(IF M ^ 
 
 Vx J/i L ) .
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 EXTRACTS FROM PRESS NOTICES OF A 
 FORMER VOLUME. 
 
 " We find these poems of sentiment by Hattie Howard entirely 
 natural, spontaneous, direct, rhythmical, and free from ambitious 
 pretense. Many of the fanciful verses have a laugh at the end ; 
 and the collection has altogether a sunny, hopeful spirit and will 
 be welcome in this time of generally morbid expression." 
 Hartford Courant. 
 
 "This author's verse shows a hearty, wholesome, human spirit, 
 Sometimes overflowing into downright fun, and a straightforward 
 directness always. It is a pleasant book, sure to be welcomed by 
 all." Hartford Times. 
 
 "These garnered gems reveal a genuine poetic faculty, and 
 are worthy their attractive setting. We give the book a hearty 
 welcome." Christian Secretary. 
 
 " Many of the poems abound in playful humor or tender touches 
 of sympathy which appeal to a refined feeling, and love for the 
 good, the true, and the beautiful." Religious Herald. 
 
 "This poet's ear is so attuned to metric harmony that she 
 must have been born within sound of some osier-fringed brook 
 leaping and hurrying over its pebbly bed. There is a variety of 
 subject and treatment, sufficient for all tastes, and these are 
 poems which should be cherished." Evening Post. 
 
 "Lovers of good poetry will herald with pleasure this new and 
 attractive volume by the well-known authoress of Hartford. A 
 wooing sentiment and genial spirit seem to guide her in every 
 train of thought. Her book has received, and deserves, warm, 
 commendations of the press." Connecticut Farmer.
 
 LATER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 HATTIE HOWARD. 
 
 Books and friends O choose with care! 
 Lest, deluded by the glare 
 
 Of their covers, or their looks, 
 You may some day in despair 
 
 Hue your choice of friends and books. 
 
 HARTFORD, CONN.
 
 PAGE. 
 
 MARCH, ....... 9 
 
 GENEROUS GIVING, ...... 11 
 
 AMBITION, ....... 12 
 
 " BEN HUR," ....... I'd 
 
 THE FORTUNE TELLER, . . . . .15 
 
 PENELOPE, ....... 17 
 
 " WATER ON THE BRAIN," . . . . .18 
 
 Too SOON! . . . . . . . 20 
 
 SLEEPING, ..... .21 
 
 TABLEAUX, . . . . . . .22 
 
 "HOLY LAND," ...... 24 
 
 BLOCK ISLAND, ...... 27 
 
 THE DEAR REMAINING FEW, . . .28 
 
 A GREAT SINGER, . . . . . . 30 
 
 SMOKE, . . . . . .32 
 
 WORRY, ....... 34 
 
 IP OTHERS WOULD, . . . . . 35 
 
 TUBEROSES, . . . . . . .36 
 
 DESTRUCTION OF FLOOD ROCK, . . .37 
 
 INAUGURATION DAY, 1887, . . . . . 40 
 
 "OLD FOLKS," ...... 42 
 
 MY ART, ....... 44 
 
 AMID THE CORN, ...... 46 
 
 THE DIFFERENCE, ...... 48 
 
 AT SEA, . . 50
 
 8 CONTENTS. 
 
 I PAGE. 
 
 NOT MINE ALONE, . . . . . .52 
 
 Ox READING SWINBURNE, . . . . .54 
 
 " YOUNG SOCIETY-DAB WIN," . . . .56 
 
 EN HIVEK, . . . . . .-57 
 
 EVOLUTION, . . . . ... 58 
 
 His POTENT PEN, . . . . 61 
 
 How SHE WENT AWAY, . . . . . 61 
 
 " OLD LIBERTY BELL," . . . . . 62 
 
 THE REASON WHY, . . . . .' . . 63 
 
 CHOOSING A PASTOR, . . ... .65 
 
 REMEMBER THE POOR, . . ... .67 
 
 THE ICE PALACE, . . . .... 68 
 
 THE SEA, . . . . ,. ... 70 
 
 THE GRANGER, . . . . . . 72 
 
 SOMNIUM POETAE, . . . . . . 74 
 
 "SUGARING OFF," . . . . . .75 
 
 LIFE, . . ... . . . .78 
 
 A GOBELIN TAPESTRY, ..... 79 
 
 BEAUTIFUL EYES, . . . . . .82 
 
 A DAY IN ANCIENT ROME, . . . . .84 
 
 "MAD ROSE," . . . . . .88 
 
 THE MAKER OF THE BELLS, . . .90 
 
 ADELE, ....... 93 
 
 Two QUESTIONS, . . . . . .94 
 
 WESTERN JUSTICE, ...... 95 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL HAND, . . . . .96 
 
 To THE STARS, . . . . . .98 
 
 A NOTED PLACE, . . . . . .99 
 
 INN-HOSPITALITY, . . . . . . 101 
 
 LOVED AND LOST, ...... 102 
 
 OUR FAULT, ....... 103 
 
 "THE MIND CURE,". . . . . .104 
 
 O WEAR A SMILING FACE, ..... 107 
 
 A CRISTMAS FOWL, . . . 108
 
 March, thou month of varied weather 
 Mild and frigid joined together 
 " Winter," amorous poets sing, 
 " Lingering in the lap of Spring." 
 
 Full of reckless threat and bluster 
 
 Thou, like daring filibuster, 
 Will not yield thy fitful way, 
 Though a king dispute thy sway. 
 
 Month of terror, storm, and blizzard I 
 Never work of skillful wizard, 
 Though in magic unsurpassed, 
 Surer, swifter than the last. 
 
 Period of expectation ! 
 
 Link between the desolation 
 And the glory of the year 
 Time of roses drawing near.
 
 10 POEMS. 
 
 Monarch viewed in many guises 
 Giving, as in rare surprises, 
 
 While we stand with cold benumb, 
 Hints of balminess to come. 
 
 March, like mortals waxing crazy 
 For the arbutus and daisy, 
 
 Violet and crocus-cup 
 
 Round our pathway springing up. 
 
 Timidly the grass is creeping, 
 Daffodils awake from sleeping, 
 And the long-dismantled woods 
 Are alive with bursting buds. 
 
 Sweetest notes are bluebirds trilling, 
 Leafless groves with music filling, 
 To whose tuneful prophecies 
 Every heart responsive is. 
 
 Fickle March ! from thee we borrow 
 Rays of promise for the morrow,; 
 For are coming, soon or late, 
 Perfect days if we but wait.
 
 GENEROUS GIVING. 11 
 
 I read of receptions in salons of fashion, 
 
 Of music, militia, and festival bells ; 
 Of elegant banquets that ravish the palate, 
 Of beauty, enchantress "and queen of the ballet, 
 In motion as graceful as 'dancing gazelles. 
 
 I think of Society's doings, and wonder 
 
 It seems such a foolish and frivolous show 
 If ever were deeds of beneficence fewer, 
 If ever a thought of the life that is truer 
 Invaded those beings with tinsel aglow. 
 
 Then turn for a moment from glittering splendor, 
 
 And into the hovels of poverty go ; 
 To meet peradventure the jeweled patrician 
 Abroad on benevolent, heavenly mission, 
 
 Whose kindness alone its recipients know. 
 
 never again may unworthy reflection 
 Thus picture humanity heartless and gay ; 
 
 For never was more of spontaneous giving 
 
 Or helping to holier, happier living, 
 
 Than brightens the earth to her children to-day. 
 
 Yea, hidden by drapery, diamonds, and gilding, 
 
 Do goodness and opulence tenderly keep 
 A corner of love for the fortune-forsaken, 
 Of pity for those by adversity shaken, 
 A tear for the sad who in solitude weep.
 
 12 POEMS. 
 
 I have not wrought for fame or gold, 
 
 To gain position, praise, or power, 
 Nor that I might o'er others hold 
 
 The envied vantage of an hour ; 
 For honeyed compliments that lie 
 
 Profuse upon the flatterer's tongue, 
 Or Fashion's captive butterfly, 
 
 No song of mine was ever sung. 
 
 I would not dare to while away 
 
 In aimless, apathetic mood 
 The precious moments of a day 
 
 Without a care for others' good ; 
 And thus in Love's unmeasured stint 
 
 An undercurrent seems to run 
 A wish to bear some helpful hint 
 
 Or bit of cheer to every one. 
 
 On each impulsive act or word 
 
 Whatever merit may depend, 
 Is shown when one, in spirit stirred 
 
 To recognize its honest trend, 
 Hath been uplifted ; and perchance 
 
 In thankfulness and sympathy, 
 Through lonely space by swift advance 
 
 A cordial hand held out to me.
 
 "BENNUR" 13 
 
 And so for those who know me true, 
 
 Who've loved me longest, loved me best, 
 Because of aught that I may do 
 
 In friendly overtures expressed 
 To brighten Life's short pilgrimage, 
 
 Ambition's aim is gratified ; 
 Though culture, lore, and wisdom sage 
 
 To me forever be denied. 
 
 "gen 
 
 Scion of an illustrious line 
 
 For ages rich in noble blood, 
 That kept, as 'twere a thing divine, 
 
 Its record clear beyond the Flood ! 
 
 What were a haughty rival's boast 
 Compared to thine, of ancient home 
 
 And ancestry, whose dawn at most 
 Coeval was with that of Rome ? 
 
 Above, not of, the populace ! 
 
 Born to a prince's proud estate ; 
 But driven from thy rightful place 
 
 By harsh vicissitudes of Fate. 
 
 Long service at the galley-oar 
 
 Thy kingly spirit could not crush ; 
 
 For Pride in chains than e'er before 
 
 Is stronger, though with conscious blush. 
 
 II 2
 
 14 POEMS. 
 
 What prowess thine, by all admired ! 
 
 That hedged thine adversary in, 
 And from " Messala's " grasp aspired 
 
 The victor's laurel crown to win. 
 
 One moment, friend and confidante, 
 If lovely " Iras " seemed to thee, 
 
 The next, a heart like adamant 
 Was shown by her duplicity. 
 
 The blandishments of cunning art 
 In Egypt's fairest daughters were, 
 
 Beside the love of " Esther's " heart, 
 Like charms of wicked sorcerer. 
 
 Apollo's self in comeliness, 
 
 Type of thy people Israel ! 
 In Roman garb, a Jew no less 
 
 Who loved his land and kindred well. 
 
 champion of thy hapless race ! 
 
 Our sympathies were all with thee 
 In thy desire to see His face 
 
 And serve " The King Who Was To Be."
 
 THE FORTUNE-TELLER. 15 
 
 " Gypsy, skilled in chiromancy, 
 Telling fortunes by the hand, 
 
 Satisfy my longing fancy 
 Answer all that I demand ! 
 
 " Dark, mysterious clairvoyant ! 
 
 Is there in my horoscope 
 Aught to make my spirits buoyant 
 
 In the promises of hope ? 
 
 " Whisper, soul of divination, 
 Thou who canst the future see ! 
 
 Whose the heart in adoration 
 Shall its queen acknowledge me ? 
 
 " Or if woe, not weal, betide me, 
 And of life's supremest bliss 
 
 Sweet experience be denied me, 
 
 What shall take the place of this ? " 
 
 Thus a maiden fair and merry, 
 On her cheeks the roses' hue, 
 
 Lips the deeper shade of cherry, 
 Did the sybil interview. 
 
 " Maiden ! palmistry my art is, 
 Leagued am I with powers that be, 
 
 Known to me the human heart is 
 All its guarded mystery.
 
 16 POEMS. 
 
 " But there's something in thy beauty, 
 In thy tone so gay and glad, 
 
 Makes me recreant to my duty 
 As a palmist I am sad. 
 
 " Not always thus hard and wrinkled 
 Was the face confronting thine, 
 
 And the love-light never twinkled 
 Once in brighter eyes than mine. 
 
 " Years ago had I a daughter, 
 Fair and beautiful as thou ; 
 
 How I loved, and loving taught her 
 Evil thought to disallow. 
 
 " This sweet child was rudely taken, 
 Stolen from my side away ; 
 
 I a wand'rer now forsaken, 
 
 Seek my darling night and day. 
 
 " For her sake no drop of sorrow 
 Would I pour on thy young heart ; 
 
 By the stars, whose aid I borrow, 
 Hope and cheer would I impart. 
 
 " In thy slender palm extended, 
 Half-afraid my own to touch, 
 
 Lines in pink and white are blended 
 Intricate, expressing much.
 
 PENELOPE. 17 
 
 " This betokens fame and glory 
 
 Thou art destined yet to win ; 
 That repeats the ' new old story ' 
 
 All thy hopes are centered in. 
 
 " This " with closer clasp she caught her 
 "Aye ! that mark I know too well 
 
 Eloise ! my long-lost daughter ! " 
 As she tottered, swooned, and fell. 
 
 Wond'riug that such mood befell her, 
 Tenderly they raised her head ; 
 
 But, alas ! the fortune-teller 
 She, the gypsy-queen, was dead. 
 
