," "I +guess it's first class tea." He ought to know how good things are, if +he would sell his silk or tar or other goods to me. Oh, knowledge is +the stuff that wins; the man without it soon begins to get his trade in +kinks. No matter where a fellow goes, he's valued for the things he +knows, not for the things he thinks. + + + + +WHEN WOMEN VOTE + +"Jane Samantha," said the husband, as he donned his hat and coat, "I +would offer a suggestion ere you go to cast your vote. We have had a +bitter struggle through this strenuous campaign, and the issues are +important, and they stand out clear and plain. Colonel Whitehead +stands for progress--for the uplift that we need: he invites +investigation of his every word and deed. He's opposed to all the +ringsters and to graft of every kind; he's a man of spotless record, +clean and pure in heart and mind. His opponent, Major Bounder, stands +for all that I abhor; plunder, ring rule and corruption you will see +him working for; all the pluggers and the heelers stood by him in this +campaign--so I ask your vote for Whitehead and the uplift, dearest +Jane." + +"William Henry," said the housewife, "I am sorry to decline, but the +wife of Colonel Whitehead never was a friend of mine. Last July she +gave a party--you recall her Purple Tea?--and invited all the +neighbors, but she said no word to me. I don't care about your issues +or your uplift or your ring, but I won't support the husband of that +silly, stuck-up thing!" + +Major Bounder was the victor on that day of stress and strife, for it +seemed that many women didn't like the Colonel's wife. + + + + +THE AGENT AT THE DOOR + +"Away with you, stranger!" exclaimed Mrs. Granger, "avaunt and +skedaddle! Come here never more! You agents are making me crazy and +breaking my heart, and I beg that you'll trot from my door! I've +bought nutmeg graters, shoelaces and gaiters, I've bought everything +from a lamp to a lyre; I've bought patent heaters and saws and egg +beaters and stoves that exploded and set me afire." + +"You're laboring under a curious blunder," the stranger protested; "I +know very well that agents are trying, and dames tired of buying; but +be not uneasy--I've nothing to sell." + +"I'm used to that story--it's whiskered and hoary," replied Mrs. +Granger, "you want to come in, and then when you enter, in tones of a +Stentor you'll brag of your polish for silver and tin. Or maybe you're +dealing in unguents healing, or dye for the whiskers, or salve for the +corns, or something that quickens egg-laying in chickens, or knobs for +the cattle to wear on their horns. It's no use your talking, you'd +better be walking, and let me go on with my housework, I think; you +look dissipated, if truth must be stated, and if you had money you'd +spend it for drink." + +"My name," said the stranger, who backed out of danger--the woman had +reached for the broom by the wall--"is Septimus Beecher; I am the new +preacher; I just dropped around for a pastoral call." + + + + +GOOD AND BAD TIMES + +"Times are so bad I have the blues," says Bilderbeck, who deals in +shoes. "All day I loaf around my store, and folks don't come here any +more; I reckon they have barely cash to buy cigars and corn beef hash, +and when they've bought the grub to eat, they can't afford to clothe +their feet. + +"There's something wrong when trade's thus pinched," says he, "and +someone should be lynched. The cost of living is so high that it's +economy to die; and death is so expensive, then, that corpses want to +live again. The trusts have robbed us left and right, and there's no +remedy in sight; the government is out of plumb and should be knocked +to Kingdom Come." + +And Ganderson, across the street, is selling furniture for feet. "All +day he hands out boots and shoes with cheerful cockadoodledoos. I have +no reason to complain," says Ganderson; all kicks are vain; my +customers don't come to hear me raising thunder by the year. + +"They have some troubles of their own, and do not care to hear me +groan. And so I beam around my place, and wear a smile that splits my +face, and gather in the shining dime--trade's getting better all the +time!" + +Though days be dark and trade be tough, it's always well to make a +bluff, to face the world with cheerful eye, as though the goose were +hanging high. No merchant ever made a friend by dire complainings +without end. And people never seek a store to hear a grouchy merchant +roar; they'll patronize the wiser gent who doesn't air his discontent. + + + + +BUCCANEERS + +(The Pirate of 1612) + +Oh, once again my merry men and I are on the water with prospects fair, +with hearts to dare, and souls athirst for slaughter! Before the +breeze we scour the seas, our vessel low and raking, and men who find +our ship behind in mortal fear are quaking. We love the fight and our +delight grows as the strife increases; we slash and slay and hew our +way to win the golden pieces. To hear, to feel the clang of steel! +Ah, that, my men, is rapture! Our hearts are stern, we sink, we burn, +we kill the men we capture! Why mercy show when well we know that when +our course is ended, we all must die--they'll hang us high, unshaven, +undefended! Ah, wolves are we that roam the sea, and rend with savage +fury; as soft our mind, our hearts as kind will be judge and jury! To +rob and slay we go our way, our vessel low and raking; and men who hail +our ebon sail may well be chilled and quaking! + +(The Pirate of 1912) + +My heart is light and glad tonight, and life seems good and merry; my +coffer groans with golden bones I've pulled from the unwary. Ah, +raiment fine and gems are mine, and costly bibs and tuckers; I got my +rocks for mining stocks--I worked the jays and suckers. What though my +game is going lame--a jolt the courts just gave me--my lawyers gay will +find a way to beat the law and save me. I'll just lie low a year or so +until the row blows over, then I'll come back to my old shack and be +again in clover! I've fifty ways to work the jays and there's a +fortune in it! The sucker crop will never stop, for one is born each +minute. + +[Illustration: Buccaneers] + + + + +ST. PATRICK'S DAY + +Away with tears and sordid fears, no trouble will we borrow, but shed +our woes like winter clothes--it's Patrick's day tomorrow. With clubs +and rakes we'll chase the snakes, and send the toads a-flying, and +we'll be seen with ribbons green, all other hues decrying. In +grass-green duds we'll plant the spuds, where they can do no growing; +with flat and sharp we'll play the harp, and keep the music going. +Then let us yell, for all is well, the world's devoid of sorrow; the +toads are snared, the snakes are scared, it's Patrick's day tomorrow. + + + + +NAMING THE BABY + +First I thought I'd call him Caesar; but my Uncle Ebenezer said that +name was badly hoodoed--wasn't Julius Caesar slain? Then I said, "I'll +call him Homer"; but my second cousin Gomer answered; "Homer was a +pauper, and he wrote his rhymes in vain." Long I pondered, worried +greatly seeking names both sweet and stately, something proud and high +and noble, such as ancient heroes bore. "I shall call him Alexander--" +but an innocent bystander muttered, "Aleck was a tyrant, and he +splashed around in gore." And my aunts said: "Only trust us, and we'll +name him Charles Augustus, which is princely and becoming, and will end +this foolish fuss." But my Cousin James objected: "Nothing else can be +expected, if you give him such a handle, but that folks will call him +Gus." "Let us call the darling Reggie," said my cheerful sister Peggy, +"which is short for Rex or Roland or some other kingly name." But my +Uncle George protested. "Surely," said he, "you but jested: never yet +did youth named Reggie scale the shining height of fame." Thus it was +for weeks together, and I often wondered whether other parents ever +suffered as I did upon the rack. All my uncles and my cousins and my +aunts gave tips by dozens, so I named the babe John Henry, and for +short we call him Jack. + + + + +WON AT LAST + +I. + +"Rise, Charles De Jones, rise, if you please; you don't look well upon +your knees. You say that I must be your bride; in all the whole blamed +countryside no other girl could fill your life with joy and sunshine, +as your wife. What can you offer--you who seek my hand? You draw ten +bucks a week. Shall I your Cheap John wigwam share, the daughter of a +millionaire, who early learned in wealth to bask? Shall I get down to +menial task? Go chase yourself! My hand shall go to one who has a +roll of dough!" + +Thus spake Letitia Pinkham Brown, the fairest girl in all the town. +Her lover, crushed beneath the weight of blows from an unkindly fate, +rended his garments and his hair and turned away in dumb despair. + + +II. + +Our hero's feet, of course, were cold, and yet his heart was strong and +bold. "It will not heal this wound of mine," he said, "to murmur and +repine. Though sad my heart, I'll sing and smile, and try to earn a +princely pile; and having got the bullion, then I'll ask her for her +hand again." + +He quenched the yearnings of his heart and plunged into the clanging +mart as agent for a handsome book instructing women how to cook. His +volume sold to beat the band and wealth came in hand over hand; but +ever, as he scoured the town, he thought of 'Titia Pinkham Brown, and +scalding tears anon would rise and almost cook his steely eyes. + + +III. + +Once more a lover knelt before Letitia Pinkham Brown and swore to +cherish her while life endures, "Come out of it," she said, "I'm yours." + +He rose, a man of stately frame; J. Roland Percival his name. He had a +high, commanding mien, and seemed possessed of much long green; in +costly fabrics he was dressed, and diamonds flashed upon his breast. + +"And so you're mine!" J. Roland cried. "You'll be my own and only +bride! Oh, joy, oh, rapture! I am It! Excuse me while I throw a fit. +Come to my arms, my precious dear! My darling love--but who comes +here?" + +De Jones stood in the arbor door, and deadly was the smile he wore. + + +IV. + +J. Roland cried in abject fear: "Great Scott! What are you doing here! + +"Well may you ask," said Charles De Jones, in bitter, caustic, scathing +tones. "You've dodged me for a dozen weeks, but now--'tis the avenger +speaks--you'll have to pay up what you owe, or to the county jug you'll +go." + +Then turning to the maiden fair, De Jones went on: "That villain there! +Four months ago I sold that man a cook book on th' installment plan. +He gave his solemn pledge to pay, for seven years, two cents a day. He +made two payments, then he flunked. I've hung around the place he +bunked, I've chased him through the rain and sleet, I've boned him on +the public street, I've shadowed him by night and day, but not a kopeck +would he pay. I'm weary of these futile sprints; I'll roast him in the +public prints, and give him such a bum renown he'll be a byword in the +town." + +She viewed her lover in amaze, and cold and scornful was her gaze. + +"And so the book you handed me, to plight our troth," with ire said +she, "you bought from Charlie here on tick? Skidoo! A deadbeat makes +me sick! I'll never marry any jay who can't dig up two cents a day!" + + +V. + +"I have a bundle in the bank," said Charles, as on his knee he sank, +"and all of it is yours to blow, so let us to the altar go." + +"I've learned some things," said L. P. Brown, "and now I would not turn +you down if you were busted flat, my dear; I've learned that love's the +one thing here that's worth a continental dam*; you ask for me--well, +here I am!" + + +* Dam--A former copper coin.