PS 2363 Class Book. Copyright^? C£PKRIGHT DEPOSIT A WREATH FOR EDWIN MARKHAM Qi M4eathjor odwin G^arriham \7rioutesjrom the z/oets a/Qi77ierlca on his (Seventieth ^Birthday Q/lpril 23, 1922 ^^ Chicago Wfoe y^ookfellozvs 1922 Three hundred copies of this first edition have been printed in the month of September, 1922 yk ^ Copyright J922 by Flora Warren Seymour THE TORCH PRESS CEDAR RAPIDS IOWA OCT 27*22 ©CI.A686523 > r V\ FOREWORD Edwin Markham, Bookfellow No. 56, spent his seven- tieth birthday at Bookfellow Lodge in Chicago, upon which occasion were read the poetic tributes here pre- sented. They represent the respect and love of the poets of America for the author of one of the world's great poems, as well for his noble character as for his high achievement, and this book is published by THE BOOK- FELLOWS as a fitting memorial to a dear and worthy com- rade. It was done by all the co-producers with great good-will and so will be received by lovers of poetry and high endeavor the world over. The portrait-profile of Mr. Markham was drawn for this book by Earl H. Reed, Bookfellow No. 2173. Let- tering on the title-page and cover is by Will Ransom, Bookfellow No. 1500. The poetic tributes are by Wallace Bruce Amsbary Mary Tarver Carroll Bertha Avery Josephine Craven Chandler Claribel Weeks Avery Thomas Curtis Clark Faith Baldwin Edmund Vance Cooke William E. Barton Helen Gray Cone Ruth Bassett Elizabeth Crighton Katharine Lee Bates Miles M. Dawson Charles G. Blanden Babette Deutsch Louis James Block Nathan Haskell Dole William Stanley Braithwaite D. J. Donovan Pauline Florence Brower Henry Dumont Witter Bynner Walter Pritchard Eaton Charles Farwell Edson Ethel Feuerlicht Sara Bard Field Joseph Andrew Galahad Zona Gale Louise Ayres Garnett Theodosia Garrison Clifford Franklin Gessler William Griffith Hazel Hall Joseph Mills Hanson Idella Janes Harrison M. V. P. Hazelton Hildegarde Hawthorne Rebecca Helman E. Sewell Hill David Irving Janes Father Jerome Josephine Johnson John Kearns Richard R. Kirk A Lady of Eighty Mary Sinton Leitch Orville Leonard Edwin Carlile Litsey Elizabeth Mac Veagh Anna Catherine Markham Minna Mathison Virginia Taylor McCormick J. Corson Miller John R. Moreland Jean Palmer Nye Emma Kenyon Parrish Antoinette DeCourcey Patterson Elia W. Peattie Marie Tello Phillips Clara Catherine Prince Aurelia Henry Reinhardt Edwin Arlington Robinson John Jerome Rooney James Rorty Lew Sarett Whitelaw Saunders Emma Playter Seabury George Steele Seymour Jay G. Sigmund Marion Couthouy Smith Myrtella Southerland Anne Higginson Spicer Vincent Starrett George Sterling Charles Hanson Towne Albert Edmund Trombly Anna Spencer Twitchell Blanche Shoemaker Wagstaff Charles R. Wakeley Lydia Avery Coonley Ward Owen P. White William Thornton Whitsett Charles Erskine Scott Wood Clement Wood AD EDWINUM MARKHAM EDWINUM laeto colimus hac die Ejusque excelsos canimus canores — Tempora cingant rutilisque sertis EDWINUM MARKHAM. Fr. Jerome A WREATH FOR EDWIN MARKHAM FROM HIS NATIVE STATE Here is a hail from Oregon — The land where your eyes first saw the sun. Wherever you go till your race is run There'll be always a hail — from Oregon! — Joseph Andrew Galahad Greetings from distant Oregon — Where mists are colored with the sun; Whose pride is great, and justly great, In you, her Poet Laureate! — Hazel Hall FROM THE GOLDEN WEST Homer's head and Milton's art Shelley's soul and Lincoln's heart! Wind and water, earth and sky, Bless the good man passing by! — George Sterling Now in that church of souls you willed The candles waver and the chants are stilled — And yet your brave expectancy will smile Hearing dream Brotherhoods that sing in file. — James Rorty Somewhere you learned that beauty is love And somehow you fashioned the secret in art. O Poet, yours is the priesthood that serves The altar of Beauty with flame from the heart. — Sara Bard Field Old Man, — I, an old man, hasten here to greet you To place a willow and a laurel on your brow — You shall live on and Death can not defeat you, You, who know the sweat of those that hoe and plough. — Charles Erskine Scott Wood Songbirds in one fair April weather, Green hills with the poppies aflame, And sea-breezes hurrying eastward, Thee, Poet and Brother acclaim. — Aurelia Henry Reinhardt 16 Why should he dread the years which but endow With mellow beauty all the gracious whole — Which do but add a luster to his brow And inches to the stature of his soul! — Anna Spencer Twitchell From where the o-o stirred the fire-born soil To a new bloom, we send to you today, Poet who sang so fittingly of toil, Aloha, friendliest word the tongue can say. — Clifford Franklin Gessler He lived, he learned to know Humanity And that Man with the Hoe. — Charles Far well Edson 17 SOME