FTERWHILES 
 
 By James Whitcomb Riley 
 
AFTERWHILES 
 
(gj> t 0e fkame <&uf0or 
 Neghborly Poems ; on Friendship, Grief and 
 
 Farm Life — Includingthe "OldSwimmin'-Hole " 
 
 Series. 
 Sketches in Prose— With Occasional Poems. 
 Afterwhiles— Serious and Dialect Verse. 
 Pipes O' Pan— Five Sketches and Fifty Poems. 
 Rhymes of Childhood— Child-Dialect and Other 
 
 Verses. 
 The Flying Islands of the Night— A Fantastic 
 
 Drama in Verse. 
 Green Fields and Running Brooks— Dialect and 
 
 Serious Poems. 
 Armazindy — Hoosier Harvest Airs, Feigned Forms 
 
 and Child Rhymes. 
 
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 An Old Sweetheart of Mine— Colored and Mono- 
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AFTERWHILES 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 
 
 FORTIETH THOUSAND 
 
 Jnbtcmapofts 
 
 BOWEN-MERRILL CO., PUBLISHERS 
 1895 
 
. ta-s 
 
 Copyright 1887 
 
 BY 
 JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY 
 
 48 65 55 
 
 AUG 25 1942 
 
TO HUMBOLDT RILEY 
 
 / can not say, and I will not say 
 That he is dead — he is just away. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PROEM ...... 3 
 
 HerrWeiser ...... 7 
 
 The Beautiful City ..... 9 
 
 Lockerbie Street . . . . .11 
 
 Das Krist Kindel ..... 13 
 
 Anselmo ....... 17 
 
 A Home-Made Fairy Tale . .18 
 
 The South Wind and the Sun . . . .20 
 
 The Lost Kiss ..... 27 
 
 The Sphinx . . . . . .29 
 
 If I Knew what Poets Know .... 30 
 
 Ike Walton's Prayer . . . . -31 
 
 A Rough Sketch ..... 34 
 
 Our Kind of a Man . . . . -35 
 
 The Harper ...... 37 
 
 Old Aunt Mary's . . . . .38 
 
 Illileo ...... 40 
 
 The King . . . • • .42 
 
 (ix) 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 A Bride ...... 44 
 
 The Dead Lover . , . . .45 
 
 A Song ...... 46 
 
 When Bessie Died . . . . .48 
 
 The Shower ...... 
 
 A Life Lesson . . . . . .5 
 
 A Scrawl ...... 5 
 
 Away ...... 
 
 Who Bides His Time ..... 55 
 
 From the Headboard of a Grave in Paraguay . . 56 
 
 Laughter Holding Both His Sides ... 57 
 
 5" 
 
 53 
 
 SONNETS 
 
 Pan ....... 61 
 
 Dusk ....... 62 
 
 June ....... 63 
 
 Silence ....... 64 
 
 Time ....... 65 
 
 Sleep ....... 67 
 
 Her Hair ...... 68 
 
 Dearth . . . . . . .69 
 
 A Voice from the Farm .... 70 
 
 When She Comes Home . . . . .71 
 
 Art and Love ...... 72 
 
CONTENTS xi 
 
 IN DIALECT 
 
 Griggsby's Station . . . . .75 
 
 Knee-Deep in June ..... ?S 
 
 When the Hearse Comes Back . . . .83 
 
 A Canary at the Farm .... 86 
 
 A Liz -Town Humorist . . . . . • 87 
 
 Kingry'sMill . . . . 89 
 
 JONEY . . . . . . -93 
 
 Nothin'to Say ..... 96 
 
 Like His Mother Used to Make . . . .98 
 
 The Train-Misser ..... 100 
 
 Granny . . . . . . .102 
 
 Old October ..... 104 
 
 Jim . . . . . . .106 
 
 A Tale of the Airly Days IC g 
 
 To Robert Burns . . . . .in 
 
 A New Year's Tia^e at Willards's ... 114 
 
 The Town Karnteel . . . . .122 
 
 Regardin' Terry Hut . ... 124 
 
 Leedle Dutch Baby . . . . .127 
 
 Down on Wriggle Crick .... 128 
 
 When de Folks is Gone . . . . .131 
 
 The Little Town o' Tailholt . ... 132 
 
 Note. — Acknowledgments are due the courtesy of the Century Mag- 
 azine for reprint here of the poems "When SheComcs Home," and "Nothin 
 to Say." 
 
AFTERWHILES 
 
PROEM 
 
 Where are they — the Afterwhiles — 
 Luring us the lengthening miles 
 Of our lives? IV here is the dawn 
 With the dew across the lawn 
 Stroked with eager feet the far 
 Way the hills and valleys are? 
 Where the sun that smites the frown 
 Of the eastward- ga^er down? 
 Where the rifted wreathes of mist 
 O'er us, tinged with amethyst, 
 Round the mountain's steep defies? 
 Where are all the afterwhiles? 
 
 Afterwhile — and we will go 
 Thither, yon, and to and fro — 
 From the stifling city-streets 
 To the country's cool retreats — 
 From the riot to the rest 
 Where hearts beat the placidest; 
 Afterwhile, and we will fall 
 Under breezy trees, and loll 
 In the shade, with thirsty sight 
 Drinking deep the blue delight 
 Of the skies that will beguile 
 Us as children — afterwhile. 
 3 
 
PROEM 
 
 After-while — and one intends 
 To be gentler to his friends — 
 To walk with them, in the hush 
 Of still evenings, o'er the plush 
 Of home-leading fields, and stand 
 Long at parting, hand in hand: 
 One, in time, will joy to take 
 New resolves for someone's sake, 
 And wear then the look that lies 
 Clear and pure in other eyes — 
 He will soothe and reconcile 
 His own conscience — afterwhile. 
 
 Afterwhile — we have in view 
 A far scene to journey to, — 
 Where the old home is, and where 
 The old mother waits us there, 
 Peering, as the time grows late, 
 Down the old path to the gate. — 
 How we'll click the latch that locks 
 In the pinks and hollyhocks, 
 And leap up the path once more 
 Where she waits us at the door! — 
 How we'll greet the dear old smtle, 
 And the warm tears — afterwhile! 
 
PROEM 
 
 Ah, the endless afterwhiles! — 
 Leagues on leagues, and miles on miles, 
 In the distance far withdrawn, 
 Stretching on, and on, and on, 
 Till the fancy is footsore 
 And faints in the dust before 
 The last milestone's granite face, 
 Hacked with : Here Beginneth Space. 
 O far glimmering worlds and wings, 
 Mystic smiles and beckonings, 
 Lead us through the shadowy aisles, 
 Out into the afterwhiles. 
 
HERR WEISER 
 
 HERR WEISER 
 
 HERR WEISER !— Three-score-years-and-ten — 
 A hale white rose of his countrymen, 
 Transplanted here in the Hoosier loam, 
 And blossomy as his German home — 
 As blossomy, and as pure and sweet 
 As the cool green glen of his calm retreat, 
 Far withdrawn from the noisy town 
 Where trade goes clamoring up and down, 
 Whose fret and fever, and stress and strife 
 May not trouble his tranquil life ! 
 
 Breath of rest, what a balmy gust! — 
 
 Quit of the city's heat and dust, 
 
 Jostling down by the winding road, 
 
 Through the orchard ways of his quaint abode. 
 
 Tether the horse, as we onward fare 
 
 Under the pear-trees trailing there, 
 
 And thumping the wooden bridge at night 
 
 With lumps of ripeness and lush delight, 
 
 Till the stream, as it maunders on till dawn, 
 
 Is powdered and pelted and smiled upon. 
 
 Herr Weiser, with his wholesome face, 
 And the gentle blue of his eyes, and grace 
 Of unassuming honesty, 
 Be there to welcome you and me ! 
 
HERR IVEISER 
 
 And what though the toil of the farm be stopped 
 And the tireless plans of the place be dropped, 
 While the prayerful master's knees are set 
 In beds of pansy, and mignonette, 
 And lily and aster and columbine, 
 Offered in love, as yours and mine? — 
 
 What, but a blessing of kindly thought, 
 
 Sweet as the breath of forget-me-not ! — 
 
 What, but a spirit of lustrous love 
 
 White as the aster he bends above ! — 
 
 What, but an odorous memory 
 
 Of the dear old man, made known to me 
 
 In days demanding a help like his, — 
 
 As sweet as the life of the lily is— 
 
 As sweet as the soul of a babe, bloom-wise 
 
 Born of a lily in paradise. 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL CITY 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL CITY 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL CITY ! Forever 
 
 Its rapturous praises resound ; 
 We fain would behold it— but never 
 
 A glimpse of its glory is found : 
 We slacken our lips at the tender 
 
 White breasts of our mothers to hear 
 Of its marvelous beauty and splendor ;— 
 
 We see — but the gleam of a tear ! 
 
 Yet never the story may tire us— 
 
 First graven in symbols of stone — 
 Rewritten on scrolls of papyrus, 
 
 And parchment, and scattered and blown 
 By the winds of the tongues of all nations, 
 
 Like a litter of leaves wildly whirled 
 Down the rack of a hundred translations, 
 
 From the earliest lisp of the world. 
 
 We compass the earth and the ocean, 
 
 From the Orient's uttermost light, 
 To where the last ripple in motion 
 
 Lips hem of the skirt of the night,— 
 But the Beautiful City evades us— 
 
 No spire of it glints in the sun — 
 No glad-bannered battlement shades us 
 
 When all our long journey is done. 
 
io THE BEAUTIFUL CITY 
 
 Where lies it? We question and listen ; 
 
 We lean from the mountain, or mast, 
 And see but dull earth, or the glisten 
 
 Of seas inconceivably vast : 
 The dust of the one blurs our vision— 
 
 The glare of the other our brain, 
 Nor city nor island elysian 
 
 In all of the land or the main ! 
 
 We kneel in dim fanes where the thunders 
 
 Of organs tumultuous roll, 
 And the longing heart listens and wonders, 
 
 And the eyes look aloft from the soul, 
 But the chanson grows fainter and fainter, 
 
 Swoons wholly away and is dead ; 
 And our eyes only reach where the painter 
 
 Has dabbled a saint overhead. 
 
 The Beautiful City ! O mortal, 
 
 Fare hopefully on in thy quest, 
 Pass down through the green grassy portal 
 
 That leads to the Valley of Rest, 
 There first passed the One who, in pity 
 
 Of all thy great yearning, awaits 
 To point out The Beautiful City, 
 
 And loosen the trump at the gates. 
 
LOCKERBIE STREET 
 
 LOCKERBIE STREET 
 
 SUCH a dear little street it is, nestled away 
 From the noise of the city and heat of the day, 
 In cool shady coverts of whispering trees, 
 With their leaves lifted up to shake hands with the 
 
 breeze 
 Which in all its wide wanderings never may meet 
 With a resting-place fairer than Lockerbie street ! 
 
 There is such a relief, from the clangor and din 
 Of the heart of the town, to go loitering in 
 Through the dim, narrow walks, with the sheltering 
 
 shade 
 Of the trees waving over the long promenade, 
 And littering lightly the ways of our feet 
 With the gold of the sunshine of Lockerbie street. 
 
 And the nights that come down the dark pathways 
 
 of dusk, 
 With the stars in their tresses, and odors of musk 
 In their moon-woven raiments, bespangled with dews, 
 And looped up with lilies for lovers to use 
 In the songs that they sing to the tinkle and beat 
 Of their sweet serenadings through Lockerbie street. 
 
LOCKERBIE STREET 
 
 O, my Lockerbie street ! You are fair to be seen — 
 Be it noon of the day, or the rare and serene 
 Afternoon of the night— you are one to my heart, 
 And I love you above all the phrases of art, ^ 
 For no language could frame, and no lips could repeat 
 My rhyme-haunted raptures of Lockerbie street. 
 