--Dictionary. + + + + +THE GREATEST THING + +The orator shrieks and clamors, and kicks up a lot of dust, and larrups +and whacks and hammers the weary old sinful Trust; the congressman +chirps and chatters, pursuing his dream of fame; but there's only one +thing that matters, and that is the baseball game. The pessimist rails +and wrangles, and takes up a lot of room and tells, in a voice that +jangles, his view of the nation's doom; we shy at his why and +wherefore, and balk at his theories lame; for there's only one thing we +care for, and that is the baseball game. The rakers of muck are busy, +with shovels and spades and screens, a-dishing up stuff that's dizzy, +in the popular magazines; these fellows are ever present, with stories +of graft and shame, and there's only one thing that's pleasant, and +that is the baseball game. Some people are in a passion, and have +been, for many weeks, because the decrees of fashion make women look +much like freaks; why worry about the dress of the frivolous modern +dame? There's only one thing impressive, and that is the baseball game. + + + + +THE UMPIRE + +Be kind to the umpire who bosses the game, whose doom is too frequently +sealed; it serves no good purpose to camp on his frame, and strew him +all over the field. + +The umpire is human--which fact you may doubt--a creature of tissues +and blood; he pales at the sound of your bloodthirsty shout, and +shrinks from the sickening thud. He may have a vine covered cottage +like yours, a home where a loving wife dwells; and when he's on duty +the fear she endures is something no chronicler tells. She hears from +the bleachers a thunderous roar, and thinks it announces his fate. "I +reckon," she sighs, "he'll come home on a door, or perhaps in a basket +or crate." + +Be kind to the umpire; his hopes are your own; he's doing the best that +he can; his head isn't elm and his heart isn't stone; he's just like +the neighboring man. Don't call him a bonehead or say his work's punk, +or that he's a robber insist; don't pelt him with castings or vitrified +junk, or smite him with bludgeon or fist. + +Suppose you are doing the best you know how, and striving your +blamedest to please, and bystanders throw at your head a dead cow, or +break your legs off at the knees. Suppose you are trying your best to +be fair, and critics come up in a crowd, set fire to your whiskers, and +pull out your hair, and put you in shape for a shroud. If people +refused to believe that you try to give them their fifty cents' worth, +you'd be so discouraged you'd sit down and cry, and say there's no +justice on earth. + +Be kind to the umpire and give him a chance to live to a happy old age; +reward him with praise and encouraging glance when he does his devoir +on his stage. Save up your dead cats for the scavenger man, your +cabbage for cigarette smoke; the umpire is doing the best that he +can--he shouldn't be killed as a joke. + + + + +THE TWO MERCHANTS + +Methinks that clerics, the whole world through, will do much as their +bosses do, for which they're not to blame; for emulation is a part, in +office, drawing room and mart, of this weird human game. + +I often go to Jimpson's store; I blow in twice a day or more to buy my +prunes and things. Old Jimpson is a joyous jay; he hustles around the +livelong day, he whistles and he sings. I like to watch the blamed old +chump; I like to see him on the jump, he is so full of steam; and all +his clerks have caught his style; they hump around with cheerful smile, +and do not loaf or dream. + +When I blow into Jimpson's lair they all seem glad to see me there and +anxious for my trade; they give me brisk attention then, and sing the +chorus, "Come again!" when from the shop I fade. + +Jim Clinker has another store. Jim Clinker's head seem always sore, he +grumbles and he scowls; and all his clerks have caught that trick; they +gloom around the store like sick or broken-hearted owls. When I go in +to buy some tea, a languid salesman waits on me as though it were a +crime to rouse him from his sour repose, his brooding over secret woes, +and occupy his time. + +If Clinker's clerks to Jimpson went, they soon would shake their +discontent, and carol like the birds; if Jimpson's clerks for Clinker +toiled their optimism would be spoiled; they'd hand out doleful words. + +And so I say, and say some more, that all the salesmen in a store will +emulate their boss; if he is sour on all the works, you may be sure his +string of clerks will be a total loss. + + + + +TODAY'S MOTTO + +"Love your neighbor as yourself," was a motto famed of yore; now it's +placed upon the shelf, with about a thousand more; now the child on +mother's knee, sees the lovelight in her eyes, while she says: +"Where'er you be, boil the germs and swat the flies!" In the olden +golden days, preachers told the sacred tale of poor Jonah's erring +ways, and his journey in the whale; of the lions in their den, and of +Daniel, good and wise; now they preach this creed to men: "Boil the +germs and swat the flies!" When my dying eyelids close, and the world +is growing dim, while I'm turning up my toes, I may ask to hear a hymn; +and the people by my bed, they will sing, with streaming eyes, while +each humbly bows his head: "Boil the germs and swat the flies!" + + + + +SOME PROTESTS + +I sit in my cushioned motor, indulging in wise remarks, concerning the +outraged voter crushed down by the money sharks. We burdened and weary +toilers are ground by the iron wheels of soulless, despotic spoilers, +and bruised by the tyrants' heels. They're flaunting their corsair +mottoes while treading upon our toes, and some of us can't have autos +or trotters or things like those. I know of a worthy neighbor who +lives in a humble cot, and after long years of labor he hasn't a single +yacht! + +While eating my dinner humble--of porterhouse steak and peas, and honey +from bees that bumble, and maybe imported cheese--I think, with a +bitter feeling, of insolent money kings, who, drunk with their wealth +and reeling, condemn me to eat such things. The pirate and banknote +monger still gloat o'er their golden stacks, while I must appease my +hunger with oysters and canvasbacks. The plutocrat has his chuffer, a +minion of greed and pelf; the poor man must weep and suffer, and drive +his own car himself. + +The plutocrat homeward totters with diamonds to load his girls, and +meanwhile my wife and daughters must struggle along with pearls. In +silk, with a trademark Latin, the plutocrat's wife appears, and I can +afford but satin to tog out my dimpled dears. The plute has a splendid +palace, with pictures and Persian rugs; he drinks from a silver chalice +and laughs at the poor men's jugs, and I, in my lowly cottage, that's +shadowed by tree and vine, fill up on mock turtle pottage, with only +three kinds of wine! + +It's time for a revolution, to punish the wealthy ones! I'll furnish +the elocution if you'll bring the bombs and guns! + + + + +THE WORKERS + +Here's to the man who labors and does it with a song! He stimulates +his neighbors and helps the world along! + +I like the men who do things, who hustle and achieve; the men who saw +and glue things, and spin and dig and weave. + +Man earns his bread in sweat or in blood since Adam sinned; and bales +of hay are better than are your bales of wind. + +Man groans beneath his burden, beneath the chain he wears; and still +the toiler's guerdon is worth the pain he bears. + +For there's no satisfaction beneath the bending sky like that the man +of action enjoys when night is nigh. + +To look back o'er the winding and dark and rocky road, and know you +bore your grinding and soul-fatiguing load-- + +As strong men ought to bear it, through all the stress and +strife--that's the reward of merit--that is the balm of life! + +I like the men who do things, who plow and sow and reap, who build and +delve and hew things while dreamers are asleep. + + + + +THE UTILITARIAN + +We sat around the stove discoursing of mighty deeds that we had done; +of struggling up the Alps and forcing our way to summits then unwon; of +fights with lions and hyenas, of facing grim and ghostly shapes, of +dodging bailiffs and subpoenas, and many perilous escapes. + +And one sat by, distraught and gloomy, and listened to each stirring +tale; his beard was long, his eyes were rheumy, his nose was red, his +aspect stale. And this old pilgrim, dour and hoary, on all our +pleasure drew the noose; for, at the end of every story, he'd sadly +ask: "What was the use?" + +I told of how I went a-sailing to Europe in an open boat; the billows +raved, the winds were wailing till I could scarcely keep afloat. The +salt sea spray was on my features; I heard King Neptune's angry shouts; +I fought with whales and other creatures, and was pursued by +waterspouts. I sailed those seas for weeks together, and bore my life +in either hand, and very often doubted whether I'd ever bring my boat +to land. But still, resolved on winning glory, I sailed along like +Captain Loose. The old man broke into my story, and mildly asked: +"What was the use?" + +Jones told of how, appareled thinly (the thirst for glory warmed his +breast), he scaled the heights of Mount McKinley and placed our flag +upon its crest. He placed the flag to thwart the scorner, the doubter, +and the man obtuse; and then the old man in the corner looked up and +asked: "What was the use?" + +Brown told of how a cask he entered and floated o'er the Horseshoe +Falls, and how all eyes for months were centered on him; in cottages +and halls the people joined to sing his praises or level at his head +abuse; the old man heard his burning phrases, and sadly asked: "What +was the use?" + +We smote him roundly in our anger, resolved to cook his ancient goose, +and still, above the din and clangor, we heard him ask, "What is the +use?" + + + + +FIRESIDE ADVENTURES + +It is not mine the world to roam; when I was born the Fates decreed +that I should always stay at home, and deal in hay and bran and feed. +For mighty deeds I have no chance while I am rustling in my store; and +yet my life has its romance, and I've adventures by the score. + +For evening comes, and then, serene, to my abode I take my way, and +grab this good old magazine, and leave the world of bran and hay. +Through Arctic wildernesses cold, I follow the explorers' train, or +seeking