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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/77609-0.txt b/77609-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc2308d --- /dev/null +++ b/77609-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1072 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77609 *** + + + + +A WINTER HOLIDAY + + + + + BY BLISS CARMAN + + LOW TIDE ON GRAND PRÉ $1.25 + + BEHIND THE ARRAS. A Book + of the Unseen 1.25 + + BALLADS OF LOST HAVEN + A Book of the Sea 1.25 + + BY THE AURELIAN WALL. A + Book of Elegies 1.25 + + + WITH RICHARD HOVEY + + SONGS FROM VAGABONDIA $1.00 + + MORE SONGS FROM VAGABONDIA 1.00 + + + Small, Maynard & Company + Boston + + + + + A WINTER HOLIDAY + + BLISS CARMAN + + [Illustration] + + Boston + Small, Maynard & Company + 1899 + + + + + _Copyright, 1899, by_ + SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY + (INCORPORATED) + + + THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A. + + + + + _To_ T. B. M. + + Scituate, Massachusetts + October, 1899 + + + + +Contents + + + PAGE + + DECEMBER IN SCITUATE 3 + + WINTER AT TORTOISE SHELL 8 + + BAHAMAN 15 + + FLYING FISH 28 + + IN BAY STREET 31 + + MIGRANTS 35 + + WHITE NASSAU 38 + + + + +A Winter Holiday + +[Illustration] + + + + +DECEMBER IN SCITUATE + + + Under a hill in Scituate, + Where sleep four hundred men of Kent, + My friend one bobolincolned June + Set up his rooftree of content. + + Content for not too long, of course, + Since painter’s eye makes rover’s heart, + And the next turning of the road + May cheapen the last touch of art. + + Yet also, since the world is wide, + And noon’s face never twice the same, + Why not sit down and let the sun, + That artist careless of his fame, + + Exhibit to our eyes, off-hand, + As mood may dictate and time serve, + His precious, perishable scraps + Of fleeting color, melting curve? + + And while he shifts them all too soon, + Make vivid note of this and that, + Careful of nothing but to keep + The beauties we most marvel at. + + Selective merely, bent to save + The sheer delirium of the eye, + Which best may solace or rejoice + Some fellow-rover by and by; + + That stumbling on it, he exclaim, + “What mounting sea-smoke! What a blue!” + And at the glory we beheld, + His smouldering joy may kindle too. + + Merely selective? Bring me back, + _Verbatim_ from the lecture hall, + Your notes of So-and-so’s discourse; + The gist and substance are not all. + + The unconscious hand betrays to me + What listener it was took heed, + Eager or slovenly or prim; + A written character indeed! + + Much more in painting; every stroke + That weaves the very sunset’s ply, + Luminous, palpitant, reveals + How throbbed the heart behind the eye; + + How hand was but the cunning dwarf + Of spirit, his triumphant lord + Marching in Nature’s pageantry, + Elated in the vast accord. + + Art is a rubric for the soul, + Man’s comment on the book of earth, + The spellborn human summary + Which gives that common volume worth. + + So at the pictures of my friend,-- + His marginal remarks, as ’twere,-- + One cries not only, “What a blue!” + But, “What a human heart beat here!” + + And now, ten minutes from the train, + Over the right-hand easy swell, + We catch the sparkle of the sea + And the green roof of Tortoise Shell. + + (He guessed from slipshod excellence + What fable to his craft applied. + The tortoise for his monitor, + And _Cur tam cito_ for his guide.) + + Here is the slanting open field, + Where billow upon billow rolls + The sea of daisies in the sun, + When June brings back the orioles. + + All summer here the crooning winds + Are cradled in the rocking dunes, + Till they, full height and burly grown, + Go seaward and forget their croons. + + And out of the Canadian north + Comes winter like a huge gray gnome, + To blanket the red dunes with snow + And muffle the green sea with foam. + + I could sit here all day and watch + The seas at battle smoke and wade, + And in the cold night wake to hear + The booming of their cannonade. + + Then smiling turn to sleep and say, + “In vain dark’s banners are unfurled; + That ceaseless roll is God’s tattoo + Upon the round drum of the world.” + + And waking find without surprise + The first sun in a week of storm, + The southward eaves begin to drip, + And the faint Marshfield hills look warm; + + The brushwood all a purple mist; + The blue sea creaming on the shore; + As if the year in his last days + Had not a sorrow to deplore. + + Then evening by the fire of logs, + With some old song or some new book; + Our Lady Nicotine to share + Our single bliss; while seaward, look,-- + + Orion mounting peaceful guard + Over our brother’s new-made tent, + Under a hill in Scituate + Where sleep so sound those men of Kent. + + + + +WINTER AT TORTOISE SHELL + + + “What wondrous life is this I lead! + Ripe apples drop about my head.” + + But as I read, that couplet seems + The merest metaphor of dreams,-- + + A parable from Arcady + Refuted by this wintry sea. + + The summer was so long ago, + I hardly can believe it so. + + Did we once really live outdoors, + With leafy walls and grassy floors, + + Through sultry morns and dreamy noons + And red October in the dunes, + + With butterflies and bees and things + That roamed the air on roseleaf wings? + + There’s not a leaf on any bough + To prove the truth of summer now; + + There’s not an apple left on high + To bear the red sun company. + + The sun himself is gone away, + A vagabond since yesterday, + + And left the maniac wind to moan + Through his deserted house alone. + + Over the hills we watched him forth + From the low lodges of the North; + + And then a hand we did not know + Dropped the tent-curtain of the snow. + + This morning all outdoors is gray + And bleak as dead Siberia. + + But what is that to lucky me? + Who would not love captivity, + + Where safe beneath their Tortoise Shell + The Lady and the Tortoise dwell? + + The Tortoise is the Lady’s son; + He makes procrastination + + A fine art in this hurrying age + Of grudging work and greedy wage. + + An open air impressionist, + He swims his landscape in a mist, + + And likes to paint his shadows blue, + If it is all the same to you. + + If not, he does not call you blind; + He waits for you to change your mind. + + His cunning knows how color lies + Eluding the untutored eyes. + + Perhaps within a year or two + You may believe his pictures true. + + The Tortoise, for a pseudonym, + Is very suitable to him. + + At Tortoise Shell the rafters green + Mimic a shady orchard screen, + + The kindly half-light of the leaves, + And June songs running round the eaves. + + The walls are hung with tapestries + Of gold flowers bending to the breeze, + + And paintings, drenched in light and sun, + Of Scituate shore and Norman town,-- + + A mute, unfading fairyland, + The glad work of a wizard hand,-- + + A small bright summer world of art + The winter cherishes at heart. + + Look, through the window, where the seas, + A million strong, ride in with ease! + + The mad white stallions in stampede. + This is your wintry world, indeed. + + But summertime and gladness dwell + Under the roof of Tortoise Shell. + + Color, imperishably fair, + Is mistress of the seasons there. + + And, ah, to-night the Gallaghers + Will come in all their mitts and furs, + + Across the fields to visit us. + Then Boston _urbs_ may envy _rus_! + + We’ll let the hooting blizzard shout; + We’ll pull the little table out; + + And Andrew Usher, ever blessed, + Shall comfort us beneath the vest. + + So trim the light, and build the fire; + Bring out your oldest, sweetest briar. + + For half an hour, if you please, + We’ll listen to _The Seven Seas_; + + Or Mr. Gallagher will sing-- + An opera or anything-- + + About the Duke of Seven Dials, + About his Dolly and her wiles. + + Then we will sit, but not for tea, + Around the smooth mahogany, + + And watch while houses full of kings + Are overthrown by knaves and things; + + And hear the pleasant clicking noise + Of triple-colored ivories. + + And Time may learn another trick + To better his arithmetic, + + When wise content subtracts a notch + For fuming weed and foaming Scotch. + + To-morrow, by the early train, + Light-hearted mirth will come again + + To race across-lots with a crew + Of St. Bernards,--contagious Lou. + + Who would not quit, for joys like these, + All idle Southern vagrancies, + + By purple cove and creamy beach, + And gold fruit hung within the reach? + + Since friendship is a thing that grows + To sturdy height in Northern snows, + + Who would not choose December weather, + Where love and cold thrive well together, + + And bide his days, content to dwell + Under the eaves of Tortoise Shell? + + + + +BAHAMAN + + + In the crowd that thronged the pierhead, + come to see their friends take ship + For new ventures in seafaring, + when the hawsers were let slip + And we swung out in the current, + with good-byes on every lip, + + Midst the waving caps and kisses, + as we dropped down with the tide + And the faces blurred and faded, + last of all your hand I spied + Signalling, Farewell; Good fortune! + then my heart rose up and cried, + + “While the world holds one such comrade, + whose sweet durable regard + Would so speed my safe departure, + lest home-leaving should be hard, + What care I who keeps the ferry, + whether Charon or Cunard!” + + Then we cleared the bar, and laid her + on the course, the thousand miles + From the Hook to the Bahamas, + from midwinter to the isles + Where frost never laid a finger, + and eternal summer smiles. + + Three days through the surly storm-beat, + while the surf-heads threshed and flew, + And the rolling mountains thundered + to the trample of the screw, + The black liner heaved and scuffled + and strained on, as if she knew. + + On the fourth, the round blue morning + sparkled there, all light and breeze, + Clean and tenuous as a bubble + blown from two immensities, + Shot and colored with sheer sunlight + and the magic of those seas. + + In that bright new world of wonder, + it was life enough to laze + All day underneath the awnings, + and through half-shut eyes to gaze + At the marvel of the sea-blue; + and I faltered for a phrase + + Should half give you the impression, + tell you how the very tint + Justified your finest daring, + as if Nature gave the hint, + “Plodders, see Imagination + set his pallet without stint!” + + Cobalt, gobelin, and azure, + turquoise, sapphire, indigo, + Changing from the spectral bluish + of a shadow upon snow + To the deep of Canton china,-- + one unfathomable glow. + + And the flying fish,--to see them + in a scurry lift and flee, + Silvery as the foam they sprang from, + fragile people of the sea, + Whom their heart’s great aspiration + for a moment had set free. + + From the dim and cloudy ocean, + thunder-centred, rosy-verged, + At the lord sun’s _Sursum Corda_, + as implicit impulse urged, + Frail as vapor, fine as music, + these bright spirit-things emerged; + + Like those flocks of small white snowbirds + we have seen start up before + Our brisk walk in winter weather + by the snowy Scituate shore; + And the tiny shining sea-folk + brought you back to me once more. + + So we ran down Abaco; + and passing that tall sentinel + Black against the sundown, sighted, + as the sudden twilight fell, + Nassau light; and the warm darkness + breathed on us from breeze and swell. + + Stand-by bell and stop of engine; + clank of anchor going down; + And we’re riding in the roadstead + off a twinkling-lighted town, + Low dark shore with boom of breaker + and white beach the palm-trees crown. + + In the soft wash of the sea air, + on the long swing of the tide, + Here for once the dream came true, + the voyage ended close beside + The Hesperides in moonlight + on mid-ocean where they ride. + + And those Hesperidian joy-lands + were not strange to you and me. + Just beyond the lost horizon, + every time we looked to sea + From Testudo, there they floated, + looming plain as plain could be. + + Who believed us? “Myth and fable + are a science in our time.” + “Never saw the sea that color.” + “Never heard of such a rhyme.” + Well, we’ve proved it, prince of idlers,-- + knowledge wrong and faith sublime. + + Right were you to follow fancy, + give the vaguer instinct room + In a heaven of clear color, + Where the spirit might assume + All her elemental beauty, + past the fact of sky or bloom. + + Paint the vision, not the view,-- + the touch that bids the sense good-bye, + Lifting spirit at a bound + beyond the frontiers of the eye, + To suburb unguessed dominions + of the soul’s credulity. + + Never yet was painter, poet, + born content with things