NEW YORK BOOKFELLOWS Reflected in his verse, as in his face, Is power and is glory and is grace. — William Griffith His years are as a tree, with leaves of truth, With fruit of beauty, ripely russet- red, With roots struck deep into the soil of youth And on God's living waters ever fed. — Faith Baldwin Poet of the high place, All that our hearts would say, Our pens but dimly trace. Hail to thy natal day! — Idella Janes Harrison The years walk gaily side by side with you, And each one, as it greets you, takes your hand And whispers, "Comrade, you will understand, I bring you only what is kind and true." — Marion Couthouy Smith If in that far home-town beyond the skies All men must ply some trade to find heaven sweet, Yours be the joy to fashion, kind and wise, The Shoes of Happiness for earth-worn feet. — Ethel Feuerlicht 18 Seventy and twenty are fifty years apart, But he has youth eternal who bears a singing heart, Twenty years or seventy — 'tis all the same to one Whose heart runs up the Hills of Dawn to greet the rising — Theodosia Garrison The Bugle Blown At Dawn While we toiled in the cruel dark, You found the splendor of the height; You are a bugle blown at dawn, Waking your brother in the light. — Clement Wood 19 FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS Time, always writing, sees no trace Of all he writes on Markham's face. On Markham's face he writes in vain : Apollo rubs it out again. — Edwin Arlington Robinson Great memories garland this fair April day When Shakespeare came and Wordsworth went away; This day, elect for precious death and birth, Brought Markham's brother-smile to sweeten earth. — Helen Gray Cone Hail we his hoar-headed prime, at the peak of his pride stands the poet; Wisdom more mellow than wine, faith that is finer than g ° ' — Babette Deutsch Leonine spirit, proclaiming the morning! Awed not by enemies, heeding no warning, Sing thou man's triumphs, scorning His backslidings. — Miles M. Dawson May Life in turn bestow upon you duly That happiness your honored presence brings To other souls, and that content, — for truly She holds within her hands few better things. — Antoinette DeCourcey Patterson 20 Once, on a Western coast, where the winds and the sea are wild, The gods leaned down and blessed a new-born wonder child. They gave him the stuff of dreams, the gift of iron song, A voice that would cry unafraid in the face of the world's deep wrong; And they filled his heart with a sense of pity and pain for the poor — He sang, and the whole world listened; he sang — and his songs shall endure. — Charles Hanson Towne The Years, like torches, flare and fade, And most things pass, and most things die, But beauty, by the poet made, Links century with century. — HlLDEGARDE HAWTHORNE Hail! Mighty singer of celestial song! You walk in beauty through the crowded throng, Beloved of all mankind; your voice shall be Deathless as music in eternity. — Blanche Shoemaker Wagstaff We would remember and forget — Forget old Time today; Remember you are with us yet, To cheer us on our way. — Elizabeth Crighton 21 SOME NEW ENGLAND GREETINGS The spirit weaveth wings From earth's few, fragile years, For what far journeyings Beyond what flaming spheres! — Katharine Lee Bates To reach the height of seventy years that shine Upon rich fruitage of a gift divine, Is heritage enough for any man To feel that he has justified God's plan. — Ruth Bassett Strong Saxon English builds our Markham's verse; It rolls with fine sonorous organ-power; It holds a volume in a couplet terse; 'Tis not ephemeral, like a pretty flower. — Nathan Haskell Dole My verse is like a tiny fire of spills That burns behind the bars, The Priest of Beauty stands upon the hills And makes his song of stars. — Claribel Weeks Avery 22 When the white haired poet counts his years He counts the songs that he has sung, Then sings again to greet the dawn, Because his heart is young. — Walter Pritchard Eaton There's one Edwin Markham, the Man with the Hoe; Through life's fertile furrows he weeded his row, And harvested song that the future may know That the hoe'll be to Markham what the raven's to Poe! — William Stanley Braithwaite 23 SONGS FROM THE SOUTHLAND Genius, passing on her way, Paused where a new-born infant lay, And gently with her fingertips She touched the child upon the lips. — Owen P. White Out of your manly heart a brutal wrong Wrung that compassionate foreboding song. Seventy years! Your song in seventy more Will have burnt out our shame from crust to core. — Albert Edmund Trombly Though not for me to bend the knee To potentates and kings, Yet glad enow I lowly bow When Edwin Markham sings. — William Thornton Whitsett Dear Master, though I may not come today And at your feet learn from your wisdom gray; Yet