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Doneghy. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i1 {display: block; margin-left: 1em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i6 {display: block; margin-left: 6em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i10 {display: block; margin-left: 10em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i12 {display: block; margin-left: 12em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i16 {display: block; margin-left: 16em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i18 {display: block; margin-left: 18em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i20 {display: block; margin-left: 20em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i22 {display: block; margin-left: 22em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem .sect {margin-top: 2em; margin-left: 6em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Old Hanging Fork and Other Poems, by +George W. Doneghy + +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 www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Old Hanging Fork and Other Poems + +Author: George W. Doneghy + +Release Date: September 1, 2008 [EBook #26505] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE OLD HANGING FORK *** + + + + +Produced by David Garcia, Diane Monico, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Kentuckiana Digital Library) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1"></a></span></p> + + +<h2>THE</h2> + +<h1><span class="smcap">Old Hanging Fork</span></h1> + +<h2>and</h2> + +<h1><span class="smcap">Other Poems</span>.<br /><br /></h1> + + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>GEORGE W. DONEGHY.<br /><br /></h2> + + +<h4>FRANKLIN, OHIO:<br /> +The Editor Publishing Co.<br /> +1897.</h4> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3"></a></span></p> +<p class="center"> +Copyright, 1897,<br /> +By<br /> +George W. Doneghy.<br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS.</h2> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="toc"> +<tr><td align='left'> </td><td align='right'><span class="smcap"> page</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Old Hanging Fork,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Sweet September Days,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Yer Old Cob Pipe,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Tim Bluster's Dream,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_15">15</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Apple Blossoms,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_18">18</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Chickamauga,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Gen. John B. Gordon,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_22">22</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Up And Down Old Clark's Run,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_23">23</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Robert Burns</span> (A Paraphrase)</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_25">25</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Wishing—Fishing,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Poe,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Barren "Idealty,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Cherished Relic,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">"Restland,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">My Valentine,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Smoke,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_36">36</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Perryville,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Longings,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Down About Old Shakertown,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_40">40</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Memoria in Æterna,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_41">41</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Mother's Grave,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_43">43</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Freckle-Faced Boy,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Dam Below the Mill,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_46">46</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Serenade,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">"Is It Hot Enough Fer You?"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_49">49</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Token,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_50">50</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">To Scenes I Used to Know,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Bereft,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_54">54</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The "Bull Spring,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_56">56</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Familiar Haunts,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_58">58</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Faded Letter,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Hermit,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The "Medical Spring,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An "Idyl" of the Ball,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_64">64</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Dreams,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Twist of "Natural Leaf,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_66">66</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">George W. Childs,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_68">68</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Old Spring-House,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Camping on the Cumberland,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_71">71</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Easter Flower,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_73">73</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Stage Coach,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_74">74</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Dick's River,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">To a Little Boy,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">When the Coal House's Full,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">December,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_81">81</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Solace,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_82">82</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Frank L. Stanton,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Old Church Bell,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_85">85</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Summer Evening,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_87">87</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Father Ryan,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Meadow Path,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_89">89</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Fox Hunters,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Charming Girl of Somerset, </span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">In July,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_94">94</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">To J. R. M.,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_95">95</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Twilight,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_96">96</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Out uv "Politicks,"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Jones' Mare,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_100">100</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">That Old Straw Hat of Mine,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_103">103</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Tom Barbee's Pond,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_105">105</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Where?</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_107">107</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Hills of Lincoln,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_109">109</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Loved and Lost,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A True Story,</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_112">112</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="The" id="The"></a>The</h2> + +<h2>Old Hanging Fork</h2> + +<h3>and</h3> + +<h2>Other Poems.</h2> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_OLD_HANGING_FORK" id="THE_OLD_HANGING_FORK"></a>THE OLD HANGING FORK.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O don't you remember those days so divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around which the heart-strings all tenderly twine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When with sapling pole and a painted cork<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We fished up and down the old Hanging Fork—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the railroad bridge, with its single span,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clear down to the mill at Dawson's old dam—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From early morn till the shades of night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And it made no difference if fish <i>didn't</i> bite?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What pleasure it gives to think and to dream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of those long, happy days, and the old winding stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When we waded the creek with our pants to the knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And got our lines tangled in a sycamore tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And were most scared to death when out from the root<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The long, wriggling snake through the water did shoot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you lost your line, your hook and your cork,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I slipped and fell in the old Hanging Fork!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The years they have come, and the years they have fled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And frosted with silver the hairs of the head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still in fond memory there lingers the joy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of scenes such as these, when a bare-footed boy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wandered away to the clear rippling stream—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No cankering care to trouble life's dream;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we spit on our bait and in whispers we'd talk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As we threw out our lines in the old Hanging Fork!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We sat there and fished with the sun beaming down<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the tops of our heads through hats minus crown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when I got a bite or you caught a perch<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We'd just give our lines a thundering lurch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And land him high up on the bank in the weeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then string him along with the pumpkin seeds!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O don't you remember the hot, dusky walk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the white pike to the old Hanging Fork?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SWEET_SEPTEMBER_DAYS" id="SWEET_SEPTEMBER_DAYS"></a>SWEET SEPTEMBER DAYS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's a something in the atmosphere, in sweet September days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That mantles all the landscape with its languid, dreamy haze;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you see the leaves a-dropping, in a lazy kind of way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the maple trees are standing in their Summer-time array.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's a yellowish tinge a-creeping over Nature's emerald sheen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the cattle stand, half-sleeping, in the middle of the stream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the glassy pool is shaded by the overhanging limb,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the pebbly bottom's glinting where the silvery minnows swim.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The tasseled corn is nodding, and the crow on drowsy wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is sailing o'er the orchard where the ripening apples swing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the fleecy clouds are floating in the azure of the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the gentle breeze is sighing as it's idly wafted by.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cantaloupes are ripening in their yellow golden rinds;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the melons, round and juicy, are a-clinging to the vines;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the merry, laughing children, in their happy hour of play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are a-romping in the meadow and a-sliding down the hay.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The busy bees are buzzing where the grapes with purple blush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the hanging bunches tempting with their weight the arbor crush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the blue jays are a-wrangling in the wood across the road,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the hickory boughs are bending 'neath an extra heavy load.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let your poets keep a-singing about the Springtime gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the blossoms and the flowers in the merry month of May—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the early Autumn splendor, with its sweet September days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eclipses boasted Springtime in a thousand kind of ways!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="YER_OLD_COB_PIPE" id="YER_OLD_COB_PIPE"></a>YER OLD COB PIPE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the chilling winds of Winter come a-knocking at the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the fleecy flakes are flying and the earth is covered o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you've supped on sweet potatoes and a 'possum frosted ripe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then glory hallelujah! Git yer<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Cob<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Pipe!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the fire is blazing brightly and the room is snug and warm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you've left your cares and troubles on the outside with the storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your natural leaf is colored with a golden yellow stripe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then glory hallelujah! Git yer<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Cob<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Pipe!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the old split-bottom rocker is far better than a throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the visions of the fancy are the fairest earth has known,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you watch the mystic shapes that the dancing shadows write,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then glory hallelujah! Git yer<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Cob<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Pipe!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When your dressing gown and slippers might be envied by a king,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the voices of the children sound as sweet as birds' that sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the feelings that possess you are all of heavenly type,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then glory hallelujah! Git yer<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Cob<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Pipe!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the ringlets aromatic have circled round your head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a drowsiness o'ertakes you, and you want to go to bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the bowlful that you're smoking has burned to ashes white,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then glory hallelujah! Quit yer<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Cob<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Pipe!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TIM_BLUSTERS_DREAM" id="TIM_BLUSTERS_DREAM"></a>TIM BLUSTER'S DREAM.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Twas a place of fifty acres, in a lonely neighborhood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And near a grove of somber pines the shackly farm-house stood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the folks, for miles around, did solemnly declare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ghosts and goblins horrible held nightly revel there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They said the house was "hanted," and that not a man alive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all the country round about, could own the place and thrive;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That the cattle died with fever, and the hogs the cholera took—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every one that tried it wore a mighty troubled look.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But they put it up at auction, and Tim Bluster bid the most,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who always said "There want no hants nor any kind of ghost<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ever walked a graveyard in the middle of the night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Could make <i>his</i> nerves unsteady, or could fill <i>him</i> with affright!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So Tim got full possession, and he moved out to his home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the first night, as he sat there, within his room alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The door was softly opened, and a cat came walking in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With eyes like balls of fire and a coat as black as sin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then squatting on its haunches, it said, in tones polite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"There seems to be but two of us to stay in here to-night!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tim muttered in a trembling voice, as for the door he run,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Perhaps <i>you</i> think there will be two, but darn me, there's but one!"<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tim staid away the blessed night, but when the daylight came,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It brought him back his courage, and it filled him full of shame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he said, unto himself, "There wasn't any cat<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Could make him leave that room again—he'd bet his life on that!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So when the shades of evening fell, Tim double-barred the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And took precautions that, perhaps, he hadn't night before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And felt quite sure that nothing now could gain admittance there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And peacefully he dozed and slept, a-sitting in his chair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then, all at once, he roused himself, and opening wide his eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beheld a figure standing there that made his hair arise<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like quills upon a porcupine, and froze his heart with fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And headless though it was, it spoke, and said in accents clear,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"There seems to be but two of us to stay in here to-night!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tim made a bound, and took with him the sash and every light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he jumped a nine-rail fence, and down the road he spun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And said, "Perhaps <i>he</i> thinks there's two, but darn <i>me</i>, there's but one!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Twas seven miles before he stopped and sat down on a log<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To catch his breath and rest awhile from his nocturnal jog<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he turned his head around, and right before his face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The figure stood, and said to him, "I think we've had a race!"<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tim tried to speak, and not a word he found to utter then,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But as he jumped from off his seat and broke away again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He spluttered out, "I <i>know</i> we have, but think it's not quite done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For you can bet right now's the time we'll have another one!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Away Tim flew—he left the road, and through the woods and fields<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pace he set was wonderful, the ghost right at his heels!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that old house is tenantless, and slowly rotting down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since that dread night Tim had his dream, and moved right back to town!