that are,-- + Must divine from every beauty + other beauties greater far, + Till the arc of truth be circled, + and her lantern blaze, a star. + + This alone is art’s ambition, + to arrest with form and hue + Dominant ungrasped ideals, + known to credence, hid from view, + In a mimic of creation,-- + To the life, yet fairer too,-- + + Where the soul may take her pleasure, + contemplate perfection’s plan, + And returning bring the tidings + of his heritage to man,-- + News of continents uncharted + she has stood tiptoe to scan. + + So she fires his gorgeous fancy + with a cadence, with a line, + Till the artist wakes within him, + and the toiler grows divine, + Shaping the rough world about him + nearer to some fair design. + + Every heart must have its Indies,-- + an inheritance unclaimed + In the unsubstantial treasure + of a province never named, + Loved and longed for through a lifetime, + dull, laborious, and unfamed, + + Never wholly disillusioned. + _Spiritus_, read, _hæres sit + Patriæ quæ tristia nescit_. + This alone the great king writ + O’er the tomb of her he cherished + in this fair world she must quit. + + Love in one farewell forever, + taking counsel to implore + Best of human benedictions + on its dead, could ask no more. + The heart’s country for a dwelling, + this at last is all our lore. + + But the fairies at your cradle + gave you craft to build a home + In the wide bright world of color, + with the cunning of a gnome; + Blessed you so above your fellows + of the tribe that still must roam. + + Still across the world they go, + tormented by a strange unrest, + And the unabiding spirit + knocks forever at their breast, + Bidding them away to fortune + in some undiscovered West; + + While at home you sit and call + the Orient up at your command, + Master of the iris seas + and Prospero of the purple land. + Listen, here was one world-corner + matched the cunning of your hand. + + Not, my friend, since we were children, + and all wonder-tales were true,-- + Jason, Hengest, Hiawatha, + fairy prince or pirate crew,-- + Was there ever such a landing + in a country strange and new? + + Up the harbor where there gathered, + fought and revelled many a year, + Swarthy Spaniard, lost Lucayan, + Loyalist, and Buccaneer, + “Once upon a time” was now, + and “far across the sea” was here. + + Tropic moonlight, in great floods + and fathoms pouring through the trees + On a ground as white as sea-froth + its fantastic traceries, + While the poincianas, rustling + like the rain, moved in the breeze, + + Showed a city, coral-streeted, + melting in the mellow shine, + Built of creamstone and enchantment, + fairy work in every line, + In a velvet atmosphere + that bids the heart her haste resign. + + Thanks to Julian Hospitator, + saint of travellers by sea, + Roving minstrels and all boatmen,-- + just such vagabonds as we,-- + On the shaded wharf we landed, + rich in leisure, hale and free. + + What more would you for God’s creatures, + but the little tide of sleep? + In a clean white room I wakened, + saw the careless sunlight peep + Through the roses at the window, + lay and listened to the creep + + Of the soft wind in the shutters, + heard the palm-tops stirring high, + And that strange mysterious shuffle + of the slipshod foot go by. + In a world all glad with color, + gladdest of all things was I; + + In a quiet convent garden, + tranquil as the day is long, + Here to sit without intrusion + of the world or strife or wrong,-- + Watch the lizards chase each other, + and the green bird make his song; + + Warmed and freshened, lulled yet quickened + in that Paradisal air, + Motherly and uncapricious, + healing every hurt or care, + Wooing body, mind, and spirit + firmly back to strong and fair; + + By the Angelus reminded, + silence waits the touch of sound, + As the soul waits her awaking + to some _Gloria_ profound; + Till the mighty Southern Cross + is lighted at the day’s last bound. + + And if ever your fair fortune + make you good Saint Vincent’s guest, + At his door take leave of trouble, + welcomed to his decent rest, + Of his ordered peace partaker, + by his solace healed and blessed; + + Where this flowered cloister garden, + hidden from the passing view, + Lies behind its yellow walls + in prayer the holy hours through; + And beyond, that fairy harbor, + floored in malachite and blue. + + In that old white-streeted city + gladness has her way at last; + Under burdens finely poised, + and with a freedom unsurpassed, + Move the naked-footed bearers + in the blue day deep and vast. + + This is Bay Street broad and low-built, + basking in its quiet trade; + Here the sponging fleet is anchored; + here shell trinkets are displayed; + Here the cable news is posted daily; + here the market’s made, + + With its oranges from Andros, + heaps of yam and tamarind, + Red-juiced shadducks from the Current, + ripened in the long trade-wind, + Gaudy fish from their sea-gardens, + yellow-tailed and azure-finned. + + Here a group of diving boys + in bronze and ivory, bright and slim, + Sparkling copper in the high noon, + dripping loin-cloth, polished limb, + Poised a moment and then plunged + in that deep daylight green and dim. + + Here the great rich Spanish laurels + spread across the public square + Their dense solemn shade; and near by, + half within the open glare, + Mannerly in their clean cottons, + knots of blacks are waiting there + + By the court-house, where a magistrate + is hearing cases through, + Dealing justice prompt and level, + as the sturdy English do,-- + One more tent-peg of the Empire, + holding that great shelter true. + + Last the picture from the town’s end, + palmed and foam-fringed through the cane, + Where the gorgeous sunset yellows + pour aloft and spill and stain + The pure amethystine sea + and far faint islands of the main. + + Loveliest of the Lucayas, + peace be yours till time be done! + In the gray North I shall see you, + with your white streets in the sun, + Old pink walls and purple gateways, + where the lizards bask and run, + + Where the great hibiscus blossoms + in their scarlet loll and glow, + And the idling gay bandannas + through the hot noons come and go, + While the ever stirring sea-wind + sways the palm-tops to and fro. + + Far from stress and storm forever, + dream behind your jalousies, + While the long white lines of breakers + crumble on your reefs and keys, + And the crimson oleanders + burn against the peacock seas. + + + + +FLYING FISH + + + Where the Southern liners go, + In the push of the purple seas, + When sky and ocean merge + Their blue immensities, + + A creature novel and fine + Will break from the foam and play, + Swift as a leaf on the wind, + Part of the light and spray. + + Will scud like a gust of snow, + Silver diaphanous things, + As if, when the sun gave will, + The sea for his part gave wings. + + For æons the Titan deep + Forged and fashioned and framed, + In the great water-mills, + Forms that no man has named. + + With hammer of thunderous seas, + With smooth attrition of tides, + Shaping each joint and valve, + Putting the heart in their sides, + + Blindly he labored and slow, + With patience ungrudging and vast, + Moulding the marvels he wrought + Nearer some purpose at last. + + Not his own. Those creatures of his + Were endowed with an alien spark, + And a hint of groping mind + That made for an unseen mark. + + For part was the stroke of force, + Fortuitous, blind, and fell, + And part was the breath of soul + Inhabiting film and cell. + + Finer and frailer they grew; + Must dare and be glad and aspire, + Out of the nether gloom + Into the pale sea-fire, + + Out of the pale sea-day + Into the sparkle and air, + Quitting the elder home + For the venture bright and rare. + + Ah, Silver-fin, you too + Must follow the faint ahoy + Over the welter of life + To radiant moments of joy! + + + + +IN BAY STREET + + + “What do you sell, John Camplejohn, + In Bay Street by the sea?” + “Oh, turtle shell is what I sell, + In great variety: + + “Trinkets and combs and rosaries, + All keepsakes from the sea; + ’Tis choose and buy what takes the eye, + In such a treasury.” + + “’Tis none of these, John Camplejohn, + Though curious they be, + But something more I’m looking for, + In Bay Street by the sea. + + “Where can I buy the magic charm + Of the Bahaman sea, + That fills mankind with peace of mind + And soul’s felicity? + + “Now, what do you sell, John Camplejohn, + In Bay Street by the sea, + Tinged with that true and native blue + Of lapis lazuli? + + “Look from your door, and tell me now + The color of the sea. + Where can I buy that wondrous dye, + And take it home with me? + + “And where can I buy that rustling sound, + In this city by the sea, + Of the plumy palms in their high blue calms; + Or the stately poise and free + + “Of the bearers who go up and down, + Silent as mystery, + Burden on head, with naked tread, + In the white streets by the sea? + + “And where can I buy, John Camplejohn, + In Bay Street by the sea, + The sunlight’s fall on the old pink wall, + Or the gold of the orange-tree?” + + “Ah, that is more than I’ve heard tell + In Bay Street by the sea, + Since I began, my roving man, + A trafficker to be. + + “As sure as I’m John Camplejohn, + And Bay Street’s by the sea, + Those things for gold have not been sold, + Within my memory. + + “But what would you give, my roving man + From countries over-sea, + For the things you name, the life of the same, + And the power to bid them be?” + + “I’d give my hand, John Camplejohn, + In Bay Street by the sea, + For the smallest dower of that dear power + To paint the things I see.” + + “My roving man, I never heard, + On any land or sea + Under the sun, of any one + Could sell that power to thee.” + + “’Tis sorry news, John Camplejohn, + If this be destiny, + That every mart should know that art, + Yet none can sell it me. + + “But look you, here’s the grace of God: + There’s neither price nor fee, + Duty nor toll, that can control + The power to love and see. + + “To each his luck, John Camplejohn, + Say I. And as for me, + Give me the pay of an idle day + In Bay Street by the sea.” + + + + +MIGRANTS + + + Hello, whom have we here + Under the orange-trees, + Where the old convent wall + Looks to the turquoise seas? + + In his jacket of olive green + He slips from bough to bough, + With a familiar air + No venue could disavow. + + Good-day to you, quiet sir! + We have been friends before, + When lilacs were in bloom + By the lovely Scituate shore. + + When the surly hordes of snow + Came down on the trains of the wind, + Two sojourners, it seems, + Were of a single mind. + + Both from the storm and gray, + The stress of the northern year, + Seeking the peace of the world, + Found tranquillity here. + + Here where there is no haste, + Lead we, each in his way, + Undistracted a while, + The slow sweet life of a day. + + Busy, contented, and shy, + Through the green shade you go; + So unobtrusive and fair + A mien few mortals know. + + It needs not the task be hard, + Nor the achievement sublime, + If only the soul be great, + Free from the fever of time. + + And your glad being confirms + The ancient _Bonum est + Nos hic esse_ of earth, + With serene, unanxious zest, + + Whether far North you fare, + When too brief spring once more + Visits the stone-walled fields + Beside the Scituate shore, + + Or here in an endless June + Under the orange-trees, + Where the old convent wall + Looks to the turquoise seas. + + + + +WHITE NASSAU + + + There is fog upon the river, there is mirk upon the town; + You can hear the groping ferries as they hoot each other down; + From the Battery to Harlem there’s seven miles of slush, + Through looming granite canyons of glitter, noise, and rush. + + Are you sick of phones and tickers and crazing cable gongs, + Of the theatres, the hansoms, and the breathless Broadway throngs, + Of Flouret’s and the Waldorf and the chilly, drizzly Park, + When there’s hardly any morning and five o’clock is dark? + + I know where there’s a city, whose streets are white and clean, + And sea-blue morning loiters by walls where roses lean, + And quiet dwells; that’s Nassau, beside her creaming key, + The queen of the Lucayas in the blue Bahaman sea. + + She’s ringed with surf and coral, she’s crowned with sun and palm; + She has the old-world leisure, the regal tropic calm; + The trade winds fan her forehead; in everlasting June + She reigns from deep verandas above her blue lagoon. + + She has had many suitors,--Spaniard and Buccaneer,-- + Who roistered for her beauty and spilt their blood for her; + But none has dared molest her, since the Loyalist Deveaux + Went down from Carolina a