DAS KR1ST KIN DEL 
 
 DAS KRIST KINDEL 
 
 I HAD fed the fire and stirred it, till the sparkles in delight 
 Snapped their saucy little fingers at the chill December 
 
 night; 
 And in dressing-gown and slippers, I had tilted back "my 
 
 throne"— 
 The old split-bottomed rocker — and was musing all alone. 
 
 I could hear the hungry Winter prowling round the outer 
 
 door, 
 And the tread of muffled footsteps on the white piazza 
 
 floor; 
 But the sounds came to me only as the murmur of a stream 
 That mingled with the current of a lazy-flowing dream. 
 
 Like a fragrant incense rising, curled the smoke of my 
 cigar, 
 
 With the lamp-light gleaming through it like a mist-en- 
 folded star ;— 
 
 And as I gazed, the vapor like a curtain rolled away, 
 
 With a sound of bells that tinkled, and the clatter of a 
 sleigh. 
 
 And in a vision, painted like a picture in the air, 
 1 saw the elfish figure of a man with frosty hair — 
 
14 DAS KRIST KIN DEL 
 
 A quaint old man that chuckled with a laugh as he ap- 
 peared, 
 
 And with ruddy cheeks like embers in the ashes of his 
 beard. 
 
 He poised himself grotesquely, in an attitude of mirth, 
 On a damask-covered hassock that was sitting on the 
 
 hearth ; 
 And at a magic signal of his stubby little thumb, 
 I saw the fireplace changing to a bright proscenium. 
 
 And looking there, I marveled as I saw a mimic stage 
 Alive with little actors of a very tender age ; 
 And some so very tiny that they tottered as they walked, 
 And lisped and purled and gurgled like the brooklets, when 
 they talked. 
 
 And their faces were like lilies, and their eyes like purest 
 
 dew, 
 And their tresses like the shadows that the shine is woven 
 
 through ; 
 And they each had little burdens, and a little tale to tell 
 Of fairy lore, and giants, and delights delectable. 
 
 And they mixed and intermingled, weaving melody with 
 
 joy, 
 Till the magic circle clustered round a blooming baby-boy; 
 
 And they threw aside their treasures in an ecstasy of glee, 
 
 And bent, with dazzled faces and with parted lips, to see. 
 
DAS KRIST KIN DEL 
 
 'Twas a wondrous little fellow, with a dainty double chin, 
 And chubby cheeks, and dimples for the smiles to blos- 
 
 • som in ; 
 And he looked as ripe and rosy, on his bed of straw and 
 
 reeds, 
 As a mellow little pippin that had tumbled in the weeds. 
 
 And I saw the happy mother, and a group surrounding her 
 That knelt with costly presents of frankincense and myrrh; 
 And I thrilled with awe and wonder, as a murmur on the 
 
 air 
 Came drifting o'er the hearing in a melody of prayer :— 
 
 By the splendor in the heavens, and the hush upon the sea, 
 And the majesty of silence reigning over Galilee, — 
 We feel Thy kingly presence, and we humbly bow the knee 
 And lift our hearts and voices in gratefulness to Thee. 
 
 Thy messenger has spoken, and our doubts have fled and gone 
 As the dark and spectral shadows of the night before the dawn; 
 And, in the kindly shelter of the light around us drawn, 
 We would nestle down forever in the breast we lean upon. 
 
 You have given us a shepherd — You have given us a guide, 
 And the light of Heaven grew dimmer when You sent Him from 
 
 Your side, — 
 But He comes to lead Thy children where the gates will open 
 
 wide 
 To welcome His returning when His works are glorified. 
 
1 6 DAS KRIST KIN DEL 
 
 By the splendor in the Heavens, and the hush upon the sea, 
 And the majesty of silence reigning over Galilee, — 
 We feel Thy kingly presence, and we humbly bow the knee 
 And lift our hearts and voices in gratefulness to Thee. 
 
 Then the vision, slowly failing, with the words of the re- 
 frain, 
 
 Fell swooning in the moonlight through the frosty win- 
 dow-pane ; 
 
 And I heard the clock proclaiming, like an eager sentinel 
 
 Who brings the world good tidings,—" It is Christmas- 
 all is well!" 
 
ANSELMO 17 
 
 ANSELMO 
 
 YEARS did I vainly seek the good Lord's grace,— 
 
 Prayed, fasted and did penance dire and dread ; 
 Did kneel with bleeding knees and rainy face, 
 
 And mouth the dust, with ashes on my head ; 
 Yea, still, with knotted scourge the flesh I flayed, 
 
 Rent fresh the wounds, and moaned and shrieked in- 
 sanely; 
 And froth oozed with the pleadings that I made, 
 
 And yet I prayed on vainly, vainly, vainly! 
 
 A time, from out of swoon, I lifted eye, 
 
 To find a wretched outcast, gray and grim, 
 Bathing my brow, with many a pitying sigh, 
 
 And I did pray God's grace might rest on him.— 
 Then, lo ! a gentle voice fell on mine ears — 
 
 " Thou shalt not sob in suppliance hereafter ; 
 Take up thy prayers and wring them dry of tears, 
 
 And lift them, white and pure, with love and laughter !" 
 
 So is it now for all men else I pray ; 
 So is it I am blest and glad alway. 
 
A HOME-MADE FAIRY TALE 
 
 A HOME-MADE FAIRY TALE 
 
 BUD, come here to your Uncle a spell, 
 And I'll tell you something you mustn't tell — 
 For it's a secret and shore-nuff true, 
 And maybe I oughtn't to tell it to you ! — 
 But out in the garden, under the shade 
 Of the apple-trees, where we romped and played 
 Till the moon was up, and you thought I'd gone 
 Fast asleep,— That was all put on ! 
 For I was a-watchin' something queer 
 Goin' on there in the grass, my dear ! — 
 'Way down deep in it, there I see 
 A little dude fairy who winked at me, 
 And snapped his fingers, and laughed as low 
 And fine as the whine of a mus-kee-to ! 
 I kept still — watchin' him closer — and 
 I noticed a little guitar in his hand, 
 Which he leant 'ginst a little dead bee — and laid 
 His cigarette down on a clean grass-blade ; 
 And then climbed up on the shell of a snail — 
 Carefully dusting his swallowtail — 
 And pulling up, by a waxed web-thread, 
 This little guitar, you remember, I said ! 
 And there he trinkled and trilled a tune — 
 ; My Love, so Fair, Tans in the Moon !" 
 
A HOME-MADE FAIRY TALE ig 
 
 Till, presently, out of the clover-top 
 
 He seemed to be singing to, came, k'pop ! 
 
 The purtiest, daintiest fairy face 
 
 In all this world, or any place ! 
 
 Then the little ser'nader waved his hand, 
 
 As much as to say, " We'll excuse^ow/" and 
 
 I heard, as I squinted my eyelids to, 
 
 A kiss like the drip of a drop of dew ! 
 
THE SOUTH IVIND AND THE SUN 
 
 THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 
 
 O THE South Wind and the Sun ! 
 
 How each loved the other one — 
 Full of fancy — full of folly — 
 
 Full of jollity and fun ! 
 
 How they romped and ran about, 
 
 Like two boys when school is out, 
 With glowing face, and lisping lip, 
 
 Low laugh, and lifted shout ! 
 
 And the South Wind— he was dressed 
 With a ribbon round his breast 
 
 That floated, flapped and fluttered 
 In a riotous unrest, 
 And a drapery of mist, 
 From the shoulder and the wrist 
 
 Flowing backward with the motion 
 Of the waving hand he kissed. 
 
 And the Sun had on a crown 
 Wrought of gilded thistledown, 
 
 And a scarf of velvet vapor, 
 And a raveled-rainbow gown ; 
 And his tinsel-tangled hair, 
 Tossed and lost upon the air, 
 
 Was glossier and flossier 
 Than any anywhere. 
 
THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 
 
 And the South Wind's eyes were two 
 
 Little dancing drops of dew, 
 As he puffed his cheeks, and pursed his lips, 
 
 And blew and blew and blew ! 
 
 And the Sun's— like diamond-stone, 
 
 Brighter yet than ever known, 
 As he knit his brows and held his breath, 
 
 And shone and shone and shone ! 
 
 And this pair of merry fays 
 
 Wandered through the summer days ; 
 Arm-in-arm they went together 
 
 Over heights of morning haze — 
 
 Over slanting slopes of lawn 
 
 They went on and on and on, 
 Where the daisies looked like star-tracks 
 
 Trailing up and down the dawn. 
 
 And where'er they found the top 
 
 Of a wheat-stalk droop and lop 
 They chucked it underneath the chin 
 
 And praised the lavish crop, 
 
 Till it lifted with the pride 
 
 Of the heads it grew beside, 
 And then the South Wind and the Sun 
 
 Went onward satisfied. 
 
22 THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 
 
 Over meadow-lands they tripped, 
 
 Where the dandelions dipped 
 In crimson foam of clover-bloom, 
 
 And dripped and dripped and dripped ; 
 
 And they clinched the bumble-stings, 
 
 Gauming honey on their wings, 
 And bundling them in lily-bells, 
 
 With maudlin murmurings. 
 
 And the humming-bird, that hung 
 
 Like a jewel up among 
 The tilted honeysuckle-horns, 
 
 They mesmerized, and swung 
 
 In the palpitating air, 
 
 Drowsed with odors strange and rare, 
 And, with whispered laughter, slipped away, 
 
 And left him hanging there. 
 
 And they braided blades of grass 
 Where the truant had to pass ; 
 
 And they wriggled through the rushes 
 And the reeds of the morass, 
 Where they danced, in rapture sweet, 
 O'er the leaves that laid a street 
 
 Of undulant mosaic for 
 The touches of their feet. 
 
THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 23 
 
 By the brook with mossy brink, 
 
 Where the cattle came to drink, 
 They trilled and piped and whistled 
 
 With the thrush and bobolink, 
 
 Till the kine, in listless pause, 
 
 Switched their tails in mute applause, 
 With lifted heads, and dreamy eyes, 
 
 And bubble-dripping jaws. 
 
 And where the melons grew, 
 
 Streaked with yellow, green and blue, 
 These jolly sprites went wandering 
 
 Through spangled paths of dew ; 
 
 And the melons, here and there, 
 
 They made love to, everywhere, 
 Turning their pink souls to crimson 
 
 With caresses fond and fair. 
 
 Over orchard walls they went, 
 
 Where the fruited boughs were bent 
 Till they brushed the sward beneath them 
 
 Where the shine and shadow blent ; 
 
 And the great green pear they shook 
 
 Till the sallow hue forsook 
 Its features, and the gleam of gold 
 
 Laughed out in every look. 
 
24 THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 
 
 And they stroked the downy cheek 
 Of the peach, and smoothed it sleek, 
 
 And flushed it into splendor ; 
 And, with many an elfish freak, 
 Gave the russet's rust a wipe — 
 Prankt the rambo with a stripe, 
 
 And the winesap blushed its reddest 
 As they spanked the pippins ripe. 
 
 Through the woven ambuscade 
 That the twining vines had made, 
 
 They found the grapes, in clusters, 
 Drinking up the shine and shade— 
 Plumpt, like tiny skins of wine, 
 With a vintage so divine 
 
 That the tongue of fancy tingled 
 With the tang of muscadine. 
 
 And the golden-banded bees, 
 Droning o'er the flowery leas, 
 
 They bridled, reined, and rode away 
 Across the fragrant breeze, 
 Till in hollow oak and elm 
 They had groomed and stabled them 
 
 In waxen stalls that oozed with dews 
 Of rose and lily-stem. 
 
THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 25 
 
 Where the dusty highway leads, 
 
 High above the wayside weeds 
 They sowed the air with butterflies 
 
 Like blooming flower-seeds, 
 
 Till the dull grasshopper sprung 
 
 Half a man's height up, and hung 
 Tranced in the heat, with whirring wings, 
 
 And sung and sung and sung ! 
 