go for pirate's gold along the storied Spanish Main. Oft, by +the miner's struggling lamp, I count the nuggets I have won; or in the +cowboys' wind-swept camp indulge in wild athletic fun. The big round +world is all for me, brought to me by the sprightly tale; o'er every +strange and distant sea my phantom ship has learned to sail, I travel +in all neighborhoods where daring man has left his tracks; I am the +hunter in the woods, I am the woodman with his ax. I am the grim, +effective sleuth who goes forth in a rare disguise, and quickly drags +the shining truth from out a mountain range of lies. I am the watcher +of the roads, the highwayman of wold and moor, relieving rich men of +their loads, to give a rakeoff to the poor. I am the hero of the +crowds, as, on my trusty aeroplane, I cleave a pathway through the +clouds, to Milky Way and Charles's Wain. I am the pitcher known to +fame; I pitch as though I worked by Steam, and in the last and crucial +game I win the pennant for my team. I am the white man's final hope, +on whom his aspirations hinge, and, notwithstanding all the dope, I +knock the daylights from the dinge. + +I am the man of action when, with lamplight gloating o'er the scene, I +bask at leisure in my den, and read my fav'rite magazine. And so all +day I stay at home attending to the treadmill grind; but when night +comes afar I roam, and leave the workday world behind. + + + + +HUNTING A JOB + +"I would like a situation. I have hunted for it long," said a youth +who looked discouraged; "everything that is is wrong; there is no +demand for labor, no respect for willing hands, hence the people who +are idle are as frequent as the sands. I have waited in the pool hall +through the long and weary day, and no lucrative position seemed to +come along that way; I have stood upon the corner, smoking at my trusty +cob, but no merchant came to hire me, though all knew I had no job; I +have sat on every doorstep that against me wasn't fenced, you could +scarcely find a building that I haven't leaned against; I have smoked a +thousand stogies, I have chewed a cord of plug, I have shaken dice with +dozens, I have touched each cider jug, to sustain my drooping spirits +while I waited for a berth, with some up-to-date employer who'd +appreciate my worth. But the world is out of kilter and the country's +out of plumb, and the poor downtrodden voter finds that things are on +the bum." + + + + +OLD AND NEW + +New songs are made in long array; we learn and sing them,--for a day, +and then they fade and die away. But when the long, sad day is +through, refreshing as the evening dew, are those old songs our fathers +knew. New books, in rich and gorgeous dress, are coming hourly from +the press, and charm by all their lovliness. But when from bench or +desk we roam, to find the resting place at home, we read the old, old +treasured tome. New friends are made at every reach of our long road +to Styx's beach; new friends of warm and pleasant speech. But when +life's sun is in the West, and feet are tired and hearts oppressed, the +old time friend seems always best. + + + + +THE HANDY EDITOR + +When a man has got a grievance that is keeping him awake, some old +moldy, tiresome trouble that has made his innards ache, then he comes +a-callyhooting to the printing-office door, for he wants to share his +trouble with the humble editore. + +When a man has got a hobby that has put him on the bum, then the people +flee a-shrieking when they chance to see him come; but he knows one +weary mortal who must suffer and endure, so he comes to share his +theories with the lowly editure. + +When a man has got a story that with age was stiff and stark when old +Father Noah told it to the people in the ark, then he comes, a-bubbling +over, to the Weekly Bugle's lair, for he wants to share his gladness +with the soulful editaire. + +O, he's always freely giving of the things that make us tired, and he's +often pretty stingy with the things that are desired; he might bring a +ray of sunlight to a life that's sad and drear, if he'd give the absent +treatment to the heartsick editeer. + + + + +THE SLEEPER WAKES + +Perhaps you've heard of old Tom Tinkle, who went to sleep like Rip Van +Winkle, and slept for thirty years; he woke the other day, and gazing +around him on the sights amazing, his soul was filled with fears. + +[Illustration: The Sleeper Wakes] + +"What world is this?" he asked, in terror; "what life, of which I'm now +a sharer? What globe do we infest? Oh, is it Saturn, Mars or Venus? +How many planets are between us and good old Mother Earth? What mighty +bird is that a-soaring--I seem to hear its pinions roaring, it scoots +along so fast? Old Earth, with all her varied features, had no such +big, outlandish creatures around, from first to last." + +"It is an airship, Thomas Tinkle," I answered him; "a modern wrinkle, +just one of many score which were by scientists invented to make the +people more contented since you began to snore." + +I told him of the wireless system and other wonders--he had missed 'em, +since he was sound asleep; of submarines which sink and travel serenely +o'er the mud and gravel beneath the raging deep. + +"You can't convince me," said the waker, "that 'tis the earth--you are +a faker, and deal in fairy tales; no man could soar away up yonder, +like some blamed albatross or condor on metal wings or sails. And as +for sending long dispatches from Buffalo clear down to Natchez, the +same not being wired, if that's done here it's not the planet whereon I +lived when mortals ran it; your stories make me tired. But what are +these rip-snorting wagons? We must be in the land of dragons! I never +saw the like! So riotously are they scooting, so wildly are they +callyhooting they fairly burn the pike!" + +I told him they were merely autos whose drivers lived up to their +mottoes that speed laws are in vain; and other miracles amazing with +delicate and pointed phrasing I started to explain. I told of triumphs +most astounding, of things which should be quite confounding to +resurrected men; but in the middle of my soaring I heard old Thomas +Tinkle snoring--he'd gone to sleep again. + + + + +IN HORSELAND + +A well-fed horse drove into town, behind a span of ancient men, whose +knees were sore from falling down and striving to get up again; their +poor old ribs were bare of meat, and they had sores upon their necks; +there wasn't, on the village street, a tougher looking pair of wrecks. +And so they shambled up the street, a spectre harnessed with a ghost; +the horse descended from his seat, and left them standing by a post. +And there they stood through half the night, and shook and shivered in +the tugs, the while their master, in delight, was shaking dice with +other plugs. And there they died, of grief and cold--no more they'll +haul the heavy plow; their master said, when he was told: "They cost +blamed little, anyhow!" + + + + +INAUGURATION DAY, 1913 + +Now Washington is swarming with men of sterling worth, all bent upon +reforming the heaven and the earth; they come from far Savannah, they +come from Texarkana, and points in Indiana, with loud yet seemly mirth. +They're come from far Alaska, where show is heaped on snow; they've +journeyed from Nebraska where commoners do grow; the famed, the wise, +the witty, the timid, and the gritty have come from Kansas City and +also Broken Bow. Their battle shout is thrilling as they go marching +by, and every man is willing at once to bleed and die; to guarantee +this nation a fine Administration he'd take a situation or kill himself +with pie. The editors of journals are marching in the throng; and old +and war-worn colonels are teetering along; and friends of Andrew +Jackson and Jefferson, now waxin' a trifle old, are taxin' their dusty +throats with song. No wonder Woodrow Wilson, as this great crowd +appears, his silken kerchief spills on some proud and grateful tears; +the ranks of colonels face him--such loyalty must brace him, and from +dejection chase him in future pregnant years. No office need go +begging before this mighty host; he need not go a-legging for masters +of the post; he has to do no pleading; they bring the help he's +needing; of dying and of bleeding they make a modest boast. And so he +views the strangers from Maryland and Maine, the tall, bewhiskered +grangers who till the Western plain; the men from desks and foyers, the +sheepmen and the sawyers, the lumberjacks and lawyers, all come to ease +the strain; he views the dusty millers from Minnesota land; the shining +social pillars from Boston's sacred strand; the men of hill and valley +around his standard rally (and on the snaps keep tally), each with a +helping hand. "My fears are in the distance," is Woodrow's grateful +song; "what foe can make resistance against this mighty throng? So let +us, lawyer, farmer, ex-plute, and social charmer, gird on our +snow-white armor, and paralyze each wrong!" + + + + +PRAYER OF THE HEATHEN + +Before a wooden idol two heathen knelt and prayed; it was their day of +bridal, the savage and the maid. "We two have come together, to +journey through the years, in calm and stormy weather, in sunshine and +in tears. O idol most exalted, protect us on our way, and may our feet +be halted from going far astray. This maid," the bridegroom muttered, +"is fresh from Nature's hands; her boudoir is not cluttered with +strings and pins and bands; she does not paint her features, or wear +rings on her paws; she's one of Nature's creatures, and lives by +Nature's laws. Her foot, she does not force it into a misfit shoe; nor +does she wear a corset to squeeze her frame in two. That frame has got +upon it no clothes she does not need; she wears no bughouse bonnet that +makes man's bosom bleed. This maid, this weaker vessel, has movements +swift and free, and she can run and wrestle, and she can climb a tree. +And it she shows a yearning to emulate the whites, our good old customs +spurning, pursuing vain delights, O idol stern and oaken, take thou thy +sceptre dread, and may the same be broken upon her silly head." + +"This bridegroom," said the maiden, "untutored is and rude, but still +he is not laden with habits vain and lewd. I hope to see him trundle +each evening to his kraal, and not blow in his bundle for long cold +pints of ale. With my consent he'll never get next the slot machine, +or use his best endeavor to burn up gasoline. No tailor hath arrayed +him, no valet hath defaced! He stands as Nature made him, +broad-chested, slim of waist! And he can swim the Niger, or rob a +lion's lair, or whip a full-grown tiger at Reno or elsewhere! And if +he would abandon our simple heathen ways, and learn to place his hand +on some foolish white men's craze, O idol, in your dudgeon, obey his +bride's behest! Take up your big spiked bludgeon, and swat him +galley-west!" + + + + +THEORY AND PRACTICE + +In public I talk of Milton and give him ecstatic praise, and say that I +love to ponder for hours o'er his