hundred years ago. + + Unmodern, undistracted, by grassy ramp and fort, + In decency and order she holds her modest court; + She seems to have forgotten rapine and greed and strife, + In that unaging gladness and dignity of life. + + Through streets as smooth as asphalt and white as bleaching shell, + Where the slip-shod heel is happy and the naked foot goes well, + In their gaudy cotton kerchiefs, with swaying hips and free, + Go her black folk in the morning to the market of the sea. + + Into her bright sea-gardens the flushing tide-gates lead, + Where fins of chrome and scarlet loll in the lifting weed; + With the long sea-draft behind them, through luring coral groves + The shiny water-people go by in painted droves. + + Under her old pink gateways, where Time a moment turns, + Where hang the orange lanterns and the red hibiscus burns, + Live the harmless merry lizards, quicksilver in the sun, + Or still as any image with their shadow on a stone. + + Through the lemon-trees at leisure a tiny olive bird + Moves all day long and utters his wise assuring word; + While up in their blue chantry murmur the solemn palms, + At their litanies of joyance, their ancient ceaseless psalms. + + There in the endless sunlight, within the surf’s low sound, + Peace tarries for a lifetime at doorways unrenowned; + And a velvet air goes breathing across the sea-girt land, + Till the sense begins to waken and the soul to understand. + + There’s a pier in the East River, where a black Ward Liner lies, + With her wheezy donkey-engines taking cargo and supplies; + She will clear the Hook to-morrow for the Indies of the West, + For the lovely white girl city in the Islands of the Blest. + + She’ll front the riding winter on the gray Atlantic seas, + And thunder through the surf-heads till her funnels crust and freeze; + She’ll grapple the Southeaster, the Thing without a Mind, + Till she drops him, mad and monstrous, with the light ship far behind. + + Then out into a morning all summer warmth and blue! + By the breathing of her pistons, by the purring of the screw, + By the springy dip and tremor as she rises, you can tell + Her heart is light and easy as she meets the lazy swell. + + With the flying fish before her, and the white wake running aft, + Her smoke-wreath hanging idle, without breeze enough for draft, + She will travel fair and steady, and in the afternoon + Run down the floating palm-tops where lift the Isles of June. + + With the low boom of breakers for her only signal gun, + She will anchor off the harbor when her thousand miles are done, + And there’s my love, white Nassau, girt with her foaming key, + The queen of the Lucayas in the blue Bahaman sea! + + + + + _This first edition of_ A WINTER HOLIDAY + _is printed for Small, Maynard & + Company at The University Press in + Cambridge, U. S. A., November, 1899_ + + + + +Transcriber’s Note + + + • Italics represented with surrounding _underscores_. + + • Small caps converted to ALL CAPS. + + • Obvious typographic errors silently corrected. + + • Variations in hyphenation kept as in the original. +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77609 *** diff --git a/77609-h/77609-h.htm b/77609-h/77609-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d316da2 --- /dev/null +++ b/77609-h/77609-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1614 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> + <title> + A winter holiday | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> + <style> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + font-family: serif; +} + +h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} +h1 { margin: 2em auto 10em auto; } + +p { + margin-top: .51em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .49em; +} + +.mt4 {margin-top: 4em;} + +.mb4 { margin-bottom: 4em; } + +.fs110 { font-size: 110%; } + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 33.5%; + margin-right: 33.5%; + clear: both; +} + +hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} +@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } +hr.full100 { width: 100%; margin: .25em 0%; } + +hr.r50 { width: 50%; margin: 1em 25%; } + +div.chapter, div.section {page-break-before: always;} +h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} +table.autotable { border-collapse: collapse; } +table.autotable td, +table.autotable th { padding: 0.25em; } + +.tdl {text-align: left;} +.tdr {text-align: right;} + +.pagenum { + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: small; + text-align: right; + font-style: normal; + font-weight: normal; + font-variant: normal; + text-indent: 0; + color: #888; +} /* page numbers */ + +blockquote { + margin-top: 0; + margin-bottom: 0; + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +.bbox {border: 2px solid;} + +.center {text-align: center;} +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} +.allsmcap {font-variant: small-caps; text-transform: lowercase;} + +figcaption {font-weight: bold;} +figcaption p {margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: .2em; text-align: inherit;} + +/* Images */ + +img { + max-width: 100%; + height: auto; +} +img.w100 {width: 100%;} + +.figcenter { + margin: 1em auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + + +/* Poetry */ +.poetry-container {display: flex; justify-content: center;} +.poetry-container {text-align: center;} +.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} +.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} +.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} + +/* Poetry indents */ +.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3.0em;} +.poetry .indentq {text-indent: -3.4em;} +.poetry .indent2 {text-indent: -2.0em;} + + +/* Transcriber's notes */ +.transnote {background-color: #E6E6FA; + color: black; + font-size:small; + padding:0.5em; + margin-bottom:5em; + font-family:sans-serif, serif; +} + +.also p { margin: .5em auto; } +.also table { width: 100%; font-size: 90%; } +.also td.tdl { padding-left: 1.5em; text-indent: -1em; } +.also td.tdr { padding-left: .25em; padding-right: .5em; + vertical-align: bottom; } +.t0 { margin-top: 2em; font-size: 150%; letter-spacing: .2em; + font-weight: bold; } +.t1 { margin-top: 1.5em; font-size: 110%; letter-spacing: .1em; } +.t2 { margin: 2em auto; } +.t3 { margin-top: 1.5em; line-height: 1.5em; word-spacing: .1em; } + +.copyright { margin-top: 4em; } +.copyright p { font-size: 80%; text-align: center; } +.press { margin-top: 10em; margin-bottom: 4em; } +.press p { font-size: 80%; text-align: center; } + +.dedication { margin: 4em auto 2em auto; } +.dedication p { word-spacing: .2em; } +.d-city { float: left; margin-top: 4em; margin-bottom: 2em; } +.d-city p { font-size: 80%; line-height: 1.0em; } + +.half-title { font-size: 200%; font-weight: bold; + letter-spacing: .1em; word-spacing: .2em; clear: both; + margin: 2em auto 0.5em auto; } + +.first-ed { margin: 2em 0% 8em 30%; } + + +/* Illustration classes */ +.illowp63 {width: 3.5%; margin: 0 auto; } +.illowp45 {width: 45%;} +.illowp-title {width: 18%;} + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77609 ***</div> +<figure class="figcenter illowp45" id="cover" style="max-width: 112.5em;"> + <img class="w100" src="images/cover.jpg" alt="Book Cover"> +</figure> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="section"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_i">[i]</span></p> +</div> + +<h1> +A WINTER HOLIDAY +</h1> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="section"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_ii">[ii]</span></p> +</div> + +<div class='mt4 mb4'> +<div class='poetry-container'> +<div class='also bbox'> +<p class='center fs110'><span class="smcap">By</span> BLISS CARMAN</p> +<hr class='full100'> +<table> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'>LOW TIDE ON GRAND PRÉ</td> + <td class='tdr'>$1.25</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'> + BEHIND THE ARRAS.<br> + A Book of the Unseen + </td> + <td class='tdr'>1.25</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'> + BALLADS OF LOST HAVEN<br> + A Book of the Sea + </td> + <td class='tdr'>1.25</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'> + BY THE AURELIAN WALL. <br> + A Book of Elegies + </td> + <td class='tdr'>1.25</td> + </tr> +</table> +<hr class='r50'> +<p class='center fs110'><span class="smcap">With</span> RICHARD HOVEY</p> +<table> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'>SONGS FROM VAGABONDIA</td> + <td class='tdr'>$1.00</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class='tdl'>MORE SONGS FROM VAGABONDIA</td> + <td class='tdr'>1.00</td> + </tr> +</table> +<hr class='full100'> +<p class='center'>Small, Maynard & Company<br> +Boston</p> +</div></div></div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="section"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_iii">[iii]</span></p> +</div> + +<p class="center t0">A<br> +WINTER HOLIDAY</p> + +<p class="center t1">BLISS CARMAN</p> + +<div class='t2'> +<p class="center"><figure class="figcenter illowp-title" id="title" style="max-width: 28.0625em;"> + <img class="w100" src="images/title.jpg" alt="Colophon"> +</figure> +</div> + +<p class="center t3">Boston<br> +Small, Maynard & Company<br> +1899</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="section"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_iv">[iv]</span></p> +</div> + +<div class='copyright'> +<p> <i>Copyright, 1899, by</i></p> +<p> <span class="smcap">Small, Maynard & Company</span></p> +<p>(<span class='allsmcap'>INCORPORATED</span>)</p> +</div> + +<div class='press'> +<p> <span class='allsmcap'>THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A.</span></p> +</div> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="section"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_v">[v]</span></p> +</div> + +<div class='dedication'> +<p class='center'><i>To</i> T. B. M.</p> +</div> +<div class='d-city'> +<div class='poetry-container'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p class='center'>Scituate, Massachusetts</p> +<p class='center'>October, 1899</p> +</div></div></div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_vi"></a><a id="Page_vii"></a>[vii]</span></p> + + <h2 class="nobreak" id="Contents"> + Contents + </h2> +</div> + +<table class="autotable"> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"></td> +<td class="tdr"> +<span class="smcap">Page</span> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#DECEMBER_IN_SCITUATE"><span class="smcap">December in Scituate</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +3 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#WINTER_AT_TORTOISE_SHELL"><span class="smcap">Winter at Tortoise Shell</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +8 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#BAHAMAN"><span class="smcap">Bahaman</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +15 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#FLYING_FISH"><span class="smcap">Flying Fish</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +28 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#IN_BAY_STREET"><span class="smcap">In Bay Street</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +31 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#MIGRANTS"><span class="smcap">Migrants</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +35 +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="tdl"> +<a href="#WHITE_NASSAU"><span class="smcap">White Nassau</span></a> +</td> +<td class="tdr"> +38 +</td> +</tr> +</table> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_viii"></a><a id="Page_1"></a><a id="Page_2"></a><a id="Page_3"></a>[3]</span></p> + + + <p class='center half-title'> + A Winter Holiday + </p> +</div> + +<figure class="figcenter illowp63" id="image003" style="max-width: 2em;"> + <img class="w100" src="images/image003.jpg" alt=""> +</figure> + + <h2 class="nobreak" id="DECEMBER_IN_SCITUATE"> + DECEMBER IN SCITUATE + </h2> + +<div class='poetry-container'> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Under a hill in Scituate,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where sleep four hundred men of Kent,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">My friend one bobolincolned June</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Set up his rooftree of content.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Content for not too long, of course,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Since painter’s eye makes rover’s heart,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the next turning of the road</div> + <div class="verse indent0">May cheapen the last touch of art.