in the name of all who dream and sing, The love and homage of the craft I bring. — Edwin Carlile Litsey As long as men shall toil His honored name will be Wreathed with the laurel bright Of immortality. — Mary Tarver Carroll 24 This pilgrim-poet shall not quench his thirst From fragile goblet rilled with purple wine; His cup God shaped where singing waters burst In grottoed coolness, 'mid wild columbine. — Elia W. Peattie 25 HERE ARE VIRGINIANS The great ones come with laurel and with bay To greet a Master crowned with fruitful years. In my small garden but one flower appears; — It is rosemary that I send today. — Josephine Johnson Magician! By the power of your word A humble hoe became a flaming sword; It smites us — fools, kings, cowards — to our knees, Wounded with shame for our iniquities. — Mary Sinton Leitch You were no careless jester with the muse, Your Pegasus no mere high-prancing steed, To plowman's work you bound his mighty thews For ages long to serve the poor man's need. — Elizabeth Mac Veagh Like his own west country, Staunch and free he stands, And holds a nation's lyric life Within his kindly hands. — Virginia Taylor McCormick Here's to friend Markham, a man among men, Whose years are the Biblical threescore and ten, May he garner four-score, and a few decades more, Enjoying the laurels achieved by his pen. — David Irving Janes 26 The poet, author, friend, With outstretched hands we meet you, With loving hearts we greet you And best of wishes send. — By a Lady of Eighty So many songs are of your weaving, And some are gold and some are red, Some are for gladness, some for grieving; You bid us choose — bitter or sweet — The dream? The bread? — Poppy or wheat? - — John R. Moreland 27 SUNG WITH A SMILE Of Edwin by Edmund Bowed by the weight of "Centuries" he stands, "Smart Sets" of "Nations" also in his hands, And reads the ponderous praise which shall be said Of Edwin Markham after he is dead. — Edmund Vance Cooke Howdy, you ole Son of a Gun, I'm sure plumb glad to greet yer An' I sure hopes when you'r one-naught-one We'll meet again an' eat yer. — Orville Leonard With this great truth a hit you've scored ; — The hoe is mightier than the sword. And this again you've made us know; — The man is mightier than the hoe. — George Steele Seymour At the Birthday Office A birthday? For you, sir? I say now! My word! Don't you think, on the square, sir, it's rather absurd For a blooming immortal with truth on his tongue To claim that he's growing — Well, take it! Write "yowrag-." _ ■ — Richard R. Kirk 28 Come with all jollity and joys! Take cares outside and park 'em. Let's celebrate the Birthday Boys; Bill Shakespeare and Eddy Markham. — Anne Higginson Spicer 29 JUST OURSELVES He ploughs the fields and turning up the earth Out of the muck and dark brings God to birth. — Louise Ayres Garnett With vision keen, with noble purpose thou Hast stressed the Age's wrongs in purple phrase; With much concern, the smug complacent now Harkens in fear to thy disturbing lays. — Wallace Bruce Amsbary Evening Hope guards the gates of sunrise, Faith kneels adown the west, When floats thro' sunset's glories, largesse of calm and rest Of eventide, And even's star Shines tranquil o'er the harbor-side, The furled sail, the lulling tide, The beaten spar. _ n TT — E. Sewell Hill Untiring minstrel of our social need, \ With message strong To hearten souls oppressed, and lives that bleed, Bowed down by wrong. We greet you as the herald of a hope, Since dawn began, Urgent, inspiring, matchless in its scope, — The brotherhood of man. — Charles R. Wakeley 30 In words not many, thoughts few if any, I'm uttering now what little I can, Heaven gild ye, God yield ye, O Poet that sings to the heart of man! — Emma Kenyon Parrish You have no thought for lords and kings, Disdaining caste and clan; You gave conviction rhythmic wings And challenged Earth for Man. — Thomas Curtis Clark The gold and crimson sun across the sea, The morning with its glorifying breath, The surging forth of Love, Fraternity, The Man victorious over Time and Death. — Louis James Block Beauty he saw and seized, And in his lines confined; So shall the world be pleased His name to beauty bind. — Henry Dumont A Master mind; a singer's soul, Whose verse stirs hearts the good to win. The world will crown with laurel wreath, The pen that points the whole world kin. — D. J. Donovan 31 His Hoe and Yours Ten thousand eyes ere yours beheld him lean Upon his hoe, and looking no more knew; But you dug deep and with an edge most keen, — Justice and brotherhood behind you grew. — William E. Barton What glass can tell the sands that flow Through years and days of joyous giving? Only the true in heart can know That but the loving are the living. — Minna Mathison