 And they loitered, hand in hand, 
 
 Where the snipe along the sand 
 Of the river ran to meet them 
 
 As the ripple meets the land, 
 
 Till the dragonfly, in light 
 
 Gauzy armor, burnished bright, 
 Came tilting down the waters 
 
 In a wild, bewildered flight. 
 
 And they heard the killdee's call, 
 
 And afar, the waterfall, 
 But the rustle of a falling leaf 
 
 They heard above it all ; 
 
 And the trailing willow crept 
 
 Deeper in the tide that swept 
 The leafy shallop to the shore, 
 
 And wept and wept and wept ! 
 
26 THE SOUTH WIND AND THE SUN 
 
 And the fairy vessel veered 
 From its moorings — tacked and steered 
 For the center of the current- 
 Sailed away and disappeared : 
 And the burthen that it bore 
 From the long-enchanted shore — 
 "Alas ! the South Wind and the Sun !" 
 1 murmur evermore. 
 
 For the South Wind and the Sun, 
 Each so loves the other one, 
 
 For all his jolly folly, 
 And frivolity and fun, 
 That our love for them they weigh 
 As their fickle fancies may, 
 
 And when at last we love them most, 
 They laugh and sail away. 
 
THE LOST KISS 27 
 
 THE LOST KISS 
 
 I PUT by the half-written poem, 
 
 While the pen, idly trailed in my hand, 
 Writes on, — " Had I words to complete it, 
 
 Who'd read it, or who'd understand? " 
 But the little bare feet on the stairway, 
 
 And the faint, smothered laugh in the hall, 
 And the eerie-low lisp on the silence, 
 
 Cry up to me over it all. 
 
 So I gather it up— where was broken 
 
 The tear-faded thread of my theme, 
 Telling how, as one night I sat writing, 
 
 A fairy broke in on my dream, 
 A little inquisitive fairy — 
 
 My own little girl, with the gold 
 Of the sun in her hair, and the dewy 
 
 Blue eyes of the fairies of old. 
 
 'Twas the dear little girl that I scolded— 
 
 " For was it a moment like this," 
 I said, " when she knew I was busy, 
 
 To come romping in for a kiss? — 
 Come rowdying up from her mother, 
 
 And clamoring there at my knee 
 For ' One 'ittle kiss for my dolly, 
 
 And one 'ittle uzzer for me!'" 
 
28 THE LOST KISS 
 
 God pity the heart that repelled her, 
 
 And the cold hand that turned her away, 
 And take, from the lips that denied her, 
 
 This answerless prayer of to-day ! 
 Take, Lord, from my mem'ry forever 
 
 That pitiful sob of despair, 
 And the patter and trip of the little bare feet, 
 
 And the one piercing cry on the stair ! 
 
 I put by the half- written poem, 
 
 While the pen, idly trailed in my hand, 
 Writes on, "Had I words to complete it, 
 
 Who'd read it, or who'd understand?" 
 But the little bare feet on the stairway, 
 
 And the faint, smothered laugh in the hall, 
 And the eerie-low lisp on the silence, 
 
 Cry up to me over it all. 
 
THE SPHINX 29 
 
 THE SPHINX 
 
 I KNOW all about the Sphinx— 
 I know even what she thinks, 
 Staring with her stony eyes 
 Up forever at the skies. 
 
 For last night I dreamed that she 
 Told me all the mystery — 
 Why for ceons mute she sat : — 
 She was just cut out for that ! 
 
3 o IF I KNEIV WHAT POETS KNOIV 
 
 IF I KNEW WHAT POETS KNOW 
 
 IF I knew what poets know, 
 
 Would I write a rhyme 
 Of the buds that never blow 
 
 In the summer time? 
 Would I sing of golden seeds 
 Springing up in ironweeds? 
 And of raindrops turned to snow, 
 If I knew what poets know ? 
 
 Did I know what poets do, 
 
 Would I sing a song 
 Sadder than the pigeon's coo 
 
 When the days are long ? 
 Where I found a heart in pain, 
 I would make it glad again ; 
 And the false should be the true, 
 Did I know what poets do. 
 
 If I knew what poets know, 
 
 I would find a theme 
 Sweeter than the placid flow 
 
 Of the fairest dream ; 
 I would sing of love that lives 
 On the errors it forgives ; 
 And the world would better grow 
 If I knew what poets know. 
 
IKE WALTON'S PRAYER 31 
 
 IKE WALTON'S PRAYER 
 
 I CRAVE, dear Lord, 
 No boundless hoard 
 Of gold and gear, 
 Nor jewels fine, 
 Nor lands, nor kine, 
 Nor treasure-heaps of anything. — 
 Let but a little hut be mine 
 Where at the hearthstone I may hear 
 The cricket sing, 
 And have the shine 
 Of one glad woman's eyes to make, 
 For my poor sake, 
 Our simple home a place divine ; — 
 Just the wee cot — the cricket's chirr — 
 Love, and the smiling face of her. 
 
 I pray not for 
 Great riches, nor 
 For vast estates and castle-halls, — 
 Give me to hear the bare footfalls 
 Of children o'er 
 An oaken floor 
 New-rinsed with sunshine, or bespread 
 With but the tiny coverlet 
 And pillow for the baby's head ; 
 
IKE WALTON'S PRAYER 
 
 And, pray Thou, may 
 The door stand open and the day 
 Send ever in a gentle breeze, 
 With fragrance from the locust-trees, 
 
 And drowsy moan of doves, and blur 
 Of robin-chirps, and drone of bees, 
 
 With afterhushes of the stir 
 Of intermingling sounds, and then 
 
 The good-wife and the smile of her 
 
 Filling the silences again — 
 
 The cricket's call, 
 
 And the wee cot, 
 
 Dear Lord of all, 
 
 Deny me not ! 
 
 I pray not that 
 Men tremble at 
 My power of place 
 And lordly sway,— 
 I only pray for simple grace 
 To look my neighbor in the face 
 
 Full honestly from day to day — 
 Yield me his horny palm to hold, 
 And I'll not pray 
 For gold ; — 
 The tanned face, garlanded with mirth, 
 It hath the kingliest smile on earth— 
 
IKE IV ALTON'S PRAYER 33 
 
 The swart brow, diamonded with sweat, 
 Hath never need of coronet. 
 And so I reach, 
 
 Dear Lord, to Thee, 
 And do beseech 
 Thou givest me 
 The wee cot, and the cricket's chirr, 
 Love, and the glad sweet face of her ! 
 
34 A ROUGH SKETCH 
 
 A ROUGH SKETCH 
 
 I CAUGHT, for a second, across the crowd- 
 Just for a second, and barely that — 
 A face, pox-pitted and evil-browed, 
 Hid in the shade of a slouch-rim'd hat— 
 With small, gray eyes, of a look as keen 
 As the long, sharp nose that grew between. 
 
 And I said : 'Tis a sketch of Nature's own, 
 
 Drawn i' the dark o' the moon, I swear, 
 On a tatter of Fate that the winds have blown 
 Hither and thither and everywhere — 
 With its keen little sinister eyes of gray, 
 And nose like the beak of a bird of prey ! 
 
OUR KIND OF A MAN 35 
 
 OUR KIND OF A MAN 
 
 I. 
 THE kind of a man for you and me ! 
 He faces the world unflinchingly, 
 And smites, as long as the wrong resists, 
 With a knuckled faith and force like fists : 
 He lives the life he is preaching of, 
 And loves where most is the need of love ; 
 His voice is clear to the deaf man's ears, 
 And his face sublime through the blind man's tears ; 
 The light shines out where the clouds were dim, 
 And the widow's prayer goes up for him ; 
 The latch is clicked at the hovel door, 
 And the sick man sees the sun once more, 
 And out o'er the barren fields he sees 
 Springing blossoms and waving trees, 
 Feeling as only the dying may, 
 That God's own servant has come that way, 
 Smoothing the path as it still winds on 
 Through the golden gate where his loved have gone. 
 
 II. 
 
 The kind of a man for me and you ! 
 However little of worth we do 
 He credits full, and abides in trust 
 That time will teach us how more is just. 
 
36 OUR KIND OF A MAN 
 
 lie walks abroad, and he meets all kinds 
 Of querulous and uneasy minds, 
 And, sympathizing, he shares the pain 
 Of the doubts that rack us, heart and brain ; 
 And, knowing this, as we grasp his hand, 
 We are surely coming to understand ! 
 He looks on sin with pitying eyes — 
 E'en as the Lord, since Paradise, — 
 Else, should we read, Though our sins should glow- 
 As scarlet, they shall be white as snow? — 
 And, feeling still, with a grief half glad, 
 That the bad are as good as the. good are bad, 
 He strikes straight out for the Right— and he 
 Is the kind of a man for you and me ! 
 
THE HARPER 37 
 
 THE HARPER 
 
 LIKE a drift of faded blossoms 
 
 Caught in a slanting rain, 
 His fingers glimpsed down the strings of his harp 
 
 In a tremulous refrain. 
 
 Patter, and tinkle, and drip, and drip ! 
 
 Ah ! but the chords were rainy sweet ! 
 And I closed my eyes and I bit my lip, 
 
 As he played there in the street. 
 
 Patter, and drip, and tinkle ! 
 
 And there was the little bed 
 In the corner of the garret, 
 
 And the rafters overhead ! 
 
 And there was the little window — 
 
 Tinkle, and drip, and drip! — 
 The rain above, and a mother's love, 
 
 And God's companionship ! 
 
38 OLD AUNT MARY'S 
 
 OLD AUNT MARY'S 
 
 WASN'T it pleasant, O brother mine, 
 In those old days of the lost sunshine 
 Of youth— when the Saturday's chores were through, 
 And the " Sunday's wood " in the kitchen, too, 
 And we went visiting, " me and you," 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's? 
 
 It all comes back so clear to-day ! 
 Though I am as bald as you are gray — 
 Out by the barn-lot, and down the lane, 
 We patter along in the dust again, 
 As light as the tips of the drops of the rain, 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's ! 
 
 We cross the pasture, and through the wood 
 Where the old gray snag of the poplar stood, 
 Where the hammering "red-heads" hopped awry, 
 And the buzzard " raised " in the " clearing" sky 
 And lolled and circled, as we went by 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 
 
 And then in the dust of the road again ; 
 And the teams we met, and the countrymen ; 
 And the long highway, with sunshine spread 
 As thick as butter on country bread, 
 Our cares behind, and our hearts ahead 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 
 
OLD AUNT MARY'S 39 
 
 Why, I see her now in the open door, 
 Where the little gourds grew up the sides and o'er 
 The clapboard roof !— And her face — ah, me ! 
 Wasn't it good for a boy to see— 
 And wasn't it good for a boy to be 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's? 
 
 And O my brother, so far away, 
 This is to tell you she waits to-day 
 To welcome us :— Aunt Mary fell 
 Asleep this morning, whispering, " Tell 
 The boys to come ! " And all is well 
 Out to Old Aunt Mary's. 
 
4 o ILLILEO 
 
 ILLILEO 
 
 ILLILEO, the moonlight seemed lost across the vales— 
 The stars but strewed the azure as an armor's scattered 
 
 scales ; 
 The airs of night were quiet as the breath of silken sails, 
 And all your words were sweeter than the notes of night- 
 ingales. 
 
 Illileo Legardi, in the garden there alone, 
 
 With your figure carved of fervor, as the Psyche carved of 
 
 stone, 
 There came to me no murmur of the fountain's undertone 
 So mystically, musically mellow as your own. 
 
 You whispered low, Illileo — so low the leaves were mute, 
 And the echoes faltered breathless in your voice's vain 
 
 pursuit ; 
 And there died the distant dalliance of the serenader's lute : 
 And I held you in my bosom as the husk may hold the 
 
 fruit. 
 
 Illileo, I listened. I believed you. In my bliss, 
 
 What were all the worlds above me since I found you thus 
 
 in this? — 
 Let them reeling reach to win me— even Heaven I would 
 
 miss, 
 Grasping earthward !— I would cling here, though I clung 
 
 by just a kiss. 
 