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="APPLE_BLOSSOMS" id="APPLE_BLOSSOMS"></a>APPLE BLOSSOMS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's the rose and the lily, the daisy and pink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many rare flowers which others may think<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are the fairest and best, the sweetest that blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With delicious perfume, and colors that glow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But go to the orchard and sniff the delight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the incense that's shed by the pink and the white,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let the soul float away in a swoon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the ambient air where the apple trees bloom!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's the cowslip, narcissus, and sweet mignonette,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The asters, verbenas, the fuschias; and yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As much as I love them in Summer array,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It's the white and the pink I dream of to-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I walk 'neath the branches that just interlace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shower their blossoms right down in my face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the breeze that is laden with rarest perfume<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is wafted along where the apple trees bloom!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With glad voices the birds as they flit to and fro<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are singing their songs where the pink and the snow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the orchard, bedecked in its garments so rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is diffusing and sending its breath on the air;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the rays of the sun sift through on the grass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the dew-drops that sparkle no jewels surpass!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Springtime at evening, at morning, at noon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How sweet is the scent of the apple trees' bloom!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when Summer is gone, and Autumn has shed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It's soft, dreamy haze through the trees overhead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On each spreading branch where blossoms now cling<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The red and the gold to the fruit it will bring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stripe with a skill and give it that blush<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only Nature can paint with her delicate brush!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O when life ebbs away, then make me a tomb<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Right out in the orchard, where the apple trees bloom!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHICKAMAUGA" id="CHICKAMAUGA"></a>CHICKAMAUGA.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To Chattanooga's vale, where flows the winding Tennessee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rugged Lookout sentinels heroic dust of sixty-three—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Chickamauga's gory field re-echoed to the cannon's roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shot and shell through serried ranks a bloody pathway tore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mountain slope and wood and field were lumined with the blaze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of musketry from Blue and Gray in those September days—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They come again, the gallant few, survivors of the fray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their breasts with hallowed memories filled, but passion passed away!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The fleeting years have silvered o'er the locks of those who live,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And turned to dust the sleeping ones who to their flag did give<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The last drop of the crimson tide from ghastly wounds poured out<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the conflict's awful din and wild resounding shout;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet it seems but yesterday, or like a passing dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When marshaled on the mountain's side they saw the bayonets gleam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As for a moment from the vale the battle's smoke was lifted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And circling o'er the Blue and Gray in lurid clouds it drifted!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now upon the blood-soaked ground once more they stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the unyielding "Rock of Chickamauga" held command,<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And strewed the field with heaps of the assaulting Gray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who dauntless rushed where lines of Blue refused to give the way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bloody scenes crowd thick and fast upon the memory here<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To fill the heart with grief and dim the eye with misty tear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spanning Time's chasm with the imagination's bridge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hear the thunder of the guns from Missionary Ridge!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And there the pyramid of balls is reared to tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mark the hallowed spot where tuneful genius fell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vagrant winds around it now seem sighing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The requiem sad of "I am dying, Egypt, dying!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prophetic words by gallant <span class="smcap">Lytle</span> penned—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A laurel wreath with immortelles to blend!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A halo hovers round about this gifted son,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose deathless name with pen and sword was nobly won!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They come to mark with tokens of their love and pride<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each consecrated spot where bleeding heroes fell and died,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gaze with reverence on some gently swelling mound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which hides the dust of comrade in his sleep profound;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To picture to the mind—with melancholy pleasure trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The unforgotten outlines of a dear, remembered face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which passed from loved ones and from life away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A victim on the bloody field of fratricidal fray!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="GENERAL_JOHN_B_GORDON" id="GENERAL_JOHN_B_GORDON"></a>GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON.</h2> + +<h3><i>Facile Princeps.</i></h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O gifted one of the Sunny South, with lips so eloquent,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In whose great heart no malice e'er was found!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now thou art a messenger of Peace, by heaven sent<br /></span> +<span class="i1">On mission of fraternity, to heal the cankering wound!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In that dread day when fratricidal strife<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Convulsed with passion—crimsoned with its blood—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No nobler son than thou who staked his life<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With veterans Gray withstood the overwhelming flood!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No sweeter tribute could be paid by mortal tongue—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No nobler sentiment the human heart could fill—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In grander strains no poet's praises e'er were sung<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of private soldier—than thy words that burn and thrill!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No treasured wrong within thy noble soul<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Has tainted with its slimy trail of hate—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No broader love of country could embrace the whole,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or bow more gracefully to iron hand of fate!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Speak on! And scatter broadcast healing seed<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That shall a harvest of good feeling yield—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Peace, no less than War, shall lend her meed<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And crown anew this hero of the bloody field!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="UP_AND_DOWN_OLD_CLARKS_RUN" id="UP_AND_DOWN_OLD_CLARKS_RUN"></a>UP AND DOWN OLD CLARK'S RUN.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bright visions of childhood! How dear to the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are the scenes which from memory can never depart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Undimmed by the sorrows, the grief and the tears<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which have shadowed the pathway of life's later years,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They come like the rainbow which follows the storm—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On remembrance reflected with colors as warm—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in dreams of delight they picture the fun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That we had long ago when we fished in Clark's Run!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With a can full of worms and a heart full of joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up and down the old stream, a bare-footed boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A truant from school, my footsteps would stray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the deep-shaded pool, or where ripples at play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As they flowed over beds of smooth-polished stones,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sang a lullaby sweet in soft undertones!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the dawn of the day to the set of the sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What pleasures we've had when we fished in Clark's Run!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Equipped with a pole, a hook and a line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stowed in some pocket a long piece of twine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On which you could string, if you seined for a week,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Every fish that was found up and down the old creek—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With one "gallus" to pants that were rolled to the knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And holes in our hats through which you could see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the sunbeams had turned the light hair to dun—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We hied us away to the banks of Clark's Run!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There we baited the hook and threw out the line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And watched the cork disappear with a rapture divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And felt just as proud as a prince or a king<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When we landed high up, with a jerk and a swing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fish that would measure two inches or more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then anchored him fast with the string to the shore!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But unnumbered now are the silver strands spun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the hair of the head since we fished in Clark's Run!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O who can there be with a heart in his breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would forget the dear scenes which so lovingly rest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the bosom when life has grown old and cold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And feel no delight when such pictures unfold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And would blot out forever from memory's page<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The records of childhood which solace old age?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Till time ends for me and with life I have done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'll dream of the days when we fished in Clark's Run!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ROBERT_BURNS" id="ROBERT_BURNS"></a>ROBERT BURNS.</h2> + +<h3>(A PARAPHRASE.)</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou lingering Star! No less'ning ray<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Will e'er bedim thy natal morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or usher in the unhallowed day<br /></span> +<span class="i1">When we forget that thou wert born!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Burns! Thou dear departed shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where is thy place of blissful rest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See'st thou again a Highland maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Who heard the groans that rent thy breast?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That sacred day can we forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Can we forget the hallowed spot<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where by the winding Ayr was set<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The sparkling jewel in lowly cot?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eternity will not efface<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The record dear of time that's past;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy memory sweet we still embrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And will as long as life shall last!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ayr, congealèd to its pebbled shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">O'erhung with wild woods, shorn of green;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The leafless birch and hawthorn hoar<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Were planted round the wintry scene;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No flowers sprang wanton to be pressed—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No birds sang love on every spray—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But brightest yet o'er all the rest<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Will ever shine thy natal day!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still o'er thy songs our rapture wakes,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And memory broods with miser care!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Time but their music sweeter makes,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As streams their channels deeper wear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Burns! Thou dear departed shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where is thy place of blissful rest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See'st thou again a Highland maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Who heard the groans that rent thy breast?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="WISHING_FISHING" id="WISHING_FISHING"></a>WISHING—FISHING.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Full well I know that wishing never yet has brought<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The things that seem to us would satisfy the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that anticipated pleasure, when at last 'tis caught,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Has naught but transitory solace to impart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet, somehow, I've ever felt and thought<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A joy there is that never can depart—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(As long as we are capable of feeling—wishing)—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And that's to leave dull care behind, and—go a-fishing!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some dream of wealth—of place—of fame—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And fleeting shadows vainly they pursue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some have sighed to win a deathless name<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where fields of carnage corpses thickly strew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shrieks of agony are heard 'mid smoke and flame;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But these are dizzy heights attained by few;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, when Dame Fortune is her favors dishing,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I hope that I'll get mine in ample time to—go a-fishing!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, was there ever any sweeter dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or music with a tone that's more entrancing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than just to wander where some mountain stream<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Is o'er the rocks and polished pebbles dancing?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nothing short of heaven itself, I ween,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Is like the moment when, his scales all glancing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You see the happy consummation of your wishing,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And catch the very fish for which you have been fishing!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="POE" id="POE"></a>POE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, melancholy child of want and woe!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A brilliant meteor in an ebon sky!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy soul's weird music all did flow<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From heart-strings touched by destiny!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Raven, perched above thy chamber door,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Responsive croaked with a prophetic word—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For in the realm of song may "Nevermore"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Such strains as thine by mortal ear be heard!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where now doth that proud spirit dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose earthly days were clouded o'er with gloom?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In regions with the sweet-voiced "Israfel,"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where never-fading flowerets bloom?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dost rest within some "distant Aidenn,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Beyond the Night's Plutonian shore?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And clasp again a sainted maiden<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whom the angels name Lenore?"<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes, "echo through the corridors of Time"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Will have a tone that ages yet will know,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And blend with all that's beautiful—sublime—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The deathless name of Edgar Allan Poe!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_BARREN_IDEALTY" id="A_BARREN_IDEALTY"></a>A BARREN "IDEALTY."</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">This song that I sing—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It is not of a spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor yet of a silvery stream—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But of a vision bright<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which came last night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the garb of a blissful dream—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I thought, as I lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It was Thanksgiving Day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I was invited to dine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where a table stood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On which everything good<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spread a feast that was almost divine!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Where the savors arose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Right under my nose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From turkey—and pumpkin pies;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And from jolly roast pig<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were slices as big<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As some of the campaign lies!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And celery so white<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Twas a thing of delight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bite the crisp stalks in two.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the cranberry sauce—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh, I tell you 'twas boss—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And flanked by an oyster stew!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Where the bread and the cake—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The best they can bake—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were cut into slices heroic.