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Yet also, since the world is wide,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And noon’s face never twice the same,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Why not sit down and let the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That artist careless of his fame,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Exhibit to our eyes, off-hand,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As mood may dictate and time serve,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">His precious, perishable scraps</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of fleeting color, melting curve?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[4]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And while he shifts them all too soon,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Make vivid note of this and that,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Careful of nothing but to keep</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The beauties we most marvel at.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Selective merely, bent to save</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sheer delirium of the eye,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Which best may solace or rejoice</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Some fellow-rover by and by;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">That stumbling on it, he exclaim,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“What mounting sea-smoke! What a blue!”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And at the glory we beheld,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">His smouldering joy may kindle too.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Merely selective? Bring me back,</div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Verbatim</i> from the lecture hall,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Your notes of So-and-so’s discourse;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The gist and substance are not all.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The unconscious hand betrays to me</div> + <div class="verse indent0">What listener it was took heed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Eager or slovenly or prim;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A written character indeed!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Much more in painting; every stroke</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That weaves the very sunset’s ply,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Luminous, palpitant, reveals</div> + <div class="verse indent0">How throbbed the heart behind the eye;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">How hand was but the cunning dwarf</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of spirit, his triumphant lord</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Marching in Nature’s pageantry,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Elated in the vast accord.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Art is a rubric for the soul,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Man’s comment on the book of earth,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The spellborn human summary</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Which gives that common volume worth.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">So at the pictures of my friend,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">His marginal remarks, as ’twere,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">One cries not only, “What a blue!”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But, “What a human heart beat here!”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And now, ten minutes from the train,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Over the right-hand easy swell,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We catch the sparkle of the sea</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the green roof of Tortoise Shell.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[6]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">(He guessed from slipshod excellence</div> + <div class="verse indent0">What fable to his craft applied.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The tortoise for his monitor,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And <i>Cur tam cito</i> for his guide.)</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Here is the slanting open field,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where billow upon billow rolls</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sea of daisies in the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When June brings back the orioles.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">All summer here the crooning winds</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Are cradled in the rocking dunes,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till they, full height and burly grown,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Go seaward and forget their croons.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And out of the Canadian north</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Comes winter like a huge gray gnome,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To blanket the red dunes with snow</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And muffle the green sea with foam.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I could sit here all day and watch</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The seas at battle smoke and wade,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And in the cold night wake to hear</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The booming of their cannonade.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Then smiling turn to sleep and say,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“In vain dark’s banners are unfurled;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That ceaseless roll is God’s tattoo</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Upon the round drum of the world.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And waking find without surprise</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The first sun in a week of storm,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The southward eaves begin to drip,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the faint Marshfield hills look warm;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The brushwood all a purple mist;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The blue sea creaming on the shore;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As if the year in his last days</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Had not a sorrow to deplore.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Then evening by the fire of logs,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With some old song or some new book;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Our Lady Nicotine to share</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Our single bliss; while seaward, look,—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Orion mounting peaceful guard</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Over our brother’s new-made tent,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under a hill in Scituate</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where sleep so sound those men of Kent.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="WINTER_AT_TORTOISE_SHELL"> + WINTER AT TORTOISE SHELL + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“What wondrous life is this I lead!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Ripe apples drop about my head.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But as I read, that couplet seems</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The merest metaphor of dreams,—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A parable from Arcady</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Refuted by this wintry sea.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The summer was so long ago,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I hardly can believe it so.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Did we once really live outdoors,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With leafy walls and grassy floors,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Through sultry morns and dreamy noons</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And red October in the dunes,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">With butterflies and bees and things</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That roamed the air on roseleaf wings?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">There’s not a leaf on any bough</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To prove the truth of summer now;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">There’s not an apple left on high</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To bear the red sun company.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The sun himself is gone away,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A vagabond since yesterday,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And left the maniac wind to moan</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through his deserted house alone.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Over the hills we watched him forth</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From the low lodges of the North;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And then a hand we did not know</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Dropped the tent-curtain of the snow.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">This morning all outdoors is gray</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And bleak as dead Siberia.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But what is that to lucky me?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Who would not love captivity,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Where safe beneath their Tortoise Shell</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The Lady and the Tortoise dwell?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">The Tortoise is the Lady’s son;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He makes procrastination</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A fine art in this hurrying age</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of grudging work and greedy wage.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">An open air impressionist,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He swims his landscape in a mist,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And likes to paint his shadows blue,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If it is all the same to you.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">If not, he does not call you blind;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He waits for you to change your mind.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">His cunning knows how color lies</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Eluding the untutored eyes.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Perhaps within a year or two</div> + <div class="verse indent0">You may believe his pictures true.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The Tortoise, for a pseudonym,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Is very suitable to him.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">At Tortoise Shell the rafters green</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Mimic a shady orchard screen,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">The kindly half-light of the leaves,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And June songs running round the eaves.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The walls are hung with tapestries</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of gold flowers bending to the breeze,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And paintings, drenched in light and sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of Scituate shore and Norman town,—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A mute, unfading fairyland,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The glad work of a wizard hand,—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A small bright summer world of art</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The winter cherishes at heart.