ILLILEO 41 
 
 And blossoms should grow odorless — and lilies all aghast — 
 And I said the stars should slacken in their paces through 
 
 the vast, 
 Ere yet my loyalty should fail enduring to the last. — 
 So vowed I. It is written. It is changeless as the past. 
 
 Illileo Legardi, in the shade your palace throws 
 Like a cowl about the singer at your gilded porticos, 
 A moan goes with the music that may vex the high repose 
 Of a heart that fades and crumbles as the crimson of a 
 rose. 
 
42 THE KING 
 
 THE KING 
 
 THEY rode right out of the morning sun — 
 
 A glimmering, glittering cavalcade 
 Of knights and ladies, and every one 
 
 In princely sheen arrayed ; 
 And the king of them all, O he rode ahead, 
 With a helmet of gold, and a plume of red 
 That spurted about in the breeze and bled 
 In the bloom of the everglade. 
 
 And they rode high over the dewy lawn, 
 With brave, glad banners of every hue 
 That rolled in ripples, as they rode on 
 
 In splendor, two and two ; 
 And the tinkling links of the golden reins 
 Of the steeds they rode rang such refrains 
 As the castanets in a dream of Spain's 
 
 Intensest gold and blue. 
 
 And they rode and rode ; and the steeds they neighed 
 
 And pranced, and the sun on their glossy hides 
 Flickered and lightened and glanced and played 
 
 Like the moon on rippling tides ; 
 And their manes were silken, and thick and strong, 
 And their tails were flossy, and fetlock-long, 
 And jostled in time to the teeming throng, 
 
 And their knightly song besides. 
 
THE KING 43 
 
 Clank of scabbard and jingle of spur, 
 
 And the fluttering sash of the queen went wild 
 In the wind, and the proud king glanced at her 
 
 As one at a willful child, — 
 And as knight and lady away they flew, 
 And the banners flapped, and the falcon, too, 
 And the lances flashed and the bugle blew, 
 
 He kissed his hand and smiled.— 
 
 And then, like a slanting sunlit shower, 
 The pageant glittered across the plain, 
 And the turf spun back, and the wildweed flower 
 
 Was only a crimson stain. 
 And a dreamer's eyes they are downward cast, 
 As he blends these words with the wailing blast : 
 It is the King of the Year rides past ! " 
 
 And Autumn is here again. 
 
44 A BRIDE 
 
 A BRIDE 
 
 "O I AM weary ! " she sighed, as her billowy 
 Hair she unloosed in a torrent of gold 
 That rippled and fell o'er a figure as willowy, 
 
 Graceful and fair as a goddess of old : 
 Over her jewels she flung herself drearily, 
 
 Crumpled the laces that snowed on her breast, 
 Crushed with her fingers the lily that wearily 
 Clung in her hair like a dove in its nest. 
 —And naught but her shadowy form in the mirror 
 To kneel in dumb agony down and weep near her ! 
 
 " Weary ? "—of what? Could we fathom the mystery?— 
 Lift up the lashes weighed down by her tears 
 And wash with their dews one white face from her his- 
 tory, 
 Set like a gem in the red rust of years? 
 Nothing will rest her— unless he who died of her 
 
 Strayed from his grave, and, in place of the groom, 
 Tipping her face, kneeling there by the side of her, 
 Drained the old kiss to the dregs of his doom. 
 —And naught but that shadowy form in the mirror 
 To kneel in dumb agony down and weep near her ! 
 
THE DEAD LOVER 45 
 
 THE DEAD LOVER 
 
 TIME is so long when a man is dead ! 
 
 Some one sews ; and the room is made 
 Very clean ; and the light is shed 
 
 Soft through the window-shade. 
 
 Yesterday I thought: " I know 
 Just how the bells will sound, and how 
 
 The friends will talk, and the sermon go, 
 And the hearse-horse bow and bow! " 
 
 This is to-day ; and 1 have no thing 
 To think of — nothing whatever to do 
 
 But to hear the throb of the pulse of a wing 
 That wants to fly back to you. 
 
46 A SONG 
 
 A SONG 
 
 THERE is ever a song somewhere, my dear ; 
 
 There is ever a something sings alway : 
 There's the song of the lark when the skies are clear, 
 
 And the song of the thrush when the skies are gray. 
 The sunshine showers across the grain, 
 
 And the bluebird trills in the orchard tree ; 
 And in and out, when the eaves drip rain, 
 
 The swallows are twittering ceaselessly. 
 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear, 
 
 Be the skies above or dark or fair, 
 There is ever a song that our hearts may hear- 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear — 
 
 There is ever a song somewhere ! 
 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear, 
 
 In the midnight black, or the mid-day blue: 
 The robin pipes when the sun is here, 
 
 And the cricket chirrups the whole night through. 
 The buds may blow and the fruit may grow 
 
 And the autumn leaves drop crisp and sere ; 
 But whether the sun, or the rain, or the snow, 
 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear. 
 
A SONG 47 
 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear, 
 
 Be the skies above or dark or fair, 
 There is ever a song that our hearts may hear- 
 There is ever a song somewhere, my dear — 
 There is ever a song somewhere ! 
 
48 WHEN BESSIE DIED 
 
 WHEN BESSIE DIED 
 
 u If from your own the dimpled hands had slipped, 
 And ne'er would nestle in your palm again; 
 If the white feet into the grave had tripped — " 
 
 WHEN Bessie died— 
 We braided the brown hair, and tied 
 It just as her own little hands 
 Had fastened back the silken strands 
 A thousand times— the crimson bit 
 Of ribbon woven into it 
 That she had worn with childish pride — 
 Smoothed down the dainty bow — and cried- 
 When Bessie died. 
 
 When Bessie died— 
 
 We drew the nursery blinds aside, 
 
 And, as the morning in the room 
 
 Burst like a primrose into bloom, 
 
 Her pet canary's cage we hung 
 
 Where she might hear him when he sung— 
 
 And yet not any note he tried, 
 
 Though she lay listening folded-eyed. 
 
 When Bessie died— 
 
 We writhed in prayer unsatisfied ; 
 
 We begged of God, and He did smile 
 
 In silence on us all the while ; 
 
WHEN BESSIE DIED 49 
 
 And we did see Him, through our tears, 
 Enfolding that fair form of hers, 
 She laughing back against His love 
 The kisses we had nothing of — 
 And death to us He still denied, 
 When Bessie died — 
 
 When Bessie died. 
 
5o THE SHOWER 
 
 THE SHOWER 
 
 THE landscape, like the awed face of a child, 
 Grew curiously blurred ; a hush of death 
 
 Fell on the fields, and in the darkened wild 
 The zephyr held its breath. 
 
 No wavering glamour-work of light and shade 
 Dappled the shivering surface of the brook ; 
 
 The frightened ripples in their ambuscade 
 Of willows thrilled and shook. 
 
 The sullen day grew darker, and anon 
 Dim flashes of pent anger lit the sky ; 
 
 With rumbling wheels of wrath came rolling on 
 The storm's artillery. 
 
 The cloud above put on its blackest frown, 
 And then, as with a vengeful cry of pain, 
 
 The lightning snatched it, ripped and flung it down 
 In raveled shreds of rain : 
 
 While 1, transfigured by some wondrous art, 
 Bowed with the thirsty lilies to the sod, 
 
 My empty soul brimmed over, and my heart 
 Drenched with the love of God. 
 
A LIFE-LESSON 51 
 
 A LIFE-LESSON 
 
 THERE! little girl; don't cry! 
 
 They have broken your doll, I know ; 
 And your tea-set blue, 
 And your play-house, too, 
 Are things of the long ago ; 
 But childish troubles will soon pass by — 
 There ! little girl ; dont cry ! 
 
 There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 
 
 They have broken your slate, I know ; 
 And the glad, wild ways 
 Of your school-girl days 
 Are things of the long ago ; 
 But life and love will soon come by. — 
 There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 
 
 There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 
 
 They have broken your heart, I know ; 
 And the rainbow gleams 
 Of your youthful dreams 
 Are things of the long ago ; 
 But Heaven holds all for which you sigh, 
 There ! little girl ; don't cry ! 
 
52 A SCRAWL 
 
 A SCRAWL 
 
 I WANT to sing something— but this is all — 
 
 I try and I try, but the rhymes are dull, 
 As though they were damp, and the echoes fall 
 Limp and unlovable. 
 
 Words will not say what I yearn to say— 
 They will not walk as I want them to ; 
 But they stumble and fall in the path of the way 
 Of my telling my love for you. 
 
 Simply take what the scrawl is worth — 
 
 Knowing I love you as sun the sod 
 On the ripening side of the great round earth 
 That swings in the smile of God. 
 
AWAY 53 
 
 AWAY 
 
 I CAN NOT say, and I will not say 
 That he is dead. — He is just away ! 
 
 With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand, 
 He has wandered into an unknown land, 
 
 And left us dreaming how very fair 
 It needs must be, since he lingers there. 
 
 And you — O you, who the wildest yearn 
 For the old-time step and the glad return, — 
 
 Think of him faring on, as dear 
 
 In the love of There as the love of Here ; 
 
 And loyal still, as he gave the blows 
 
 Of his warrior-strength to his country's foes.- 
 
 Mild and gentle, as he was brave,— 
 When the sweetest love of his life he gave 
 
 To simple things : —Where the violets grew 
 Pure as the eyes they were likened to, 
 
 The touches of his hands have strayed 
 As reverently as his lips have prayed: 
 
54 
 
 AWAY 
 
 When the little brown thrush that harshly chirred 
 Was dear to him as the mocking-bird ; 
 
 And he pitied as much as a man in pain 
 A writhing honey-bee wet with rain.— 
 
 Think of him still as the same, I say : 
 He is not dead— he is just away ! 
 
W HO BIDES HIS TIME 55 
 
 WHO BIDES HIS TIME 
 
 WHO bides his time, and day by day 
 
 Faces defeat full patiently, 
 And lifts a mirthful roundelay, 
 
 However poor his fortunes be,— 
 He will not fail in any qualm 
 
 Of poverty— the paltry dime 
 
 It will grow golden in his palm, 
 
 Who bides his time. 
 
 Who bides his time— he tastes the sweet 
 
 Of honey in the saltest tear ; 
 And though he fares with slowest feet 
 
 Joy runs to meet him, drawing near: 
 The birds are heralds of his cause ; 
 
 And, like a never-ending rhyme, 
 The roadsides bloom in his applause, 
 Who bides his time. 
 
 Who bides his time and fevers not 
 In the hot race that none achieves, 
 
 Shall wear cool-wreathen laurel, wrought 
 With crimson berries in the leaves ; 
 
 And he shall reign a goodly king, 
 And sway his hand o'er every clime, 
 
 With peace writ on his signet ring, 
 Who bides his time. 
 
56 HEADBOARD OF A GRAVE IN PARAGUAY 
 
 FROM THE HEADBOARD OF A GRAVE IN 
 PARAGUAY 
 
 A TROTH, and a grief, and a blessing, 
 Disguised them and came this way,— 
 
 And one was a promise, and one was a doubt, 
 And one was a rainy day. 
 
 And they met betimes with this maiden,— 
 And the promise it spake and lied, 
 
 And the doubt it gibbered and hugged itself, 
 And the rainy day— she died. 
 
LAUGHTER HOLDING BOTH HIS SIDES 57 
 
 LAUGHTER HOLDING BOTH HIS SIDES 
 
 AYE, thou varlet ! Laugh away ! 
 All the world's a holiday ! 
 Laugh away, and roar and shout 
 Till thy hoarse tongue lolleth out! 
 Bloat thy cheeks, and bulge thine eyes 
 Unto bursting ; pelt thy thighs 
 With thy swollen palms and roar 
 As thou never hast before ! 
 Lustier ! wilt thou ! peal on peal ! 
 Stiflest? Squat and grind thy heel- 
 Wrestle with thy loins, and then 
 Wheeze thee whiles, and whoop again ! 
 