living lays; I speak of his noble +epic, that jewel which proudly shines, and quote from his splendid +sonnets (I know maybe twenty lines); but when I am home John Milton is +left on the bookcase shelf; he's rather too dull for reading--you know +how it is yourself; to lighten the weight of sorrow that over my spirit +hangs, I dig up the works of Irwin or Nesbit or Kendrick Bangs. + +I talk much of Thomas Hardy when I'm with the cultured crowd, and say +that few modern writers so richly have been endowed; I speak of his +subtle treatment of life and its grim distress, and quote from "The +Trumpet Major" or spiel a few lines from "Tess." But when I am in my +chamber, where no one can see me read, remote from the highbrow people +and all that the highbrows need, I never have known a longing to reach +for the Hardy tomes; I put in a joyous evening with Watson and Sherlock +Holmes. + +I talk a good deal of Wagner in parlor and drawing room, and speak of +the gorgeous fabrics he wove on his wondrous loom, the fabrics of sound +and beauty, the wonderful scroll of tone, and say that this mighty +genius remains in a class alone. I whistle "The Pilgrims' Chorus," and +chortle of "Lohengrin," and say that all other music is merely a venial +sin. But when at my own piano Susannah sits down to play, I beg her to +cut out Wagner and shoo all his noise away. "I'm weary and worn and +beaten; my spirits," I say, "are low; so give us some helpful music--a +few bars of Jungle Joe!" + + + + +FOOL AND SAGE + +The fool and his money are parted, not long did they stay in cahoots; +but the fool is the cheeriest-hearted and gladdest of human galoots. +His neighbor is better and wiser, six figures might tell what he's +worth; but O how folks wish the old miser would fall off the edge of +the earth! + + + + +THEN AND NOW + +In olden times the gifted bard found life a pathway rough and hard. +Starvation often was his goad, and some dark garret his abode, and +there, when nights were long and chill, he sadly plied his creaking +quill. He wrote of shepherds and their crooks, of verdant vales and +babbling brooks, displaying artfully his lore--while bailiffs +threatened at the door. And having wrought his best, he took with +trembling hands his little book to lay before some haughty lord, and +cringe around for a reward. Some times, perchance, he got a purse; +anon he only drew a curse; and often in a prison yard the weary, +debt-incumbered bard was herded with the squalid throng, and damned the +shining peaks of song. + +The world moves on. The bard today finds life a soft and easy way. If +he elects to cut his hair he has the price and some to spare. Attired +in purple, he goes by with hard boiled shirt and scrambled tie, and you +can hear his bullion clank as he goes prancing to the bank. He writes +no tame, insipid books of dairy maids or shepherds' crooks, of singing +birds or burbling streams, or any other worn-out themes. Anon he +touches up his lyre to boost a patent rubber tire, or sings a noble +song that thrills concerning someone's beeswax pills. His lyre's a +wonder to behold; its frame is pearl, its strings are gold. His +sheetiron laurels never fade; the grocer's glad to get his trade. +While he can make the muses sweat he'll never go to jail for debt. + +He calmly puts his harp away, when he has toiled a 10-hour day, and +softly sighs: "There's nothing wrong with this old graft of deathless +song!" + + + + +THE SLEEPER + +They have planted him deep in a grave by the fence, where the sand burs +are thick and the jimson is dense; he's sleeping at last, and as still +as a mouse, held down by a boulder as big as a house, and the +whangdoodle mourns in a neighboring tree, with a voice that's as sad as +the sorrowing sea. They have planted him deep in the silt and the +sand, with appropriate airs by the fife and drum band, and they +joyfully yell when the sad rites are o'er: "Gosh ding him, he's taking +his straw votes no more." + + + + +FOOLING AROUND + +Old Griggins the grocer, has gone to the dump, and people who knew him +say he was a chump; his prospects were fine when he opened his store, +and customers brought him their bullion and ore, and bought his +potatoes and pumpkins and peas, his milk and molasses, his chicory, +cheese. But soon they went elsewhere to blow in their plunks, for +Griggins turned out such a foolish old hunks; while others were +rustling for shilling and pound, old Griggins the grocer kept fooling +around. + +He stood in the alley and ranted and tore, debating the tariff with +some one next door; he roasted the tariff on spigots and spoons while +customers waited to purchase some prunes; he argued that congress is +out for the pelf, and left his trade palace to wait on itself. And +patrons got huffy, their molars they ground, while Griggins the grocer +was fooling around. + +Old Griggins kept cases on sprinters and pugs, and talked of their +records, while people with jugs were wishing he'd fill them with syrup +or oil, and cut out his yarns, which were starting to spoil; he'd talk +about Jeffries or Johnsing or Gotch for forty-five minutes or more by +the watch, while customers jingled their coin in his store, and waited +and waited, and sweated and swore. At last they would leave his old +joint on the bound, while Griggins the grocer was fooling around. + +The man who would win in these strenuous days must tend to his knitting +in forty-five ways, be eager and hustling, with vim all athrob, his +mind not afield, but intent on his job. The sheriff will come with his +horse and his hound to talk with the man who keeps fooling around. + + + + +GUESS WHO! + +He is the press and the people, the sultan who rules the Turks; he is +the bell in the steeple, and he is the whole blamed works. He is the +hill and valley, the dawning, the dusk, the moon; he is the large white +alley, he is the man in the moon. He is the soothing slumber, he is +the soul awake, he is the big cucumber, that gives us the bellyache. +He is the fire that quickens, the company that insures; he is the ill +that sickens, and he is the thing that cures. He is the ruling +Russian, and we are the groveling skates; he is the constitution, and +he's the United States. + + + + +TRYING AGAIN + +No boarding house, tavern or inn was in sight; so into a cavern went +Bruce, in sore plight. By enemies hunted, a price on his head, and all +his schemes shunted, he wished he was dead. "In vain my endeavor, +repulsed my demands; I'll try again never--I throw up my hands!" And +so he lay sighing and cussing his fate, and wished he was lying stone +dead in a crate. A spider was spinning its web by the wall; now +losing, now winning, now taking a fall; though often it tumbled, it +breathed not a sob, nor crawfished nor grumbled, but stuck to its job. +Then Bruce opened wider his eyes and exclaimed: "That dodgasted spider +has made me ashamed! I'm but a four-flusher to sit here and whine! +This morning must usher in triumphs of mine!" + +He canned all his wailing and cut out the frown, and went forth +a-smiling, and won a large crown! + +And legions of fellows with tears in their eyes, who wear out their +bellows with groaning and sighs, who think they are goners, ordained to +the dump, would harvest some honors if they would just hump! The +spiders are teaching, the same as of old; the spiders are preaching a +gospel of gold: "Though baffled and broken, O children of men, let +grief be unspoken--go at it again!" + + + + +ICONOCLASM + +King Skeptic wears his modern crown, his stern, destructive law +prevails; he's tearing all our idols down, disproving all our fav'rite +tales. Is there a legend you hold dear, some legend of the long ago? +King Skeptic hears it with a sneer, and digs up history to show that +things of that sort never chanced, and never could, and never will. +"We have," he says, "so much advanced, that fairy tales don't fill the +bill. No faked-up tales of knightly acts, no Robin Hood romance for +me; the only things worth while are Facts, Statistics, and the Rule of +Three." + +With diagrams he shows full well that old-time tales are things to +scorn; that such a man as William Tell, in liklihood, was never born. +If Gessler lived and had a hat, he didn't hang it on a pole; the rules +of Euclid show us that--so goes King Skeptic's rigmarole. But, +granting that he had a lid, and hung it on a pole awhile, and granting +that the people did bow down to reverence that tile, this does not +prove that William shot an apple through an apple's core, and so the +anecdote is rot--don't let us hear it any more. + +One-eyed Horatius never held the bridge beside his comrades bold, while +Sextus and his foemen yelled--because there was no bridge to hold. +With Fact King Skeptic pounds your head, and prods you with it to the +hilt, and shows Horatius had been dead ten years before the bridge was +built. "He fell not in the Tiber's foam, performed no feats of arms +sublime. I know! The city clerk of Rome sent me the records of that +time!" + +Mazeppa's ride was all a joke, as all the statisticians know; the horse +he rode was city broke, and stopped whene'er he whispered "whoa." Most +luckily, the village vet wrote down the facts with rugged power; +Mazeppa simply made a bet the horse could go three miles an hour; he +wasn't strapped upon its back, no perils dire did him befall; he rode +around a kite-shaped track, and lost his bet, and that was all. + +And so it goes; you can't relate a legend of heroic acts but that the +Skeptic then will state objections based on Deadly Facts. Romance is +but a total loss, and all the joy of life departs; we've nothing left +but Charlie Ross, and he'll turn up, to break our hearts. + + + + +GATHERING ROSES + +I've gathered roses and the like, in many glad and golden Junes; but +now, as down the world I hike, my weary hands are filled with prunes. +I've gathered roses o'er and o'er, and some were white, and some were +red; but when I took them to the store, the grocer wanted eggs instead. +I gathered roses long ago, in other days, in other scenes; and people +said: "You ought to go, and dig the weeds out of your beans." A +million roses bloomed and died, a million more will die today; that man +is wise who lets them slide, and gathers up the bales of hay. + + + + +THE FUTURE SPORT + +The airship is a thing achieved; it has its rightful place, as well as +any autocart that ever ran a race. The farmer, in the coming years, +when eggs to town he brings, will flop along above the trees, upon his +rusty wings. The doctor, when he has a call, from patients far or +near, will quickly strap his pinions on, and hit the atmosphere. And +airship racing then will be the sport to please the crowds; there'll be +racecourses overhead, and grandstands in the clouds. The umpire, on +his patent wings, will hover here and there; the fans, with rented +parachutes, will prance along the air; the joyous shrieks of flying +sports will keep the welkin hot, and soaring cops will blithely chase +the scorching aeronaut. We'll soon be living overhead, our families +and all; and then we'll only need the earth to land on when we fall. + + + + +TAKING ADVICE + +A forty-foot constrictor once was swallowing a goat, and having lots of +trouble, for the horns stuck in his throat. And then a warthog came +along, and said: "Oh, foolish snake! To swallow all your victuals +whole is surely a mistake. It puts your stomach out of plumb, your +liver out of whack, and gives you all the symptoms in the latest +almanac. If serpents for abundant health would have a fair renown, +they'll chew a mouthful half an hour before they take it down. Eat +slowly, with a tranquil mind and heart serene beneath, and always use a +finger bowl, and always pick your teeth. I'm reading up Woods +Hutchinson and Fletcher and those guys, and following the rules they +make, which are extremely wise, and oh, it pains me to the quick, and +jars my shrinking soul, to see a foolish snake like you absorbing +dinners whole!" + +The serpent got his dinner down, with whiskers, horns and feet, then +slept three weeks; then looked around for something more to eat. And, +having killed a jabberwock, and found it fat and nice, he thought he'd +eat according to the warthog's sage advice. + +Ah, never more that snake is seen upon his native heath! The little +serpents tell the tale of how he starved to death! + +Moral: + +The counsel of the great may help the man next door, 'tis true, and yet +turn out to be a frost when followed up by you. + + + + +POST-MORTEM INDUSTRY + +You've heard of Richard Randle Rox? He died; they put him in a box, +and lowered him into a grave, and said: "He'll surely now behave." + +For years this fertile Richard penned books, rhymes and essays without +end. His helpful, moral dope was seen in every uplift magazine, and +people used to wonder how the wheels within that bulging brow produced +such countless bales of thought, such wondrous wealth of tomyrot; and +folks chewed cloves and cotton waste to try to take away the taste. + +At last he died before his time--killed off by an ingrowing rhyme. The +mourners laid him on his pall, his three assorted names and all, and +said: "Doggone him! Now he'll stop this thing of writing helpful +slop." He got the finest grave in town, and marble things to hold him +down. + +Long years have passed since R. R. Rox was placed in silver-mounted +box; and does he rest in peace? Instead, he's working harder now he's +dead. New books are coming from his pen until the chastened sons of +men look round, their eyelids red with grief--look round, imploring for +relief. "Is there no way," so wails the host, "to lay this Richard +Randle's ghost?" + + + + +THE CONQUEROR + +The pugilist, tall and majestic, and proud of his numerous scars, was +telling of foreign, domestic, and all kinds of Homeric wars. His +hearers were standing before him in attitudes speaking of awe, for what +could they do but adore him, the man with the prognathous jaw? + +"My make-up," he said, "rather queer is, I've never seen others that +way; I simply don't know what a fear is; I really rejoice in the fray, +I guess I'm the champion glarer, my glance seems to wilt all my foes; +I've seen fellows crumple with terror before we had got down to blows. +This made me so often the victor; no qualms in my bosom I feel; I don't +fear a boa constrictor--my heart is an engine of steel." + +[Illustration: The Conqueror] + +And so of his feats superhuman he talked in a voice ringing loud, until +a small, fiery-eyed woman came elbowing up through the crowd. Her +voice, like her person, was spindling, but Hercules heard when she +called: "Come home, now, and cut up some kindling, or I will be +snatching you bald!" No more of his triumphs he lilted, like Spartacus +spieling in Rome; the steel hearted warrior wilted, and followed his +conquerer home. + + + + +THE TRUTHFUL MERCHANT + +If Ananias lived today and ran the corner store, he couldn't keep the +wolf away from his old creaking door. For men who spend their +hard-earned rocks won't patronize the man who must forever, when he +talks, make truth an also ran. + +I bought a whole new suit of clothes from Bilks, across the street. He +said to me: "Such rags as those just simply can't be beat. They +ornament the clothier's trade, and eke the tailor's shears; they will +not shrink, they will not fade, they'll last a hundred years. Go +forth," said Bilks, "upon the street, in all your pomp and pride, and +every pretty girl you meet will wish she was your bride." + +So I went forth in brave array, the city's one best bet. There was a +little shower that day, and I got slightly wet. And then the truth was +driven in that my new rags were punk. Alas, my friends, it was a sin +the way those trousers shrunk! The buttons from my waistcoat flew with +dull and sickening crack; my coat soon changed from brown to blue and +then split up the back. + +Old Bilks gold-bricked me in that deal, but does his system pay? He'll +never get another wheel from me till Judgment Day. The kopeck that you +win by guile may swell your roll today, but in the clammy afterwhile it +melts that roll away. + + + + +STANDING PAT + +Your arguments for modern things with me cannot avail; my father reaped +his grain by hand and thrashed it with a flail; then who am I to strike +new paths and buy machinery? The methods good enough for dad are good +enough for me! I want no hydrant by my house--such doodads I won't +keep! My father drew the water from a well three furlongs deep, and +skinned his hands and broke his back a-pulling at the rope, and methods +that my father used will do for me, I hope! Don't talk of your +electric light; a candle's all I need; my father always went to bed +when 'twas too dark to read; I want no books or magazines to clutter up +my shack; my father never read a thing but Johnson's almanac. A +bathroom? Blowing wealth for that ridiculous appears; my father never +used to bathe, and lived for ninety years. I care not for your +"progress" talk, "reform" or other tricks; my father never used to vote +or fuss with politics; he never cared three whoops in Troy which side +should win or lose, and I'm content to go his gait, and wear my +father's shoes. + + + + +THE OUTCAST + +You ask me why I weep and moan, like some lost spirit in despair, and +why I wonder [Transcriber's note: wander?] off alone, and paw the +ground and tear my hair? You ask me why I pack this gun, all loaded +up, prepared to shoot? Alas! my troubles have begun--the women folk +are canning fruit! There is no place for me to eat, unless I eat upon +the floor; and peelings get beneath my feet, and make me fall a block +or more; the odors from the boiling jam, all day assail my weary snoot; +you find me, then, the wreck I am--the women folk are canning fruit! +O, they have peaches on the chairs, and moldy apples on the floor, and +wormy plums upon the stairs, and piles of pears outside the door; and +they are boiling pulp and juice, and you may hear them yell and hoot; a +man's existence is the deuce--the women folk are canning fruit! + + + + +ODE TO KANSAS + + Kansas: Where we've torn the shackles + From the farmer's leg; + Kansas: Where the hen that cackles, + Always lays an egg; + Where the cows are fairly achin' + To go on with record breakin', + And the hogs are raising bacon + By the keg! + + + + +DOMESTIC HAPPINESS + +It is good to watch dear father as he blithely skips along, on his face +no sign of bother, on his lips a cheerful song; peeling spuds and +scraping fishes, putting doilies on the chairs, sweeping floors and +washing dishes, busy with his household cares. Now the kitchen fire is +burning; to get supper he will start--mother soon will be returning +from her labors in the mart. + +Poor tired mother! Daily toiling to provide our meat and bread! Where +the eager crowd is moiling, struggling on with weary tread! Battling +with stockjobbing ladies, meeting all their wiles and tricks, or +embarking in the Hades of the city's politics! But forgotten is the +pother, all the work day cares are gone, when she comes home to dear +father with his nice clean apron on! There's your chair, he says; "sit +in it; supper will be cooked eftsoons: I will dish it in a +minute--scrambled eggs and shredded prunes." It is good to watch him +moving round the stove with eager zeal, in his every action proving +that his love goes with the meal. + +When the evening meal is eaten and the things are cleared away, then we +sit around repeatin' cares and triumphs of the day; and the high +resounding rafter echoes to our harmless jokes, to our buoyant peals of +laughter, while tired mother sits and smokes. Thus her jaded mind +relaxes in an atmosphere so gay, and she thinks no more of taxes or of +bills that she must pay; smiles are soon her face adorning, in our nets +of love enmeshed, and she goes to work next morning like a giantess +refreshed. + + + + +CELEBRITIES + +He had written lovely verses, touching hollyhocks and hearses, +lotus-eaters, ladies, lilies, porcupines and pigs and pies, nothing +human was beyond him, and admiring people conned him, adoration in +their bosoms and a rapture in their eyes. He had sung of figs and +quinces in the tents of Bedouin princes, he'd embalmed the Roman Forum +and the Parthenon of Greece; many of his odes were written in the +shrouding fogs of Britain, while he watched the suffrage ladies mixing +things with the police. + +So we met to do him honor; worshipper and eager fawner begged a tassel +of his whiskers, or his autograph in ink; never was there so much +sighin' round a pallid human lion, as he stood his lines explaining, +taking out the hitch and kink! + +All were in a joyous flutter, till we heard some fellow mutter: "Here +comes Griggs, the southpaw pitcher, fairly burdened with his fame! He +it was who beat the Phillies--gave the Quaker bugs the willies--he it +was who saved our bacon in that 'leven-inning game!" + +Then we crowded round the pitcher, making that great man the richer by +a ton of adulation, in a red-hot fervor flung; and the poet, in a +pickle, mused upon the false and fickle plaudits of the heartless +rabble, till the dinner gong was rung! + + + + +THE VIRTUOUS EDITOR + +I use my Trenchant, fertile pen to help along the cause of men and make +the sad world brighter, to give all good ambitions wings, to help the +poor to better things and make their burdens lighter. The page whereon +my screeds appear envoys a sacred atmosphere; it's helpful and +uplifting; it hands out morals by the ton, and shows the people how to +shun the rocks to which they're drifting. + +You say my other pages reek with filthy "cures for cancer"? +Impertinently, sir, you speak, and I refuse to answer. + +All causes good and true and pure, and everything that should endure +I'm always found supporting; and in my lighter moments I to heights of +inspiration fly, the soft-eyed muses courting. To those who wander far +astray I, like a shepherd, point the way to paths