<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +<span class="i2">And the amber ice cream<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Melted into my dream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like love to the heart of a 'poet';<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And they heaped up my plate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I sat there and ate<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till I awoke with a yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a shiver and shake<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a pain and an ache<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That rudely my dream did dispel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">But dreams, as you know,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By contraries go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus I fear if it will be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With the one of delight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That came last night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I feasted so heartily;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Thanksgiving Day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the usual way<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will come to me, don't you see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the dinner I had<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the ache that was bad<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prove a——barren "idealty"!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_CHERISHED_RELIC" id="A_CHERISHED_RELIC"></a>A CHERISHED RELIC.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In the attic, unused, there they put it away;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old oaken frame has begun to decay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What iron's about it is eaten with rust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And upon and around it are cobwebs and dust;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dear, loving hands that on it have spun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With labor and toil forever are done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And long is the time since I saw them unreel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The threads, snowy white, from the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It stood on a porch where the Summer sunshine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sifted down to the floor through a clambering vine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose tendrils about the lattice-work clung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like my heart-strings round her, and the song that she sung;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the pictures of fancy I con o'er and o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till, raptured, I see the dear features once more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thrill with the touch when her lips set the seal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of her love, as she spun on the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then through the shadows and mists of many long years<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old cottage home to the vision appears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though youth it has fled, and the hair it is gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'm a bare-footed boy returned to his play—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forgetting the present to dream once again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That life had no anguish, no sorrow, no pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sweetly the bells of the memory peal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When communing up there with the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And back from the past, with its grief and its joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come the tones of a voice I heard when a boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I see once again, as it moved to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A form that now rests where the wild roses blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the sentinel stars their love vigils keep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Above the dear one in her long, dreamless sleep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But memories sweet to a heart that can feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still cluster around the old spinning-wheel.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some spokes from the rim are broken and gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And it stands there forsaken, neglected, alone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It knows naught of language, but a story can tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a charm that for me time cannot dispel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And often I climb the old attic stair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The love of my childhood with it to share,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And emotions possess me I cannot conceal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When fondly I gaze on the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The distaff is worn and smooth with the touch<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the now folded hands that used it so much;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lingering there I clearly can trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweet smile of love from a well-cherished face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which sheds round about it a halo divine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When thus I am kneeling at memory's shrine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hallows the thoughts which on the mind steal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When up there alone with the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis then that I see her in saintly guise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the fast-welling tears that come to my eyes—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A vision arrayed in raiment white<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That beckons to me from the regions of light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And illumines the way that my footsteps may tread<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unerringly where her love for me led—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the straight path that she tried to reveal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As she taught me, and spun on the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes, the finger of Time has furrowed the brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And silvered the hair, yet I dream of her now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As when, long ago, I heard as a child<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The words of her love that my sorrows beguiled;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this relic she used but brings back anew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The morning of life, that was fresh with the dew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Distilled from the heart, as she taught me to kneel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Right down by her side, and the old spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="RESTLAND" id="RESTLAND"></a>"RESTLAND."</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN IN THE DANVILLE (KY.) CEMETERY.</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within thy hallowed precincts on this sweet autumnal day,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">We're wandering 'neath the cedar and the pine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where rests the sacred dust of loved ones passed away,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And bleeding hearts a melancholy pleasure find.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In memory's faithful mirror here once more we trace<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Familiar forms of those in life we knew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And see again the shadowy outlines of some face<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That, living, beamed with kindness—ever true.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old age, and manhood's prime, and helpless infancy<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Have dotted o'er with many an emerald mound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And marked each stone with mournful tracery<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Which stands within this consecrated ground.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And there the marble shaft its stately head<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In polished whiteness pointing to the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here the modest tribute to the lowly dead—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The silent monitors that tell us all must die.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lavish Nature her bright smile imparts<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And decks with lovely flowers in early Spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here the sympathetic tear unbidden starts,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And loving hands their sweetest tributes bring.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Loved spot! A solace to the living 'tis to know<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That when at last—life's fitful fever o'er—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cortege sad, with solemn step and slow,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Shall bear us here, to rest forever more,—<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VII.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Till that bright day when ransomed spirits rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And loved and lost shall reunited be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To dwell in realms beyond the star-lit skies<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Throughout one circling, vast eternity!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="MY_VALENTINE" id="MY_VALENTINE"></a>MY VALENTINE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I passed her on the crowded street—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This winsome maid, demure and sweet—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And envious saw the silken tresses<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That seemed to give her cheeks caresses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rapture felt that thrilled me through<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When on me glanced those eyes of blue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From underneath the drooping lashes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That could not hide their azure flashes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And oh, I dreampt of bliss divine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If she would be—my Valentine!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And visions of as fair a face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As painter's pencil e'er did trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would haunt the mind each waking hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And slumber owned its magic power—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until I found by merest chance<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That belladonna made the glance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And borrowed hair had lent its aid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For silken tresses of this maid—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And padding—paint—did all combine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To make for me—my Valentine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_SMOKE" id="A_SMOKE"></a>A SMOKE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O others may boast of their pleasures galore—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The miser with rapture may count o'er his store,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some may imagine great happiness there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the gay shining beam of Society's glare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But best of all comforts a feller can know,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While wintry winds whistle and fast flies the snow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is a pipe after supper, by a bright blazing fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Encircled with ringlets that curl high and higher!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O doctors may tell you and others declare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It'll shorten your days and your heart will impair—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That nicotine poison will flow through your veins<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nervous distraction will rack with its pains;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what cares a feller in slippers and gown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When wintry winds whistle and snow's pouring down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With papers and books, and his feet near the fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Encircled with ringlets that curl high and higher?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O rare are the fancies, contentment and bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That drive away care in an hour such as this!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the ills of this life and the things that provoke<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are lost for the while in the blue curling smoke<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a pipe and tobacco that's yellow as gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And raptures supernal the senses unfold.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O give me a chair by a bright blazing fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sweet-smelling ringlets that curl high and higher!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="PERRYVILLE" id="PERRYVILLE"></a>PERRYVILLE.</h2> + +<h3>FOUGHT OCTOBER 8th, 1862.</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here on this spot, where Nature now, with chilling, icy breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has mantled in a robe of white the field of strife and death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We view in memory once again the awful scenes where met<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In serried ranks the Blue and Gray—and tears the lashes wet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For those who fell that dreadful day are mingled with the dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And often here the plow upturns a bayonet red with rust:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sad memento of the time when passion held full sway—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reminder to the rustic swain of fratricidal fray.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">From yonder hill the shotted guns in dreadful chorus rang—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on this plain was heard that day the glittering sabre's clang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in that vale, where wound the brook, with waters murmuring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We stood and heard the Minie balls their deadly message sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saw the life blood, gushing red, from stricken comrade near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose gentle voice his loved ones then no more should ever hear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His blue eyes close—his bosom heave—his pulse forever still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sacrifice to cause held dear, on the field of Perryville!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And the swiftly circling years can ne'er erase<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From Memory's tablets or from Nature's face<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> +<span class="i0">One spot of all the rest we're standing near—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By fiercely battling hosts the prize held dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old spring's waters still are gurgling from the rock<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where famished soldiers knelt—grim Death himself to mock;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here on that day in ghastly heaps they lay—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Commingling with the Blue the men that wore the Gray!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now the virgin snow has covered o'er the sod<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where once in fierce array contending armies trod;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wintry wind makes mournful music through the trees<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where then the clash of arms was floating on the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And deep-toned guns belched forth the screaming shell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like fiendish messengers of Death let loose from hell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now Nature's peaceful emblem spread o'er glade and hill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enwraps beneath its folds the bloody field of Perryville.<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">December 26, 1895.</span> +</div></div> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LONGINGS" id="LONGINGS"></a>LONGINGS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gim me back my stone-bruised heel,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And them tow-linen pants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' that old pole an' line an' reel,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">An' all them boyhood ha'nts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' that old hat I used to wear,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That didn't hav' no crown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' that same crop uv yeller hair—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Sun-burnt on top ter brown—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' them playmates I used ter know,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">An' loved like very brothers—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' you kin let the old world go<br /></span> +<span class="i1">An' giv' its wealth ter others!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gim me back one gallus, too,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That buttoned with a peg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' them blamed ticks that burrowed through<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The skin uv either leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' that old single-barrel gun,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As crooked as a rail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' that same dog that used ter run<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The molly cotton-tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' lem me hav' the tops I spun—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The kites that I hav' sailed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' then at last, when life is done,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Who'd keer if it had failed?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="DOWN_ABOUT_OLD_SHAKERTOWN" id="DOWN_ABOUT_OLD_SHAKERTOWN"></a>DOWN ABOUT OLD SHAKERTOWN.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You may boast about the landscapes fair so far across the sea<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of castled Rhine, and southern France, and favored Italy—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But have you seen, when Springtime flings the scented blossoms down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The forests and the meadows green around old Shakertown?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You may boast of some that bask beneath perpetual Summer's smiles—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those "Eden's of the eastern wave"—the sunny Grecian isles—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And others that perhaps you've seen, of beauty and renown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But come and view the country spread around old Shakertown!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O come and boast that you have been where Nature's lavish hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bestowed the gifts of wood and field that vie with any land—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where valleys wear a velvet robe—the hills an emerald crown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of bluegrass shimmering in the sun, around old Shakertown!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O come to old Kentucky then, and to her garden spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then wander wheresoe'er you will, it ne'er will be forgot—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Nature's face is wreathed in smiles nor wears a single frown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mar the beauty she has spread around old Shakertown!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="MEMORIA_IN_AETERNA" id="MEMORIA_IN_AETERNA"></a>MEMORIA IN ÆTERNA.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet Memory! thou faculty divine—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Triumphant o'er the cruel hand of Time!