Baptismal drop of genius, wisdom's tear, Man's benediction, beauty's chastened flame, And all the vanished snows of yesteryear, White poet, weave to-day your crown of fame! — Vincent Starrett O Seer, who sees the great eternal plan Of peace on earth to all the nations free, Who dreams and prays the brotherhood of man, And Light across the Aprils yet to be. Poet and prophet from the Golden Gate, That swings the world in from the Sunset Sea, Who champions labor with a love so great, It circles all the world: We welcome Thee. — Emma Playter Seabury 32 FROM ALL ARO UND Here is the love I love to send, With all my heart I greet you thus, Dear friend who has the world for friend, Your birthday is your gift to us. — Zona Gale May songs thrill your heart with each morning's glow, And peace fill your soul when the sunsets go. — Clara Catherine Prince May beauty of a dream of Brotherhood Still light thy path uncounted years apart, A torch revealing happiness and good To all men here, Great Understanding Heart! — Myrtella Southerland There is no age to thought. The years but open up new trails. And some there be who follow, some who lead — A leader thou! _ — Jean Palmer Nye Dear poet friend, an April too I chose To slip into this world of verse and prose; And singing here beneath your stately tree, My song shall celebrate your jubilee. —John Kearns 33 If "to grow old in Heaven is to grow young," As bard and sage have sung; This day that marks your birth Proclaims a Heaven on Earth. — Pauline Florence Brower Shakespeare's April, Shakespeare's day, Launched you on your singing way; And today your valiant mirth, Like April's sun, renews our earth. — Lydia Avery Coonley Ward Speaking me face to face — no never — But height to height and depth to depth — forever! — Bertha Avery You made a gallant truce with Time And flung it to the breeze — To waft your galaxy in rhyme Spanning two centuries. — Marie Tello Phillips Entering the Harbor Pilot of a white-sailed ship On life's uncharted sea; God your Captain; on the prow A winged Victory. — Whitelaw Saunders 34 As peasants, bowed in wordless prayer When drifts the Angelus at even ; We smaller ones stand hushed today, Before the song your heart has given! — Jay G. Sigmund Man, out of the West! Man, out of the loins of the tender and glowing West! Thou, for our honor and glory and strength — We greet thee ! T -, _ b — Josephine Craven Chandler Heart throbs and fire and sunset gleams You weave into a song, And all the world lays down its dreams To listen long. „ & — Rebecca Helman Unbowed by seven decades straight he stands And passes on to youth the torch of flame; The homage of our words, our hearts, our hands We offer now to Edwin Markham's name. — M. V. P. Hazelton The years are only rocks, on which he scales The heights. From each, his searching eye unveils New sweeps of earth whereon his brothers tread; New glories in God's heavens overhead. — Joseph Mills Hanson 35 On Returning Edwin Markham's Gold Spectacles I send you back your crystal glasses In which the golden vision passes. O, would we wore those magic rings Thro' which to see the heart of things! — John Jerome Rooney To Edwin Markham On meeting him at the California Market with Albert Bender Down from spaces I had come, from the Orient, the sea, Down to the tallest offices on earth. . . But, close to the Golden Gate, a poet greeted me With plains of wisdom and with peaks of mirth. — Witter Bynner Yea, surely, he who chose to come to earth Upon the date of Master Shakespeare's birth Could be no less than what he is this morn — Poet beloved, unto the purple born. Hail! O Singer, our hearts are yours today; Our little fames, like weeds, shall pass away, But yours, as great and green as Ygdrasil, Fills earth with loveliness — and long shall fill. Three score years and ten ! This means naught to one Whose works, like marble temples in the sun, Stand forth at noon in flawless lines of white, And charm the everlasting stars at night. — Charles G. Blanden 36 The Sword To E. M., after reading "The Man with the Hoe" Over the moiling jungle of the world, God frowned — Beholding the broken millions bowed upon the ground, The sunken-eyes, and those with ageless sorrows numb, — The predatory few, the driven dumb. Splendid His wrath: behind a thundering fusillade, From a flapping scabbard of the clouds He flashed a blade ; And lunging His lightning-jagged sword of mighty girth Across the dark, He plunged it in the earth. Oh, beautiful the leafy tapestries of night, The cheery bough, the darkling swallow in its flight; More beautiful the flaming wrath that makes men free To look upon the bird, the bough, the tree. — Lew Sarett 37 Democracy's great Champion, brave and bold, Flung out his thunder-song across the