 With new delight again we've read 
 
 The story of Penelope 
 Her patient weaving of the thread 
 
 Into a fabric, fair to see, 
 Whose consummation it is said 
 
 Should seal at once her destiny. 
 
 Her task was ever just begun ; 
 
 For artfulness as promptly spoiled, 
 As soon as each day's work was done, 
 
 The textile web at which she toiled 
 From early morn till set of sun 
 
 And thus her anxious suitors foiled. 
 
 II 2*
 
 18 POEMS. 
 
 0, baffled courtiers ! ye who sued 
 A hero's loyal wife to gain ! 
 
 For untold centuries ye have stood 
 As targets for the world's disdain ; 
 
 While she, a queen beloved and good, 
 Is honored still in Virtue's reign. 
 
 Let modern suppliants profit by 
 The lesson, efficacious still 
 
 Though learned, alas ! with face awry ; 
 That impolitic, imbecile. 
 
 And " born to rue " are they who try 
 To circumvent a woman's will. 
 
 an the gmitt." 
 
 'Twas morning ; in the Orient 
 
 The primal rays of daylight shone 
 Till field and forest's dim extent 
 
 Took on effulgence, form, and tone ; 
 Anon the mountains' misty sides 
 
 In far perspective glistened bright 
 As darkness vanished, that divides 
 
 As with a curtain day from night. 
 
 The thrifty farmer, quick astir 
 At Chanticleer's familiar notes, 
 
 Doled out to each dumb servitor 
 His daily share of corn and oats ;
 
 " WATER ON THE BRAIN." 19 
 
 And letting down the pasture-bars 
 
 Advantage gave to lowing kine, 
 Impatient as untrained hussars 
 
 To break the ranks of fodder-line. 
 
 Then from his ring-streaked, brindled pets, 
 
 Upon a triple-legged stool 
 He sat, extracting creamy jets 
 
 To swell the liquid lactage-pool 
 Within the pail ; and spryly stepped 
 
 From each to each, and did not bilk 
 Till all were vacuous except 
 
 The cow that gave the buttermilk. 
 
 This frothy fluid, looking pure 
 
 As snowy flakes from Heaven's dome, 
 By thirsty city epicure 
 
 Was guzzled in as bovine foam 
 Excelsior until one day 
 
 The cattle, splashing through a bog, 
 In some unheard-of, wondrous way, 
 
 Let in the milk a spotted frog 
 
 For so the trembling dealer said, 
 
 Confronted by his customer, 
 Who bade him gulp it down instead 
 
 Of shamefully deceiving her ; 
 Alas! his produce he might " brook," 
 
 But could not brook a woman's scoff
 
 20 POEMS. 
 
 So with a jerk the can he took 
 
 And tossed its mingled contents off. 
 
 Of course lie never told the tale 
 
 But enterprising rivals say 
 Who thrive on his deserted trail : 
 
 " He perished by the ' Milky Way ! ' " 
 But, with opinions formed with care, 
 
 Are others who the case explain 
 In cruel jest for they declare 
 
 " 'Twas only water on the brain ! " 
 
 00 
 
 A modest violet, azure-eyed, 
 
 Stirred 'neath its dark, protecting mold, 
 And whispered, " Why, it can't be cold ! " 
 
 To the slumb'ring daisy by its side ; 
 " For I am sure I hear the tread 
 Of gentle -Spring above my head! 
 
 " Her touch is making all things bright 
 For where the snow was wont to drift 
 Upon our bed, a widening rift 
 
 Lets in the blessed, glad sunlight 
 And I can feel the atmosphere 
 So warm, I know that Spring is here !
 
 SLEEPING. 21 
 
 " I hear a voice that seems to say, 
 As from some far-off vernal bower, 
 * Come forth, thou earliest Spring flower ! ' 
 
 It sounds so like the voice 'of May, 
 I think I'll just peep'out to see 
 If any one is calling me ! " 
 
 And so she did sweet innocent ! 
 Not knowing that above the ground, 
 Grim " Old Jack Frost " was prowling round 
 
 With footstep light, on mischief bent ; 
 And, lo ! he nipped her from her stem 
 While north winds sang her requiem ! 
 
 " Too soon ! " cried Daisy, in her bed : 
 " The early worm is always caught ! 
 Just see what poor, dear Violet got ! 
 
 I'll not be quite so fast ! " she said 
 " But I'll appear at a later hour, 
 And be the earliest Spring flower." 
 
 A little crib I sat beside, 
 And watched two stars at eventide 
 That silken lashes drooped to hide ; 
 I hummed a song and softly stepped, 
 And in the dark my vigil kept 
 The stars were out the baby slept !
 
 22 POEMS. 
 
 The handsome Spanish artist brought 
 
 From his enchanting land by night, 
 His pictures a bewitching lot, 
 
 Done all by hand in pink and white ; 
 An " Indian Girl," a masterpiece 
 
 We mean a miss terpiece, was placed 
 On exhibition with a crease 
 
 Half way between her chin and waist ; 
 At which we marveled, much afraid 
 
 For he was such a taking chap 
 The charming portraiture was made 
 
 While she was sitting on his lap. 
 Next came the " Japanese," admired 
 
 By all, from lovely top to toe 
 In shining tinselry attired, 
 
 With eyes cut bias, sleeves to flow ; 
 We took her in until she fell 
 
 That is, the artist pulled her down 
 And then we saw the stunning belle 
 
 Who captivates and sways the town. 
 When " Expectation " came in play 
 
 As graceful as a waterfall, 
 We recognized her by the way 
 
 She hung herself upon the wall 
 0, dear ! what language does convey 
 
 Of course, she didn't hang herself !
 
 TABLEAUX. 23 
 
 She sat or stood the border lay 
 
 With her inside upon a shelf ; 
 Can't anybody understand ? 
 
 So much explaining takes up time, 
 And " Time is Money " and we've planned 
 
 A thousand ways for every dime. 
 Then later, in that very frame, 
 
 In closest jam a perfect squeeze, 
 The " Merry Wives of Windsor " came 
 
 So tight they didn't dare to breathe ; 
 Who was old Windsor, anyhow ? 
 
 Like Brigham Young an awful " Saint" 
 With wives the law did not allow, 
 
 Who choked them into meek restraint ? 
 But then they looked so innocent, 
 
 And seemed to like the Mormon plan, 
 To have and hold, and be content 
 
 With but the fraction of a man ; 
 We saw " Justitia " serene, 
 
 Who on a tub stood upside down 
 Oh ! why, of course, the tub we mean 
 
 Now do not criticize and frown ! 
 Had she with honest balance weighed 
 
 Her audience, we do aver 
 This statuesque, imposing maid 
 
 Had found that all were wanting her. 
 The manager, with ready wit 
 
 That never yet was known to fail,
 
 24 POEMS. 
 
 Convulsed us by the happy hit 
 
 Of offering the gems for sale ; 
 Which made " the pictures " pout and groan, 
 
 When, to avert the war he'd waged, 
 He said in more emollient tone 
 
 That they were "nearly all engaged." 
 Old " Castle Garden " showed a scene 
 
 That all who've seen it understand, 
 For " Jean Crapeau " and " Erin " green 
 
 With " Saner Kraut-" were hand in hand ; 
 The " Singing School " wound up the show 
 
 With baton flourish grand and fine, 
 And when the people rose to go 
 
 The curtain fell on " Auld Lang Syne." 
 
 gawd." 
 
 Delectable " Holy Land ! " magical book ! 
 
 In thy pages enchanting, I lingering look, 
 
 And oft am transported in rapture, to dwell 
 
 In the midst of the scenes thou portrayest .so well. 
 
 With thee, I have crossed the broad ocean, and seem 
 To behold every valley and mountain and stream 
 That burst on thy vision, and thrilled thee with joy, 
 And a memory left, Time can never- destroy.
 
 "HOLT LAND." 25 
 
 Historic Old England I've traversed, and stood 
 Beside sculptured tombs of the great and the good ; 
 And oft, in Earth's corners neglected, have found 
 Lone graves that must ever be hallowed ground. 
 
 The steep Alpine track I have climbed without fear, 
 While the sound of the avalanche greeted my ear ; 
 And, surmounting those crowns of perpetual snow, 
 Looked down on the beautiful valley below. 
 
 top of St. Peter's magnificent dome 
 surveyed the vast city of Rome 
 jling emotions, and tried to recall 
 j and grandeur, her pride and her fall. 
 
 were streets that once echoed the tread 
 [ring armies and there captive led, 
 'l, though in fetters rejoicingly trod, 
 And sealed with his life his devotion to God. 
 
 I've been awed by the Sphinx and the Pyramids, while 
 Ascending the sacred, mysterious Nile, 
 That still floweth on through green valleys, as when 
 In Egypt ruled Joseph a prince among men. 
 
 I've wandered where Thebes, of historic renown, 
 That once of the civilized world was the crown, 
 In desolate ruins, seems sadly to say, 
 Earth's grandeur and glory thus yield to decay. 
 
 3
 
 26 POEMS. 
 
 But the wish of my heart, my life-dream was fulfilled, 
 And with sacred emotions my spirit was thrilled, 
 When my gaze rested first on the valleys so green, 
 Of that holiest land upon earth Palestine ! 
 
 There in sweet meditation I " walked by the sea " 
 Oft blest by His presence 0, bright Galilee ! 
 And a beautiful picture my memory fills 
 Of a mirror, encased in a frame-work of hills. 
 
 I have climbed to the summit, and cannot forget 
 The memories that cling around thee, Olivet ! 
 What scenes have occurred in Gethsemane's shade, 
 Where Jesus hath knelt, and in agony prayed. 
 
 I've " walked about Zion," and lingered to see 
 The spot where Redemption was purchased for me ; 
 And shared in the deep-thrilling awe that awaits 
 The stranger who enters Jerusalem's gates. 
 
 All the teachings of childhood came over me, when 
 I followed where He, the dear Saviour of men, 
 " Went about doing good "- for wherever He trod, 
 Are recognized still the foot-prints of God. 
 
 glorious Land ! that has witnessed the birth 
 And the death of our Saviour no land upon earth 
 More favored than thou and till life shall depart 
 Of thee, blessed memories shall dwell in my heart.
 
 BLOCK ISLAND. 27 
 
 Oh ! billow-chafed and wind-swept isle, 
 
 Engirt by rugged seas ; 
 Forsaken by the traveler, 
 Forgotten by the sojourner, 
 Bereft of beauty's grace and smile 
 
 And summer indices ! 
 
 An ocean-field with ice afloat 
 
 Thy crystal setting- is ; 
 The shifting floe, for daring feet 
 That holds but danger and deceit, 
 Erewhile that rocked the pleasure boat 
 
 And fed the fisheries. 
 
 Through many a league of bleakest space, 
 
 The ray that never dies, 
 From storm-beleagured Pharos' light 
 On fair Montauk or Watch Hill height, 
 Of sail and sailors show no trace 
 
 Beneath the wintry skies. 
 
 As once the bold, intrepid Kane, 
 
 Hero adventurous, 
 For weary months environed lay 
 A prisoner in an Arctic bay, 
 So thou art bosomed in the main 
 
 A frigid nautilus.
 
 28 POEMS. 
 
 lonely isle ! the very wave 
 
 That, like a gem impearled, 
 Shall hold thee sparkling on its breast 
 In bud and bloom and verdure dressed, 
 Enfolds thee now as in the grave 
 Cut off from all the world. 
 
 Remaining 
 
 The touch beneficent of Spring 
 
 Shall clothe the hill and vale and plain 
 With verdure, bloom, and everything 
 
 That makes this world a fair domain ; 
 But none of these can gladness bring 
 
 To our sad hearts, or wake the strain 
 In other days we used to sing 
 
 Days that will never come again ! 
 
 Though rich and beautiful her dower 
 
 As ever graced an earthly throne, 
 Still desolate the fairest bower 
 
 If we must walk therein alone ; 
 Or pass a solitary hour 
 
 No friendly hand to clasp our own ; 
 Can song of bird, or hue of flower 
 
 Make up for one dear face or tone ?
 
 THE DEAR REMAINING FEW. 29 
 
 With heavy pinions hovering, 
 
 It seems that Death is in the air, 
 The whole bright world o'ershadowing ; 
 
 For friends are falling everywhere, 
 To whom, departed, still we cling ; 
 
 Life's promises were all so fair, 
 And in their presence comforting 
 
 We took no note of time or care. 
 
 Around the crumbling walls of clay, 
 
 Their home from ours that now divide, 
 In summer-time shall children play 
 
 And lovers walk at eventide ; 
 While anguish words cannot portray, 
 
 Our hearts must bear, too oft allied 
 To futile questionings why they, 
 
 In grace and beauty, should have died. 
 
 Angel dread ! whose wings have fanned 
 
 The cheeks that bore the roses' hue 
 With blighting power, whose fateful hand 
 
 Sweet lips has touched, like poison-dew 
 Behold ! a few yet proudly stand 
 
 Beside us, brave and strong and true ! 
 Though but a remnant of our band, 
 
 spare the dear remaining few ! 
 