SONNETS 
 
 (59) 
 
PAN 
 
 PAN 
 
 THIS PAN is but an idle god, I guess, 
 
 Since all the fair midsummer of my dreams 
 He loiters listlessly by woody streams, 
 
 Soaking the lush glooms up with laziness ; 
 
 Or drowsing while the maiden-winds caress 
 
 Him prankishly, and powder him with gleams 
 Of sifted sunshine. And he ever seems 
 
 Drugged with a joy unutterable— unless 
 His low pipes whistle hints of it far out 
 
 Across the ripples to the dragonfly 
 
 That, like a wind-born blossom blown about, 
 
 Drops quiveringly down, as though to die — 
 Then lifts and wavers on, as if in doubt 
 Whether to fan his wings or fly without. 
 
62 DUSK 
 
 DUSK 
 
 THE frightened herds of clouds across the sky 
 
 Trample the sunshine down, and chase the day 
 Into the dusky forest-lands of gray 
 
 And sombre twilight. Far, and faint, and high, 
 
 The wild goose trails his harrow, with a cry 
 Sad as the wail of some poor castaway 
 Who sees a vessel drifting far astray 
 
 Of his last hope, and lays him down to die. 
 
 The children, riotous from school, grow bold 
 
 And quarrel with the wind whose angry gust 
 
 Plucks off the summer-hat, and flaps the fold 
 Of many a crimson cloak, and twirls the dust 
 
 In spiral shapes grotesque, and dims the gold 
 Of gleaming tresses with the blur of rust. 
 
JUNE 63 
 
 JUNE 
 
 QUEENLY month of indolent repose! 
 
 I drink thy breath in sips of rare perfume, 
 As in thy downy lap of clover-bloom 
 
 1 nestle like a drowsy child and doze 
 
 The lazy hours away. The zephyr throws 
 The shifting shuttle of the Summer's loom 
 And weaves a damask-work of gleam and gloom 
 
 Before thy listless feet : The lily blows 
 A bugle-call of fragrance o'er the glade ; 
 
 And, wheeling into ranks, with plume and spear, 
 Thy harvest-armies gather on parade ; 
 
 While, faint and far away, yet pure and clear, 
 A voice calls out of alien lands of shade, — 
 "All hail the Peerless Goddess of the Year ! " 
 
64 SILENCE 
 
 SILENCE 
 
 THOUSANDS and thousands of hushed years ago, 
 
 Out on the edge of Chaos, all alone 
 
 I stood on peaks of vapor, high upthrown 
 Above a sea that knew nor ebb nor flow, 
 Nor any motion won of winds that blow, 
 
 Nor any sound of watery wail or moan, 
 
 Nor lisp of wave, nor wandering undertone 
 Of any tide lost in the night below. 
 So still it was, I mind me, as I laid 
 
 My thirsty ear against mine own faint sigh 
 To drink of that, I sipped it, half afraid 
 
 'Twas but the ghost of a dead voice spilled by 
 The one starved star that tottered through the shade 
 
 And came tiptoeing toward me down the sky. 
 
TIME 65 
 
 TIME 
 
 I 
 
 THE ticking — ticking— ticking of the clock !— 
 That vexed me so last night ! — " For though Time keeps 
 Such drowsy watch," I moaned, " he never sleeps, 
 
 But only nods above the world to mock 
 
 Its restless occupant, then rudely rock 
 It as the cradle of a babe that weeps ! " 
 I seemed to see the seconds piled in heaps 
 
 Like sand about me ; and at every shock 
 
 Of the harsh bell, tolling a new hour's birth, 
 The sandy pyramids were swirled away 
 
 As by a desert-storm that swept the earth 
 Stark as a granary floor, whereon the gray 
 
 And mist-bedrizzled moon amidst the dearth 
 Came crawling, like a sickly child, to lay 
 Ls pale face next mine own and weep for day. 
 
 II 
 
 Wait for the morning ! Ah ! we wait indeed 
 For daylight, we who toss about through stress 
 Of vacant-armed desires and emptiness 
 
 Of all the warm, warm touches that we need, 
 
 And the warm kisses upon which we feed 
 5 
 
66 TIME 
 
 Our famished lips in fancy ! May God bless 
 The starved lips of us with but one caress 
 
 Warm as the yearning blood our poor hearts bleed! 
 
 ... A wild prayer !— bite thy pillow, praying so— 
 Toss this side, and whirl that, and moan for dawn 
 
 Let the clock's seconds dribble out their woe 
 
 And time be drained of sorrow ! Long ago 
 We heard the crowing cock, with answer drawn 
 As hoarsely sad at throat as sobs . . . Pray on ! 
 
 
SLEEP 67 
 
 SLEEP 
 
 THOU drowsy god, whose blurred eyes, half awink, 
 Muse on me,— drifting out upon thy dreams, 
 I lave my soul as in enchanted streams 
 
 Where reveling satyrs pipe along the brink, 
 
 And, tipsy with the melody they drink, 
 Uplift their dangling hooves and down the beams 
 Of sunshine dance like motes. Thy languor seems 
 
 An ocean-depth of love wherein I sink, 
 Like some fond Argonaut, right willingly, — 
 
 Because of wooing eyes upturned to mine, 
 And siren-arms that coil their sorcery 
 
 About my neck, with kisses so divine, 
 The heavens reel above me, and the sea 
 Swallows and licks its wet lips over me. 
 
68 HER HAIR 
 
 HER HAIR 
 
 THE beauty of her hair bewilders me— 
 
 Pouring adown the brow, its cloven tide 
 
 Swirling about the ears on either side, 
 And storming round the neck tumultuously : 
 Or like the lights of old antiquity 
 
 Through mullioned windows, in cathedrals wide, 
 
 Spilled moltenly o'er figures deified 
 In chastest marble, nude of drapery. 
 And so I love it.— Either unconfined ; 
 
 Or plaited in close braidings manifold ; 
 Or smoothly drawn ; or indolently twined 
 
 In careless knots whose coilings come unrolled 
 At any lightest kiss ; or by the wind 
 
 Whipped out in flossy ravelings of gold. 
 
DEARTH 69 
 
 DEARTH 
 
 I HOLD your trembling hand to-night— and yet 
 I may not know what wealth of bliss is mine, 
 My heart is such a curious design 
 Of trust and jealousy ! Your eyes are wet- 
 So must I think they jewel some regret, — 
 ' And lo, the loving arms that round me twine 
 
 Cling only as the tendrils of a vine 
 Whose fruit has long been gathered : I forget, 
 While crimson clusters of your kisses press 
 Their wine out on my lips, my royal fare 
 Of rapture, since blind fancy needs must guess 
 
 They once poured out their sweetness otherwhere, 
 With fuller flavoring of happiness 
 Then e'en your broken sobs may now declare. 
 
7 o A VOICE FROM THE FARM 
 
 A VOICE FROM THE FARM 
 
 IT is my dream to have you here with me, 
 Out of the heated city's dust and din- 
 Here where the colts have room to gambol in, 
 And kine to graze, in clover to the knee. 
 I want to see your wan face happily 
 Lit with the wholesome smiles that have not been 
 In use since the old games you used to win 
 When we pitched horseshoes : And I want to be 
 At utter loaf with you in this dim land 
 Of grove and meadow, while the crickets make 
 Our own talk tedious, and the bat wields 
 His bulky flight, as we cease converse and 
 In a dusk like velvet smoothly take 
 Our way toward home across the dewy fields. 
 
IV HEN SHE COMES HOME 71 
 
 WHEN SHE COMES HOME 
 
 WHEN she comes home again ! A thousand ways 
 
 I fashion, to myself, the tenderness 
 
 Of my glad welcome : I shall tremble— yes ; 
 And touch her, as when first in the old days 
 I touched her girlish hand, nor dared upraise 
 
 Mine eyes, such was my faint heart's sweet distress. 
 
 Then silence : And the perfume of her dress : 
 The room will sway a little, and a haze 
 
 Cloy eyesight— soulsight, even — for a space : 
 And tears — yes ; and the ache here in the throat, 
 
 To know that I so ill deserve the place 
 Her arms make for me ; and the sobbing note 
 
 I stay with kisses, ere the tearful face 
 
 Again is hidden in the old embrace. 
 
72 ART AND LOVE 
 
 ART AND LOVE 
 
 HE faced his canvas (as a seer whose ken 
 Pierces the crust of this existence through) 
 And smiled beyond on that his genius knew 
 
 Ere mated with his being. Conscious then 
 
 Of his high theme alone, he smiled again 
 Straight back upon himself in many a hue 
 And tint, and light and shade, which slowly grew 
 
 Enfeatured of a fair girl's face, as when 
 First time she smiles for love's sake with no fear. 
 
 So wrought he, witless that behind him leant 
 A woman, with old features, dim and sere, 
 And glamoured eyes that felt the brimming tear, 
 
 And with a voice, like some sad instrument, 
 That sighing said, " I'm dead there ; love me here ! 
 
IN DIALECT 
 
 (73) 
 
GRIGGSBY'S STATION 75 
 
 GRIGGSBY'S STATION 
 
 PAP'S got his patent-right, and rich as all creation ; 
 But where's the peace and comfort that we all had be- 
 fore? 
 
 Le's go a-visitin' back to Griggsby's Station- 
 Back where we ust to be so happy and so pore ! 
 
 The likes of us a-livin' here ! It's jest a mortal pity 
 To see us in this great big house, with cyarpets on the 
 stairs, 
 And the pump right in the kitchen ! And the city ! city ! 
 city !— 
 And nothin' but the city all around us ever'wheres ! 
 
 Climb clean above the roof and look from the steeple, 
 And never see a robin, nor a beech or ellum tree ! 
 
 And right here in ear-shot of at least a thousan' people, 
 And none that neighbors with us or we want to go and 
 see! 
 
 Le's go a-visitin' back to Griggsby's Station — 
 Back where the latch-string's a-hangin' from the door, 
 
 And ever' neighbor 'round the place is dear as a relation- 
 Back where we ust to be so happy and so pore ! 
 
76 GRIGGSBY'S STATION 
 
 I want to see the Wiggenses, the whole kit and bilin', 
 A-drivin' up from Shallor Ford to stay the Sunday 
 through ; 
 And I want to see 'em hitchin' at their son-in-law's and 
 pilin' 
 Out there at 'Lizy Ellen's like they ust to do ! 
 
 I want to see the piece-quilts the Jones girls is makin'; 
 And I want to pester Laury 'bout their freckled hired 
 hand, 
 And joke her 'bout the widower she come purt' nigh a- 
 takin', 
 Till her Pap got his pension 'lowed in time to save his 
 land. 
 
 Le's go a-visitin' back to Griggsby's Station- 
 Back where they's nothin' aggervatin' anymore, 
 
 Shet away safe in the woods around the old location — 
 Back where we ust to be so happy and so pore ! 
 
 I want to see Marindy and he'p her with her sewin', 
 And hear her talk so lovin' of her man that's dead and 
 gone, 
 And stand up with Emanuel to show me how he's grow- 
 in', 
 And smile as I have saw her 'fore she put her mournin' 
 on. 
 
GRIGGSBY'S STATION 77 
 
 And I want to see the Samples, on the old lower eighty, 
 Where John, our oldest boy, he was tuk and burried — for 
 
 His own sake and Katy's, — and I want to cry with Katy 
 As she reads all his letters over, writ from The War. 
 
 What's in all this grand life and high situation, 
 And nary pink nor hollyhawk a-bloomin' at the door? — 
 
 Le's go a-visitin' back to Griggsby's Station — 
 Back where we ust to be so happy and so pore ! 
 
78 KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE 
 
 KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE 
 
 I 
 
 TELL you what I like the best— 
 'Long about knee-deep in June, 
 
 'Bout the time strawberries melts 
 On the vine, — some afternoon 
 Like to jes' git out and rest, 
 
 And not work at nothin' else ! 
 