years, Calling the world to reckoning for tears The toiler wept in heat and rain and cold. The Shepherd of the fields of lyric gold For Song's proud feet prepared a path that cheered Love-brooding youth, grief-stricken age, and reared For men his mount of beauty, fold on fold. Beloved Master, skilled in flaming line, — Seeker and shaper of the dream divine, — Your help has eased the burden of the world, Where Right's poor, trampled banners lie unfurled; You lifted high Love's cup of deathless youth, With hands that knew the white-winged bird of truth. — J. Corson Miller 38 Down the Line Seventy years — a mystic phrase. The heart has thronged with meanings — Completion, judgment, retrospect Are in it — a questioning of the ways The soul has come, the forces that direct; A wonder at the chances that spelt fate Upon one's own blind path, And down obliterated roads Where dim ancestral figures bore our loads. Reading, O poet, the story of your house, A hundred times your type is there, That Apollonian face and air, That cry for justice, that insistent drearn Of life more full and fair. I feel a host behind you down the years, A tempo in their blood that beats in yours, Something they dowered you with of high and fine That still in you endures. Today I see them down the centuries stand Each with importunate hand Upon the shoulder of the next ahead, Unseen, deflecting you to left or right, Unnoted, giving rhythm to your step, Unheard, giving you your power of words to smite, Uplooking, giving your eyes That large and fearless outlook toward the skies. But hold, I hear you say, What of the hap of circumstance to sway, The pull of some strange star to swerve The course; the spell of books whose soul Goes into ours? Ah true, these things may curve 39 Man's path — advance his soul, delay, Yet never alone he picks the road he tries. We beckon, or thrust back, the good The wrong, because of olden evil forsworn, Or good upheld, while we were yet unborn — Because of will that stood, Or failed, long since, and lies Coiled up in us today, Augmented, lessened on the way. They had a will to goodness, that old breed ; And what of you sprung from their seed — A scholar finding books as close as friends, Mankind's all-lover who least of these defends, A thinker most at home in things unseen, An artist feeling beauty a pain that stings, A poet wondering at all human things, — You, blending two old lines in one, glean Best of both, you emphasize The justice they for centuries claimed. The order and the beauty they have named, You sound in clearer voice, You frame with sharper choice. You spoke the word that is the century's key Crying the world unsafe that does not loose For ampler human use The toil-bound drudge made brute and blind That we may rest cultured and fine and free. You spoke when none were speaking, none dared speak; Your call went traveling on the wind Across the continent and the sea In pentecostal tongue; And shall be heard and sung 40 Until your happy trine of good Is safe for all — bread, beauty, brotherhood. — Anna Catherine Markham 41 Somewhat more than thirty-five years ago, Edwin Markham came upon a small print of Millet's celebrated painting, "The Man with the Hoe," and the pain of it filled his heart. He placed the print upon his wall and, looking at it, jotted down what he calls the rough "field notes" of his now famous poem. Four years later he chanced upon the original painting, and for him it be- came at once "the most solemnly impressive of all modern paintings." It came to him "wrapped around with more terror than the fearsome shapes of Dante." For an hour he stood before the painting, absorbing its majestic de- spair, the terrible import of its admonition. When he had returned to his study, in Oakland, California, he resurrected his "field notes," and wrote the poem as we know it to-day. The manuscript reproduced in facsimile in this bro- chure, is the first, the original, copy of the poem in its final state. The verses were published in the San Fran- cisco Examiner, and shortly they electrified the nation. They were copied far and wide, and their fame was known and celebrated in foreign lands. Over night, as it were, their author became the most talked-of poet in the world. The poem made him thousands of friends, and many critics. To-day it is one of the most famous poems in the English language. Whatever else he may write — and he has written many other notable poems, some of them, in the opinion of critics, better than "The Man with the Hoe" — Mr. Markham always will be re- membered as the author of that tremendous work, which so admirably supplements the great painting that in- spired it. — Vincent Starrett 42 Jhe ftW mvtti ^ Ho*-. 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