 3*
 
 30 POEMS. 
 
 & 05vmt Jnnrjer. 
 
 The tears were dropping softly down 
 
 Upon my polonaise 
 A velvet vine-embroidered gown, 
 
 A " Dolly Varden craze " 
 When through the door a little maid 
 
 Came with a timid rap, 
 And looking up in wonder laid 
 
 A pansy in my lap. 
 
 " Don't cry ! " she said, and turned away, 
 
 And I saw her not for years, 
 Whose presence like a sunbeam lay 
 
 Across the path of tears ; 
 Till in a Western town one night 
 
 Amid a rapturous throng 
 I sat beneath the calcium light, 
 
 To greet the queen of song. 
 
 The debutante, that gifted child, 
 
 Had been beyond the sea, 
 And learned to trill the linnet's wild, 
 
 Sweet notes of melody ; 
 Had caught the prirna donna's role, 
 
 Marchesi's pupil apt, 
 And caroled till her tuneful soul 
 
 Grow tremulous and rapt.
 
 A GREAT SINGER. 31 
 
 Not Jenny Lind nor Malibran 
 
 Sang more divinely sweet, 
 Or held, as only divas can, 
 
 Adorers at their feet ; 
 That heavenly maid Calliope, 
 
 Among her worshipers, 
 Had been distraught with jealousy 
 
 To hear a voice like hejs. 
 
 But while the world in homage bowed 
 
 To recognize her gift, 
 I only saw a sable cloud 
 
 Through which a golden rift 
 Of sunlight cleared the mists away ; 
 
 And standing in the gap 
 Was she who laid, on that sad day, 
 
 A pansy in my lap. 
 
 cantatrice ! sing for aye, 
 
 And still be good and kind 
 As when with childish na'ivet 
 
 My sorrow you divined ; 
 And for your Fame-crowned womanhood, 
 
 While dear affection swells 
 With thoughts of " Auld Lang Syne " renewed, 
 
 Accept Love's immortelles.
 
 32 POEMS. 
 
 jimolte. 
 
 'Tvvas a zero morn, and the air was keen 
 
 As a glittering blade of Damascene, 
 
 And gathering frost on the window told 
 
 An icy tale of the piercing cold ; 
 
 From savory viands that formed the base 
 
 Of the matin meal and a whispered grace 
 
 I watched the vapors curling away 
 
 From a thousand flues in the morning gray, 
 
 And thus to my jubilant vis-a-vis, 
 
 Who like a comet eclipses me, 
 
 With sudden thought impetuous spoke : 
 
 " Why, what becomes of the clouds of smoke ?/' 
 
 Do they center and form those misty piles 
 
 That drink in light like beautiful isles 
 
 On the boundless face of the sea of sky ? 
 
 Or low on Orion, like shadows nigh, 
 
 Untold anathemas bringing down 
 
 For tingeing astral castles brown, 
 
 Do they tell star-dwellers what earth must be 
 
 By its dense, exhalant impurity ? 
 
 That light and grace and bloom we lack, 
 
 Our globe is drear and our skies are black, 
 
 Earth's denizens never bereft of a tear 
 
 Because of the poisonous atmosphere ?
 
 SMOKE. 33 
 
 Or away on some old plantation ground 
 Where freedmen's cabins cluster round, 
 And Dinah's bit of tinder stuff 
 Emits one feeble, flickering puff, 
 Do fumes of Northern wood and coal 
 With Southern exhalations roll, 
 And like the clasp of friendly hands 
 Above those reunited lands 
 In mingled waves suffuse the air 
 And, like the blessing after prayer, 
 Descend on grass-grown battle plains 
 In winter snows or summer rains ? 
 
 Do they circle away in vanishing lines 
 
 To rest on the tops of soughing pines 
 
 In the wilderness where the moose-deer roams 
 
 As wild as Zulus in Afric' homes; 
 
 Where anglers revel encamped about 
 
 The limpid haunts of the speckled trout, 
 
 Where the lumber-camp and woodman's axe 
 
 Efface the wild opossum's tracks ; 
 
 Where Androscoggin's waters sweep 
 
 A mighty pathway to the deep, 
 
 And honest Dow and Statesman Elaine 
 
 Adorn like stars the brow of Maine ? 
 
 Or are they wafted, soon or late, 
 To El Dorado's " Golden Gate,"
 
 34 POEMS 
 
 And tossed about by. every gale 
 That rends Pacific's stoutest sail, 
 But redwood giants move no more 
 Than Zephyr's breath the iron door ? 
 Perchance like nebula? awhile 
 They hang o'er Santa Barbara's isle ; 
 Precursor of discomfort hid 
 In the weary heart of the invalid, 
 To whom the months' incessant rain 
 And sunshine's loss is added pain. 
 
 wandering vapors ! like the breeze 
 
 That rocks the navies of the seas 
 
 To intermix with London fog 
 
 The city's arteries to clog, 
 
 Or dimly veil the face serene 
 
 Of proud Britannia's sovereign queen 
 
 Though North or South, or West or East 
 
 Diffusing like the foamy yeast, 
 
 errant vapors ! lost in space 
 
 Like shreds of fine illusion lace, 
 
 To other worlds bear not the joke 
 
 That ours is wreathed in tobacco-smoke! 
 
 Contentment reigning in the heart 
 Knows never fuss nor flurry ; 
 
 It is not work that wears one out 
 But everlasting worry.
 
 IF OTHERS WOULD. 35 
 
 |f liters mcmtct. 
 
 If other human beings had 
 
 The goodness that is his, 
 The tender love and sympathy, 
 
 The winning courtesies, 
 This world would never be the vale 
 
 Of sorrow that it is. 
 
 If other mortals would extend 
 
 A helping hand to those 
 Who, by untoward Fate, endure 
 
 Misfortune's cruel blows, 
 Prosperity and happiness 
 
 Would blossom as the rose. 
 
 If others would but learn of him, 
 
 In hearts of gratitude 
 Who must forever be enshrined 
 
 0, if they only would, 
 Each in his own appointed place 
 
 Might do a world of good ! 
 
 No preacher nor philosopher, 
 
 Nor saintly acolyte, 
 More clearly understands that Earth 
 
 Cannot be Eden quite 
 And yet he bears a cheerful part 
 
 In setting it aright.
 
 36 POEMS. 
 
 rarest of flowers ! that seem to exhale 
 
 On the stillness of air, or the breath of the gale, 
 
 All effluent odors in botany shrined ; 
 
 The volatile essences richly combined 
 
 Of orchis diffusions, deliciously blent 
 
 With lavender, orange, and balsamine scent. 
 
 No jessamine chalice or hyacinth vase, 
 No mignonette-perfumed or blossoming space 
 Of violets redolent, dewy and sweet, 
 With delicate fragrance is half so replete, 
 As one of these exquisite florets that hold 
 The cream of aroma in waxen-like mold. 
 
 There's a " Flowery Kingdom " way over the sea, 
 
 The home of the Mongol, the " heathen Chinee "- 
 
 But why this cognomen of fanciful sound 
 
 Applies to their bit of terrestrial ground, 
 
 No pundit can tell, be he ever so wise, 
 
 And chance if Confucius himself could surmise. 
 
 But Yankees, quick-witted and willing to guess, 
 
 Are equally ready and free to confess 
 
 By " coolies " imported who slavishly toil 
 
 As cheap as the dirt on American soil 
 
 That every known spot where a Chinaman dwells 
 
 Is held in remembrance because of its " smells.''
 
 DESTRUCTION OF FLOOD ROOK. 37 
 
 And so, to preserve our dear continent free 
 From Eastern effluvium, what can there be 
 More potent and lasting in counter-effect, 
 The dainty olfactory sense to protect, 
 Than lovely tuberoses, ambrosial and rare, 
 In fine distillations suffusing the air ? 
 
 And as in the ocean when refuse is tossed, 
 
 By free salination impurity's lost, 
 
 So these liliaceous corolla-cups bear 
 
 In happier living a recognized share ; 
 
 And prove their beneficence, beauty, and worth 
 
 Refining, adorning, and sweetening earth. 
 
 Jtestructtcnx of fflood | 
 
 restless man ! unsatisfied 
 
 With Earth whence sprung thy parent-tree, 
 Upon whose branches far and wide 
 
 Hang jewels of thy pedigree, 
 Fair scions touched with family pride 
 
 That marks their true heredity ! 
 
 Doth not this mundane planet, graced 
 With light and bloom and beauty sweet, 
 
 By its Designer firmly placed 
 Beneath thy own inconstant feet, 
 
 Respond to thy fastidious taste, 
 Or its requirements kindly meet ?
 
 38 POEMS. 
 
 The cascade leaping from its source, 
 A crystal spring upon the hill, 
 
 Becomes a mighty water-course 
 Subservient to thy slightest will, 
 
 And gives of its unfailing force 
 
 To guide the loom or turn the mill. 
 
 The monarchs of the forest bow 
 Beneath the sturdy woodman's axe, 
 
 The glebe unrolls before the plow 
 A furrow for the yeoman's tracks, 
 
 And science from the mountain-brow 
 Discerns a planet's parallax. 
 
 The billowy sea, that danced and laughed 
 And man's dominion long defied, 
 
 Bears on its bosom princely craft 
 Palatial ships that proudly glide ; 
 
 Or flying sail that breezes waft 
 
 With speed that rivals time and tide. 
 
 Yet combating alike rebuff 
 
 Or ridicule, unlimited 
 Is man's ambition not enough 
 
 The scope of his victorious tread 
 Till ocean-reefs, sea-chafed and rough, 
 
 Are riven in their stony bed.
 
 DESTRUCTION OF FLOOD ROCK 39 
 
 A little hand so soft and white 
 
 Impels the swift electric spark, 
 The hidden fuse that shall ignite 
 
 In submarine recesses dark, 
 Which like a flash of Heaven's light 
 
 Goes straight to its projected mark. 
 
 As if the dreaded Typhoon gale 
 
 Had vexed the spirit of the main, 
 Uprose an instantaneous wail 
 
 Of subterranean rage and pain ; 
 As when that ancient temple-vail 
 
 By power divine was rent in twain. 
 
 As if Titanic power lay 
 
 In youth's dexterity and grace, 
 Or as a giant would convey 
 
 Neptunian rocks through airy space, 
 So scattered fragments leagues away 
 
 Of sunken ledges wrenched apace. 
 
 Rejoice, mariner ! to thee 
 
 Shall " Hell-Gate " nevermore present 
 
 An obstacle that may not be 
 By man's devices circumvent, 
 
 Till hither vessels ride as free 
 As Arab from his desert-tent.
 
 40 POEMS. 
 
 As calm succeds the tempest's roar, 
 
 So elements are reconciled ;~ 
 Now, conqueror of sea and shore, 
 
 Since " Peace on Earth " again hath smiled, 
 Be thou contented evermore 
 
 And led as by a little child !~ 
 
 gatj ; 1887. 
 
 Ascending* smoke from countless flues, 
 
 Like floating nebula, 
 Hung over snowy avenues 
 
 As trackless as the sea ; 
 Where rural lane and city street 
 
 Unbroken stretches lay, 
 Beneath the sun that rose to greet 
 
 Inauguration Day. 
 
 Inspirited by fife and drum, 
 
 Militia bands enrolled, 
 From office, bench, and counter come 
 
 Like minute-men of old ; 
 A glittering retinue, who led 
 
 The chosen ruler's way 
 With serried ranks and martial tread, 
 
 Inauguration Day.
 
 INA UO URA T10N DA T, 1887. 41 
 
 Not fairer was that world renowned, 
 
 Suburb Pantheon dome, 
 That like a storied temple crowned 
 
 Antique and classic Rome, 
 Than Hartford's stately edifice, 
 
 In festival array 
 Like some enthroned impe*ratrice, 
 
 Inauguration Day. 
 
 Proud Capitol ! in chiseled grace 
 
 Like beauty's sculptured queen, 
 Environing in council space 
 
 A grand impressive scene, 
 That angels must have thrilled to see ; 
 
 Who registered for aye 
 Those solemn vows of fealty, 
 
 Inauguration Day. 
 
 As governors thus come and go, 
 
 May each unsullied be 
 And wear like garments of the snow 
 
 The robe of purity ; 
 In fair Connecticut our State 
 
 May rectitude hold sway, 
 And love of justice consecrate 
 
 Inauguration Day.
 
 42 POEMS. 
 
 Mysteries of election day 
 Yet had scarcely cleared away, 
 Ere attention all was drawn 
 To a strange phenomenon 
 Wondrous transformation rare 
 Happening at our fancy " Fair." 
 
 In the twinkling of an eye 
 Not a shade of reason why 
 Rosy maidens, laughing-eyed, 
 Ruddy youth, our hope and pride, 
 All their bloom and freshness lost 
 Like carnations nipped by frost. 
 
 Heads as suddenly grew white 
 As if due to awful fright, 
 While the sobriquet " Antiques " 
 Rose from costume's crazy freaks ; 
 For such robes, put on at dark, 
 Might have come from " Noah's ark." 
 