 II 
 
 Orchard's where I'd ruther be — 
 Need n't fence it in fer me !— 
 
 Jes' the whole sky overhead, 
 And the whole airth underneath — 
 Sorto' so's a man kin breathe 
 
 Like he ort, and kindo' has 
 Elbow-room to keerlessly 
 
 Sprawl out len'thways on the grass 
 Where the shadders thick and soft 
 
 As the kivvers on the bed 
 Mother fixes in the loft 
 Alius, when they's company ! 
 
KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE 79 
 
 III 
 Jes' a-sorto' lazein' there — 
 S'lazy, 'at you peek and peer 
 Through the wavin' leaves above, 
 Like a feller 'ats in love 
 And don't know it, ner don't keer ! 
 Ever'thing you hear and see 
 Got some sort o' interest — 
 Maybe find a bluebird's nest 
 Tucked up there conveenently 
 Fer the boys 'at's apt to be 
 Up some other apple-tree ! 
 Watch the swallers skootin' past 
 'Bout as peert as you could ast; 
 Er the Bobwhite raise and whiz 
 Where some other's whistle is. 
 
 IV 
 Ketch a shadder down below, 
 And look up to find the crow ; 
 Er a hawk away up there, 
 'Pearantly froze in the air !— 
 
 Hear the old hen squawk, and squat 
 
 Over ever' chick she's got, 
 Suddent-like !— And she knows where 
 
 That-air hawk is, well as you !— 
 
 You jes' bet yer life she do !— 
 
80 KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE 
 
 Eyes a-glitterin' like glass, 
 Waitin' till he makes a pass ! 
 
 V 
 Pee-wees' singin', to express 
 
 My opinion, 's second class, 
 Yit you'll hear 'em more er less ; 
 
 Sapsucks gittin' down to biz, 
 Weedin' out the lonesomeness ; 
 Mr. Bluejay, full o' sass, 
 
 In them base-ball clothes o' his, 
 Sportin' 'round the orchard jes' 
 Like he owned the premises ! 
 
 Sun out in the fields kin sizz, 
 But flat on yer back, I guess, 
 
 In the shade's where glory is ! 
 That's jes' what I'd like to do 
 Stiddy fer a year er two ! 
 
 VI 
 Plague ! ef they aint sompin' in 
 Work 'at kindo' goes ag'in 
 My convictions !— 'long about 
 Here in June especially!— 
 Under some old apple tree, 
 Jes' a-restin' through and through. 
 I could git along without 
 
KNEE- DEEP IN JUNE 81 
 
 Nothin' else at all to do 
 
 Only jes' a-wishin' you 
 Was a-gittin' there like me, 
 And June was eternity ! 
 
 VII 
 Lay out there and try to see 
 Jes' how lazy you kin be ! — 
 
 Tumble round and souse yer head 
 In the clover-bloom, er pull 
 
 Yer straw hat acrost yer eyes 
 And peek through it at the skies, 
 Thinkin' of old chums 'ats dead, 
 Maybe, smilin' back at you 
 In betwixt the beautiful 
 
 Clouds o' gold and white and blue !— 
 Month a man kin railly love- 
 June, you know, I'm talkin' of! 
 
 VIII 
 March aint never nothin' new !— 
 Aprile's altogether too 
 Brash fer me ! and May — I jes' 
 'Bominate its promises, — 
 Little hints o' sunshine and 
 Green around the timber-land— 
 
82 KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE 
 
 A few blossoms, and a few 
 Chip-birds, and a sprout ertwo— 
 Drap asleep, and it turns in 
 'Fore daylight and snows agin !— 
 But when June comes— Clear my throat 
 
 With wild honey ! Rench my hair 
 In the dew ! and hold my coat ! 
 
 Whoop out loud ! and throw my hat !- 
 
 June wants me, and I'm to spare ! 
 
 Spread them shadders anywhere, 
 
 I'll git down and waller there, 
 And obleeged to you at that ! 
 
WHEN THE HEARSE COMES BACK 83 
 
 WHEN THE HEARSE COMES BACK 
 
 A THING 'at's 'bout as tryin' as a healthy man kin meet 
 Is some poor feller's funeral a-joggin' 'long the street: 
 The slow hearse and the hosses— slow enough, to say the 
 
 least, 
 Fer to even tax the patience of the gentleman deceased ! 
 The low scrunch of the gravel— and the slow grind of the 
 
 wheels, — 
 The slow, slow go of ev'ry woe 'at ev'rybody feels ! 
 So I ruther like the contrast when I hear the whiplash 
 
 crack 
 A quickstep fer the hosses, 
 
 When the 
 
 Hearse 
 
 Comes 
 
 Back! 
 
 Meet it goin' to'rds the cimet'ry, you'll want to drap yer 
 
 eyes — 
 But ef the plumes dont fetch you, it'll ketch you other- 
 wise — 
 You'll haf to see the caskit, though you'd ort to look away 
 And 'conomize and save yer sighs fer any other day ! 
 Yer sympathizin' won't wake up the sleeper from his rest — 
 Yer tears won't thaw them hands 0' his 'at's froze acrost 
 his breast ! 
 
84 WHEN THE HEARSE COMES BACK 
 
 And this is why— when airth and sky's a-gittin' blurred 
 
 and black — 
 I like the flash and hurry 
 When the 
 
 Hearse 
 
 Comes 
 
 Back! 
 
 It's not 'cause I don't 'predate it ain't no time fer jokes, 
 Ner 'cause I' got no common human feelin' fer the folks;— 
 I've went to funerals myse'f, and took on some, perhaps, 
 Fer my heart's 'bout as mal'able as any other chap's,— 
 I've buried father, mother— But I'll haf to jes' gxtyou 
 To "excuse »w," as the feller says. — The p'int I'm driv- 
 
 in' to 
 Is, simply, when we're plum' broke down and all knocked 
 
 out a'whack, 
 It he'ps to shape us up, like, 
 When the 
 
 Hearse 
 
 Comes 
 
 Back! 
 
 The idy! wadin' round here over shoe-mouth deep in 
 
 woe, 
 When they's a graded 'pike o' joy and sunshine, don't 
 
 you know ! 
 
IVHEhl THE HEARSE COMES BACK 85 
 
 When evenin' strikes the pastur', cows'll pull out fer the 
 
 bars, 
 And skittish-like from out the night'll prance the happy 
 
 stars. 
 And so when mv time comes to die, and I've got ary friend 
 'At wants expressed my last request — I'll, mebby, rick- 
 
 ommend 
 To drive slow, if they haf to, goin' 'long the oufard track, 
 But I'll smile and say, " You speed 'em 
 When the 
 
 Hearse 
 
 Comes 
 
 Back!" 
 
86 A CANARY AT THE FARM 
 
 A CANARY AT THE FARM 
 
 FOLKS has ben to town, and Sahry 
 Fetched 'er home a pet canary,— 
 And of all the blame', contrary, 
 
 Aggervatin' things alive! 
 I love music— that's I love it 
 When its free— and plenty of it;— 
 But I kindo' git above it, 
 
 At a dollar-eighty-five ! 
 
 Reason's plain as I'm a-sayin', — 
 Jes' the idy, now, o' layin' 
 Out yer money, and a-payin' 
 
 Fer a wilier-cage and bird, 
 When the medder-larks is wingin' 
 Round you, and the woods is ringin' 
 With the beautifullest singin' 
 
 That a mortal ever heard ! 
 
 Sahry 's sot, tho'.— So 1 tell her 
 
 He's a purty little feller, 
 
 With his wings o' creamy-yeller, 
 
 And his eyes keen as a cat ; 
 And the twitter o' the critter 
 'Pears to absolutely glitter ! 
 Guess I'll haf to go and git her 
 
 A high-priceter cage 'n that ! 
 
A LIZ-TOWN HUMORIST 87 
 
 A LIZ-TOWN HUMORIST 
 
 SETTIN' round the stove, last night, 
 
 Down at Wess's store, was me 
 
 And Mart Strimples, Tunk, and White, 
 
 And Doc Bills, and two er three 
 
 Fellers of the Mudsock tribe 
 
 No use tryin' to describe ! 
 
 And says Doc, he says, says he, — 
 
 Talkin' 'bout good things to eat, 
 
 Ripe mushmillon's hard to beat! " 
 
 I chawed on. And Mart he 'lowed 
 Wortermillon beat the mush. — 
 ' Red," he says, "and juicy— Hush !— 
 I'll jes' leave it to the crowd ! " 
 Then a Mudsock chap, says he, — 
 Punkin's good enough fer me — 
 Punkin pies, I mean," he says, — 
 Them beats millons ! What say, Wess? ' 
 
 I chawed on. And Wess says,—" Well, 
 You jes' fetch that wife of mine 
 All yer wortermillon-rm^, 
 And she'll bile it down a spell- 
 In with sorgum, I suppose, 
 And what else, Lord only knows ! 
 
88 A LIZ-TOIVN HUMORIST 
 
 But I'm here to tell all hands 
 
 Them p'serves meets my demands ! " 
 
 I chawed on. And White he says, — 
 "Well, I'll jes' stand in with Wess— 
 I'm no hog!" And Tunk says,— " I 
 Guess I'll pastur' out on pie 
 With the Mudsock boys ! " says he ; 
 " Now what's yourn ? " he says to me : 
 I chawed on— fer— quite a spell- 
 Then I speaks up, slow and dry,— 
 "Jes' tobacker!" I-says-I.— 
 And you'd orto' heerd 'em yell! 
 
KINGRY'S MILL 
 
 KINGRY'S MILL 
 
 ON old Brandywine — about 
 Where White's Lots is now laid out, 
 And the old crick narries down 
 To the ditch that splits the town, — 
 Kingry's Mill stood. Hardly see 
 Where the old dam ust to be ; 
 Shallor, long, dry trought o' grass 
 Where the old race ust to pass ! 
 
 That's ben forty years ago — 
 Forty years o' frost and snow- 
 Forty years o' shade and shine 
 Sence them boyhood-days o' mine !— 
 All the old landmarks o' town 
 Changed about, er rotted down ! 
 Where's the Tanyard? Where's the Still? 
 Tell me where's old Kingry's Mill? 
 
 Don't seem furder back, to me, 
 
 I'll be dogg'd ! than yisterdy, 
 
 Sence us fellers, in bare feet 
 
 And straw hats, went through the wheat, 
 
 Cuttin' crost the shortest shoot 
 
 Fer that-air old ellum-root 
 
 Jest above the mill-dam — where 
 
 The blame' cars now crosses there! 
 
go KINGRY'S MILL 
 
 Through the willers down the crick 
 We could see the old mill stick 
 Its red gable up, as if 
 It jest knowed we'd stol'd the skiff ! 
 See the winders in the sun 
 Blink like they was wonderun' 
 What the miller ort to do 
 With sich boys as me and you ! 
 
 But old Kingry !— who could fear 
 That old chap, with all his cheer? — 
 Leanin' at the winder-sill, 
 Er the half-door o' the mill, 
 Swoppin' lies, and pokin' fun 
 'N jigglin' like his hoppers done, 
 Laughin' grists o' gold and red 
 Right out o' the wagon-bed ! 
 
 What did HE keer where we went? — 
 1 Jest keep out o' devilment, 
 And don't fool around the belts, 
 Bolts, ner burrs, ner nothin' else 
 'Bout the blame machinery, 
 And that's all I ast! " says-ee. 
 Then we'd climb the stairs, and play 
 In the bran-bins half the day ! 
 
KINGRY'S MILL 91 
 
 Rickollect the dusty wall. 
 And the spider-webs, and all ! 
 Rickollect the trimblin' spout 
 Where the meal come josslin' out — 
 Stand and comb yer fingers through 
 The fool-truck an hour er two- 
 Felt so sort 0' warm-like and 
 Soothin' to a feller's hand ! 
 
 Climb, high up above the stream, 
 And " coon " out the wobbly beam 
 And peek down from out the lof 
 Where the weatherboards was off — 
 Gee-mun-«^ ! w'y> it takes grit 
 Even jest to think of it! — 
 Lookin' 'way down there below 
 On the worter roarin' so ! 
 