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Look, through the window, where the seas,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A million strong, ride in with ease!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The mad white stallions in stampede.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">This is your wintry world, indeed.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But summertime and gladness dwell</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under the roof of Tortoise Shell.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Color, imperishably fair,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Is mistress of the seasons there.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And, ah, to-night the Gallaghers</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Will come in all their mitts and furs,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Across the fields to visit us.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Then Boston <i>urbs</i> may envy <i>rus</i>!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">We’ll let the hooting blizzard shout;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We’ll pull the little table out;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And Andrew Usher, ever blessed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shall comfort us beneath the vest.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">So trim the light, and build the fire;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Bring out your oldest, sweetest briar.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">For half an hour, if you please,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We’ll listen to <i>The Seven Seas</i>;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Or Mr. Gallagher will sing—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">An opera or anything—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">About the Duke of Seven Dials,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">About his Dolly and her wiles.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Then we will sit, but not for tea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Around the smooth mahogany,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And watch while houses full of kings</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Are overthrown by knaves and things;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And hear the pleasant clicking noise</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of triple-colored ivories.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And Time may learn another trick</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To better his arithmetic,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">When wise content subtracts a notch</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For fuming weed and foaming Scotch.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">To-morrow, by the early train,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Light-hearted mirth will come again</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">To race across-lots with a crew</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of St. Bernards,—contagious Lou.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Who would not quit, for joys like these,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">All idle Southern vagrancies,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">By purple cove and creamy beach,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And gold fruit hung within the reach?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Since friendship is a thing that grows</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To sturdy height in Northern snows,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Who would not choose December weather,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where love and cold thrive well together,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And bide his days, content to dwell</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under the eaves of Tortoise Shell?</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="BAHAMAN"> + BAHAMAN + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In the crowd that thronged the pierhead,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">come to see their friends take ship</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For new ventures in seafaring,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">when the hawsers were let slip</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And we swung out in the current,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">with good-byes on every lip,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Midst the waving caps and kisses,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">as we dropped down with the tide</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the faces blurred and faded,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">last of all your hand I spied</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Signalling, Farewell; Good fortune!</div> + <div class="verse indent2">then my heart rose up and cried,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“While the world holds one such comrade,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">whose sweet durable regard</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Would so speed my safe departure,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">lest home-leaving should be hard,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">What care I who keeps the ferry,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">whether Charon or Cunard!”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Then we cleared the bar, and laid her</div> + <div class="verse indent2">on the course, the thousand miles</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From the Hook to the Bahamas,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">from midwinter to the isles</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where frost never laid a finger,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and eternal summer smiles.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Three days through the surly storm-beat,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">while the surf-heads threshed and flew,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the rolling mountains thundered</div> + <div class="verse indent2">to the trample of the screw,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The black liner heaved and scuffled</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and strained on, as if she knew.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">On the fourth, the round blue morning</div> + <div class="verse indent2">sparkled there, all light and breeze,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Clean and tenuous as a bubble</div> + <div class="verse indent2">blown from two immensities,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shot and colored with sheer sunlight</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and the magic of those seas.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In that bright new world of wonder,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">it was life enough to laze</div> + <div class="verse indent0">All day underneath the awnings,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and through half-shut eyes to gaze</div> + <div class="verse indent0">At the marvel of the sea-blue;</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and I faltered for a phrase</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Should half give you the impression,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">tell you how the very tint</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Justified your finest daring,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">as if Nature gave the hint,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Plodders, see Imagination</div> + <div class="verse indent2">set his pallet without stint!”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Cobalt, gobelin, and azure,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">turquoise, sapphire, indigo,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Changing from the spectral bluish</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of a shadow upon snow</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To the deep of Canton china,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">one unfathomable glow.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And the flying fish,—to see them</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in a scurry lift and flee,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Silvery as the foam they sprang from,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">fragile people of the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Whom their heart’s great aspiration</div> + <div class="verse indent2">for a moment had set free.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">From the dim and cloudy ocean,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">thunder-centred, rosy-verged,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">At the lord sun’s <i>Sursum Corda</i>,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">as implicit impulse urged,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Frail as vapor, fine as music,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">these bright spirit-things emerged;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Like those flocks of small white snowbirds</div> + <div class="verse indent2">we have seen start up before</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Our brisk walk in winter weather</div> + <div class="verse indent2">by the snowy Scituate shore;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the tiny shining sea-folk</div> + <div class="verse indent2">brought you back to me once more.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">So we ran down Abaco;</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and passing that tall sentinel</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Black against the sundown, sighted,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">as the sudden twilight fell,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Nassau light; and the warm darkness</div> + <div class="verse indent2">breathed on us from breeze and swell.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Stand-by bell and stop of engine;</div> + <div class="verse indent2">clank of anchor going down;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And we’re riding in the roadstead</div> + <div class="verse indent2">off a twinkling-lighted town,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Low dark shore with boom of breaker</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and white beach the palm-trees crown.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In the soft wash of the sea air,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">on the long swing of the tide,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Here for once the dream came true,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">the voyage ended close beside</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The Hesperides in moonlight</div> + <div class="verse indent2">on mid-ocean where they ride.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And those Hesperidian joy-lands</div> + <div class="verse indent2">were not strange to you and me.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Just beyond the lost horizon,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">every time we looked to sea</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From Testudo, there they floated,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">looming plain as plain could be.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Who believed us? “Myth and fable</div> + <div class="verse indent2">are a science in our time.”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Never saw the sea that color.”</div> + <div class="verse indent2">“Never heard of such a rhyme.”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Well, we’ve proved it, prince of idlers,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">knowledge wrong and faith sublime.