 Spirit full of revelry, 
 
 First appeared in ecstasy 
 
 She whose ruff and spacious dress 
 
 Marked the days of good " Queen Bess " 
 
 While our modern queen took on 
 
 Style of " Martha Washington."
 
 "OLD FOLKS" 43 
 
 ' George " was hanging round near by 
 He who could not " tell a lie " 
 When the " flour-pot," he said, 
 Had been emptied on his head," 
 We believed him, for we knew 
 By his locks it must be true ! 
 
 Charmed by " Jacob's " fluent tongue, 
 To his arm, confiding, clung 
 Rachel " saucy, sweet, and quaint 
 Far from being solemn saint ! 
 Even in grandmother's cap, 
 Still admired by many a chap ! 
 
 Could it be that " fourteen years' " 
 
 Alternating hopes and fears, 
 
 Waiting for his " Rachel " fair, 
 
 Thus had bleached out " Jacob's " hair 
 
 Carved his alabaster skin, 
 
 Put those extra wrinkles in ? 
 
 Clad in antiquated rig, 
 
 Snowy cue and periwig, 
 
 Polished, graceful, well at ease, 
 
 Prodigal in arts to please, 
 
 Who'd have thought that courtly man 
 
 Was " our bashful, modest Dan ? " 
 
 Thus, in highest style of art, 
 Each so well assumed his part
 
 44 POEMS. 
 
 In fantastic, odd disguise, 
 That we scarce could recognize 
 One of that capricious set 
 Whom an hour before we met. 
 
 Sweet delusion ! born to last 
 Only till the " Fair " had passed ! 
 For with morn's succeeding dawn 
 Every trace of age was gone ; 
 While the " box receipt " supply 
 " Our piano " helped to buy. 
 
 As if my unpretending rhymes 
 
 Publicity might ever claim, 
 Or echo rapture as in chimes 
 
 Resounding from the bells of Fame ! 
 I never dreamed of such renown, 
 
 And only wrote because my heart 
 Provoked the same resistless frown 
 
 Whene'er I tried to fetter art. 
 
 The solemn grandeur of the sea, 
 The beauty of the summer sky, 
 
 The song-bird's revel, wild and free, 
 In rhythm spake to ear and eye, 
 
 Till melody possessed my soul ;
 
 MY ART. 45 
 
 And Poesy, as if astir 
 The measured numbers to control, 
 Became its meet interpreter. 
 
 And other hearts that throbbed as mine, 
 
 Intensified and thrilled no less, 
 Grew covetous of every line 
 
 So facile-traced that could express 
 Their undivulged, unuttered thought ; 
 
 And praised each lyric pseudo gem, 
 And gratefully the singer sought 
 
 In metric strains who sang for them. 
 
 I have not borrowed of the books 
 
 That teach symmetric, polished phrase, 
 Nor delved in musty, classic nooks ; 
 
 Nor dared to penetrate the maze 
 Of Concord's deep philosophy 
 
 And Buddhist fallacies I hate ; 
 For never shall my Heaven be 
 
 An aimless, vague, Nirvana-state. 
 
 But narrow-sphered to critic sight, 
 
 Have I with true, unsullied pen 
 In kindliness essayed to write 
 
 As one who loves his fellow-men ; 
 And when my gift persisted in 
 
 Hath wakened some accordant note, 
 It hath to me sweet solace been 
 
 And Sorrow's potent antidote.
 
 46 POEMS. 
 
 As use and polish render bright 
 
 The rusty cimeter of steel, 
 So poor endowments turned aright 
 
 An unsuspected grace reveal ; 
 And thus I dream, and feel, and know 
 
 That in celestial atmosphere, 
 To full fruition yet shall grow 
 
 The bud of talent lent me here. 
 
 tfte 
 
 When roasting ears are peeping through 
 
 Their silken tassel curls, 
 When corn leaves glisten in the dew 
 
 Like ribbons strewn with pearls ; 
 When Pho3bus' splendor is revealed 
 
 And gilds the summer morn, 
 I love to walk the furrowed field 
 
 Among the rows of corn. 
 
 It brings to mind those vanished days 
 
 In adolescence sweet, 
 When through familiar seas of maze 
 
 With ardent, childish feet 
 That never tired, the glebe I trod 
 
 The " hired man " to warn 
 Where grew the tares, or where a clod 
 
 Obstructed hills of corn.
 
 AMID THE CORN. 47 
 
 A happy home upon the farm 
 
 In memory holds a place, 
 That city life with all its charm 
 
 Can never quite efface. 
 give me back the days of yore ! 
 
 When I, a farmer born, 
 In pantalet and pinafore 
 
 Grew up amid the corn. 
 
 that I could to nature true 
 
 From etiquette relax, 
 And follow, as I used to do, 
 
 Papa's unerring tracks ! 
 A scholar, who could wield the pen, 
 
 Whose honors well were borne, 
 Was he this noblest, best of men 
 
 Who plowed and hoed the corn. 
 
 I'd rather be, though dumb and droll, 
 
 An effigy to-day, 
 A man of straw upon a pole 
 
 To scare the crows away, 
 Than like a figure fashion-spun 
 
 A palace to adorn, 
 Disdainfully look down on one 
 
 Who works amid the corn.
 
 48 POEMS. 
 
 Love is no restricted part 
 
 Of a woman's trusting heart, 
 
 Balancing in like degrees 
 
 Other traits and qualities, 
 
 Like a " corner lot " of bliss 
 
 In its guarded edifice ; 
 
 'Tis her very life wrapped up 
 
 In the secret treasure cup 
 
 Of her soul its vital sense 
 
 Holding proud pre-eminence 
 
 Over every other thought ; 
 
 'Tis a ray supernal caught 
 
 From effulgence round the Throne 
 
 " God is Love " and He alone. 
 
 Love in man is little more 
 Than a ripple passing o'er 
 The deep current of a life 
 With untold diversions rife ; 
 Either knotty points of law 
 All his aspirations draw, 
 Or resistless struggles he 
 With some new theology ; 
 Or, as children play with blocks,. 
 Notes the rise and fall of stocks,.
 
 THE DIFFERENCE. 49 
 
 Fraternizes " bulls and bears," 
 Speculating unawares 
 Till his soul in not a cleft 
 Hath for love a " margin " left. 
 
 Maiden with the blooming cheek, 
 But a word to thee we speak ; 
 If a man shall say : " To you, 
 0, my love ! my heart is true 
 As the needle to the pole 
 Day-star art thou of my soul ! 
 If thou look disdainfully 
 On my suit, repelling me, 
 All the solace that I crave 
 Shall be this an early grave 
 And the finale to thy scoff, 
 My untimely taking off ! " 
 Do not on his words rely 
 Just for love men never die ! 
 
 But, creation's lord, if thou 
 Cherishest a mutual vow, 
 Do not, we admonish thee, 
 Let the monster jealousy 
 Drive thy sweetheart to despair ; 
 Tempting her to say : " Beware, 
 Faithless one ! do not forget 
 Love shall be requited yet ; 
 
 II 5
 
 50 POEMS. 
 
 Glistening on yonder green 
 Shall a double cross be seen ; 
 Since thy perfidy I've known 
 I will die but not alone ! " 
 believe her sure as fate 
 She will do it soon or late ! 
 
 The victim of miscarried plans, 
 This rueful self, as all may see, 
 A pouting " ward in chancery," 
 Perforce abideth yet on lands 
 As hot as arid desert-sands ; 
 But that immortal spirit-part, 
 Mine alter ego, longing heart, 
 Whatever it may be, 
 Is far away at sea. 
 
 Like unspent geysers pours the heat, 
 O'erflows its crucible of brass, 
 Makes crispy sward of verdant grass, 
 To lava-beds converts the street, 
 And sears the soles of tender feet ; 
 While dear copartners wonder much 
 If this intense caloric touch 
 Affects my fancies free 
 never ! I'm at sea !
 
 AT SEA. 51 
 
 What though the torrid atmosphere 
 This " too, too solid flesh " transform 
 Into a compound soft and warm, 
 And sad companions drop a tear ^ 
 O'er one who lies unburied here! 
 It is not I I'm on the wave 
 In cool circumfluence I lave 
 And pure felicity, 
 A nereid of the sea. 
 
 Seek I a kingdom ? 'tis the main ! 
 Where I may smile at billows high, 
 The vortex of the deep defy, 
 Consort with him whose potent reign 
 Encompasses the watery plain ; 
 Or with admiring, ardent eyes 
 Behold the glorious sunset skies, 
 In rainbow mystery, 
 That beautify the sea. 
 
 Mais il est mal a propos though. 
 That some resistless, secret art 
 Hath forced the spirit to depart ; 
 For everywhere I chance to go, 
 That is this empty shell I know 
 That friends who value my caress 
 Remark my absent-mindedness, 
 And wish the soul of me 
 Were not so far at sea.
 
 52 POEMS. 
 
 The landscape, that in verdure glows 
 With all the freshness of the rose, 
 In myriad forms of beauty, throws 
 
 A spell of rapture o'er me ; 
 As like a queen upon her throne, 
 From lofty parapet alone 
 I view, admire, and call my own 
 
 The hills and vales before me. 
 
 Yes ; all is mine, of beauty wrought 
 By superhuman skill and thought 
 A priceless heritage, which naught 
 Can wrest from my possession 
 While satellites in splendor shine, 
 And joyous sounds, and prospects fine, 
 On every thrilling sense combine 
 To make their true impression. 
 
 In rare, pellucid atmosphere, 
 Through tangled boughs afar I peer 
 Receptacles of hidden cheer 
 
 In fruitage, ripe and ruddy ; 
 Like odd designs in arabesque, 
 Though wild, fantastic, and grotesque, 
 Presenting scenes so picturesque 
 
 I fain would pause to study.
 
 ON READING SWINBURNE. 55 
 
 Might awaken deep unrest ; 
 Fire the blood of one possessed 
 Even of a royal crest. 
 Scion of a kingly line. 
 
 Thine is matchless eloquence 
 
 Thou a benefactor born ! 
 As, endowed with prescience, 
 Thou dost search out vain pretense 
 'Neath the garb of innocence, 
 And in true benevolence 
 
 Hold it up to human scorn. 
 
 Does that winged steed Pegasus 
 
 He who threw Bellerophon 
 Risky as a blunderbuss, 
 Frisking round so mischievous, 
 Ever show his animus 
 Mettlesome, and hazardous 
 
 To thy safety, Algernon ? 
 
 As enchanted we peruse 
 
 Stanzas rich in polished lore, 
 Envy we the power that woos, 
 In Parnassian interviews 
 With thy generous patron muse, 
 Favors none knew how to use 
 
 Half so gracefully before.
 
 56 POEMS. 
 
 Who so prodigal to thee ? 
 
 King of meters, tell us, do ! 
 Is it fair Calliope 
 Goddess eloquent is she 
 Or divine Melpomene ? 
 Tell thy secret, so may we 
 
 Importune the muses, too ! 
 
 For, Swinburne ! to thy height 
 
 We poor publican afar 
 Downcast and despairing quite, 
 Dare not lift our eyes, but smite 
 On our bosom day and night ; 
 Thou the sun in splendor bright 
 We, not even a tiny star ! 
 
 UCf: 
 
 In vestments fine, the latest plan, 
 The tailor had arrayed him ; 
 
 His low-necked jacket, light rattan, 
 And staring lens betrayed him ; 
 
 But in our hearts we never can 
 Find language to upbraid him, 
 
 But try to call this thing a man ! 
 Because the Lord hath made him.
 
 NOT MINE ALONE. 53 
 
 In parting benison benign 
 
 The sunset glow, like mellow wine, 
 
 Irradiates this wealth of mine 
 
 With marvelous refulgence ; 
 Like that a mortal blest perceives 
 On " one of those ambrosial eves 
 A day of storms so often leaves," 
 
 To crown its wild indulgence. 
 
 The aureole, o'er field and town, 
 Might tempt a wandering seraph down 
 To view that iridescent crown 
 
 Whose brilliance so enchants me. 
 1 can but wonder if it be 
 The splendor of reality, 
 Through some supernal agency, 
 
 Or due to necromancy. 
 
 All beauty, charm, and novelty 
 Beneath the sky, is not for me 
 Alone the heritage ; for he 
 
 Who hath an ear to hear it, 
 Or eye to see it matters not 
 With true esthetic ardor fraught, 
 May claim whatever God hath wrought 
 
 For eye, and ear, and spirit. 
 
 And who, with highest sense endued, 
 From boundless riches, oft renewed, 
 
 II 5*
 
 54 POEMS. 
 
 Would choose the' best of all that's good, 
 Will find his chief employment 
 
 In lonely haunt, or busy mart, 
 
 In searching out that valued part ; 
 
 To treasure it within his heart, 
 A well-spring of enjoyment. 
 