and fields Elysian; +no sordid motives soil my pen as I assist my fellow men, no meanness +mars my vision. + +You say I print too many ads, unfit for youths' perusal, of fakers' +pills and liver pads? I gave you one refusal to argue that, so quit +your fuss and cease your foolish chatter; it is beneath me to discuss a +purely business matter. + +I point out all the shabby tricks which now disgrace our politics, +those tricks which shame the devil; I ask the voters to deface +corruption and our country place upon a higher level. Through endless +wastes of words I roam to make the Fireside and the Home the nation's +shrine and glory; and Purity must ring again in every offspring of my +pen, in every screed and story. + +You say my paper isn't fit for aught but toughs and muckers? That all +the fakers come to it when they would fleece the suckers? Your +criticism takes the buns! It's surely most surprising! You'll have to +see the man who runs the foreign advertising. + + + + +THIS DISMAL AGE + +"It is a humdrum world," he said, "in which we now abide! alas! the +good old times are dead when brave knights used to ride to war upon +their armored steeds; then bloodshed was in style; then men could do +heroic deeds, and life was worth the while. If I should go with lance +and sword to enemy of mine--to one by whom I've long been bored, and +cleave him to the chine, there'd be no plaudits long and loud, no +wreaths from ladies pale; the cops would seek me in a crowd, and hustle +me to jail. If down the highway I should press, beneath the summer +skies, to rescue damsels in distress and wipe their weeping eyes, I'd +win no praises from the sports; they'd call me a galoot; I'd have to +answer in the courts to breach-of-promise suit. Adventure is a thing +that's dead, we've reached a low estate, and I was born, alas!" he +said, "five hundred years too late." + +He took the morning paper then, which reeked with thrilling things, +with tales of fighting modern men; the strife of money kings; the +eager, busy, human streams throughout this mundane hive; the struggle +of the baseball teams, which for the pennant strive; the polar hero and +his sled; the race of motor cars; the flight of aernauts o'erhead, +outlined against the stars. + +"It is a humdrum age," he sighed, "of avarice the fruit. Upon a steed +I'd like to ride, and wear a cast iron suit, and live as lived the +knights of old, the heroes of romance; I'd like to carry spurs of gold +and wield a sword and lance; but in this drear and pallid age, from +Denver to Des Moines, there's naught to stir a noble rage--there's +nothing counts but coin!" + + + + +BOOST THINGS + +Don't sit supinely on your roost, but come along and help us boost, for +better things of every kind, and leave your kicking clothes behind. O +let us boost for better streets, and softer beds, and longer sheets; +for smoother lawns and better lights, and shorter-winded blatherskites; +for finer homes, and larger trees, for bats and boots and bumble bees; +for shorter hours and longer pay, and fewer thistles in our hay, for +better grub, and bigger pies, for two more moons to light the skies. +And let the wolves of war be loosed on every man who doesn't boost! + + + + +THE ADVENTURER + +He had braved the hungry ocean when the same was in commotion, he had +floated on the wreckage of his tempest-shattered bark; he had flirted +in deep waters with the merman's wives and daughters, he had scrapped +through seven sessions with a large man-eating shark. + +He had roamed in regions polar, where there's no effulgence solar, he +had slain the festive walrus and the haughty arctic bear; and his +watchword had been spoken in the wastes by whites unbroken, and he +shelled out many gumdrops to the natives living there. + +In the jungles, dark and fearful, where the tiger, fat and cheerful, +gnaws the bones of foreign hunters, he had gone, unscathed, his way; he +had whipped a big constrictor, and emerged the smiling victor from a +scrimmage with a hippo, which was fond of deadly fray. + +He was shot with poisoned arrows and his tale of anguish harrows up the +bosom of the reader, but he lived to journey home; he was chased by +wolves in Russia, thrown in prison cell in Prussia, and was captured by +fierce bandits in the neighborhood of Rome. He had lived where dwells +the savage whose ambition is to ravage and to fill his cozy wigwam with +a handsome line of scalps; he had lived with desert races, sought the +strange and distant places, he had stood upon the summit of the +loftiest of Alps. + +To his home at last returning, filled with sentimental yearning, "Now," +he cried, "farewell to danger--I have left its stormy track!" Far from +scenes of strife and riot he desired long years of quiet, but a casting +from an airship fell three miles and broke his back. + + + + +THEY ALL COME BACK + +The stars will come back to the azure vault when the clouds are all +blown away; and the sun will come back when the night is done, and give +us another day; the cows will come back from the meadows lush, and the +birds to their trysting tree, but the money I paid to a mining shark +will never come back to me! The leaves will come back to the naked +boughs, the flowers to the frosty brae; the spring will come back like +a blooming bride, and the breezes that blow in May; and joy will come +back to the stricken heart, and laughter and hope and glee, but the +money I blew for some mining stock will never come back to me! + + + + +HOME BUILDERS + +Old Bullion has a stack of rich things in his shack; of Persian rugs +and antique jugs and costly bric-a-brac. There's art work in the hall, +fine paintings on the wall; and yet a gloom as of the tomb is hanging +over all. Here costly books abound. "This cost a thousand pound; that +trade-mark blur means Elzivir--I've nothing cheap around. Here's Venus +in the foam; the statue came from Rome; I bought the best the world +possessed when I built up this home." Thus proudly Bullion talks, as +through his home he walks, and tells the cost of things embossed, of +vases, screens and crocks. No children's laughter rings, among those +costly things; no sounds of play by night or day; no happy housewife +sings. For romping girl or boy might easily destroy a priceless jug, +or stain a rug, and ruin Bullion's joy. The guests of Bullion yawn, +impatient to be gone, afraid they'll mar some lacquered jar, or tread +some fan upon. + +Down here where Tiller dwells you hear triumphant yells of girls and +boys who play with toys, with hoops and horns and bells. There are no +costly screens; no relics of dead queens; but on the stand, close to +your hand, cheap books and magazines. There's no Egyptian crock, or +painted jabberwock, but by the wall there stands a tall and loud +six-dollar clock. Old Tiller can't impart much lore concerning art, or +tell the price of virtu nice until he breaks your heart. But in his +home abide those joys which seem denied to stately halls upon whose +walls are works of pomp and pride. That pomp which smothers joy, and +chills a girl or boy, may have and hold the hue of gold, but it has +base alloy. + + + + +FAILURE AND SUCCESS + +He was selling tacks and turnips in a gloomy corner store, and he never +washed his windows and he never swept the floor, and he let the cobwebs +gather on the ceiling and the walls, and he let his whiskers flourish +till they brushed his overalls. So his customers forsook him--for his +patrons were not chumps--and the sheriff came and got him and that +merchant bumped the bumps. + +He was selling hens and hammocks, as he'd done since days of youth, and +he queered himself with many, for he never told the truth. Oh, he +thought it rather cunning if he sold a rooster old as a young and +tender pullet through the artful lies he told; and he'd sell a shoddy +hammock as a thing of silken thread, and the customer would bust it and +fall out upon his head; so his customers forsook him, and he sadly +watched them flit, and the sheriff came and got him, and that merchant +hit the grit. + +He was selling shoes and sugar--sugar from the sunny South--and he'd +roast the opposition when he should have shut his mouth. He would +stand and rant and rumble by the hour of Mr. Tweet, who was selling +shoes and sugar in the shack across the street; and he'd vow all kinds +of vengeance, and he'd tell all kinds of tales, till his wearied +patrons sometimes rose and smote him with his scales; for they cared +about his troubles and his sorrows not three whoops, and the sheriff +came and got him, and that merchant looped the loops. + +He was selling books and beeswax, and his store was neat and clean, and +the place was bright and cheerful, and the atmosphere serene. He was +tidy in his person, and his clerks were much the same, and no precious +time was wasted, in the tiresome knocking game. And the customer who +entered was with courtesy received, and he felt quite proud and happy +when of cash he was relieved. And the merchant's word was golden, what +he said was always true, and he sold no moldy beeswax, saying it was +good as new. And his trade kept on increasing till his bank account +was fat, and the sheriff, when he met him, always bowed and tipped his +hat. + + + + +THE OPEN ROAD + +Romance + +To walk again the open road I have a springtime longing; I yearn to +leave my town abode, the jostling and the thronging, and tread again +the quiet lanes, among the woodland creatures; where birds are singing +joyous strains to beat the music teachers. Afar from honks of motor +cars, and all the city's clamor, I'd like to sleep beneath the stars, +and feel no katzenjammer when in the vernal dawn I wake, as chipper as +the foxes, to eat my frugal oatmeal cake put up in paper boxes. I fain +would revel in the breeze that blows across the clover, and drink from +brooks, with stately trees, like Druids, bending over. I'd leave the +pavement and the wall, the too persistent neighbor, and hear the +rooster's early call that wakes the world to labor. I'd seek the +hayfields whose perfume the jaded heart doth nourish, I'd go where +wayside roses bloom and johnny-jump-ups flourish. I'd see the pasture +flecked with sheep and mule and colt and heifer, and let my spirit lie +asleep upon the twilight zephyr. Oh, town, I leave you for a week, +your burdens and your duties! The country calls me--I must seek its +glories and its beauties! + +Reality + +Gee whiz! I'd give a million bones to be back home a-sleeping! My +shoes are full of burs and stones, and I am tired of weeping. Last +night I sought a stack of hay, where slumber's fetters bound me, and at +the cold, bleak break of day a husky farmer found me. I tried to +pacify his nibs when he stood there and blessed me; alas, his pitchfork +smote my ribs, his cowhide shoes caressed me. The dogs throughout this +countryside all seem to think they need me; they've gathered samples of +my hide, and many times they've treed me. And when I roamed the +woodland path to see the