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Right were you to follow fancy,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">give the vaguer instinct room</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a heaven of clear color,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Where the spirit might assume</div> + <div class="verse indent0">All her elemental beauty,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">past the fact of sky or bloom.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Paint the vision, not the view,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">the touch that bids the sense good-bye,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Lifting spirit at a bound</div> + <div class="verse indent2">beyond the frontiers of the eye,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To suburb unguessed dominions</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of the soul’s credulity.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Never yet was painter, poet,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">born content with things that are,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Must divine from every beauty</div> + <div class="verse indent2">other beauties greater far,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till the arc of truth be circled,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and her lantern blaze, a star.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">This alone is art’s ambition,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">to arrest with form and hue</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Dominant ungrasped ideals,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">known to credence, hid from view,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a mimic of creation,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">To the life, yet fairer too,—</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the soul may take her pleasure,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">contemplate perfection’s plan,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And returning bring the tidings</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of his heritage to man,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">News of continents uncharted</div> + <div class="verse indent2">she has stood tiptoe to scan.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">So she fires his gorgeous fancy</div> + <div class="verse indent2">with a cadence, with a line,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till the artist wakes within him,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and the toiler grows divine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shaping the rough world about him</div> + <div class="verse indent2">nearer to some fair design.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Every heart must have its Indies,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">an inheritance unclaimed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the unsubstantial treasure</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of a province never named,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Loved and longed for through a lifetime,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">dull, laborious, and unfamed,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Never wholly disillusioned.</div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Spiritus</i>, read, <i>hæres sit</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Patriæ quæ tristia nescit</i>.</div> + <div class="verse indent2">This alone the great king writ</div> + <div class="verse indent0">O’er the tomb of her he cherished</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in this fair world she must quit.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Love in one farewell forever,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">taking counsel to implore</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Best of human benedictions</div> + <div class="verse indent2">on its dead, could ask no more.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The heart’s country for a dwelling,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">this at last is all our lore.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But the fairies at your cradle</div> + <div class="verse indent2">gave you craft to build a home</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the wide bright world of color,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">with the cunning of a gnome;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Blessed you so above your fellows</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of the tribe that still must roam.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Still across the world they go,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">tormented by a strange unrest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the unabiding spirit</div> + <div class="verse indent2">knocks forever at their breast,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Bidding them away to fortune</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in some undiscovered West;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">While at home you sit and call</div> + <div class="verse indent2">the Orient up at your command,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Master of the iris seas</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and Prospero of the purple land.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Listen, here was one world-corner</div> + <div class="verse indent2">matched the cunning of your hand.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Not, my friend, since we were children,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and all wonder-tales were true,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Jason, Hengest, Hiawatha,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">fairy prince or pirate crew,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Was there ever such a landing</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in a country strange and new?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Up the harbor where there gathered,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">fought and revelled many a year,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Swarthy Spaniard, lost Lucayan,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Loyalist, and Buccaneer,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Once upon a time” was now,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and “far across the sea” was here.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Tropic moonlight, in great floods</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and fathoms pouring through the trees</div> + <div class="verse indent0">On a ground as white as sea-froth</div> + <div class="verse indent2">its fantastic traceries,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">While the poincianas, rustling</div> + <div class="verse indent2">like the rain, moved in the breeze,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Showed a city, coral-streeted,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">melting in the mellow shine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Built of creamstone and enchantment,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">fairy work in every line,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a velvet atmosphere</div> + <div class="verse indent2">that bids the heart her haste resign.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Thanks to Julian Hospitator,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">saint of travellers by sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Roving minstrels and all boatmen,—</div> + <div class="verse indent2">just such vagabonds as we,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">On the shaded wharf we landed,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">rich in leisure, hale and free.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">What more would you for God’s creatures,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">but the little tide of sleep?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a clean white room I wakened,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">saw the careless sunlight peep</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through the roses at the window,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">lay and listened to the creep</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Of the soft wind in the shutters,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">heard the palm-tops stirring high,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And that strange mysterious shuffle</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of the slipshod foot go by.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a world all glad with color,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">gladdest of all things was I;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In a quiet convent garden,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">tranquil as the day is long,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Here to sit without intrusion</div> + <div class="verse indent2">of the world or strife or wrong,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Watch the lizards chase each other,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and the green bird make his song;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Warmed and freshened, lulled yet quickened</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in that Paradisal air,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Motherly and uncapricious,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">healing every hurt or care,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Wooing body, mind, and spirit</div> + <div class="verse indent2">firmly back to strong and fair;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">By the Angelus reminded,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">silence waits the touch of sound,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As the soul waits her awaking</div> + <div class="verse indent2">to some <i>Gloria</i> profound;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till the mighty Southern Cross</div> + <div class="verse indent2">is lighted at the day’s last bound.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And if ever your fair fortune</div> + <div class="verse indent2">make you good Saint Vincent’s guest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">At his door take leave of trouble,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">welcomed to his decent rest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of his ordered peace partaker,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">by his solace healed and blessed;</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Where this flowered cloister garden,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">hidden from the passing view,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Lies behind its yellow walls</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in prayer the holy hours through;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And beyond, that fairy harbor,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">floored in malachite and blue.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In that old white-streeted city</div> + <div class="verse indent2">gladness has her way at last;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under burdens finely poised,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and with a freedom unsurpassed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Move the naked-footed bearers</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in the blue day deep and vast.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">This is Bay Street broad and low-built,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">basking in its quiet trade;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Here the sponging fleet is anchored;</div> + <div class="verse indent2">here shell trinkets are displayed;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Here the cable news is posted daily;</div> + <div class="verse indent2">here the market’s made,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">With its oranges from Andros,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">heaps of yam and tamarind,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Red-juiced shadducks from the Current,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">ripened in the long trade-wind,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Gaudy fish from their sea-gardens,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">yellow-tailed and azure-finned.