 Poet! thou hast wondrous art, 
 
 Rare as necromantic skill ! 
 Thou canst touch the coldest heart, 
 Life and love to it impart, 
 Make the crystal tear-drop start 
 As, unchained, thy fancies dart 
 Hither, thither, at thy will. 
 
 Words but playthings are to thee 
 Which like happy child among 
 
 Thou dost revel fearless, free, 
 
 Leaping oft the boundary 
 
 Of conventionality, 
 
 By the strength of imagery 
 In thy metric mother-tongue. 
 
 Taken at thy very best, 
 
 There's a " lilt in every line " 
 That, in rude plebeian breast,
 
 EN HIVER. 57 
 
 grc fpxrer. 
 
 Le long de la rue neigeuse, 
 Dans la saison rigoureuse, 
 
 Je passe souvent, 
 Tout oubliant la tempete 
 Qui frappe autour de ma tete 
 
 Furieusement. 
 
 Sans peur, sans souci, sans peine, 
 Je marche comme une reine, 
 
 Essayant avoir 
 
 L' air bon ; rencontrant 1'orage 
 A bras ouverts, mon visage 
 
 Eclatant d'espoir. 
 
 Sous son tapis blanc la terre, 
 Une grande mer de verre, 
 
 Quand vient le printemps 
 Fleurira comme la rose ; 
 Nous dormant beaucoup de cause 
 
 Pour contentement. 
 
 Parmi la neige a 1'aurore, 
 Ou en regardant la flore, 
 
 Je me satisfais ; 
 Car 1' e"toile d'espe" ranee 
 Peint le ciel de 1'existence 
 
 Le teint violet.
 
 58 POEMS. 
 
 Ho, everybody ! an hour purloin 
 From time's brief distribution 
 
 Of leisure moments, just to join 
 The " class in evolution." 
 
 To all the world tuition's free 
 
 A school with no defection, 
 No begging for admission-fee, 
 
 And better, no collection. 
 
 Did love for geologic laws, 
 
 The all-prevailing passion, 
 Lead us ? Oh, no ! we went because 
 
 To go was all the fashion. 
 
 For we had loved to stare at stars 
 
 On some ambrosial even ; 
 Or, through the moonlight's argent bars, 
 
 Look longingly to Heaven. 
 
 Or, far removed from haunts of men, 
 This mundane sphere forgetting, 
 
 Admire that distant sky-land when 
 The golden sun was setting. 
 
 Then, presto ! what a fall was there ! 
 
 As landed 'mid the strata 
 Of subterranean regions, where 
 
 The darkness dims the data.
 
 EVOLUTION. 59 
 
 In eloquent, unwritten speech, 
 
 Defying skill of sages, 
 To read what rocks so grandly teach 
 
 About the vanished ages. 
 
 How wonderful ! that science can 
 
 Bridge o'er the mighty chasm 
 Between the dear, developed man 
 
 And shapeless bioplasm. 
 
 Yet, every mite that ever groped 
 
 Before or after Noah 
 Is classified and microscoped, 
 
 And labelled " Protozoa." 
 
 By evolution laws we find, 
 
 Though dimly comprehended, 
 That vertebrates of human kind 
 
 Are from a worm descended. 
 
 Again 'tis said does logic fall ? 
 
 Because we've heard a dozen 
 Times, at least, that every whale 
 
 Is our primeval cousin. 
 
 Propounding theories like these 
 
 Nobody seems to bother ; 
 And we may choose whate'er we please 
 
 For our revered forefather.
 
 60 POEMS. 
 
 Imagination runs away 
 For what is there to hinder, 
 
 When all the wise logicians saj 
 That water is a cinder ? 
 
 In his most lucid interval 
 
 Did anybody think it 
 That aqua, too, is a mineral ": 
 
 And so, how dare we drink it ? 
 
 So marvelous and plausible 
 
 Are these advanced ideas 
 Unto a world already full 
 
 Of ills and panaceas, 
 
 And all explained in tones as clear 
 As softly tinkling cymbal ; 
 
 Not sounding brass beguiles the ear, 
 But cultured Mr. Kimball. 
 
 But, touching our ancestral tree, 
 
 Our filial doting spirit 
 Resents the thought, and sighs that we 
 
 Were ever born to hear it. 
 
 By turns we scowl and smile and grieve. 
 
 Then grow severely spunky ; 
 Because we never will believe 
 
 That man was once a monkey !
 
 HIS POTENT PEN. 61 
 
 gis goteut gcu. 
 
 A power was his unique and strange, 
 
 That held the world entranced ; 
 Beyond whose utmost, loftiest range, 
 
 By easy flights advanced, 
 He soared, and wrought amid the stars 
 The diction that no blemish mars. 
 
 He touched his pen and moved so free 
 
 Because he willed it so 
 The waves of Thought's tremendous sea ; 
 
 Whose ever-widening flow 
 Still circled in controlling reach 
 Of purpose marked by polished speech. 
 
 What was it lay in a bit of steel, 
 
 A nib of gold, or quill, 
 That made the world accordant feel 
 
 As touched with tender thrill ? 
 Why, only this his potent pen 
 Was dipped in love for his fellow-men ! 
 
 |loiu ^lic 
 
 We bade her good-night, looking into her eyes 
 Already that shone with celestial surprise, 
 And when we returned a brief interval-space 
 A beautiful angel had taken her place. 
 
 II 6
 
 62 POEMS. 
 
 0, Liberty herald ! thy echoes I hear, 
 As down through the century, year after year, 
 The resonant voice that our forefathers knew, 
 Triumphant and thrilling, still loyal and true, 
 In paeans rings out o'er the land that we love, 
 Proclaiming good-will to the people thereof. 
 
 In thy reverberations sonorously mix 
 
 With the patriot spirit of Seventy-Six, 
 
 The soul, that seems wafted from some distant shore 
 
 As if intervening, rough seas passing o'er, 
 
 Of " Old Independence," obedience to God, 
 
 Resistance to tyrants at home and abroad. 
 
 From the bosom of Earth wast thou, Liberty Bell, 
 
 In crude metal taken, and fashioned so well, 
 
 And by skillful artificer given a tongue 
 
 In the City of Brotherly Love that first rung, 
 
 As Victory's bright, starry pennon unfurled 
 
 To the uplifted gaze of a wondering world. 
 
 Old Liberty Bell ! though corroded with rust, 
 
 And choked and half-buried 'neath undisturbed dust, 
 
 And haplessly cracked on that memorable day 
 
 In overstrained efforts to greet Henry Clay, 
 
 Thy clarion notes of the past resound yet, 
 
 Recalling the days we would never forget.
 
 THE REASON WET. 63 
 
 Now, Liberty Bell, on thy way to the South, 
 Thy history travels before; every mouth 
 Can the story repeat of the stirring events 
 That led to the birth-day of Freedom and hence 
 To our proud elevation, and paramount worth 
 Admired and honored all over the Earth. 
 
 May favors auspicious thy wand'rings attend, 
 And greetings fraternal from Northern hearts blend 
 With those of our neighbors, till courtesies kind 
 Shall " many in one" so harmoniously bind, 
 That in jubilant tones shall thy aged tongue tell 
 Of a country united, Liberty Bell ! 
 
 The bobolink and oriole 
 
 Are wild with blithesome singing ; 
 Each pouring out his happy soul 
 In gleeful notes beyond control, 
 
 Till melody is ringing 
 In forest, field, and orchard gay 
 With countless blossoms' rich array. 
 
 The pendant leaf is never still, 
 
 The bending twigs are dancing 
 As if in rapt, accordant thrill
 
 64 POEMS. 
 
 With every fresh, spontaneous trill 
 From tuneful throats, enhancing 
 The gladness and the glory of 
 Sweet May, the month that warblers love. 
 
 Hilarious lad and romping lass, 
 
 Alert in vigor bounding, 
 Come unawares in meadow grass 
 On many an interwoven mass 
 
 Of fibers fine, surrounding 
 That little world where bird and mate 
 In hope exultant watch and wait. 
 
 Thus every nest, half-hidden by 
 The verdure round it growing, 
 
 A home reveals explaining why 
 
 So gaily sing and lightly fly 
 
 The feathered songsters ; knowing 
 
 That in their promised fledgeling brood 
 
 Shall song and rapture be renewed. 
 
 So, like the birds, the heart doth sing 
 
 In dulcet tone and meter, 
 That hath some fond, endearing thing 
 'Round which its tendrils twine and cling ; 
 
 So is existence sweeter 
 To one who holds in cherished thought 
 Some love-encircled, home-like spot.
 
 CHOOSING A PASTOR. 65 
 
 Now this is what the deacon said : 
 
 (May blessings crown each saintly head !) 
 
 " For leagues around we've sought to find 
 
 Some one to fill the place 
 Who shall our hearts together bind ; 
 An honest man as God designed, 
 With earnest purpose, cultured mind, 
 
 And liberal share of grace." 
 
 Then anxious parents had their say : 
 (Whose scions claim the right of way !) 
 
 " Before the winning flag unfurls 
 
 We clamor for the youth ; 
 'Mid business cares, in social whirls 
 We cannot train our boys and girls 
 Before them, he must scatter pearls 
 
 Of wisdom and of truth ! " 
 
 The young men exercised their brains : 
 (And for a while forgot their canes !) 
 
 " We want a man about our size, 
 A manly, whole-souled, genial chap, 
 
 II 6*
 
 66 POEMS. 
 
 Who, though he may have won the prize 
 In Greek and Hebrew exercise, 
 Can catch a base-ball as it flies, 
 Or wear the umpire's cap ! " 
 
 The lovely maidens shook their curls 
 And said : (Oh, my ! what saucy girls !) 
 
 " Now we won't have a pastor prim 
 Or grave, with carping tongue ! 
 
 He must be handsome, tall, and slim, 
 
 Our cavalier in twilight dim, 
 
 And we'll lay down our lives for him 
 Of course, he must be young ! " 
 
 The populace at large chimed in : 
 (Who dodge the missiles aimed at sin !) 
 
 " He may be prophet, king, or priest, 
 
 A ' Tabernacle Saint ' 
 Who has his congregation fleeced, 
 For aught we care but this at least 
 We want an intellectual feast 
 
 Without sectarian taint ! " 
 
 Thus everybody aired his views 
 About the kind of man
 
 REMEMBER THE POOR. 67 
 
 Our wealthy, cultured church should choose 
 To wear our " Reverend Idol's " shoes ; 
 But no one dreamed he might refuse 
 To come, and spoil our plan. 
 
 In course of time we half agreed 
 
 A certain man might do, 
 Who seemed to apprehend our need ; 
 But, though particular indeed, 
 It never entered in " our creed " 
 
 That he might be so, too. 
 
 And so, at last, we gave a call 
 
 To him that, to our mind, 
 Appeared embodiment of all 
 That we had hoped for pretty, tall, 
 Whose many virtues might appall 
 The careless world in evil thrall ; 
 In eloquence, bereft of drawl ; 
 As copious as a waterfall, 
 Whose bump of avarice was small, 
 Whom we believed adept at ball ; 
 
 And he why, he declined ! 
 
 lfue 
 
 A far greater blessing to us 't will insure, 
 And a mansion in Heaven will help to secure, 
 If we have in kindness remembered the poor.
 
 68 POEMS. 
 
 gfoe See 
 
 In crystalline splendor a sight to behold, 
 It rose like Jerusalem's temple of old ; 
 
 No sound of a hammer was there, 
 But block upon block, from the ice-harvest cold 
 Dissevered and chiseled in exquisite mold, 
 
 Made up its proportions so fair. 
 
 Within its broad galleries gracefully wrought, 
 As solid expressions of fanciful thought, 
 
 A million ef luminous beams 
 More brilliant than stellar rays lighted the spot 
 That shone like a mermaid's sub-aqueous grot, 
 
 Or the wonderful fabric of dreams. 
 
 No cavern stalactic down under the ground, 
 With drops of bi-carbonate oozing around 
 
 In pensile, calcareous cones ; 
 No ice-impearled castle has ever been found 
 With iridal colors so gorgeously crowned 
 
 As this of prismatical stones. 
 
 As if all the rainbows that ever the sun 
 Had kissed into being were blended in one, 
 
 An arcade of frostwork and dews ; 
 So gleamed in transparency filaments spun 
 By embryo artists as chromos begun 
 
 Abounding in scintillant hues.
 
 THE ICE PALACE. 69 
 
 Not like the renowned Coliseum of Rome, 
 
 A structure upreared from foundation to dome 
 
 By men who wore Slavery's gyves ; 
 But Liberty's sons, as if building a home, 
 Toiled day after day as with honey and comb 
 
 Do busy bees labor in hives. 
 
 A city-full poured through its glistening halls, 
 Its gelid, pellucid, and argentine walls 
 
 Where traffickers offered their wares ; 
 Tobogganers awkward in blankets and shawls 
 Who struggled as if with Niagara Falls 
 
 Ascending the slippery stairs. 
 
 With flambeau, and rocket, and oriflamme bright, 
 The Fire King leading his cohorts by night, 
 
 In uniform scarlet and gold, 
 Besieged the Ice Monarch who ordered aright, 
 And routed with snow-balls the enemy's light 
 
 And left them in darkness and cold. 
 