wild-flowers' tinting, a bull pursued me in +its wrath and broke all records sprinting. At noontide I sat down to +rest, and rose depressed and dizzy; I'd sat upon a hornet's nest, and +all the birds got busy. My whiskers now are full of hay, my legs are +lame and weary; it's been a-raining every day, and all the world is +dreary. The road will do for those who like a pathway rough and +gritty; I've had enough--just watch me hike back to the good old city. + + + + +THE MILLIONAIRES + +They like to make the people think that all their piles of yellow +chink, are weary burdens, to be borne, with eyes that weep and hearts +that mourn; but as you jog along the road, you see no millionaires +unload. They like to talk and drone and drool, to growing youths in +Sunday school, and tell them that the poor man's lot is just the thing +that hits the spot; to warn them of ambition's goad--they talk, and +talk, but don't unload. They like to talk of days long gone, when life +for them was at its dawn, and they were poor and bent with toil, and +drew their living from the soil, and lived in some obscure abode--and +so they dream, but don't unload. They like to take a check in hand, +and, headed by the village band, present it to some charity--'twould +mean five cents to you or me; then they're embalmed in song and ode; +they smirk and smile, but don't unload. + + + + +LITTLE MISTAKES + +I used to trade at Grocer Gregg's and paid him heaps of cash for flour +and cheese and germ-proof eggs, and cans of succotash. But now he +doesn't get my trade--that's why his bosom aches; I had to quit him, +for he made so many small mistakes. + +He'd send me stale and wilted greens when I had ordered fresh; he's +send me gutta percha beans, all string and little flesh. And when I +journeyed to his store to read the riot act, three score apologies or +more he'd offer for the fact. That doggone clerk of his, he'd say, had +got the order wrong; and always, in the same old way, he'd sing the +same old song. He seemed to think apologies were all I should desire, +when he had sent me moldy cheese or herrings made of wire. + +And when his bill came in, by jings, it always made me hot; he'd have +me charged with divers things I knew I never bought. Then I would call +on Grocer Gregg in wrath and discontent, and seize him firmly by the +leg and ask him what he meant. Then grief was in the grocer's looks, +frowns came, his eyes betwixt; "The idiot who keeps my books," he'd +say, "has got things mixed. I wouldn't have such breaks as these for +forty million yen; I offer my apologies and hope you'll come again." + +He'd often send the things I bought to Colonel Jones, up town, and I +would get a bunch of rot that should have gone to Brown. And oft at +home I'd wait and wait, in vain for Sweitzer cheese; instead of that +I'd get a crate of codfish, prunes or peas. And then I'd go to Grocer +Gregg, and mutter as I went; "I'll take that merchant down a peg, and +in him make a dent." He'd spring the same old platitudes when I had +reached his den: "That vampire who delivers goods has balled things up +again." + +Apologies are good enough, excuses are the same; but forty-seven are +enough to tire one of that game. It's better far to shun mistakes, and +do things right at first, than to explain your dizzy breaks till your +suspenders burst. + + + + +EASY MORALITY + +When things are moving slick as grease, it's easy to be moral then, to +wear a gentle smile of peace, and talk about good will to men. Such +virtue doesn't greatly weigh, in making up the books of life; the man +who cheerful is and gay, in times of sorrow and of strife, is better +worth a word of praise, than all the gents of smiling mien, who swear +in forty different ways when life has ceased to be serene. This +morning, as I ambled down, a neighbor fell (the walk was slick) and +slid half-way across the town, and landed on a pile of brick. He slid +along at such a rate the ice was melted as he went; his shins were +barked, and on his pate there was a large unsightly dent. And when +he'd breath enough to talk, he didn't cave around and swear, or blank +the blanked old icy walk; he merely cried: "Well, I declare!" + + + + +THE CRITIC + +Some years ago I wrote a book, and no one read it save myself; it +occupies a dusty nook, all sad and lonesome, on the shelf. And having +found I couldn't write such stories as would please the mob, I sternly +said, "I'll wreak my spite on those who can hold down the job." So now +I sit in gloomy state and roast an author every day, and show he's a +misguided skate who should be busy baling hay. The people read me as I +cook my victims, and exclaim with glee, "If he would only write a book, +oh where would Scott and Dickens be?" + +I used to think that I could sing, but when a few sweet trills I'd +shed, the people would arise and fling dead cats and cabbage at my +head. Then, realizing that my throat was modeled on the foghorn plan, +I said, "If I can't sing a note, I'll surely roast the folks who can!" +I go to concerts and look wise, and shudder as in misery; in vain the +prima donna tries to win approving smiles from me; in vain the tenor or +the bass, to gain from me admiring looks, pours floods of music through +his face--I squirm as though on tenderhooks. And people watch my +curves and sigh; "He has it all by heart, by jing! What melody would +reach the sky if he would but consent to sing!" + +When I was young I painted signs, but not a soul my work would buy, for +all my figures and my lines were out of drawing and awry. And so I +said; "It breaks my heart that I can't sell a single sign; but in the +noble realms of art as critic I shall surely shine!" And so I grew a +Vandyke beard, and let my hair grow long as grass, and studied up a +jargon weird, and learned to wear a single glass. Then to the +galleries I went and looked at paintings with a frown, and wept in +dismal discontent that art's so crushed and beaten down. And people +followed in my tracks to ascertain my point of view; whenever I applied +the ax they gaily swung the cleaver, too. And often, through a solemn +hush, I'd hear my rapt admirers say: "If he would only use the brush, +Mike Angelo would fade away!" + + + + +THE OLD TIMER + +You've built up quite a city here, with stately business blocks, and +wires a-running far and near, and handsome concrete walks. The trolley +cars go whizzing by, and smoke from noisy mills is trailing slowly to +the sky, and blotting out the hills. And thirty years ago I stood upon +this same old mound, with not a house of brick or wood for twenty miles +around! I'm mighty glad to be alive, to see the change you've made; +it's good to watch this human hive, and hear the hum of trade! + + I list to the moans and wails + Of your town, with its toiling hands, + But O for the lonely trails + That led to the unknown lands! + +[Illustration: The Old Timer] + +I used to camp right where we stand, among these motor cars, and +silence brooded o'er the land, as I lay 'neath the stars, save when the +drowsy cattle lowed, or when a broncho neighed; and now you have an +asphalt road, and palaces of trade! We hear the clamor of the host on +every wind that blows, when people take the time to boast of how their +city grows! I do not doubt that you will rise to greater heights of +fame, and maybe paint across the skies your city's lustrous name! + + I list to the ceaseless tramp + Of the host, with its hopes and fears; + But O for the midnight camp + And the sound of the milling steers! + + + + +THE BRIGHT FACE + +Things are moving slowly? Business seems unholy? Better things are +coming, though they seem delayed! Sitting down and scowling, standing +up and growling, fussing round complaining will not bring the trade! +Here comes Mr. Perkins for a quart of gherkins--don't begin to tell him +all about your woes; you will only bore him, laying griefs before him, +and he'll be disgusted when he ups and goes. Show him that you're +cheerful, for the merchant tearful always jars his patrons, always +makes them groan; they don't want to hearken to the ills that darken +over you for they have troubles of their own. + +Here comes Mrs. Twutter for three yards of butter--let her see you +smiling, let her find you gay; be as bright and chipper as a new tin +dipper, show you're optimistic, in the good old way! If you mope and +mumble this good dame will tumble, and she'll tell her neighbors that +your head is sore; no one likes a dealer who's a dismal squealer, so +your friends will toddle to some other store. When the luck seems +balky, and the trade is rocky, that's the time to whistle, that's the +time to grin! Time to make a showing that your trade is growing, time +to show your grit and rustle round like sin. + +Here comes Mr. Bunyan for a shredded onion, bullion in his trousers, +checkbook in his coat; give him no suspicion that the dull condition in +the world of commerce has destroyed your goat! + + + + +LADIES AND GENTS + +When I was younger kids were kids, in Kansas or in Cadiz; now all the +boys are gentlemen, and all the girls are ladies. Where are the kids +who climbed the trees, the tousled young carousers, who got their faces +black with dirt, and tore their little trousers? Where are the lads +who scrapped by rounds, while other lads kept tallies? The maids who +made their pies of mud, and danced in dirty alleys? They're making +calf-love somewhere now, exchanging cards and kisses, they're all fixed +up in Sunday togs, and they are Sirs and Misses. Real kids have +vanished from the world--which fact is surely hades; and all the boys +are gentlemen, and all the girls are ladies. + + + + +AUTUMN JOYS + +The summer days have gone their ways, to join the days of summers +olden; the eager air is making bare the trees, the leaves are red and +golden; the flowers that bloomed are now entombed, the morn is chill, +the night is dreary; and I confront the same old stunt that all my life +has made me weary. Hard by yon grove our heating stove is standing red +and fierce and rusty; and I must black its front and back, and get +myself all scratched and dusty. And I must pack it on my back, about a +mile, up to our shanty, and work with wire and pipes and fire, the +while I quote warm things from Dante. + + + + +THE LAND OF BORES + +In the country of the bores people never shut the doors, and they leave +the windows open, so you're always catching cold; and they lean against +your breast while relating moldy jest that had long and flowing +whiskers when by Father Adam told. In the country of the bores people +carry sample ores, and they talk of mines prolific till you buy ten +thousand shares; and they sell you orange groves and revolving fireless +stoves, while they loll upon your divan with their feet upon your +chairs. In the country of the bores every other fellow roars of the +sins of public servants and the need of better things; in a nation full +of vice he alone is pure and nice, he alone has got a halo and a flossy +pair of wings. In