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On thy tablets we may trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lines his fingers ne'er efface,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And take with us till latest day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The images that light our way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And picture thus in a shadowy form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loved and lost he's from us torn—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their lids by Death so early sealed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life's crimson tide by him congealed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tyrant has not all concealed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They in thy mirror still revealed!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Before the morning sunbeams kissed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The face of Nature—veiled in mist—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heralded with golden ray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The opening of the perfect day—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere yet the sable shades of night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At dawn's approach had winged their flight—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We've listed to the whispering breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That's wafted o'er the trembling trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And seemed to hear the voices sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of loved ones now we ne'er can meet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till earthly night shall pass away—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Supplanted by immortal day!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And thus in retrospective mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alone with Nature's solitude<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In some secluded sylvan dell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her myriad voices float and swell<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And flitting shadows softly tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of dear ones lost—yet loved so well!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then to the sunny home where dwelt—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Ere yet the envious tyrant dealt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blow that blighted hopes have felt)—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fond fancy wanders, and can see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once happy scenes that ne'er can be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lost in thy shades, O Memory!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But those to us so cruelly denied<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are drifting now upon some fairer tide—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their scattered ashes on Hope's pinions rise<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And people realms beyond the azure skies!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then may our faltering footsteps lead<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To where fond hearts may never bleed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where vanished faces, cherished forms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are anchored safe from life's rude storms;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where strains seraphic, soft and low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rapt ear greet, and we shall know<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loved and lost we only see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In visions of sweet Memory!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_MOTHERS_GRAVE" id="A_MOTHERS_GRAVE"></a>A MOTHER'S GRAVE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The years have passed in ceaseless round<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Since first they laid her here to rest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In dreamless sleep beneath the silent mound,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With folded hands upon her gentle breast.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The ivy twines about the crumbling stone,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And Springtime's scented blossoms fling<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their incense o'er the peaceful home<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That knows no more of suffering.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Full many a Summer's sun has shed<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its brightest smile upon the hallowed spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sobered Autumn and wild Winter spread<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Their garments here—she heeds them not!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The feathered wildlings of the wood and field<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Their untaught melody around it make,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But she who sleeps with eyes so softly sealed<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Their gladsome songs can never more awake.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O restful sleep beneath the crumbling mold<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To dream no more of hopes unrealized!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Grave! What treasures do thy confines hold<br /></span> +<span class="i1">By us so dearly loved and fondly prized!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_FRECKLE-FACED_BOY" id="A_FRECKLE-FACED_BOY"></a>A FRECKLE-FACED BOY.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I'm just in my glory when the cat I can tease,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or I'm hunting for bird nests up in the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I wear out my pants in the seat and the knees;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'm the pride of my daddy, my mammy's own joy—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A frolicsome, rollicksome, freckle-faced boy!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can make a top hum, and at marbles, you bet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'm the cock of the walk and the king of the "set;"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'm hearty and healthy—and don't you forget<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dead loads of "goodies" that I can destroy—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'm a frolicsome, rollicksome, freckle-faced boy!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They send me to school with my satchel and books,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my pockets bulged out with nails and fish-hooks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sometimes while there my teacher she looks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And captures the things that provoke and annoy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From a frolicsome, rollicksome, freckle-faced boy!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My mammy she says that it's quite evident<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the country some day I'll be President;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But auntie, she says from the way I am bent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gold of her dream will be full of alloy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From a frolicsome, rollicksome, freckle-faced boy!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I'm huntin' for fun, and I don't have a care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there's dirt on my hands, and I don't comb my hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And off-colored patches quite often I wear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But there's no kind of sport the young heart can cloy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a frolicsome, rollicksome, freckle-faced boy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_DAM_BELOW_THE_MILL" id="THE_DAM_BELOW_THE_MILL"></a>THE DAM BELOW THE MILL.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Springtime am a-comin', and the dogwood soon will bloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the blossoms ten times thicker than the green leaves are in June,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if yer want some pleasure that I nominate divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just git yer minnow bucket, and yer hook and pole and line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And slip away some mornin', when the weather's bright and still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hang a four-pound jumper at the dam below the mill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There are lots of other pleasures in the old world here below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a mighty heap of happiness a feller 'll never know—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never mind about 'em—just yer slip away and feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That something so delectable that over yer will steal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For it sets the pulses beatin' with a magic kind of thrill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When yer hang a four-pound jumper at the dam below the mill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When yer 'gin to take the fever, and yer feel it comin' on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why yer boun' ter go a-fishin', just as shore as yer born;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then ye'd better git yer trapping's in the proper kind o' fix,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And go and hear the music when yer reel a-spinnin' clicks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For he rushes through the water at a pace that's fit ter kill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When yer hang a four-pound jumper at the dam below the mill!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_SERENADE" id="THE_SERENADE"></a>THE SERENADE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The winds were hushed, and thin and high<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The fleecy clouds were drifting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And through them as she sailed the sky<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The moon's soft light was sifting.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beneath her pale and tender ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its silvery kiss imprinting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All dew-bedecked each flower and spray<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Like myriad jewels glinting.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Across the lawn there floats the sound<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of music sweet—entrancing—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Neath a latticed casement, ivy-bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where love-lit eyes were glancing.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The flute and harp and mandolin<br /></span> +<span class="i1">There dulcet notes were blending,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And strains divine from a violin<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In harmony ascending.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Enraptured by the magic spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I lingering stood, and listening,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It seemed to me that I could tell<br /></span> +<span class="i1">What love to her was whispering.<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">* * * * *<br /></span> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I looked above and chanced to see<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The man in the moon was scowling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For they had struck up "Sweet Marie,"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And the old watch-dog was howling!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IS_IT_HOT_ENOUGH_FER_YOU" id="IS_IT_HOT_ENOUGH_FER_YOU"></a>"IS IT HOT ENOUGH FER YOU?"</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I wouldn't mind the weather much—I'd sizzle and I'd stew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And do the very best I could the heat to struggle through,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I could find some way, you know, the feller to eschew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who greets you with the chestnut phrase—<br /></span> +<span class="i10">"<span class="smcap">Is it hot enough fer you?</span>"<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The mercury might climb the tube and spill right out the top—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweat might ooze from every pore and off my carcass drop—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wouldn't mind the heat at all, and keep my temper too,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If it wasn't for the cuss who says—<br /></span> +<span class="i10">"<span class="smcap">Is it hot enough fer you?</span>"<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun might shine his level best—the sky seem molten brass—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The heat might dry up every stream, and burn up all the grass—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The evening come without a breeze—the morning have no dew—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If it wasn't for the 'moke' who asks<br /></span> +<span class="i10">"<span class="smcap">Is it hot enough fer you?</span>"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_TOKEN" id="THE_TOKEN"></a>THE TOKEN.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a ringlet of flaxen hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Tied with a ribbon blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laid by the hand of a mother there—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Cherished with love so true!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a soft and silken curl,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Bound with a knotted bow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Worn on the head of a little girl<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Lost in the long-ago.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a hallowed treasure kept<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From the grave's decay and mold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over which her eyes have wept<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With anguish all untold!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a link in the golden chain,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">By Death's cold hand unbroken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which leads to where she'll meet again<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The wearer of this token.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a relic undefiled,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Enshrined in a broken heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rent in twain when a darling child<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And a loving mother part!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Only a ringlet of flaxen hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Tied with a ribbon blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clipped from the head of an angel fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose hands are beckoning you!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TO_SCENES_I_USED_TO_KNOW" id="TO_SCENES_I_USED_TO_KNOW"></a>TO SCENES I USED TO KNOW.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can see the back-log blazing and the sparkles take their flight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up the cavernous old chimney on a merry Christmas night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can see the old folks smiling and the children's cheeks aglow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a saucy maiden standing there beneath the mistletoe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can hear the laughter mingle with the strains of music sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As we tripped the light fantastic with the "many-twinkling feet;"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can see the moonlight gleaming through the trees upon the snow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When memory takes me back again to scenes I used to know.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can see the candles burning bright upon the Christmas tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can see the presents handed round, and hear the shouts of glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from the buried years there comes a-stealing on the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A something indefinable which bids the tear-drop start;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can see the blue smoke curling, through the little strip of wood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Between the winding turnpike road and where the farmhouse stood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can see the colts a-playing, I can hear the cattle low—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When memory takes me back again to scenes I used to know.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can see it all when fancy weaves its magic with a dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I hear the tones from voices like the murmur of a stream;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And oh, the heart seems young again and from its anguish free<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I gaze upon these pictures that are ever dear to me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then I see the darkies dancing, I can hear the fiddle ring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As they gathered in the cabin and they cut the pigeon-wing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can smell the 'possum roasting, I can see the cider flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When memory takes me back again to scenes I used to know.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="BEREFT" id="BEREFT"></a>BEREFT.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more to feel the pressure warm<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of dimpled arms around your neck—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more to clasp the little form<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That Nature did with beauty deck.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more to hear the music sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of merry laugh and prattling talk—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more to see the busy feet<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Come toddling down the shaded walk.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more the glint of flaxen hair<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That nestled 'round the lilied brow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more the rose's bloom will wear<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The cheek so cold and pallid now.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more the light from loving eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose hue was like the violet blown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Summer's softest, bluest skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Had lent it coloring from their own.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more to fondly bend above<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The little one when slumber wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sweetest dreams, the smile of love<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The placid features then had caught.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more on earth—oh, nevermore!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The shattered idols of the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can yearning love nor time restore—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But—you may meet to never part!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_BULL_SPRING" id="THE_BULL_SPRING"></a>THE "BULL SPRING."</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the burning sun of Summer shines from out a brassy sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And has parched and browned the meadows, and the creek's run dry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sweet it is to wander there and hear the water sing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It's rippling song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since Logan and the pioneers first stood upon its bank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heard it gurgle from the rock, and of its waters drank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With ceaseless music in its flow, like silvery chimes that ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has been the song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Around about the fields and woods of old "Magnolia" spread—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Indigenous to "tansy"—"mint"—and the lithe-limbed thoroughbred;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And far above, on drowsy wing, the crow seems listening<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the rippling song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No music that I've ever heard seems half so soft and sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As that in silvery tones it makes while flowing at your feet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sometimes when I'm far away I'd give most anything<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hear the song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis then that fancy wanders, and I sit and fondly dream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I'm gazing in its liquid depths and see the pebbles gleam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As when in happy childhood, and free from sorrow's sting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I heard the song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And I sniff again the flavor of the aromatic breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the mint-bed and the tansy, as it floated through the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hear music mingle of the birds upon the wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the laughing song of gladness from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">"Bull<br /></span> +<span class="i20">Spring!