 The King of the carnival pompously grown 
 From homage to him so obsequious shown, 
 
 Like Xerxes reviewing his fleet, 
 In* royal habiliments sat on his throne 
 And issued commands in imperious tone 
 
 To vassalry bowed at his feet. 
 
 The festival Queen in bewitching array, 
 As fair as a maid of Circassia to-day,
 
 70 POEMS. 
 
 With cheeks like twin roses aglow, 
 Environed by courtiers and satellites gay 
 Regiua, the favorite, tempered her sway 
 
 As Helios softens the snow. 
 
 The fete had gone by but the sovereign pair, 
 Who gave to the scene a nobility air, 
 
 As icicles lovingly cling 
 To the roof of a mansion, in happy despair 
 Had frozen together and fast to the chair 
 Borealis and bride ! who will have to stay there 
 
 Till palaces melt in the spring. 
 
 it was luxury to feel 
 The vital force renewed, 
 
 Upon the Crescent strand to kneel 
 In silent gratitude, 
 
 And drink the ocean-breezes in 
 
 Like cordial balm or medicine ! 
 
 Rejuvenescence in the air, 
 As borne on pinions fleet, 
 
 Betrayed its touch in faces fair 
 And quick, elastic feet, 
 
 And bounding pulse of all in quest 
 
 Of comfort, happiness, and rest.
 
 THE SEA. 71 
 
 What mystery is like the sea ? 
 
 Enhancing Life's brief length 
 By added years' sweet guarantee, 
 
 Recruiting health and strength ; 
 And yet the yawning sepulcher 
 For many a happy voyager. 
 
 Is it some sad, remorseful throb 
 
 Provokes its wild unrest, 
 That thousands it has dared to rob 
 
 Of whom they loved the best, 
 And thus 0, irony of Fate ! 
 Bereaved ones seeks to compensate ? 
 
 As well might we essay to solve 
 
 The riddle of the Sphinx, 
 As from Oceanus evolve 
 
 That chain of mystic links 
 That fetters in obscurity 
 The dark enigma of the sea. 
 
 How strange ! its benefits to crave 
 
 With ardent impetus, 
 Or choose rencounter with the wave, 
 
 So often treacherous, 
 That holds in its profound abyss 
 A vast, marine necropolis.
 
 72 POEM8. 
 
 Look not upon him with disdain, 
 
 Ye dwellers in the town ; 
 Nor wax facetious as ye mark 
 
 His homespun garb of brown. 
 
 " Only a Granger," say the rich, 
 
 The. favored upper ten ; 
 And Madame Grundy shuts her doors 
 
 On Nature's noblemen. 
 
 " Only a Granger," scoffing cry 
 The Wall street bulls and bears, 
 
 Who deal in futures, puts, and calls, 
 Gambling in watered shares, 
 
 And scorn the honest son of toil, 
 
 Who fills a useful place ; 
 Who grows, but does not corner, wheat, 
 
 Nor grinds the poor man's face. 
 
 " Only a Gwanjah," lisp the dudes, 
 Those beings minus brains ; 
 
 Their habitat, convivial clubs, 
 Their food, the heads of canes. 
 
 " Only a Granger," do you say ? 
 
 Aye, but his labor gains 
 The daily bread of myriads, 
 
 And all mankind sustains.
 
 THE GRANGER. 73 
 
 The city's countless denizens, 
 
 The lowly and the great, 
 On him depend ; his toil supports 
 
 The fabric of the state. 
 
 All honor to the upright men 
 
 Who till our acres broad ; 
 By tens of thousands they marched forth 
 
 For country, right, and God, 
 
 When dark Secession raised her torch, 
 
 With parricidal hand, 
 To light the fires of civil strife 
 
 In our erst-happy land. 
 
 And country-nurtured statesmen oft 
 
 In halls of Congress sit, 
 Who yield to none in intellect, 
 
 Ability, or wit. 
 
 While dudes adjust their single lens, 
 
 Or puff the " Cameo," 
 The farmer ponders the nation's weal, 
 
 E'en as he plies the hoe. 
 
 Ye dandies, reverence this man, 
 
 In coat of faded hue ; 
 Ye are not worthy to unloose 
 
 His dusty cowhide shoe, 
 n 7
 
 74 POEMS. 
 
 lady-killer exquisite, 
 
 With face devoid of tan, 
 Go, swing the scythe and drive the plow, 
 
 And learn to be a man. 
 
 HAEEY HOWARD. 
 
 Omnia nunc nix arva tegit, premit alba viasque, 
 Frigidaque glacies ramis dependet ab altis 
 Arborum, et in fluviis vitrea sub veste teguntur 
 Undique nunc latices, et hiems superat mala terram. 
 Sed milii jam veris signa adparent venientis ; 
 Collibus ecce caput se evolvens tollit ad auras 
 Flos violae, dulcis melioris nuntius horae. 
 Turn laetus tarn dulce poeta patore fenestrae 
 Spectans, somnit agros segetum messi locupletes; 
 Junix Candida arat, pellit genialis arator ; 
 Querci sub patera recubans umbra, ipse tuetur, 
 Cum volucres cantant, et formosissima Tellus. 
 Atque procul pastor pecus amplum ducit in arvis, 
 Errando atque canit modulamina rustica avena. 
 Bt sed nunc subito glaciei moles cadit alto 
 Ab tecto, factusque fragor, monet atque poetam 
 Jam esse hiemem, nondumque aestatis tempus adesse ; 
 Evigilat, piget et vatem, versatque fenestra. 
 
 HAREY HOWARD.
 
 "SUGARING OFF." 75 
 
 "g>n&nmn& ft" 
 
 Round after round in rugged tramp, 
 
 But wholesome discipline, 
 By sturdy hands about the camp 
 
 The sap was gathered in ; 
 When one .perspiring, very red, 
 
 And sitting on a trough, 
 " To close the season," so he said, 
 
 Proposed to " sugar off." 
 
 Beyond the farm-house still and white, 
 
 Beyond the poplar bars, 
 A lignous pile emitted light 
 
 That paled the brighest stars ; 
 Where caldrons hung, like those of which 
 
 The Bard of Avon told, 
 With ebullition contents rich 
 
 Above the flame of gold. 
 
 A score or more of beaux and belles 
 
 On toothsomeness intent, 
 Like buzzing bees in flower-dells 
 
 Inhaled the maple scent ; 
 Who danced around in impish glee 
 
 Like witches in Macbeth, 
 And stirred the sweet consistency, 
 
 And laughed till out of breath.
 
 76 POEMS. 
 
 In fidget spells, by trial sips 
 
 Of liquid boiling hot, 
 How many burned their saucy lips ; 
 
 And pouted at the thought 
 Of strips of plaster stretched across 
 
 Each rosy orifice, 
 Or sighed in secret o'er the loss 
 
 Of some prospective kiss. 
 
 Anon, the mass like melted wax 
 
 Electrified their hopes, 
 Who followed out diversion's tracks 
 
 By making candy ropes ; 
 That by mysterous lasso twirls 
 
 How, record never tells 
 Glued ribbon-bows and spiral curls 
 
 To overcoat lapels. 
 
 How many lads in languid pose 
 
 Leaned later 'gainst the trees, 
 The sticky syrup on their clothes, 
 
 The 'lasses on their knees 
 That is, the sugar ! never yet 
 
 Hath language run so fast 
 But one can never quite forget 
 
 What happened decades past. 
 
 Such fun beyond the curfew hour 
 A Puritan might rue,
 
 "SUGARING OFF." 77 
 
 Or like an unbelieving Giaour 
 
 Deny the statement true ; 
 But so it was till Pater (and 
 
 A lantern) caused surprise, 
 Who quite broke up the festive band 
 
 And captured their supplies. 
 
 0, with a wild remembrance-thrill 
 
 My heart in rapture beats ! 
 The egg-shell cups again I fill 
 
 With granulated sweets, 
 And mold in scalloped patty-pans 
 
 Delicious maple cakes 
 As yellow as the golden sands, 
 
 But pure as snowy flakes. 
 
 I've been, as by the drift of chance, 
 
 A wanderer for years 
 From those delightful, happy haunts 
 
 That memory endears ; 
 But never life hath been so bright 
 
 As when, upon a trough 
 With Peter Stump, one blessed night 
 
 I helped to " sugar off." 
 
 ***** 
 
 And for his sake, where'er he is, 
 
 This rustic ode I pen 
 To stir his risibilities ; 
 
 The jolliest of men, 
 
 7*
 
 78 POEMS. 
 
 Though Prelate of the Holy See ; 
 
 Who dreams sometimes I know 
 Of sweetness, sap, and sorcery 
 
 0, years and years ago ! 
 
 Like over-wrought embroideries 
 
 In dainty handicraft embossed, 
 Producing strange complexities 
 
 In which the true design is lost, 
 So life a tangled fabric is, 
 
 With threads half-hidden, linked and crossed. 
 
 We all are weaving day by day, 
 
 Like ancient, notable housewife, 
 In our unskilled, imperfect way, 
 
 'Mid cares and disappointments rife, 
 Rude ells of fretwork to portray 
 
 At last the finished web of life. 
 
 But proud success for which we yearn 
 
 Is often hid in trembling doubt ; 
 And when the cause we would discern 
 
 Of hinderance, or threatened rout, 
 We find that some unlucky turn 
 
 The woof of years has raveled out.
 
 A GOBELIN TAPESTRY. 79 
 
 [Of the time of Louis Quatorze.] 
 
 0, had this royal, rich relique 
 
 This rare chef-d'oeuvre, odd and old 
 Volition, and a tongue to speak, 
 
 What history it might unfold ! 
 'T would take us back to gilded days 
 
 Of dissolute, imperial France ; 
 When Moliere wrote his classic lays, 
 
 And Fenelon his grand romance. 
 
 0, time ! how nearly memory fails 
 
 To trace its great antiquity 
 Revert to Fontainebleau, Versailles, 
 
 And Louis, lord of luxury ! 
 A sovereign's gift, it may have graced 
 
 The palace home of Maintenon ; 
 Or gratified the cultured taste 
 
 Of connoisseurs, long dead and gone. 
 
 It forms the imagery of dreams, 
 
 Invades the Sabbath sanctity, 
 Disturbs sweet solitude, and seems 
 
 Like some hobgoblin mystery ; 
 The present fades and slips away, 
 
 A panoramic view unrolls 
 Of lords and ladies, good and gay, 
 
 Or passion-fed, salacious souls.
 
 80 POEMS. 
 
 Then handed down from sire to son 
 
 Along the Bourbon dynasty, 
 What admiration hath it won 
 
 In many a court festivity ! 
 Perchance it hung behind the throne 
 
 'Mid velvet arras in a scene 
 Where, like an orient vision, shone 
 
 The fair proportions of" a queen. 
 
 Was e'er a penny spent in alms 
 
 That this embellished treasure cost 
 Per favor dropped within the palms 
 
 That o'er and o'er its meshes crossed ? 
 For hands that could so deftly trace 
 
 A pattern thus complex and quaint, 
 Might join the ends of raveled lace, 
 
 Or Love's unconscious blushes paint. 
 
 Did some poor maid, without renown, 
 
 Toil on the fabric late and long 
 Whose pittance bought her wedding gown, 
 
 Its price a sixpence and a song ? 
 Or does it breathe of cloister-cells 
 
 Where pensive virgins, hid for years, 
 With faces white as immortelles 
 
 Their rosaries told through silent tears ? 
 
 Or in those far-famed factories, 
 Where Gobelin artificers
 
 A GOBELIN TAPESTRY. 81 
 
 Knew naught of hard monopolies 
 
 Except as ill-paid laborers, 
 Was bright young manhood's supple strength 
 
 Through weary seasons robbed of grace, 
 Embossing one brief ell in length 
 
 But one that time should not efface ? 
 
 But why should crowds so frantic be 
 
 Before this antiquated gem 
 As 'twere a charm, phylactery, 
 
 Or sort of amulet for them ? 
 Have not our busy dames and belles 
 
 With cunning ringers wrought to-day, 
 By feminine, spasmodic spells, 
 
 In just as true, artistic way ? 
 
 Look at our screens and crazy quilts, 
 
 Our lambrequins hung everywhere, 
 The reptile tribe, or birds on stilts 
 
 That decorate our gay portieres ; 
 Embroidered dogs on ottomans, 
 
 So natural that, in the dark, 
 As faithful household guardians 
 
 They ever serve but never bark. 
 
 modern art ! decry the thought 
 
 That more than we our grandmas knew ; 
 
 Or that our predecessors caught 
 Diviner rays it isn't true !
 
 82 POEMS. 
 
 And though in raptures eloquent, 
 And rhapsodies we oft engage, 
 
 'Tis not o'er skill more excellent 
 But that it bears the stamp of age. 
 
 Then, reverend seniors, hear our lay ! 
 