the country of the bores men who wish to do their +chores are disturbed by agitators who declaim of iron heels, urging +toiling men to rise, with chain lightning in their eyes and do +something to the tyrant and his car with bloody wheels. In the country +of the bores evermore the talksmith pours floods of language on the +people, who were better left alone. But that land is far away, and we +should rejoice today that we're living in a country where no bores were +ever known. + + + + +SKILLED LABOR + +The pumpmaker came to my humble abode, for the pump was in need of +repair; his auto he left by the side of the road, and his diamonds he +placed on a chair. And he said that the weather was really too cold, +for comfort, this time of the year; and he thought from Japan--though +she's haughty and bold--this country has nothing to fear. He thought +that our navy should equal the best, for a navy's a warrant of peace; +and he said when a man has a cold on his chest, there's nothing as good +as goose grease. He thought that the peach crop is ruined for good, +and the home team is playing good ball; and the currency question is +not understood, by the voters he said, not at all. Then he looked at +the pump and he gave it a whack and he kicked at the spout and said +"Shucks!" And he joggled the handle three times up and back, and +soaked me for seventeen bucks. + + + + +AN EDITORIAL SOLILOQUY + +I sit all day in my gorgeous den and I am the boss of a hundred men; my +enemies shake at my slightest scowl, I make the country sit up and +howl; to the farthest ends of this blooming land men feel the weight of +my iron hand. + + But, oh, for the old, old shop, + Where I printed the Punktown Dirk, + And the toil and stress with the darned old press + That always refused to work! + + +I soothe my face with a rich cigar and ride around in a motor car; I go +to a swell cafe to dine and soak my works in the rarest wine. Oh, +nothing's too rich for your Uncle Jones, whose check is good for a heap +of bones! + + But, oh, for the old, old shop, + Where I set up the auction bills, + And printed an ad of a liver pad, + And took out the pay in pills! + + +I've won the prize in the worldly game, my name's inscribed on the roll +of fame; my home is stately, in stately grounds, I have my yacht and I +ride to hounds; nothing I've longed for has been denied; is it any +wonder I point with pride? + + But, oh, for the old, old shop, + In the dusty Punktown street! + I was full of hope as I wrote my dope, + Though I hadn't enough to eat! + + + + +YOUTHFUL GRIEVANCES + +"My lads," quoth the father, "come forth to the garden, and merrily +work in the glow of the sun; to loiter about is a crime beyond pardon, +when there's so much hoeing that has to be done! It pains me to mark +that you'd fain be retreating away from the hoes and such weapons as +these; you're diligent, though, when the time comes for eating the +turnips and lettuce and cabbage and peas." + +"Alas," sigh the boys, "that our father must work us like galley +slaves, thus, at the hoe and the spade! More fortunate lads all have +gone to the circus, they revel in peanuts and pink lemonade! Oh, what +is the profit of pruning and trimming, and sowing the radish, and +planting the yam, when everyone knows there is excellent swimming two +miles up the creek at the foot of the dam? + +"Sail in!" cries the parent, "the daytime is speeding, the night will +be here in the space of three shakes! Oh, this is the season for +digging and seeding, for doing great deeds with the long-handled rakes! +Consider the maxims of Franklin, the printer, the rede of the prophets, +of poets who sing; in comfort they live through the stress of the +winter, who toil like the ants or the bees in the spring!" + +"For maxims and proverbs it's little we're wishing," the boys mutter +low, as they wearily delve; "the neighbor boy says there is elegant +fishing--he went after catfish and came home with twelve. We have to +stay here doing labors that cramp us, while others are pulling out fish +by the pound! They're playing baseball every day on the campus, and +down in the grove there's a merry-go-round!" + +Alack! If the parents could see with the vision of boys and if boys +used the eyes of their sires, then fun would be labor, with rapture +elysian, and toil would be play, to the music of lyres! + + + + +SUNDAY + +Now the day is fading slowly and the week is near its close; comes the +Sabbath, calm and holy, with its quiet and repose; then the wheels no +more are driven, and the noise no longer swells and like whisperings of +heaven, sound the far-off Sabbath bells. Are we striving, are we +reaching, for the life serene and sweet? Not by platitudes and +preaching, not by praying on the street, but by doing deeds of +kindness, comforting some heart that's sore, helping those who grope in +blindness, giving something from our store. If it be our strong +endeavor to make others' lives less hard, then forever and forever +Sunday brings a rich reward. + + + + +JOHN BARLEYCORN + +I like to find the gifted youth, the youth of brains and virtue, and +whisper in his ears: "In truth, one flagon will not hurt you. He who +eschews the painted breath is nothing but a fossil; just try a drink of +liquid death--just join me in high wassail." At first my words may not +avail, they but offend and fret him, but I keep camping on his trail +until at last I get him. + +And having marked him for my own, I glory in the reaping; I feel that +death, and death alone, can take him from my keeping. He's mine to do +with as I will, he's mine, both soul and body; his one ambition is to +fill his outcast form with toddy. At first I take away his pride, +destroy his sense of honor, and when I see these things have died, I +know he is a goner. I house him in a squalid den, and take his decent +garments, and entertain him now and then with rats and other varmints. +I place a mortgage on his shack, despite his feeble ravings, I put old +rags upon his back, and confiscate his savings. And thus I take what +is a man, here in your Christian city, and make him, by my ancient +plan, a thing to scorn and pity. + +My victims lie in Potter's Fields in regiments and legions; John +Barleycorn his scepter wields o'er all these smiling regions. I find +new victims every day as I go blithely roaming; a million feet I lead +astray between the dawn and gloaming. With sparkling beer and foaming +ale I am my friends befriending, and to the poorhouse and the jail my +followers are wending. You hear the pageant's dreary song as down the +road it ambles; I wonder, oftentimes, how long you'll stand my cheerful +gambols? + + + + +CHRISTMAS DAY + +It is the day of kindness, and for this day we're freed from all the +sordid blindness of selfishness and greed; we have a thought for +others, we'd ease their load of care; and all men are our brothers, and +all the world is fair. + +This is the day of laughter, wherein no shadows fall; and 'neath the +cottage rafter, and in the mullioned hall, are happy cries ascending, +and songs of joy and peace; why should they have an ending? Why should +the music cease? The music! When we hear it, we old men softly sigh; +"Could but the Christmas spirit live on, and never die!" + +This is the day of giving, and giving with a smile makes this gray life +we're living seem doubly worth the while. When giving we're forgetting +the counting-room and mart, and all the work-day fretting--and this +improves the heart; forgetting bonds and leases, and every sordid +goal--this sort of thing increases the stature of the soul! + +This is the day of smiling, and faces stern and drear, on which few +smiles beguiling are seen throughout the year, are lighted up with +pleasure and eyes are soft today, and old men trip a measure with +children in their play. And graybeards laugh when pelted with snow by +springalds flung, and frozen hearts are melted, and ancient hearts are +young. + +It is a day for singing old songs our fathers knew, while gladsome +bells are ringing a message sweet to you; a day that brings us nearer +to heaven's neighborhood, that makes our vision clearer for all that's +true and good. + +On with the Christmas revels in cottage and in hall! While from the +starry levels smiles Christ, who loves us all! + + + + +A CRANK'S THANKSGIVING + +Like others, I'm grateful for plenty to eat; I'm fond of a plateful of +rich turkey meat. For pies in the cupboard, and coal in the bin, for +tires that are rubbered, and motors that spin; for all of my treasures, +for all that I earn, for comforts and pleasures, my thanks I return. +I'm glad that the nation is greasy and rich, acquiring high station +with nary a hitch; her barns are a-bursting with mountains of grain; +her people are thirsting for glory and gain. She'll ne'er backward +linger, this land of our dads, for she is a dinger at nailing the +scads. I'm glad that our vessels bring cargoes across, while counting +rooms wrestle with profit and loss; that men know the beauties of +figures and dates, and tariffs and duties and railway rebates. + +I'm glad there are dreamers not industry-drunk, surrounded by schemers +whose god is the plunk. I'm glad we've remaining incompetent jays, not +always a-straining, in four hundred ways, to run down and collar one +big rouble more, to add to the dollar they nailed just before. I'm +glad there are writers more proud of their screeds than board of trade +fighters of options and deeds. I'm glad there are preachers who tell +of a shore where wealth-weary creatures need scheme never more. + +For books that were written by masters of thought; for harps that were +smitten with Homeric swat; for canvases painted by monarchs of art; for +all things untainted by tricks of the mart; for hearts that are kindly, +with virtue and peace, and not seeking blindly a hoard to increase; for +those who are grieving o'er life's sordid plan; for souls still +believing in heaven and man; for homes that are lowly with love at the +board; for things that are holy, I thank thee, O Lord! + + + + +THE BRIEF VISIT + +I won't be long in this vale of tears; my works may run for a few more +years, but even that is a risky bet, and the sports are hedging already +yet. At morning a gent feels gay and nice; and evening finds him upon +the ice, with his folded hands and his long white gown, and his toes +turned up and his plans turned down. So, viewing this sad uncertainty, +and hearing the wash of the Dead Man's sea, I want to chortle the best +I can, and try to cheer up my fellow man; to make a fellow forget his +care, and make him laugh when he wants to swear, is as much as a poet +can hope to do, whose lyre is twisted and broke in two. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIPPLING RHYMES*** + + +******* This file should be named 22692.txt or 22692.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/6/9/22692 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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