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FAMILIAR_HAUNTS" id="FAMILIAR_HAUNTS"></a>FAMILIAR HAUNTS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give me the patches on my pants, the freckles on my face—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The happy heart where cankering care had never found a place—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let my bare feet walk again that dirt road down the hill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That led me to the river's brink, beyond the old Mock Mill!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give me the youthful friends I knew, now scattered far and wide—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loved ones who have passed beyond the bounds of time and tide—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let me see the rose's hue that mantled every cheek<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When we were run-aways from school, a-fishing in the creek.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give me the stone-bruise on my heel, the hat without a crown—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The unkempt suit of yellow hair the sun had burnt to brown—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let me go and soak myself, just where we used to walk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In that old swimmin' pool we had, up on the Hanging Fork!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give me the wealth I used to have—a wealth of vast content—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pockets that were always full—but in them not a cent—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let me hear the music sweet the wild birds used to sing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In woods and fields I wandered o'er, beyond the Old Cove Spring!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give me—but what's the use of wishing for the days that won't return—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vanished faces of the friends for whom we fondly yearn?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And what's the use of trying to look beyond the misty screen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Time's hand has hung between the eye and each familiar scene?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_FADED_LETTER" id="A_FADED_LETTER"></a>A FADED LETTER.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O what memories sweet entwine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around each word and faded line!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yellow and dim with the touch of years,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soiled with the marks of tears—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sacred treasure of the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which death alone can from him part—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A letter—cherished as no other—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ending with the name of—Mother!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Writ it was to a wayward boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When life to him seemed full of joy—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pleading with him so to live<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he her heart no grief would give—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That after years might ne'er be fraught<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sorrow that himself had wrought:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"May guardian angels 'round you hover,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She wrote—and signed the name of—Mother!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The paper has the taint of must—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hand that traced the lines is dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And silvery hair is on the head<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of that same boy since first he read<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This missive from the sainted one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bore her love to an erring son—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More fondly prized than any other—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twas written by the hand of—Mother!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_HERMIT" id="THE_HERMIT"></a>THE HERMIT.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By the waters of a river, where the rocks like giants stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There a stranger, young and favored, built a home with his own hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hewed the logs and reared the roof-tree, where for years alone he dwelt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wanderer from the sunny Southland, and from pangs his heart had felt.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Legend says high-born and wealthy, seeking there in Nature's wilds<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To forget a maiden fickle, basking in a rival's smiles.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where the music of the wild birds, echoed from the cliffs around,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blended with the voice of waters, flowing past with silvery sound;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where in Springtime wild flowers blooming shed their incense day and night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the rugged cliff-sides wearing robes of dogwood, snowy white;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where in Summer old trees spreading overhead a leafy roof<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flung their shadows, deep and cooling, 'gainst the burning sunbeams proof;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where in Winter wild winds raving whistled 'round his lonely home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the swollen torrent rushing struck the rocks with sullen tone—<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He a sunnier clime forsaking for the "dark and bloody ground,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the forest stretched unbroken—there the wanderer rest had found.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All of human-kind deserting, where no din of toil and strife<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ever came to break the stillness—there he spent a hermit's life.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All his frugal wants supplying from the storehouse Nature gave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nevermore his footsteps bending toward where Hope had found its grave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Striving to forget the false one, dwelling 'neath her sunny skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who had left the arrow rankling in his heart with honied lies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long ago she was forgotten, and at last surcease had come—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For his heart was stilled forever, and his lips were sealed and dumb.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long he lay beside the river, flowing sweetly there to-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where was found a bleaching skeleton, and a rude hut in decay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There where briars in tangled network sway above a little mound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rest the bones of Southern stranger, in the "dark and bloody ground!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_MEDICAL_SPRING" id="THE_MEDICAL_SPRING"></a>THE "MEDICAL SPRING."</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let tipplers all boast of the pleasure divine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That is found in old whisky, in beer and in wine—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what are all those to a feller who knows<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the "Medical Spring" in its purity flows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And has knelt at its brink and just drank his fill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the clear, sparkling fluid, from Nature's own still?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How often I've strayed on a hot Summer's day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where it gurgles and gushes, then flows on its way<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a ripple as sweet as the music that died<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the tones of loved voices are to us denied,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mirrored my face in the "Medical Spring,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the beetling old cliffs their cool shadows fling!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not riches, nor honors, nor place do I crave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere they lay me at last to rest in the grave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh, let me hear its music once more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drink from its depths while I kneel on its shore—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then bear me away on the Death Angel's wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While my lips are yet moist from the "Medical Spring!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="AN_IDYL_OF_THE_BALL" id="AN_IDYL_OF_THE_BALL"></a>AN "IDYL" OF THE BALL.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In reel, in waltz, in lancer's maze,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">She moved with pretty air of grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the ball-room's brilliant blaze<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Seemed borrowed brightness from her face!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, winsome maid, demure and sweet!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I'll ne'er forget when first I met her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saw the dainty slippered feet<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Glide o'er the floor at Linnietta!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, dreams of youth and beauty rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">What rose-hued visions thou canst paint!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But none in loveliness compare<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With her who seemed Love's patron saint!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her pictured image haunts the mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And, oh, I never can forget her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor rarer pleasure hope to find<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Than dance with her at Linnietta!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Arrayed in softly flowing gown,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The love-light flashing from her eyes—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With cheeks aglow like roses blown<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Beneath the ardent summer skies—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No artist hand could fitly trace<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The wondrous charm that did beset her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When tripping with a fairy's grace<br /></span> +<span class="i1">O'er the waxen floor at Linnietta!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="DREAMS" id="DREAMS"></a>DREAMS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sweetest dreams, it seems to me, that we can ever know,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are those the fancy brings to us of days of long-ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When rainbow-tinted pictures all are like a mirage flung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the canvas memory weaves—of days when we were young.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The step may falter, eye be dim—the brow may wrinkles wear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And underneath the crumbling mould our friends be sleeping there—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh, these visions come to us as to the rose the dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And while with raptured gaze we look the heart seems ever new.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, when perhaps at last we're left a laggard on life's stage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This is the mellowed draught we quaff our longings to assuage—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As sweet as that from Paradise the smiling Houris hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Prophet's faithful followers when at its gates they stand!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If one last prayer were left to me for my declining days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its form should be that I might hear the chimes that memory plays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when at last upon my grave the wavy grass had sprung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some passer-by could truly say "His heart was ever young!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_TWIST_OF_NATURAL_LEAF" id="A_TWIST_OF_NATURAL_LEAF"></a>A TWIST OF "NATURAL LEAF."</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some sing of the lily, some sing of the rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some sing of each flower in beauty that blows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sing me a song that shall render its meed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the fragrance and aroma found in a weed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which banishes care and mitigates grief—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mean a big twist of old "natural leaf!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When sorrow's dark mantle the spirit doth wear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the heart is oppressed with the demon of care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then get out your pipe and its magic invoke<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all of your troubles will vanish in smoke!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, you who have tried it will know what I mean<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the praises I sing of a hank of long green!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since the days of King James and his old counterblast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its sway of all classes has ever held fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And its patron saint Raleigh forever will live<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In remembrance as sweet as affection can give,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the incense we burn is an offering seen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In wreaths of blue smoke from a twist of long green!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now some may advise you and others may swear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That nicotine poison your nerves will impair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if from the weed you'd just kept aloof<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From heartburn and palsy you'd surely been proof—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a man who had died at a hundred fifteen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was hastened away by smoking long green!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But a cigar, a pipe, or a good juicy chew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will yield you more comfort than harm they will do,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And murder the microbes that float in the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make magical dreams in the old arm-chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If you will remember, and never forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To just draw the line at a vile cigarette!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="GEORGE_W_CHILDS" id="GEORGE_W_CHILDS"></a>GEORGE W. CHILDS.</h2> + +<h3><span class="smcap">February 4th</span>, 1894.</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Gone to his exceeding great reward,"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The friend of rich and poor alike;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there'll rest not beneath the sward<br /></span> +<span class="i1">More shining mark that death could strike.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The benefactor of his race—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">His noble soul from avarice free;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By heaven lent the sordid earth to grace—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A nation's tears sincerely shed for thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thrice blest the one, in lowly lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Contented with an humble place,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who by thy noble heart was ne'er forgot<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And knew thy smiling, loving face!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, thus too early snatched away<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From generous act and loving deed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thousands will now deplore the day—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thousands now whose hearts will bleed!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The heaven-pointing shaft for thee<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its stately head might never raise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thy sweet memory would ever be<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Hymned by thy fellow-mortals' praise!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, thanks to Him who in His image made<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And to the world this beacon gave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With tears we'll water flowers that never fade<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And gently drop upon his new-made grave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_OLD_SPRING-HOUSE" id="THE_OLD_SPRING-HOUSE"></a>THE OLD SPRING-HOUSE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With its rude walls of stone and its moss-covered roof—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">('Tis a picture inwoven with memory's woof)—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It stands there to-day, as it stood in the years<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When we knew naught of sorrow—nor anguish—nor tears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though far from it now, I can see it at will—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old spring-house at the foot of the hill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O flights of fond fancy that deeply inurn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet scenes of our childhood, no more to return!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which carry us back in visions and dreams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And illumine life's pathway with memory's gleams—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till we see once again, though with tears the eyes fill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old spring-house at the foot of the hill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There we children, bare-footed, would wander to play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wade in the branch that flowed on its way<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the meadows and fields with current so fleet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a gurgle and ripple that sounded so sweet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the water that helped turn the wheel at the mill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was from the spring-house at the foot of the hill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And, oh! I remember a pair of blue eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With glances as tender and soft as the skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a little brown head that was covered with curls,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the laughter that rippled between rows of pearls,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which was changed to a cry of despair and of woe<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the craw-fish was clinging to a little pink toe!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Distilled by the heart into memory's wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis thus that we drink a draught that's divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lighten the burdens which after years bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And banish with dreaming the demon of Care!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O in fond recollection I linger there still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the old spring-house at the foot of the hill!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though vanished forever the faces that smiled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hushed is the laughter I heard when a child—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet often when musing they float back to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I see them and hear it as clear as can be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I'm playing again, while the heart strings all thrill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the old spring house at the foot of the hill!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CAMPING_ON_THE_CUMBERLAND" id="CAMPING_ON_THE_CUMBERLAND"></a>CAMPING ON THE CUMBERLAND.