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Here a group of diving boys</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in bronze and ivory, bright and slim,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Sparkling copper in the high noon,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">dripping loin-cloth, polished limb,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Poised a moment and then plunged</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in that deep daylight green and dim.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Here the great rich Spanish laurels</div> + <div class="verse indent2">spread across the public square</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Their dense solemn shade; and near by,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">half within the open glare,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Mannerly in their clean cottons,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">knots of blacks are waiting there</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">By the court-house, where a magistrate</div> + <div class="verse indent2">is hearing cases through,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Dealing justice prompt and level,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">as the sturdy English do,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">One more tent-peg of the Empire,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">holding that great shelter true.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Last the picture from the town’s end,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">palmed and foam-fringed through the cane,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the gorgeous sunset yellows</div> + <div class="verse indent2">pour aloft and spill and stain</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The pure amethystine sea</div> + <div class="verse indent2">and far faint islands of the main.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Loveliest of the Lucayas,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">peace be yours till time be done!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the gray North I shall see you,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">with your white streets in the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Old pink walls and purple gateways,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">where the lizards bask and run,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the great hibiscus blossoms</div> + <div class="verse indent2">in their scarlet loll and glow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the idling gay bandannas</div> + <div class="verse indent2">through the hot noons come and go,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">While the ever stirring sea-wind</div> + <div class="verse indent2">sways the palm-tops to and fro.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Far from stress and storm forever,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">dream behind your jalousies,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">While the long white lines of breakers</div> + <div class="verse indent2">crumble on your reefs and keys,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the crimson oleanders</div> + <div class="verse indent2">burn against the peacock seas.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="FLYING_FISH"> + FLYING FISH + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the Southern liners go,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the push of the purple seas,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When sky and ocean merge</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Their blue immensities,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A creature novel and fine</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Will break from the foam and play,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Swift as a leaf on the wind,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Part of the light and spray.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Will scud like a gust of snow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Silver diaphanous things,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As if, when the sun gave will,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sea for his part gave wings.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">For æons the Titan deep</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Forged and fashioned and framed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the great water-mills,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Forms that no man has named.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">With hammer of thunderous seas,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With smooth attrition of tides,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shaping each joint and valve,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Putting the heart in their sides,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Blindly he labored and slow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With patience ungrudging and vast,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Moulding the marvels he wrought</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Nearer some purpose at last.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Not his own. Those creatures of his</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Were endowed with an alien spark,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And a hint of groping mind</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That made for an unseen mark.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">For part was the stroke of force,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Fortuitous, blind, and fell,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And part was the breath of soul</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Inhabiting film and cell.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Finer and frailer they grew;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Must dare and be glad and aspire,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Out of the nether gloom</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into the pale sea-fire,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Out of the pale sea-day</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into the sparkle and air,</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Quitting the elder home</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For the venture bright and rare.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Ah, Silver-fin, you too</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Must follow the faint ahoy</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Over the welter of life</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To radiant moments of joy!</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="IN_BAY_STREET"> + IN BAY STREET + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“What do you sell, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea?”</div> + <div class="verse indentq">“Oh, turtle shell is what I sell,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In great variety:</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“Trinkets and combs and rosaries,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">All keepsakes from the sea;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">’Tis choose and buy what takes the eye,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In such a treasury.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“’Tis none of these, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Though curious they be,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But something more I’m looking for,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“Where can I buy the magic charm</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of the Bahaman sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That fills mankind with peace of mind</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And soul’s felicity?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[32]</span></p> + <div class="verse indentq">“Now, what do you sell, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Tinged with that true and native blue</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of lapis lazuli?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“Look from your door, and tell me now</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The color of the sea.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where can I buy that wondrous dye,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And take it home with me?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“And where can I buy that rustling sound,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In this city by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of the plumy palms in their high blue calms;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or the stately poise and free</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“Of the bearers who go up and down,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Silent as mystery,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Burden on head, with naked tread,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In the white streets by the sea?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“And where can I buy, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sunlight’s fall on the old pink wall,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or the gold of the orange-tree?”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[33]</span></p> + <div class="verse indentq">“Ah, that is more than I’ve heard tell</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Since I began, my roving man,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A trafficker to be.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“As sure as I’m John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And Bay Street’s by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Those things for gold have not been sold,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Within my memory.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“But what would you give, my roving man</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From countries over-sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For the things you name, the life of the same,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And the power to bid them be?”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“I’d give my hand, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For the smallest dower of that dear power</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To paint the things I see.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“My roving man, I never heard,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">On any land or sea</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under the sun, of any one</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Could sell that power to thee.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[34]</span></p> + <div class="verse indentq">“’Tis sorry news, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If this be destiny,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That every mart should know that art,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Yet none can sell it me.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“But look you, here’s the grace of God:</div> + <div class="verse indent0">There’s neither price nor fee,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Duty nor toll, that can control</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The power to love and see.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indentq">“To each his luck, John Camplejohn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Say I. And as for me,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Give me the pay of an idle day</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Bay Street by the sea.”