 Be not like doleful pessimists, 
 Lugubrious while growing gray, 
 
 For loving loyalty insists 
 Upon our honest guarantee ; 
 
 'Tis worth the token be consoled 
 For, like this ancient tapestry, 
 
 We'll honor you because you're old ! 
 
 As clear as lovely Lake Tahoe ! 
 That, like a mirror's polished face, 
 Reveals pure depths where one may trace 
 
 The shrubs and flowers that round it grow ; 
 
 So, as in pantomimic show, 
 
 Within their liquid fathoms glow 
 
 Quick fancies darting to and fro. 
 
 Like opals, changeable to view, 
 
 Their matchless beauty is displayed 
 In shifting tints of light and shade ;
 
 BEAUTIFUL EYES. 83 
 
 As if prismatic drops of dew 
 Had let the golden sunlight through, 
 And intercepting rays of blue 
 Took each its own cerulean hue. 
 
 Anon they flash like orbs of jet, 
 As dark as night, of velvet black ; 
 And, like a gipsy's, might hurl back 
 
 The charge of saucy, gay coquette 
 
 From some bewildered amoret ; 
 
 Then, gray and brown together met, 
 
 Grow angel-like in meek regret. 
 
 As radiant as diamonds bright 
 
 In exquisite eadean de noce ; 
 
 A bridal token less verbose, 
 More pleasing unto sense and sight 
 Of one upon her marriage-night, 
 Than tomes of missives pink and white 
 That loving thought could e'er indite. 
 
 A matron's are those love-lit eyes ; 
 
 Within whose fringe-encircled spheres 
 
 A soulful, wistful look appears, 
 That seems to blend, in meaning wise, 
 The glory and the sweet surprise 
 Of something seen beyond the skies 
 The mystery of Paradise.
 
 84 POEMS. 
 
 Divining-stars ! they haunt me so, 
 And secrets seem to read as well ; 
 For things I never meant to tell 
 To anybody, friend or foe, 
 Maybe that happened long ago, 
 Are pictured in them just as though 
 Some solemn certainty they know. 
 
 , ay n 
 
 (A Recitation before the Chantanqna Circle.) 
 
 Come, let us leave these narrow bounds 
 That circumscribe the sphere of home, 
 
 And soar away beyond the sea 
 And spend a day in ancient Rome ! 
 
 In far Italia's sunny land 
 
 Where roll the Arno and the Po, 
 
 Where turrets rise from castles grand 
 Beside the Tiber's rapid flow. 
 
 O, mists of buried years, roll back ! 
 
 And bring, in retrospective glance, 
 The Roman epoch and an age 
 
 That time and distance but enhance. 
 
 A few rude shepherds on a hill, 
 
 Their huts and herds, an earthen wall 
 
 That hemmed them in from troublous foes 
 Let these the dawn of Rome recall.
 
 A DAY IN ANCIENT ROME. 85 
 
 Yet, from this petty fortress sprung 
 
 A mighty nation that compelled 
 All Italy to own her sway, 
 
 And distant peoples subject held ; 
 
 That grew in splendor, wealth, and power, 
 
 Became the home of cultured art, 
 And on the world's arena played 
 
 For centuries the sovereign's part. 
 
 Great deities have been dethroned, 
 Their thunderbolts are harmless now ; 
 
 And so, within their temple walls, 
 We stand on Campidoglio's brow, 
 
 And cast expectant, rapturous eyes 
 
 Far to the distant Orient 
 Where Helios in splendor rose, 
 
 Whose orbit spans the firmament. 
 
 Here at our feet the Forum lies, 
 
 Where Cicero with silver tongue 
 Entranced the wondering populace, 
 
 Who on his thrilling accents hung. 
 
 This stony pavement tessellate 
 
 Re-echoed once victorious tread 
 Of conquering armies from the wars 
 
 Where Caesar, or where Pompey, led. 
 
 II 8
 
 86 POEMS. 
 
 Who laid the trophies of success 
 Down at the feet of Jupiter ; 
 
 For ignorant, blind devotees 
 
 Of heathen gods those ancients were. 
 
 On yonder cliff precipitous 
 
 That shadowed the transgressor's gate, 
 The traitoress, Tarpeia, met 
 
 At Sabine hands her wretched fate. 
 
 We tread the Corso's busy street, 
 
 That once triumphal arches spanned ; 
 
 The Campus Martius wander o'er 
 For promenade aud pleasure planned. 
 
 Down through the great Pantheon's dome 
 The golden sunlight falls aslant ; 
 
 Like Heaven's benediction on 
 
 A scene that seraphim might haunt. 
 
 Before yon Colosseum's pile 
 
 Might wandering Jews let fall a tear 
 
 For captives of their hapeless race 
 Compelled those mighty walls to rear. 
 
 Oh, were those ruins animate, 
 And could their history unfold, 
 
 A wondering world would pause to hear 
 Their record of the days of old !
 
 A DAT IN ANCIENT ROME. 87 
 
 We should forget this sordid life, 
 
 Our dearest hopes remember not, 
 To revel in that glorious past 
 
 With such associations fraught. 
 
 The Via Sacra we might walk 
 
 With Horace, our companion-guide 
 
 Or Virgil, whose enchanting lays 
 Are our rich legacy and pride. 
 
 0, fallen Rome ! thy prestige gone, 
 
 Of opulence and splendor shorn, 
 Till, of thy grandeur, naught remains 
 
 Save fragments shattered and forlorn. 
 
 Thus, proudest monuments upreared 
 By man shall yield to slow decay ; 
 
 The sun shall fade, the stars shall fall, 
 Yea, Heaven and earth shall pass away. 
 
 When futile things and scenes of time, 
 
 Ephemeral and insecure, 
 Into oblivion have passed, 
 
 Jehovah and his word endure. 
 
 Then what to us if funeral pyre 
 
 Receive our dust, or crumbling sod 
 
 Or where the soul's abode may be, 
 If it but safely rest in God ?
 
 88 POEMS. 
 
 (A Seaside Episode.) 
 
 Her nose was long, but ended in 
 
 A mighty sudden point ; 
 Not plump, nor plumb above the chin, 
 
 But always out of joint. 
 Her eyes were serious, dull, and sad ; 
 
 Cosmetics made her fair ; 
 I knew all this, but then she had 
 
 The most bewitching hair. 
 Molasses candy color shone 
 
 In each resplendent braid, 
 That threw the golden light of sun 
 
 Completely in the shade ; 
 And when in one symmetric coil 
 
 Upon her classic head, 
 It made the other maidens boil 
 
 With envy so they said. 
 As neatly as an artisan 
 
 Might turn a polish-lathe, 
 I asked her I, a modest man 
 
 To go with me and bathe. 
 Nay, be not shocked ! this etiquette 
 
 Is practised every day 
 " Down by the sea " and yet and yet 
 
 They're proper in their way.
 
 "MAD ROSE." 89 
 
 A Naiad sojourns in this town 
 
 Who like a duck can swim, 
 Or like a tub float upside down, 
 
 Who boasts she learned of him. 
 Of course 'twould never do on land, 
 
 " 6W-land-ish " it would be 
 And this is why, we understand, 
 
 So many go to sea. 
 My painted boat at anchor lay, 
 
 A jaunty craft, but frail, 
 So, apropos, to close the day 
 
 We took an evening sail. 
 A bit of caution going, down, 
 
 She gave me on the stair : 
 " Now, Fred ! look out ! if I should drown, 
 
 Don't grab me by the hair ! " 
 Her book account eclipsed her nose, 
 
 She was a " million-heir 
 ess ; so I said : My darling Rose, 
 
 I'd grab you anywhere ! " 
 The sky grew dark, the wind arose, 
 
 The shore lay far beyond ; 
 Her face was white as her summer-clothes, 
 
 And mine to correspond. 
 The boat gave one tremendous pitch, 
 
 The gale took off her hat 
 I never dreamed she wore a switch, 
 
 And made of jute, at that !
 
 90 POEMS. 
 
 And grappled with despairing force, 
 
 And sense of urgent need, 
 At something slippery and coarse 
 
 Like rope of ocean-weed. 
 That " mortal coil " came shuffling off, 
 
 And, wriggling like an eel, 
 It fell into " the water-trough," 
 
 And soon was ausgespiel. 
 Alas ! the pleasure of the day 
 
 Was marred and I am sad 
 For iny unlucky fiancee 
 
 Is bald and awful mad! 
 
 of tlxe 
 
 In that land beyond the sea 
 
 Where the Pope " a prisoner " dwells, 
 In a hovel, it may be, 
 
 Lived the maker of the bells ; 
 Bells that rang in hospices, 
 
 Called St. Bernard monks to prayer 
 Or to wandering refugees 
 
 Spake of rest and shelter there. 
 
 Bells resounding through the halls 
 
 Of the stately Vatican, 
 Or intoned in cottage-walls 
 
 Roused the slumbering fisherman ;
 
 THE MAKER OF THE BELLS. 91 
 
 Bells enshrined in monarchs' homes, 
 
 Trembling like their diadems, 
 Chiming in cathedral domes, 
 
 Tolling holy requiems. 
 
 Oh ! the sound of wedding-bells 
 
 Due to his metallic art, 
 Mingling oft with funeral knells, 
 
 Echoed in his very heart ; 
 Till like friends his bells became, 
 
 He could name them one by one, 
 Listening by fagot-flame 
 
 When his day of toil was done. 
 
 In the belfry-tower of Fame, 
 
 When his masterpiece was placed, 
 Ruthless the invader came, 
 
 His beloved land laid waste ; 
 Carried to a foreign coast, 
 
 Like a stolen captive bird, 
 His especial pride and boast 
 
 Clearer bells were never heard. 
 
 Long he sorrowed, like a child 
 
 For a playmate dead and gone, 
 To his loss unreconciled 
 
 Vain it were to labor on ; 
 So a wanderer he became, 
 
 Drifting to the Emerald isle,
 
 92 POEMS. 
 
 Homeless, hopeless, bent in frame, 
 Never seen or known to smile. 
 
 When the clouds of dark despair 
 
 Hung above him like a pall, 
 Sweeter than the voice of prayer, 
 
 Louder than muezzin-call, 
 Over Erin's vale and strand, 
 
 Solemn waves of atmosphere 
 Bore to him, in anthem grand, 
 
 Sounds that thrilled his startled ear. 
 
 In a moment, as it were, 
 
 Time and space and grief forgot, 
 He, the skilled artificer, 
 
 Glimpses of Italia caught ; 
 Of his workshop and his home, 
 
 Children climbing on his knee, 
 While above St. Peter's dome 
 
 Rang his chimes across the sea. 
 
 Oh ! it seemed that buried years 
 
 All came back as in a dream, 
 Smiles were born of happy tears 
 
 On the banks of Shannon's stream ; 
 Never music banished pain 
 
 Like his bells of life a part ; 
 But the sudden joyous strain 
 
 Snapped the tension of his heart.
 
 ADELE. 93 
 
 Turn where I may her face I see, 
 
 So beautiful and bright, 
 One year ago as it looked to me 
 
 Upon her wedding-night ; 
 And it seems so strange that she is gone, 
 As a star might fade in orient dawn. 
 
 Within the sanctuary aisle, 
 
 While music filled the place, 
 With buoyant step and beaming smile, 
 
 In all her queenly grace 
 I saw her first, a peerless bride ; 
 A lover's joy, a husband's pride. 
 
 Could one of all that brilliant throng, 
 
 This bitter day foresee, 
 Or know how soon the nuptial song 
 
 A solemn dirge should be, 
 Or in that festal atmosphere 
 Discern the shadow of a bier ? 
 
 Into the dear old church once more 
 
 She comes oh, not as then ! 
 The sad-faced preacher walks before, 
 
 And hands of reverent men 
 Bear slowly through a weeping qrowd 
 The bride of death in her snowy shroud.
 
 94 POEMS. 
 
 Earth ! encumbered everywhere 
 With dull, unlovely flowers, 
 
 Could' st thou not sooner, better spare, 
 Than this fair bloom of ours, 
 
 Some one that tender look nor word 
 
 Compassionate had ever stirred ? 
 
 The world shall miss her pleasantry, 
 And friends her dear caress, 
 
 And days and years to come shall be 
 So full of weariness ; 
 
 While cherished hopes in ruins lie, 
 
 And cloud-like gloom obscures the sky. 
 
 long as memory shall last, 
 'Twill bear on sorrow's wave 
 
 A thought of her, with blessings past, 
 In motherhood who gave 
 
 Herself, a dying sacrifice, 
 
 For a stranger soul from Paradise. 
 
 (^tuesttons. 
 
 The world perchance may bear in mind 
 The query : " What is left behind?" 
 But angels ask, when all is o'er : 
 "What deeds of good have gone before?"
 
 WESTERN JUSTICE. 95 
 
 WHK&izxn gusito, 
 
 'Twas a session of court in an Occident town, 
 And the criminal stood in the dock 
 
 The same who had shot a poor Chinaman down 
 With a countenance hard as a rock. 
 