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where the Cumberland flows on its way to the South,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From its source in the hills half-way to its mouth—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Autumn has come and tempered the rays<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the hot blazing sun with its soft mellow haze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is an Eden of bliss and a place of delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the minnows are good and the "jumpers" will bite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a fellow's well fixed with a reel and a pole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And other "equipments"—(of which I've been told)!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To camp there and fish for a week at a time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And have the four-pounders just tug at your line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is a feeling akin to sweet visions we see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When we dream of that home where we all hope to be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And no king in the world who sits on a throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E'er felt the rare joy that thrills to the bone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When you throw out your line and it whizzes away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just cutting the water to foamy white spray!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He darts here and there, dead game to the last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When he feels the barbed hook and finds that he's fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And plunges and struggles, disdaining to yield,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till exhausted at last to the bank he is reeled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And carefully lifted from out the old stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While he flounders and gasps and his scaly sides gleam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you measure his length and guess at his weight—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Five inches too long and a pound too great)!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when shadows of evening are gathering around,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the sun with pure gold each hill-top has crowned,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then pick up your trappings and leisurely wend<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your way back to camp, above the long bend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the cook has prepared a supper, I trow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ne'er dreamt of in thoughts of Delmonico!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you'll sit there and eat for an hour or more<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With an appetite keen—and unheard of before!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now bring out your pipe and fill up the bowl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And loll there and smoke till it seems that the soul<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is wafted away like the ringlets that rise<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As blue as the dome of the star-jeweled skies!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then roll in a blanket with your feet to the blaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the croak of the frogs and the ripple that plays<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will lull you to sleep with music as sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As that of the song when the angels you greet!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="AN_EASTER_FLOWER" id="AN_EASTER_FLOWER"></a>AN EASTER FLOWER.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The flower that she gave to me<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Has withered now and died—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet with fond fidelity<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its faded leaves abide.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The petals that so fragrant then<br /></span> +<span class="i1">She wore upon her breast—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still clinging to the lifeless stem,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With miser care possessed.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As when in sweetest purity<br /></span> +<span class="i1">It shed its perfume rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A symbol dear 'twill ever be<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of one divinely fair!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Plucked by the cruel hand of Death<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In beauty's youthful bloom—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She perished with his chilling breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And withered in the tomb.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I will cherish ever thus<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The token that she gave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When sun-lit skies were over us,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Unclouded by the grave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_STAGE_COACH" id="THE_STAGE_COACH"></a>THE STAGE COACH.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No matter what the weather was, in good old stage coach days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The driver with his ruddy face and spanking team of bays<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would spin along the turnpike road, o'er level stretch and hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wound away from "Idleburg" to classic Nicholasville.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The depths beneath his seat were filled with leathern sacks of mail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the coach's top at times was crowded to the rail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With trunks, valises, packages, and bundles by the score,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That must have weighed, it seemed to me, five thousand pounds or more.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And strapped within the bulging boot, that hung far out behind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was added weight enough to make a team of oxen blind;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And counting all the passengers that filled the coach within,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The load those horses had to drag—I thought it was a sin!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How proud of them the driver was! And often he would brag<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That they could pull a heavier load and never balk or flag;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If all the road was ankle-deep in miry, sticky mud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That was the time his team would show its metal and its blood.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The "ribbons" then he'd gather up, and give his whip a crack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And any team in front of him had better clear the track;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He seemed to own the turnpike road, and kept the right of way<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unto himself as jealously as bloomers do to-day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By wood and field he wound along, and by the river's bank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when he reached the covered bridge the hoof-beats on the plank<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were echoed from the cliffs around and from the vale below;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And going up the hill beyond he'd let 'em walk and blow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then urged into a trot again around the curves they spun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till hove in sight the manor-house of Camp Dick Robinson;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on beyond where Nelson lay, the bravest of the brave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Nicholasville at last was reached, to them the reins he gave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when the sun was hanging low and slanting shadows fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the streets of "Idleburg" that old familiar yell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would greet the ears of villagers from small boys as they ran<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With open mouths and lusty lungs a-shouting "Here comes Sam!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah me! The old stage coach, abandoned now, stands in the stable lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A victim to the tooth of rust, and slow decay and rot;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its whole-souled driver years ago forever passed away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And crumbled now to dust the hand that drove each gallant bay!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="DICKS_RIVER" id="DICKS_RIVER"></a>DICK'S RIVER.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Rock-sentineled, romantic stream!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy waters flow with silvery gleam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where glassy pools and visions greet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Embosomed in some cool retreat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then rippling o'er a pebbly bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With current fleet thy course is led<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To where, walled in by beetling cliffs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It plunges o'er the hidden rifts.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Past where the meadows gently sweep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The limpid waters silent creep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until, o'erhung with cooling shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They lave the shores of sylvan glade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many a wild-flower blooming there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its incense flings upon the air;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spreading o'er each sloping side<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An emerald carpet stretches wide.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now gliding out, the waters gleam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sparkle with the sun's warm beam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reflecting then some mirrored cloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like specter wrapt in filmy shroud—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till pouring down with fretful whirl<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They o'er the mill-dam rush and curl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And foaming round in eddies deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The circles wide and wider creep!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, by thy wave I've loved to stray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On many a balmy summer's day—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When youth, and hope, and life were sweet—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy wooded banks and cliffs to greet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And often back to days of yore<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fancy strays along thy shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And musing thus I fondly dream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see again thy waters gleam!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TO_A_LITTLE_BOY" id="TO_A_LITTLE_BOY"></a>TO A LITTLE BOY.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear little one with eyes so blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And silken ringlets of flaxen hair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, may life have in store for you<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Something better than anguish and care!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh, may thy footsteps guided be<br /></span> +<span class="i6">In paths of peace and pleasantness!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh, may those bright eyes never see<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Much of the cold world's bitterness!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear little one with innocent lips,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tasting life's cup at the sparkling brim!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, may the dregs that sorrow sips<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ever be kept aloof from him!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh, may the smile on his dimpled face<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Through the years to come still linger there!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh, may Time's fingers gently place<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The silver strands in his flaxen hair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="WHEN_THE_COAL_HOUSES_FULL" id="WHEN_THE_COAL_HOUSES_FULL"></a>WHEN THE COAL HOUSE'S FULL.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the nights are gittin' chilly and the leaves begin to fade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' the mercury's down to thirty, 'stead o' ninety in the shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There's a happy kind o' feelin' takes possession o' the soul—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the smoke house full o' middlin', and the coal house full o' coal!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the wintry winds are whistlin' through the branches o' the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' the dead leaves are a-flyin' and a-rustlin' in the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You kin feel the vast contentment that over you will roll—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the barn is full o' fodder, and the coal house full o' coal!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the 'skeeter's ceased from troublin' and the fly is chilled to death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' the window-pane is written with the Frost King's icy breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You kin dream about the Summer-time, an' that old fishin' pole—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the pantry's full o' victuals, an' the coal house full o' coal!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When your supper's been digested an' you're dozin' in your chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or you're tucked between the blankets from the frosty, nippin' air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why, your dreams will be the sweeter if you've helped some sufferin' soul<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose larder's scant o' victuals, and his coal house minus coal!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="DECEMBER" id="DECEMBER"></a>DECEMBER.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">White-shrouded, latest-born of all the year,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In thy cold hands no bud or floweret bearing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou comest now to wail above the bier<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of thy dead sisters—on thy bosom wearing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The icy jewel and the frosted gem—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But on thy marble brow the Star of Bethlehem!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beneath thy foot-prints lie the Autumn leaves,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Mould'ring and hast'ning to decay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where the drifting snow its mantle weaves<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The Summer songsters sang the happy hours away.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What tho' the birds have flown the blighted stem?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There's in thy jeweled crown the Star of Bethlehem!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SOLACE" id="SOLACE"></a>SOLACE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">One Autumn evening, wandering, when the sun was hanging low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through a woodland where the music of a streamlet's gentle flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Commingled with the rustling of the yellow golden leaves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the idling breeze's sighing as it floated through the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I heard sweet voices whispering in accents soft and low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lulled to rest the troubled soul, like those of long ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Enchanted thus I lingered, by unseen hands fast bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My willing fancy captive to the magic of sweet sound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eagerly I listened to the whispering voices tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of happy days of childhood, and the tear unbidden fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As were pictured to the mind again the halcyon scenes of yore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And loved ones that no more I'll meet till on the silent shore!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And as the slanting shadows fell athwart the scattered leaves<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The language that the voices spoke was formed of words like these:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"You may mingle with the sordid world, in eager, restless haste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To struggle for the golden fruit that Mammon loves to taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But find at last, the end attained, that there are better things<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To satisfy the longing heart—that sweeter solace brings.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Thy Springtime, thy Summer, and thy Autumn's mellowed haze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If rightly lived and rightly spent, will bring rare, happy days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That temper with their sunshine the frigid Winter's wrath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When gathering storms are darkling o'er life's declining path,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lend a ray celestial that hoarded gold ne'er gave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lighten all thy journey, from the cradle to the grave."<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FRANK_L_STANTON" id="FRANK_L_STANTON"></a>FRANK L. STANTON.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sweetest music put in song since Robby Burns's time<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is that which breathes its harmony from Georgia's sunny clime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the fragrant-scented odor that the climbing jasmine flings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Commingles with the melody that gifted Stanton sings!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It may not suit a bookish clan that cannot understand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rhythm and the cadences they never can command—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what is that to him that knows and touches all the strings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of hearts responsive to his strain when gifted Stanton sings?<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We read his songs and hear the notes repeated once again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His ear has caught when listening to the mocking-bird's refrain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And interwoven with the sense a mystic something rings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fills the soul with ecstasy when gifted Stanton sings!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Sunny South! where blooming flowers and where the whispering pine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Attunes his harp till every string gives forth a sound divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We love you for the many gifts that generous Nature brings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But best of all—we love you for the song that Stanton sings!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_OLD_CHURCH_BELL" id="THE_OLD_CHURCH_BELL"></a>THE OLD CHURCH BELL.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It hangs today where it has hung for fifty years or more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But some who loved its silver tones the church-yard covers o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many are the times since then, with deep and solemn knell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has tolled for dear departed ones the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">Church<br /></span> +<span class="i22">Bell!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within a latticed tower it swings, high up above the street,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every Sabbath morn is heard the music clear and sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which floats above the village roofs, and over hill and dell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upborne upon the vagrant wind, from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">Church<br /></span> +<span class="i22">Bell!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Full many a change the hand of Time has in the village wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And passing years have often been with grief and anguish fraught,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet age has never changed its tones, and years cannot dispel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The magic of the music from the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">Church<br /></span> +<span class="i22">Bell!