</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="MIGRANTS"> + MIGRANTS + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Hello, whom have we here</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under the orange-trees,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the old convent wall</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Looks to the turquoise seas?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In his jacket of olive green</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He slips from bough to bough,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With a familiar air</div> + <div class="verse indent0">No venue could disavow.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Good-day to you, quiet sir!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We have been friends before,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When lilacs were in bloom</div> + <div class="verse indent0">By the lovely Scituate shore.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">When the surly hordes of snow</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Came down on the trains of the wind,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Two sojourners, it seems,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Were of a single mind.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Both from the storm and gray,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The stress of the northern year,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Seeking the peace of the world,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Found tranquillity here.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Here where there is no haste,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Lead we, each in his way,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Undistracted a while,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The slow sweet life of a day.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Busy, contented, and shy,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through the green shade you go;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">So unobtrusive and fair</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A mien few mortals know.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">It needs not the task be hard,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Nor the achievement sublime,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If only the soul be great,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Free from the fever of time.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And your glad being confirms</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The ancient <i>Bonum est</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Nos hic esse</i> of earth,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With serene, unanxious zest,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"><p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Whether far North you fare,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When too brief spring once more</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Visits the stone-walled fields</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Beside the Scituate shore,</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Or here in an endless June</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Under the orange-trees,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the old convent wall</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Looks to the turquoise seas.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span></p> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="WHITE_NASSAU"> + WHITE NASSAU + </h2> +</div> + + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">There is fog upon the river, there is mirk upon the town;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">You can hear the groping ferries as they hoot each other down;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From the Battery to Harlem there’s seven miles of slush,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through looming granite canyons of glitter, noise, and rush.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Are you sick of phones and tickers and crazing cable gongs,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of the theatres, the hansoms, and the breathless Broadway throngs,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of Flouret’s and the Waldorf and the chilly, drizzly Park,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When there’s hardly any morning and five o’clock is dark?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I know where there’s a city, whose streets are white and clean,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And sea-blue morning loiters by walls where roses lean,</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">And quiet dwells; that’s Nassau, beside her creaming key,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The queen of the Lucayas in the blue Bahaman sea.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">She’s ringed with surf and coral, she’s crowned with sun and palm;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She has the old-world leisure, the regal tropic calm;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The trade winds fan her forehead; in everlasting June</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She reigns from deep verandas above her blue lagoon.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">She has had many suitors,—Spaniard and Buccaneer,—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Who roistered for her beauty and spilt their blood for her;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But none has dared molest her, since the Loyalist Deveaux</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Went down from Carolina a hundred years ago.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Unmodern, undistracted, by grassy ramp and fort,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In decency and order she holds her modest court;</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">She seems to have forgotten rapine and greed and strife,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In that unaging gladness and dignity of life.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Through streets as smooth as asphalt and white as bleaching shell,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the slip-shod heel is happy and the naked foot goes well,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In their gaudy cotton kerchiefs, with swaying hips and free,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Go her black folk in the morning to the market of the sea.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Into her bright sea-gardens the flushing tide-gates lead,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where fins of chrome and scarlet loll in the lifting weed;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With the long sea-draft behind them, through luring coral groves</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The shiny water-people go by in painted droves.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Under her old pink gateways, where Time a moment turns,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where hang the orange lanterns and the red hibiscus burns,</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">Live the harmless merry lizards, quicksilver in the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or still as any image with their shadow on a stone.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Through the lemon-trees at leisure a tiny olive bird</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Moves all day long and utters his wise assuring word;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">While up in their blue chantry murmur the solemn palms,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">At their litanies of joyance, their ancient ceaseless psalms.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">There in the endless sunlight, within the surf’s low sound,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Peace tarries for a lifetime at doorways unrenowned;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And a velvet air goes breathing across the sea-girt land,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till the sense begins to waken and the soul to understand.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">There’s a pier in the East River, where a black Ward Liner lies,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With her wheezy donkey-engines taking cargo and supplies;</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">She will clear the Hook to-morrow for the Indies of the West,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For the lovely white girl city in the Islands of the Blest.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">She’ll front the riding winter on the gray Atlantic seas,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And thunder through the surf-heads till her funnels crust and freeze;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She’ll grapple the Southeaster, the Thing without a Mind,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till she drops him, mad and monstrous, with the light ship far behind.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Then out into a morning all summer warmth and blue!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">By the breathing of her pistons, by the purring of the screw,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">By the springy dip and tremor as she rises, you can tell</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her heart is light and easy as she meets the lazy swell.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">With the flying fish before her, and the white wake running aft,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her smoke-wreath hanging idle, without breeze enough for draft,</div> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span></p> + <div class="verse indent0">She will travel fair and steady, and in the afternoon</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Run down the floating palm-tops where lift the Isles of June.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">With the low boom of breakers for her only signal gun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She will anchor off the harbor when her thousand miles are done,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And there’s my love, white Nassau, girt with her foaming key,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The queen of the Lucayas in the blue Bahaman sea!</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span></p> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class='first-ed'> +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>This first edition of</i> <span class="smcap">A Winter Holiday</span></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>is printed for Small, Maynard &</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Company at The University Press in</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Cambridge, U. S. A., November, 1899</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> +</div> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter transnote"> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="Transcribers_Note"> + Transcriber’s Note + </h2> + +<ul> + <li>Obvious typographic errors silently corrected.</li> + <li>Variations in hyphenation kept as in the original.</li> + <li>New original cover art included with this eBook is granted + to the public domain.</li> +</ul> +</div> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77609 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/77609-h/images/cover.jpg b/77609-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0509591 --- /dev/null +++ b/77609-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/77609-h/images/image003.jpg b/77609-h/images/image003.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..191e4c9 --- /dev/null +++ b/77609-h/images/image003.jpg diff --git a/77609-h/images/title.jpg b/77609-h/images/title.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5acdaa8 --- /dev/null +++ b/77609-h/images/title.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6c72794 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This book, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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