 Rickollect the flume, and wheel, 
 And the worter slosh and reel 
 And jest ravel out in froth 
 Flossier'n satin cloth ! 
 Rickollect them paddles jest 
 Knock the bubbles galley-west, 
 And plunge under, and come up, 
 Drippin' like a worter-pup ! 
 
92 KINGRY'S MILL 
 
 And, to see them old things gone 
 That I onc't was bettin' on, 
 In rale pint o' fact, I feel 
 Kindo' like that worter- wheel,— 
 Sorto' drippy-like and wet 
 Round the eyes— but paddlin' yet, 
 And, in mem'ry, loafin' still 
 Down around old Kingry's Mill ! 
 
JONEY 93 
 
 JONEY 
 
 HAD a hare-lip— Joney had : 
 
 Spiled his looks, and Joney knowed it ; 
 Fellers tried to bore him, bad— 
 But, ef ever he got mad, 
 
 He kep' still and never showed it. 
 'Druther have his mouth, all pouted 
 
 And split up, and like it wuz, 
 Than the ones 'at laughed about it. — 
 
 Purty is as purty does ! 
 
 Had to listen ruther clos't 
 
 'Fore you knowed what he wuz givin' 
 You ; and yet, without no boast 
 Joney he wuz jest' the most 
 
 Entertainin' talker livin' ! 
 Take the Scriptur's and run through 'em, 
 
 Might say, like a' auctioneer, 
 And 'ud argy and review 'em 
 
 'At wuz beautiful to hear ! 
 
 Hare-lip and inpediment, 
 
 Both wuz bad, and both agin him — 
 But the old folks where he went, 
 'Peared like, knowin' his intent, 
 
 'Scused his mouth for what wuz in him. 
 
94 JONEY 
 
 And the childern all loved Joney — 
 And he loved 'em back, you bet ! — 
 
 Put their arms around him on'y 
 
 None had ever kissed him yet ! 
 
 In young company, someway, 
 
 Boys 'ud grin at one-another 
 On the sly ; and girls 'ud lay 
 Low, with nothin' much to say, 
 
 Er leave Joney with their mother. 
 Many and many a time he's fetched 'em 
 
 Candy by the paper-sack, 
 And turned right around and ketched 'em 
 
 Makin' mouths behind his back ! 
 
 S'prised, sometimes, the slurs he took. — 
 
 Chap said onc't his mouth looked sorter 
 Like a fish's mouth 'ud look 
 When he'd been jerked off the hook 
 
 And plunked back into the worter.— 
 Same durn feller— its su'prisin', 
 
 But it's facts— 'at stood and cherred 
 From the bank that big babtizin' 
 
 'Pike-bridge accident occurred !— 
 
 Cherred fer Joney while he give 
 Life to little childern drowndin' ! 
 
JONEY 95 
 
 Which wuz fittenest to live — 
 Him 'at cherred, er him 'at div' 
 
 And saved thirteen lives? . . . They 
 found one 
 Body, three days later, floated 
 
 Down the by-o, eight mile' south, 
 All so colored-up and bloated — 
 
 On'y knowed him by his mouth ! 
 
 Had a hare-lip — Joney had — 
 
 Folks 'at filed apast all knowed it— 
 Them 'at ust to smile looked sad, 
 But ef HE thought good er bad, 
 
 He kep' still and never showed it. 
 'Druther have that mouth, all pouted 
 
 And split up, and like it wuz, 
 Than the ones 'at laughed about it. 
 
 Purty is as purty does ! 
 
96 NOTHIN' TO SAY 
 
 NOTHIN' TO SAY 
 
 NOTHIN* to say, my daughter ! Nothin' at all to say !— 
 Gyrls that's in love, I've noticed, ginerly has their way ! 
 Yer mother did, afore you, when her folks objected to me— 
 Yit here I am, and here you air; and yer mother— where 
 is she ? 
 
 You look lots like yer mother : Purty much same in size ; 
 And about the same complected ; and favor about the 
 
 eyes : 
 Like her, too, about livid here, — because she couldn't 
 
 stay: 
 It'll 'most seem like you was dead— like her !— but I hain't 
 
 got nothin' to say ! 
 
 She left you her little Bible — writ yer name acrost the 
 
 page— 
 And left her ear-bobs fer you, ef ever you come of age. 
 I've alius kep' 'em and gyuarded 'em, but ef yer goin' 
 
 away — 
 Nothin' to say, my daughter ! Nothin' at all to say ! 
 
 You don't rikollect her, I reckon ? No ; you wasn't a year 
 old then ! 
 
 And now yer— how old air you? W'y, child, not "twen- 
 ty!" When? 
 
NOTHIN' TO SAY 97 
 
 And yer nex' birthday's in Aprile? and you want to git 
 
 married that day ? 
 .... I wisht yer mother was livin' !— but— I hain't got 
 
 nothin' to say ! 
 
 Twenty year ! and as good a gyrl as parent ever found ! 
 There's a straw ketched onto yer dress there— I'll bresh it 
 
 off — turn round. 
 (Her mother was jes' twenty when us two run away !) 
 Nothin' to say, my daughter ! Nothin' at all to say ! 
 
LIKE HIS MOTHER USED TO MAKE 
 
 LIKE HIS MOTHER USED TO MAKE 
 
 " UNCLE JAKE'S PLACE," ST. JO, MO., 1874 
 
 " I WAS born in Indiany," says a stranger, lank and slim, 
 As us fellers in the restarunt was kindo' guyin' him, 
 And Uncle Jake was slidin' him another punkin pie 
 And a' extry cup o' coffee, with a twinkle in his eye, — 
 " I was born in Indiany— more'n forty year' ago— 
 And I hain't ben back in twenty— and I'm workin' back- 
 
 'ards slow ; 
 But I've et in ever' restarunt 'twixt here and Santy Fee, 
 And I want to state this coffee tastes like gittin' home, to 
 
 me ! 
 
 " Pour us out another, Daddy," says the feller, warmin' 
 
 up, 
 A-speakin' 'crost a saucerful, as Uncle tuck his cup,— 
 " When I seed yer sign out yander," he went on, to Un- 
 cle Jake,— 
 11 'Come in and git some coffee like yer mother used to 
 
 make' — 
 I thought of my old mother, and the Posey county farm, 
 And me a little kid agin, a-hangin' in her arm, 
 As she set the pot a-bilin', broke the eggs and poured 'em 
 
 in"— 
 And the feller kindo' halted, with a trimble in his chin : 
 
LIKE HIS MOTHER USED TO MAKE 99 
 
 And Uncle Jake he fetched the feller's coffee back, and 
 
 stood 
 As solemn, fer a minute, as a' undertaker would ; 
 Then he sorto' turned and tiptoed to'rds the kitchen door— 
 
 and nex', 
 Here comes his old wife out with him, a-rubbin' of her 
 
 specs— 
 And she rushes fer the stranger, and she hollers out, " It's 
 
 him ! — 
 Thank God we've met him comin' !— Don't you know yer 
 
 mother, Jim?" 
 And the feller, as he grabbed her, says,—" You bet I hain't 
 
 forgot— 
 But," wipin' of his eyes, says he, "yer coffee's mighty 
 
 hot!" 
 
THE TRAIN-M1SSER 
 
 THE TRAIN-MISSER 
 
 AT UNION DEPOT 
 
 'LL WHERE in the world my eyes has bin— 
 Ef I haint missed that train agin ! 
 Chuff! and whistle! and toot! and ring ! 
 But blast and blister the dasted train ! — 
 How it does it 1 can't explain ! 
 Git here thirty-five minutes before 
 The dern thing's due !— and, drat the thing ! 
 It'll manage to git past — shore ! 
 
 The more I travel around, the more 
 
 I got no sense! — To stand right here 
 
 And let it beat me ! 'LI ding my melts ! 
 
 I got no gumption, ner nothin' else ! 
 
 Ticket Agent's a dad-burned bore !— 
 
 Sell you a ticket's all they keer !— 
 
 Ticket Agents ort to all be 
 
 Prosecuted— and that's jes' what !— 
 
 How'd I know which train's fer me? 
 
 And how'd I know which train was not?— 
 
 Goern and comin' and gone astray, 
 
 And backin' and switchin' ever'-which-way ! 
 
THE TRAIN-MISSER 101 
 
 Ef I could jes' sneak round behind 
 Myse'f, where I could git full swing, 
 I'd lift my coat, and kick, by jing ! 
 Till I jes' got jerked up and fined ! — 
 Fer here I stood, as a dern fool's apt 
 To, and let that train jes' chuff and choo 
 Right apast me — and mouth jes' gapped 
 Like a blamed old sandwitch warped in two ! 
 
GRANNY 
 
 GRANNY 
 
 GRANNY'S come to our house, 
 
 And ho ! my lawzy-daisy ! 
 All the childern round the place 
 
 Is ist a-runnin' crazy ! 
 Fetched a cake fer little Jake, 
 
 And fetched a pie fer Nanny, 
 And fetched a pear fer all the pack 
 
 That runs to kiss their Granny! 
 
 Lucy Ellen's in her lap, 
 
 And Wade, and Silas Walker, 
 Both's a-ridin' on her foot, 
 
 And 'Polios on the rocker ; 
 And Marthy's twins, from Aunt Marin's, 
 
 And little orphant Anny, 
 All's a-eatin' gingerbread 
 
 And giggle-un at Granny ! 
 
 Tells us all the fairy tales 
 Ever thought er wundered — 
 
 And 'bundance o' other stories- 
 Bet she knows a hunderd ! — 
 
 Bob's the one fer " Whittington," 
 And " Golden Locks" fer Fanny! 
 
 Hear 'em laugh and clap ther hands, 
 Listenin' at Granny ! 
 
GRANNY 103 
 
 'Jack the Giant-Killer" 's good- 
 
 And " Bean-stalk" 's another- 
 So's the one of "Cinderell' " 
 
 And her old godmother ;— 
 That-un's best of all the rest — 
 
 Bestest one of any,— 
 Where the mices scampers home 
 
 Like we runs to Granny ! 
 
 Granny's come to our house, 
 
 Ho ! my lawzy-daisy ! 
 All the childern round the place 
 
 Is ist a-runnin' crazy! 
 Fetched a cake fer little Jake, 
 
 And fetched a pie fer Nanny, 
 And fetched a pear fer all the pack 
 
 That runs to kiss ther Granny ! 
 
io4 OLD OCTOBER 
 
 OLD OCTOBER 
 
 OLD OCTOBER'S purt' nigh gone, 
 And the frosts is comin' on 
 Little heavier every day — 
 Like our hearts is thataway ! 
 Leaves is changin' overhead 
 Back from green to gray and red, 
 Brown, and yeller, with their stems 
 Loosenin' on the oaks and e'ms; 
 And the balance of the trees 
 Gittin' balder every breeze — 
 Like the heads we're scratchin' on ! 
 Old October's purt' nigh gone. 
 
 I love Old October so, 
 I can't bear to see her go — 
 Seems to me like losin' some 
 Old-home relative er chum — 
 'Pears like sorto' settin' by 
 Some old friend 'at sigh by sigh 
 Was a-passin' out o' sight 
 Into everlastin' night! 
 Hickernuts a feller hears 
 Rattlin' down is more like tears 
 Drappin' on the leaves below — 
 I love Old October so ! 
 
OLD OCTOBER 105 
 
 Can't tell what it is about 
 Old October knocks me out I— 
 I sleep well enough at night — 
 And the blamedest appetite 
 Ever mortal man possessed, — 
 Last thing et, it tastes the best !— 
 Warnuts, butternuts, pawpaws, 
 lies and limbers up my jaws 
 Fer raal service, sich as new 
 Pork, spareribs, and sausage, too. — 
 Yit, fer all, they's somepin' 'bout 
 Old October knocks me out! 
 
io6 JIM 
 
 JIM 
 
 HE was jes' a plain, ever'-day, all-round kind of a jour., 
 
 Consumpted-lookin'— but la! 
 The jokeiest, wittiest, story-tellin', song-singin', laugh- 
 in'est, jolliest 
 Feller you ever saw ! 
 Worked at jes' coarse work, but you kin bet he was fine 
 enough in his talk, 
 And his feelin's too ! 
 Lordy! ef he was on'y back on his bench agin to-day, 
 a-carryin' on 
 Like he ust to do ! 
 