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since it was placed within the tower, in days of long ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tempests wild have round it raved, and many a driven snow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has sifted through the slats up there, and mantled as it fell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In robes of white its dwelling place, and the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">Church<br /></span> +<span class="i22">Bell!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though gone from earth and earthly things—forever passed away—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The faithful ones who loved while here its summons to obey<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now rest beyond the tide of Time, with rapture long to dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there their footsteps guided were by the<br /></span> +<span class="i16">Old<br /></span> +<span class="i18">Church<br /></span> +<span class="i22">Bell!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_SUMMER_EVENING" id="A_SUMMER_EVENING"></a>A SUMMER EVENING.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun has sunk in the crimson west,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And "around the languid eyes of day"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Twilight's dreamy shadows rest<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And light and shade alternate play;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The winds are hushed, nor leaf nor flower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is swayed with motion by their power.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The fireflies with meteor lamps<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Arise from out the dewy lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there the elfin cricket chants<br /></span> +<span class="i1">His vespers when the day is gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And far above, the sky's coquette<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With all her starry train is met.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FATHER_RYAN" id="FATHER_RYAN"></a>FATHER RYAN.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In Southern sunny clime there is a hallowed tomb,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where rest the ashes of a minstrel priest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soft winds that are laden with a sweet perfume<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Their requiems for him have never ceased.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We read his songs, and hear again the tread<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of armed battalions, marching to the fray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or see once more the features of belovèd dead<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose life blood crimsoned uniforms of gray!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We see the tattered banner that he loved so well<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Again unfurled and fluttering in the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And once again we hear the "rebel yell"<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Triumphant wafted o'er the riven trees!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, may thy minstrel spirit find eternal rest<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In some fair clime where nothing can be lost!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where anguish never more can rend thy breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And fondest hope can ne'er be tempest tost!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_MEADOW_PATH" id="THE_MEADOW_PATH"></a>THE MEADOW PATH.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It led adown the sloping hill, and through the valley wound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where the blooming clover shed its fragrance all around,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then between the maple trees, across the little brook,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To where the old fence bars let down, a tortuous course it took;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And often are the times I've heard the merry, ringing laugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From rosy-ankled children there, along the meadow path.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Three boys—and a little girl whose hair was chestnut gold—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(She's resting now in dreamless sleep beneath the crumbling mold;)—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I remember her as when, with innocence and glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her laughing eyes looked into mine—for she was dear to me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus it is I love to let the fancy photograph<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The merry group that idled there, along the meadow path.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adown it oft we used to go at twilight for the cows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wander from the beaten track a rabbit to arouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And watch him as he scampered off, with frightened leap and bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The while we made the welkin ring and with our shouts resound.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweetest flowers that bloom for me—a fragrant aftermath—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are those that in the memory blow, along the meadow path!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_FOX_HUNTERS" id="THE_FOX_HUNTERS"></a>THE FOX HUNTERS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With fleet-limbed steeds and baying pack<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They follow close on Reynard's track,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wake the slumbering echoes round<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With music of the horn and hound;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through wood and field, o'er hill and dale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They course him in the moonlight pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sport they find which brings delight—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These reckless riders of the night!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The game is up! away, away!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor hedge nor fence their course can stay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They clear them at a single leap,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like the wind they onward sweep!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er fallen trunk and hidden ditch<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fearless horsemen plunge and pitch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heedless all they follow on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With ringing shout and winding horn!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy wondrous ride, oh Tam O'Shanter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To speed like theirs was but a canter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had you bestrode that night instead<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of gray mare Meg a thoroughbred<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Such as Kentuckians only breed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Scotia then an unknown steed),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No carline could have caught his rump<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And left your brute with scarce a stump!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His foaming horse with throbbing sides<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unslackened yet his pace he rides,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till in among the yelping hounds<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The foremost huntsman proudly bounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sees the leaders of the chase<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Two matchless dogs that set the pace)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'ertake the game and win the race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then dismounts and feels the flush<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of victory as he takes the brush!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O royal sport, befitting kings!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It bids the demon Care take wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the rose's hue to the cheek it brings!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sweeter music none can hear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than that which greets the list'ning ear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By distance mellowed to a key<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That breathes divinest harmony—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wakes the slumbering echoes round—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The winding horn and baying hound!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_CHARMING_GIRL_OF_SOMERSET" id="THE_CHARMING_GIRL_OF_SOMERSET"></a>THE CHARMING GIRL OF SOMERSET.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By magic spell was I entranced<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When on me first thy brown eyes glanced,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sunbeams played at hide and seek<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro' silken ringlets on thy dimpling cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like some glorious halo shed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their radiance o'er thy shapely head—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And seemed as if they loved to dwell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where'er thy airy footsteps fell!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in my dreams I see thee now—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pearly teeth—the arching brow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The form that mocks the sculptor's art<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To add one curve that could impart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More beauty and more witching grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or chisel out a sweeter face!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest be the hour when first I met<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This charming girl of Somerset!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IN_JULY" id="IN_JULY"></a>IN JULY.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, for a deep-shaded spot where the shadows cool<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Are hid from the rays of the glaring sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the sparkling waters from a limped pool<br /></span> +<span class="i1">O'er the gleaming pebbles in ripples run!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where the sloping banks are with verdure clad,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And the hoary cliffs with moss o'ergrown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the tangled vine and the wildflowers pad<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The fallen trunk and the hidden stone!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where the song that wells from a feathered throat<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The echoes repeat again and again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the drifted sedge and the bubbles float<br /></span> +<span class="i1">O'er the glassy depths of a miniature main!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where the willows dip in the edge of the stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And sway and nod in the passing breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a feller could tranquilly rest and dream<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of a howling blizzard and a good hard freeze!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TO_J_R_M" id="TO_J_R_M"></a>TO J. R. M.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I walked within the silent city of the dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which then with Autumn leaves was carpeted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where the faded flower and withered wreath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bespoke the love for those who slept beneath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, weeping, stood beside a new-made grave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which held the sacred dust that friendship gave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That heart with milk of human kindness overflowed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sympathetic hand its generous aid bestowed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lighten others' burdens on life's weary road!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there no polished shaft need lift its head<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In lettered eulogy above the sainted dead—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His deeds are monuments above the dust whereon we tread!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When from its fragile tenement of clay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To fairer realms his spirit winged its way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With poignant grief we stood around the bier<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which held the lifeless form of one held dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And broken hearts that knew no comfort then<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still mourn the loss of one of Nature's noblemen!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWILIGHT" id="TWILIGHT"></a>TWILIGHT.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun is sinking where the western hills<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The vision bounds with rugged summits old,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with his latest beam he brightly gilds<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And crowns with amethyst and gold.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The distant music of a tinkling bell<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Is floating o'er the meadow's gentle sweep—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No discords mar the magic of the spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And stealthily the twilight shadows creep.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And gently falls upon the listening ear—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Like tones from voices of the long-ago—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cadence of the murmuring waters near—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With rhythmic ripplings soft and low.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now grow apace the shadows' slanting shapes<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And fade the rugged hills to misty gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As dying day its calm departure takes<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And yields to coming night her sable sway.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The vaulted dome above now glows afar<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With many a soft and tender light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each sparkling gem it wears a jeweled star,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With sweet effulgence purely bright.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet scene! Sweet hour! If to the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No quick'ning pulses they can lend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to the soul no rapture thus impart—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Vain were our lives—and vainer still the end!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, such the time when he who will may feel<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Release from care, vexation, toil, and strife—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And musing then will gently o'er him steal<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The sweetest moments of the turmoil—life!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="OUT_UV_POLITICKS" id="OUT_UV_POLITICKS"></a>OUT UV "POLITICKS."</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I'll tell yer what," said Uncle Zeke, down at the country store,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"I'd been a farmer all my life—fur twenty year or more—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until one day my noddle here, it got plumb out o' fix,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Er-swellin' with the idy that I's made fur politicks.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I'd been ter hear them fellers speak, an' rip an' rant an' rave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When 'lection time's er-comin' on, who tell yer how ter save<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ther kentry frum tarnation ruin, by sendin' only men<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That's fit ter draw ther salaries, an' honest—jest like them.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"So listen, boys—yer'll profit by ther story that I tell—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I left ther farm ter 'lectioneer an' run fur constable;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wouldn't hearken ter my wife—she said I'd lost my wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' as fur holdin' offices—<i>she</i> knowed <i>I</i> wusn't fit.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"But ennyhow, I sold er steer, an' then er heifer calf,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' bought er bran' new suit o' clothes fur twenty an' er half,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' 'fore ther 'lection day cum roun' I'd sold my wheat an' oats,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' spent ther proceeds that I got in purchasin' uv votes.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I knowed 'twus wrong—agin ther law—ter do er thing like that—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But then ther boys all said, yer know, 'twould take er little 'fat,'<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fur ther feller that I run agin could have no earthly hope<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Uv beatin' me if I'd use ther right amount uv 'soap.'<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I jocks I did—I won ther fight—I sarved er single term—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(But fur ther salary that I got I wouldn't give er durn);<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' right up here I wear ther scar that shows whar I wus hit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ther day I rid fur forty miles ter sarve that cussed 'writ!'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="JONES_MARE" id="JONES_MARE"></a>JONES' MARE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Farmer Jones was noted for fast horses on his place,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And also as the father of a son with freckled face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hair so red it looked as if it had been dyed in blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Ephraim was the "masher" of the country neighborhood.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This Ephraim Jones' yellow mare, she was no nice and fleet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That all the girls for miles around on Eph. were very "sweet,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In hopes to get a ride or two behind her on the road,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sleigh-bells jingling 'round her neck, some day when it had snowed.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or else to spin along the pike, with buggy top let down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ribbons sailing out behind, when Eph. would drive to town,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The envy of the country boys, and many maidens fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A-casting wistful glances at the youth with reddish hair.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This thing went on till finally our Ephraim fell in love<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With Tildy Ann Serepty Brown—as gentle as a dove—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of all the girls around about the reigning country bell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose father was as rich as cream—he'd struck an oil well!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">About three nights in every week could Ephraim's yellow mare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be found a-standing hitched outside, while he was courting there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so the boys, with envy mad and jealousy aroused,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To humble Eph. hit on a plan they heartily espoused.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If anything in all the world, beside sweet Tildy Ann,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was dear to Ephraim's eye and heart, it was his claybank, Fan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He boasted of her speed and looks, and of her pedigree—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said more intelligence in a brute no man would ever see.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VII.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He kept her curried till her coat it shone like burnished gold—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With silver-mounted harness on, a beauty to behold.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A brand new buggy hitched to her, a-glinting in the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She "took the cake" for speed and style from every other one.