 As if to dispel every doubt of his guilt, 
 
 And strengthen the tragic report, 
 There lay the Celestial whose blood had been spilt, 
 
 That is, his " remainder " in court. 
 
 The judge, with his sombrero tipped on his head, 
 And his pantaloons tucked in his boots, 
 
 Was bound to " dispense (witK) the law," so he 
 " That the present predicament suits." [said 
 
 The statutes were strict and the chances were slim, 
 And well might the law-breaker quail, 
 
 When justice, impartial, accorded to him 
 A ninety days' sojourn in jail. 
 
 " Now, Judge ! I'll be hanged that's a little too steep, 
 
 For surely your honor must know 
 That the life of a coolie, though ever so cheap, 
 
 Was never so shockingly low." 
 
 The man of the ermine betrayed no remorse, 
 
 But read from the page on his knee : 
 " The minimum six months for stealing a horse, 
 
 For killing a Chinaman three ! "
 
 96 POEMS. 
 
 eautifttt 
 
 In thoughtful mood, I sought to trace 
 My favorite author's plans, 
 
 When suddenly before my face 
 Uprose four shapely hands. 
 
 Their merry owners, young and fair, 
 Purloined my chosen book, 
 
 And crowded round my easy-chair 
 With eager, wistful look, 
 
 And begged for my decision calm, 
 To ease their minds distressed ; 
 
 Which hand before me bore the palm 
 Of beauty, o'er the rest. 
 
 Divinely, finely-moulded, all 
 
 My admiration drew 
 To native grace, that might enthrall 
 
 An artist's fancy, too. 
 
 Of one I praised the matchless form, 
 And its consummate skill, 
 
 And clasped another, soft and warm, 
 With sweet and tender thrill.
 
 PARTED. 97 
 
 fairy palm that lay in mine 
 Like some pellucid gem, 
 Might tempt a monarch to resign 
 His rightful diadem. 
 
 A duchess might have coveted 
 
 Such models plump and small ; 
 And I, by many fancies led, 
 
 Could not decide at all. 
 
 " My dear young friends," I made reply, 
 
 " The fairest, best, most true 
 In all this world, becomes so by 
 The good that it can do." 
 
 " They all are beautiful to me, 
 
 And if one does excel 
 In loveliness, the other three, 
 My wisdom cannot toll." 
 
 " If, in its honest palm, each day 
 Some deed of kindness lives, 
 Go ask the poor, and they will say 
 ' It is the hand that gives. ' ' 
 
 parted. 
 
 Peace is born of Pain, and we 
 Say, submissive, "Thy will be!" 
 Fate has parted you and me. 
 
 II 9
 
 98 POEMS. 
 
 go fo* Stars. 
 
 Empyreal lamps, forever bright, 
 Set in the ebon dome of night 
 
 Like studs of sparkling gold, 
 What marvels, since Creation's dawn, 
 Your starry orbs have gazed upon, 
 
 For centuries untold ! 
 
 Your light shone luminous and warm 
 Ere Nature rounded into form 
 
 This whirling mundane sphere ; 
 Ere Luna, with her argent beams, 
 Bright guardian of a world in dreams, 
 
 Poured forth effulgence clear. 
 
 There was a time when sages sought 
 To win, by ceaseless toil and thought, 
 
 The secrets of the skies ; 
 To read the destinies of man, 
 And fathom God's mysterious plan, 
 
 Concealed from mortal eyes. 
 
 Oh, later Science laughs to scorn, 
 As idle superstition, born 
 
 Of ignorance profound, 
 The ancient astrologic art, 
 Which swayed the seer's prophetic heart, 
 
 And made him world-renowned.
 
 A NOTED PLACE. 09 
 
 Great prophets, once accounted wise, 
 With straining orbs who searched the skies, 
 
 Your plan excites our mirth ; 
 For we, with lengthened tube of brass 
 And double lens of convex glass, 
 
 Bring down the stars to earth. 
 
 HARRY HOWARD. 
 
 A picture hangs upon my wall 
 That fascinates the gaze of all ; 
 
 It is no dream of fancy, 
 The reveling of fond conceit 
 In some fantastic brain replete 
 
 With wild extravagancy. 
 
 Nor he who dared the scene to limn 
 Could so have wrought from idle whim, 
 
 But, as by inspiration ; 
 And gave to common things the glow 
 That angel fingers might bestow 
 
 On some divine creation. 
 
 Who seized the palette of the skies, 
 And dipped his brush in Eden dyes, 
 
 And caught the sunset glory, 
 To represent a waterfall
 
 100 POEMS. 
 
 As issuing from a ragged wall 
 Of rock with cycles hoary. 
 
 A deep ravine, o'ershadowed by 
 Huge precipices mountain high ; 
 
 That stand, as cleft asunder, 
 Like bold gigantic sentinels 
 To guard the loveliest of dells, 
 
 And Nature's rarest wonder. 
 
 A streamlet bent like a shepherd's crook.. 
 Defining many a cozy nook, 
 
 Within whose sweet seclusion 
 May weary toilers, care-distressed, 
 Enraptured linger, dream, and rest; 
 
 Secure from rude intrusion. 
 
 Where cunning elves, in sportive freak, 
 Might play at charming " hide and seek '' 
 
 Till, echoing long after, 
 Should hill and dale return the sound 
 Of wild hilarity's rewound, 
 
 In peals of spirit-laughter. 
 
 Might not the amatory Muse 
 Who in her dainty chalice brews 
 
 The wine of fond desire 
 The lovely rose-crowned Erato, 
 In these recesses long ago 
 
 Have tuned her magic lyre ?
 
 INN-HOSPITALITY. 101 
 
 Whose dulcet strains inspire still, 
 And touch with Passion's tender thrill, 
 
 The scores of youthful lovers 
 That here, in some sequestered spot, 
 Remembering each the world forgot 
 
 One everywhere discovers. 
 
 Oh motley crowds of visitors, 
 As artists, tramps, philosophers, 
 
 The place are ever haunting ; 
 So oft described by tongue and pen 
 That all the world knows " Watkins' Glen " 
 
 Is perfectly enchanting. 
 
 Within a spacious corridor, 
 
 A waiter found a visitor, 
 
 His visage drawn into a knot 
 
 With mortal rage, because he thought 
 
 The management had tricked him ; 
 " Are you a guest of this hotel ?" 
 Asked the white-aproned Afric swell. 
 
 " A guest ! No, I'm a victim ! " 
 
 HARRY HOWARD. 
 9*
 
 102 POEMS. 
 
 and 
 
 O it was sad to bear her 
 
 (That chill November night) 
 Away from all who loved her so, 
 
 Away from life and light ; 
 To hollow a grave in the frozen mold, 
 And leave her alone in the dark and cold". 
 
 As if the dress that robed her 
 
 Like shining nebulae, 
 When marriage-vows unclosed her lips, 
 
 Now folded rigidly, 
 
 And pillows soft her cheeks that press 
 Could give her warmth's luxuriousness. 
 
 O could a ray of sunshine, 
 To cheer the long, long hours, 
 
 Have struggled through the casket-lid 
 With all its wealth of flowers, 
 
 And through the satin and the lace, 
 
 The iciness 'twould half displace. 
 
 Or had it been that morning's 
 
 Delicious light and air 
 Had bathed her grave a little while, 
 
 Before we laid her there. 
 We could have turned away with less 
 Regret, and more of hopefulness.
 
 OUR FAULT. 10S 
 
 If day's meridian splendor 
 
 Had fallen on her face, 
 When tearfully we laid her in 
 
 Her lowly dwelling-place, 
 It would have seemed in loving thought 
 A golden halo round the spot. 
 
 Upon the solemn midnight, 
 
 From hearts unreconciled, 
 Goes out the pleading anguish-cry, 
 
 Despairing, sad, and wild: 
 " Beloved, from that unseen shore 
 
 Come back, come back to us once more." 
 
 O heaven must be brighter 
 
 For one like summer's rose 
 Who perished in her loveliness, 
 
 And sleeps beneath the snows ; 
 But, in immortal grace and bloom, 
 Who lives again beyond the tomb. 
 
 If never in our skies appear 
 Refulgent gleams the heart to cheer, 
 
 And make the sombre world aglow; 
 If Life is always dull and drear, 
 
 Tis just because we make it^so.
 
 104 POEMS. 
 
 Oh, who knows what the " mind cure" is? 
 Tlie "latest craze" in remedies 
 
 That everybody's trying 
 For if the rumors half be true 
 Of all that it is said to do, 
 
 'Twill save a world of dying. 
 
 " The age of miracles is past ! 
 
 A nine-days' wonder 'twill not last ! n 
 
 So says the horrid skeptic ; 
 But, on the other hand, we find 
 A host of maimed, and halt, and blind, 
 
 Consumptive and dyspeptic, 
 
 Of rich and poor, of high and low, 
 Who've tried it, and who ought to know, 
 
 Declare there's virtue in it ; 
 They say it beats their puzzled brains 
 How it can banish ills and pains, 
 
 In less than half a minute. 
 
 
 
 It takes a " crank," as full of kinks 
 As a wire-mattress is of links, 
 
 With aching joints rheumatic, 
 And straightens every tangle out ; 
 A.nd makes him run and leap and shout 
 
 In sudden joy ecstatic.
 
 " THE MIND CURE." 105 
 
 Suppose a stomach's knotted up 
 Until it can't retain a sup 
 
 Of anything (but whisky), 
 Just seek the " mind-magician's " haunt, 
 He says, " Eat anything you want ! " 
 
 Is not this rather risky ? 
 
 
 
 A pair of squinting, crooked eyes 
 That never saw the azure skies 
 
 But as a cross-barred vision, 
 With one unbias'd, air-line glance 
 Straightway transforms the broad expanse 
 
 Into a scene Elysian. 
 
 They say a twisted, curved back-bone, 
 That like the letter S has grown, 
 
 Can be a thing of beauty ; 
 Each vertebra its place slip in, 
 Without a drop of medicine 
 
 But just from sense of duty. 
 
 Now, this is certayily benign ! 
 
 For who could live without a spine 
 
 A reservoir for marrow ? 
 The plan should anybody try, 
 He very soon would occupy 
 
 A space secure but narrow.
 
 106 POEMS. 
 
 Old fogy doctors of the town 
 Would dearly love to put it down, 
 
 As humbug for the fact is, 
 They find "their occupation's gone," 
 As patients everywhere are drawn. 
 
 To tliis new-fangled practice. 
 
 A journal, too, renowned and wise y 
 The noble "mind-cure " classifies 
 
 With modern " shams, delusions. " 
 With " woman suffrage, come-out schemes " 
 Of some fanatic's phantom dreams 
 
 Oh, what absurd conclusions ! 
 
 We don't see why an editor 
 Should ever cast a harmless slur 
 
 On innocent diversions; 
 But greatly fear the thought is sad 
 That "too much learning makes him mad," 
 
 And fond of mild aspersions. 
 
 What does the " mind-cure doctor " do t 
 Why, not a thing but look at you, 
 
 As if he were enchanted ; 
 And presently, your stubborn will 
 Is conquered by his little (?) bill> 
 
 Which in your face is flaunted.
 
 WEAR A SMILING FACE. 107 
 
 O matchless " mind-cure " mystery ! 
 Let not the bond of faith in thee 
 
 A ruthless hand dissever ; 
 For they who once thy name maligned, 
 Are " sitting, clothed, in their right mind," 
 
 And hope to live forever. 
 
 a Smiting 
 
 wear a smiling face, 
 
 No matter what your sorrow ! 
 
 Let not the doleful trace 
 
 Of private woes displace 
 
 The sunny glance, nor chase 
 Bright hours into the morrow! 
 
 And speak a cheerful word, 
 
 E'en though your heart be breaking! 
 Like happy song of bird, 
 It may revive when heard 
 Some drooping spirit, stirred 
 
 To depths of bitter aching. 
 
 It is not ours to know 
 
 How oft a nobler yearning, 
 
 In some sad life below, 
 
 Is born of that sweet glow 
 
 The countenance doth show 
 With love-light ever burning.
 
 108 POEMS. 
 
 & Christmas 
 
 Five mortal hours I cooked that chicken, 
 And then sat down and cried ; 
 
 For when a fork I tried to stick in, 
 It never pierced its hide. 
 
 A tougher biped strutted never 
 
 Upon a barn-yard plain ; 
 I'd like to wring its neck forever, 
 
 And would, if I had it again. 
 
 I put in soda, salt and savor- 
 
 v stuff, till nearly dark, 
 To reconstruct that ancient flavor, 
 
 That smelt like Noah's ark. 
 
 And waited I, a starving sinner 
 
 Till six o'clock at night ; 
 And ordered, long before the dinner, 
 
 The paraffine for light. 
 
 I half-expired, no longer able 
 
 To bear such emptiness; 
 And just revived when to the table 
 
 It came in evening dress. 
 
 But when the platter took its form on 
 Its horrid eye-teeth showed ; 
 
 And just as true as I'm a Mormon, 
 That chicken got up and crowed.
 
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