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VIII.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They heard that Eph. one night would call upon his Tildy Ann<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To make arrangements all complete to carry out a plan:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It would be Sunday following, when all in style he'd go<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With Tildy and the yellow mare to the country "bonnet-show."<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IX.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Supplied with brushes, cans of paint of every shade and hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to furnish light by which to work, a bull's-eye lantern, too,<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> +<span class="i0">At ten o'clock that night so dark you couldn't see a wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They striped his Fan with red and brown, and black and blue and pink.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">X.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Next morning when he went to feed, and opened wide the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No zebra that was ever foaled could boast the stripes she wore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her ears were white, her legs were green, her tail was fiery red,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as he gazed upon her then I can't tell what he said!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THAT_OLD_STRAW_HAT_OF_MINE" id="THAT_OLD_STRAW_HAT_OF_MINE"></a>THAT OLD STRAW HAT OF MINE.</h2> + +<h3>(WITH APOLOGIES TO RILEY.)</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As one who dreams at evening o'er the new hats that he's worn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And muses on the better times that once to him were known,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I turn the leaves of fancy till, in shadowy design,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see the faded ribbon on that old straw hat of mine.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The firelight seems to mock me as the ruddy flames arise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I turn about to rest me of the dazzle in my eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I ponder then in silence, save a sigh that seems to yoke<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its fate with my condition, and to vanish like the smoke.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With fondest recollection the loving thoughts that start<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into being are but feelings from the bottom of my heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to wear the new hats over is a luxury divine—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till my truant fancy wanders with that old straw hat of mine.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now I hear without my chamber, like a fluttering of wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rustling of the autumn wind as through the trees it sings,<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And I feel no twinge of conscience to deny me any scheme<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That will bring to me a hat of which I now can only dream.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In fact, to speak in earnest, if I could work a charm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'd try it on old Isaacs—'twouldn't do him much of harm—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I'd find an extra flavor in memory's mellow wine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I thought of how I swapped him that old straw hat of mine.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VI.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A thing of real beauty, with a shape of airy grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Floats out of Isaacs' storehouse, as the genii from the vase,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, oh! I gaze upon it with a pair of loving eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As glowing as the summer and as tender as the skies!<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">* * * * *<br /></span> +</div> +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">VII.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, ah! my dream is broken when I gaze upon that chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For my eyes are now wide open and—the same old hat is there;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And reluctantly and sadly all my visions I resign<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To know that I must wear again that old straw hat of mine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TOM_BARBEES_POND" id="TOM_BARBEES_POND"></a>TOM BARBEE'S POND.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O sweet are the memories when backward we gaze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the vista of years to our schoolboy days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When faces now vanished to the vision appear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the music of voices long hushed we can hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As together we romped where the school-house stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or joyfully wended our way through the wood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where placidly lay, in the valley beyond,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The moss-covered waters of Tom Barbee's pond!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though scattered by Time o'er the face of the earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sorrow and anguish have succeeded to mirth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still many there be whose mist-bedewed eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Looks longingly back, while the breast heaves a sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To that far-away time, when together we played<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the school-house yard, or on Saturdays strayed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the knots in our sleeves were tied tight as a bond,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As we splashed and we dived in Tom Barbee's pond!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The "pleasures of memory" by Rogers were lined,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With rhythm as sweet as in verse you will find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But could he e'er picture one-half of the joys<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We had when we wandered as barefooted boys<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Through the woods and the fields and the meadows out there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With our sun-blistered backs and the burrs in our hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or recall to the mind a remembrance more fond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than bathing and swimming in Tom Barbee's pond?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="WHERE" id="WHERE"></a>WHERE?</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, where are the friends that in youth we once knew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose smiles were like sunshine, whose hearts were so true?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! they are lost in the darkness and gloom<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That veils them from sight in the cold, silent tomb!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, where are the years that forever have fled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over Life's morning their radiance shed?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the Past written down on the unending scroll<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Time—grim destroyer—his victims enroll!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, where are the fancies, the visions, the dreams,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That filled the young breast—with which memory teems?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They have faded away—from life they have passed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like stars blotted out when the sky's overcast!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">IV.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, where are the hopes that have beckoned us on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With their beacons of light, through sunshine and storm?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like spectres—like phantoms—like vapor and mist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They have vanished forever—a will-o'-the-wisp!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">V.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, where are the harbors, the havens of rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That solace can give to a heart that's opprest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They are hid from the vision beyond the blue sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet the eye of sweet Faith their portals descry!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_HILLS_OF_LINCOLN" id="THE_HILLS_OF_LINCOLN"></a>THE HILLS OF LINCOLN.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O the hills of old Lincoln!—I can see them to-day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As they stretch in dim distance far, far away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on Fancy's swift pinions my spirit hath flown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To rest 'mid the scenes which my childhood has known—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the old Hanging Fork, with its silvery gleam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glides away 'tween the meadows like thoughts in a dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And far to the south, with their outlines so blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rugged knobs blend into heaven's own hue!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O the hills of old Lincoln!—how fondly I gaze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On their wildwoods and thickets and deep-tangled ways<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When memory's mirror presents them to view,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I dream once again that I tread them anew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While raptured I listen to the music of love<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That the song-birds are singing in the tree-tops above,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the soul drifts away in a swoon of delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unanchored from care and from sorrow's cold blight!<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O the hills of old Lincoln!—my footsteps have trod<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up and down their green valleys, with shotgun and rod,<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And it seems to me now that the years that have fled<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around their old summits a halo have shed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That guides the fond fancy unerringly there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When backward it wanders with childhood to share<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet scenes such as these, inurned in the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And which from fond memory can never depart!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LOVED_AND_LOST" id="LOVED_AND_LOST"></a>LOVED AND LOST.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"><div class="sect">I.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweetly to sleep beneath the fresh green turf<br /></span> +<span class="i1">They laid the loved and lost away;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A chair is vacant by the household hearth,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And shadow-vested Sorrow's there to-day.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">II.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The tender hands that guided us in youth<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Are folded now upon the gentle breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And those dear eyes whose depths were love and truth<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Are closed to open in eternal rest.<br /></span> +</div> + + +<div class="stanza"><div class="sect">III.</div></div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Through simple faith and duty well performed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A crown of light forever shall be hers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though with bitter grief and anguish mourned,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A consolation gleams through blinding tears!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_TRUE_STORY" id="A_TRUE_STORY"></a>A TRUE STORY.</h2> + +<h3>(READ BEFORE A MEETING OF THE DANVILLE +SCRIBBLER CLUB.)</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear friends, to-night the inspiration of my theme<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is not the baseless fabric of a weird, fantastic dream—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For truth, combined with justice, doth impel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And therefore it is fact—not fiction—that I tell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Truth, crushed to earth, will rise again"—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A maxim true as holy writ;—then it is plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If rudely woven by an untaught hand it be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sustains but transitory wrong and injury.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And thus it is, in homely rhyme, I venture forth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Relating nothing here but under oath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if, perchance, at times it sounds a little strange,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You know that truth o'er fiction hath a wider range.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">These stanzas three I hope you'll deem explanatory—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As introductory and preliminary to the story—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A preface simply used before I introduce<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The proper characters essential for our use.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And just one moment more attention I will claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And crave indulgence while I here explain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That "character" is used in a Pickwickian sense—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So truth and justice need not take offense.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Twas when the Autumn leaves, with russet hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scarce quivered in the gentle wind, and when the dew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lay sparkling on the grass, beneath the argent moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tragedy took place—of which I'll tell you soon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And ever and anon a fleecy, drifting cloud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meek Dian's face would veil with filmy shroud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lend to wood and field that softened ray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unmatched in beauty from the glaring god of day!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I will tell the story as 'twas told to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And vouched for by some others—two or three—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose word to doubt would be a heinous sin—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, armed with truth, in confidence I will begin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah, memory! Thou art a fickle jade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And oft responsible when grave mistakes are made,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And therefore 'tis with caution that I hesitate<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When truthful things I undertake to state.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This much is due to accuracy and circumspection,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As well as to a rather faulty recollection;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so I'll trespass on your patience now no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But straightway tell the story—as I said before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All good beginnings have that natural trend<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which safely leads to a successful end,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stories all should have their plots well laid—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which neither prose nor verse can do, when haste is made.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis said "procrastination is the thief of time,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this might seem to be the object of my rhyme.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had I not told you, as I should have done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The reason why the story's not begun.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis my sole object, then, to give without delay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The narrative in a direct and proper way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For as you know some critics may be here<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whom scribbling rhymesters may, with justice, fear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"What shameless bards we have! And yet, 'tis true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There are as mad, abandoned critics, too!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This couplet, penned by Pope, is ever new—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But then, dear friends, the second line was <i>not</i> for you!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I only quote that you may comprehend<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How modesty in <i>me</i> has missed its end,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And why it is I ever undertook to write<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The story that I'm going to tell—sometime to-night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An introduction that will keep the listener in suspense<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I deem derogatory to good taste and sense;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this is also why I'll nothing put as prefatory<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before I launch right out into the story.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I'm going to make it thrilling, crisp and short,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In purest diction drest, with gems of thought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So intermingled with the story's warp and woof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That from beginning I can scarcely keep aloof.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I'll put quotation marks to shrive me of the sin<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of plagiarism when such language I begin—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That every one of you may plainly see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tell the story as 'twas told to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So calmly, coolly then, I think I will proceed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To give you now the story—taking heed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To curtail all that truth and justice will permit—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Remembering that "brevity's the soul of wit."<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But undue haste would cause me to forget<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mar the memory of its telling with regret<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I had overlooked some startling fact,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which on both truth and justice would re-act!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now, dear friends, don't think that you are "sold"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If still as yet the story's left untold—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But paper, ink, your patience, and my time<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are all exhausted in this race with rhyme!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>Transcriber's Notes</h3> + +<p>Variations in spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been +retained from the original book, except for the following changes:</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_9">9</a>: raiload changed to railroad:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">(From the raiload bridge, with its single span,).</span><br /> +<br /> +Page <a href="#Page_49">49</a>: Aud changed to And:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">(Aud do the very best I could the heat to struggle through,).</span><br /> +<br /> +Page <a href="#Page_56">56</a>: Punctuation corrected from:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">(Old "Bull "Spring?") to (Old "Bull Spring!").</span><br /> +<br /> +Page <a href="#Page_62">62</a>: Their changed to There:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">(There where briars in tangled network sway).</span><br /> +<br /> +Page <a href="#Page_101">101</a>: Ephram's changed to Ephraim's:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">(Was dear to Ephram's eye and heart, it was his claybank, Fan;).</span><br /> +</p> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Old Hanging Fork and Other Poems, by +George W. 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