 Any shop-mate'll tell you there never was, on top o' dirt, 
 
 A better feller 'n Jim ! 
 You want a favor, and couldn't git it anywheres else— 
 
 You could git it o' him! 
 Most free-heartedest man thataway in the world, I guess ! 
 
 Give up ever' nickel he's worth— 
 And, ef you'd a-wanted it, and named it to him, and it 
 was his, 
 
 He'd a-give you the earth ! 
 
 Alius a-reachin' out, Jim was, and a-he'pin' some 
 
 Pore feller onto his feet— 
 He'd a-never a-keered how hungry he was hisse'f, 
 
 So's the feller got somepin' to eat ! 
 
 
JIM 107 
 
 Didn't make no difference at all to him how he was dressed, 
 
 He ust to say to me,— 
 " You togg out a tramp purty comfortable in winter-time, 
 a-huntin' a job, 
 
 And he'll git along ! " says he. 
 
 Jim didn't have, ner never could git ahead so overly much 
 
 O' this world's goods at a time.— 
 'Fore now I've saw him, more'n onc't, lend a dollar, and 
 haf to, more'n likely, 
 
 Turn round and borry a dime ! 
 Mebby laugh and joke about it hisse'f fer a while— then 
 jerk his coat, 
 
 And kindo' square his chin, 
 Tie on his apern, and squat hisse'f on his old shoe-bench, 
 
 And go to peggin' agin ! 
 
 Patientest feller, too, I reckon', at ever jes' naturely 
 
 Coughed hisse'f to death ! 
 Long enough after his voice was lost he'd laugh in a whis- 
 per and say 
 
 He could git ever'thing but his breath — 
 " You fellers," he'd sorto' twinkle his eyes and say, 
 
 " Is a-pilin' onto me 
 A mighty big debt for that-air little weak-chested ghost 
 0' mine to pack 
 
 Through all Eternity ! " 
 
108 JIM 
 
 Now there was a man 'at jes' 'peared like, to me, 
 
 'At ortn't a-never a-died ! 
 " But death hain't a-showin' no favors," the old boss said, 
 
 "On'y to Jim! "and cried: 
 And Wigger, who puts up the best sewed-work in the 
 shop— 
 
 Er the whole blame neighberhood, — 
 He says, " When God made Jim, I bet you He didn't do 
 anything else that day 
 
 But jes' set around and feel good ! " 
 
A TALE OF THE AIRLY DAYS 109 
 
 A TALE OF THE AIRLY DAYS 
 
 OH ! TELL ME a tale of the airly days— 
 
 Of the times as they ust to be ; 
 Piller of Fire," and " Shakspeare's Plays," 
 
 Is a 'most too deep fer me ! 
 I want plain facts, and I want plain words, 
 
 Of the good old-fashioned ways, 
 When speech run free as the songs of birds — 
 
 'Way back in the airly days. 
 
 Tell me a tale of the timber-lands, 
 
 And the old-time pioneers — 
 Somepin' a pore man understands 
 
 With his feelin's, well as ears : 
 Tell of the old log house,— about 
 
 The loft, and the puncheon floor — 
 The old fire-place, with the crane swung out, 
 
 And the latch-string through the door. 
 
 Tell of the things jest like they wuz— 
 
 They don't need no excuse! 
 Don't tetch 'em up like the poets does, 
 
 Till they're all too fine fer use ! 
 Say they wuz 'leven in the family — 
 
 Two beds and the chist below, 
 And the trundle-beds 'at each helt three ; 
 
 And the clock and the old bureau. 
 
io A TALE OF THE AIRLY DAYS 
 
 Then blow the horn at the old back door 
 
 Till the echoes all halloo, 
 And the childern gethers home onc't more, 
 
 Jest as they ust to do ; 
 Blow fer Pap till he hears and comes, 
 
 With Tomps and Elias, too, 
 A-marchin' home, with the fife and drums, 
 
 And the old Red White and Blue ! 
 
 Blow and blow— till the sound draps low 
 
 As the moan of the whipperwill, 
 And wake up Mother, and Ruth, and Jo, 
 
 All sleepin' at Bethel Hill ; 
 Blow and call till the faces all 
 
 Shine out in the back-log's blaze, 
 And the shadders dance on the old hewed wall, 
 
 As they did in the airly days. 
 
TO ROBERT BURNS 
 
 TO ROBERT BURNS 
 
 SWEET SINGER, that I loe the maist 
 
 O' ony, sin' wi' eager haste 
 
 I smacket bairn-lips ower the taste 
 
 O' hinnied sang, 
 I hail thee, though a blessed ghaist 
 
 In Heaven lang! 
 
 For, weel I ken, nae cantie phrase, 
 Nor courtly airs, nor lairdly ways, 
 Could gar me freer blame, or praise, 
 
 Or proffer hand, 
 Where " Rantin' Robbie" and his lays 
 
 Thegither stand. 
 
 And sae these namely lines I send, 
 Wi' jinglin' words at ilka end, 
 In echo o' the sangs that wend 
 
 Frae thee to me 
 Like simmer-brooks, wi' mony a bend 
 
 O' wimplin' glee. 
 
 In fancy, as wi' dewy een, 
 
 I part the clouds aboon the scene 
 
 Where thou wast born, and peer atween, 
 
 I see nae spot 
 In a' the Hielands half sae green 
 
 And unforgot ! 
 
12 TO ROBERT BURNS 
 
 I see nae storied castle-hall, 
 
 Wi' banners flauntin' ower the wall, 
 
 And serf and page in ready call, 
 
 Sae grand to me 
 As ane puir cotter's hut, wi' all 
 
 Its poverty. 
 
 There where the simple daisy grew 
 Sae bonnie sweet, and modest, too, 
 Thy liltin' filled its wee head fu' 
 
 O' sic a grace, 
 It aye is weepin' tears o' dew 
 
 Wi' droopit face. 
 
 Frae where the heather bluebells fling 
 Their sangs o' fragrance to the Spring, 
 To where the lavrock soars to sing, 
 
 Still lives thy strain, 
 For a' the birds are twittering 
 
 Sangs like thine ain. 
 
 And aye, by light o' sun or moon, 
 By banks o' Ayr, or Bonnie Doon, 
 The waters lilt nae tender tune 
 
 But sweeter seems 
 Because they poured their limpid rune 
 
 Through a' thy dreams. 
 
TO ROBERT BURNS 113 
 
 Wi' brimmin' lip, and laughin' ee, 
 Thou shookest even Grief wi' glee, 
 Yet had nae niggart sympathy 
 
 Where Sorrow bowed, 
 But gavest a' thy tears as free 
 
 As a' thy gowd. 
 
 And sae it is we loe thy name 
 To see bleeze up wi' sic a flame, 
 That a' pretentious stars 0' fame 
 
 Maun blink asklent, 
 To see how simple worth may shame 
 
 Their brightest glent. 
 
ii4 A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS' S 
 
 A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 I 
 
 THE HIRED MAN TALKS 
 
 THERE'S old man Willards ; an' his wife ; 
 An' Marg'et— S'repty's sister ;— an' 
 There's me— an' I'm the hired man ; 
 
 An' Tomps McClure, you bet yer life ! 
 
 Well, now, old Willards haint so bad, 
 
 Considerin' the chance he's had. 
 
 Of course, he's rich, an' sleeps an' eats 
 Whenever he's a mind to : Takes 
 
 An' leans back in the Amen-seats 
 An' thanks the Lord fer all he makes- 
 
 That's purty much all folks has got 
 
 Ag'inst the old man, like as not ! 
 
 But there's his woman— jes' the turn 
 
 Of them-air two wild girls o' hern— 
 Marg'et an' S'repty— alius in 
 
 Fer any cuttin'-up concern- 
 Church festibals, an' foolishin' 
 
 Round Christmas-trees, an' New Year's sprees- 
 Set up to watch the Old Year go 
 
 An' New Year come — sich things as these ; 
 An' turkey-dinners, don't you know ! 
 
A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT IVILLARDS'S 115 
 
 S'repty's younger, an' more gay, 
 
 An' purtier, an' finer dressed 
 Than Marg'et is— but lawzy-day ! 
 She haint the independentest !— 
 Take care! " old Willards used to say, 
 Take care ! Let Marg'et have her way, 
 An' S'repty, you go off an' play 
 On your melodeum ! " — But best 
 
 Of all comes Tomps ! An' I'll be bound, 
 Ef he haint jes' the beatin'est 
 Young chap in all the country round ! 
 
 Ef you knowed Tomps you'd like him, shore ! 
 They haint no man on top 0' ground 
 Walks into my affections more!— 
 An' all the Settlement'll say 
 That Tomps was liked jes' thataway 
 By ever'body, till he tuck 
 
 A shine to S'repty Willards.— Then 
 You'd orto' see the old man " buck," 
 An' h'ist hisse'f, an' paw the dirt, 
 
 An' hint that common workin'-men 
 That didn't want their feelin's hurt, 
 
 Had better hunt fer " comp'ny " where 
 The folks was pore an' didn't care ! — 
 The pine-blank facts is,— the old man, 
 Last Christmas was a year ago, 
 
n6 A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 Found out some presents Tomps had got 
 Fer S'repty, an' hit made him hot- 
 Set down an' tuck his pen in hand 
 An' writ to Tomps an' told him so 
 On legal cap, in white an' black, 
 An' give him jes' to understand 
 " No Christmas-gifts o' ' lily-white' 
 An' bear's-ile could fix matters right," 
 An' wropped 'em up an' sent 'em back ! 
 Well, S'repty cried an' snuffled round 
 
 Consid'able. But Marg'et she 
 Toed out another sock, an' wound 
 Her knittin' up an' drawed the tea, 
 An' then set on the supper-things, 
 An' went up in the loft an' dressed— 
 An' through it all you'd never guessed 
 
 What she was up to ! An' she brings 
 Her best hat with her an' her shawl, 
 An' gloves, an' redicule, an' all, 
 An' injirubbers, an' comes down 
 An' tells 'em she's a-goin' to town 
 To he'p the Christmas goin's-on 
 Her church got up. An' go she does — 
 The best hosswoman ever was ! 
 "An' what'll WE do while you're gone?" 
 The old man says, a-tryin' to be 
 Agreeable. "Oh ! you?" says she,— 
 
A NEIV YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 "You kin jaw S'repty, like you did, 
 An' slander Tomps ! " An' off she rid ! 
 
 Now, this is all I'm goin' to tell 
 Of this here story— that is, I 
 Have done my very level best 
 As fer as this, an' here I " dwell, " 
 As auctioneers says, winkin' sly: 
 Hits old man Willards tells the rest. 
 
 II 
 
 THE OLD MAN TALKS 
 
 Adzackly jes' one year ago, 
 
 This New Year's day, Tomps comes to me— 
 In my own house, an' while the folks 
 Was gittin' dinner, — an' he pokes 
 
 His nose right in, an' says, says he : 
 4 1 got yer note — an' read it slow! 
 
 You don't like me, ner I don't^ow," 
 He says, — "we 're even there, you know! 
 
 But you've said, furder, that no gal 
 
 Of yourn kin marry me, er shall, 
 
 An' I'd best shet off comin', too ! " 
 An' then he says,—" Well them's YOUR views, 
 
 But, havin' talked with S'repty, we 
 
 Have both agreed to disagree 
 
 With your peculiar notions some, 
 An' that's the reason I refuse 
 
u8 A NEIV YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 To quit a-comin' here, but come- 
 Not fer to threat, ner raise no skeer, 
 An' spile yer turkey-dinner here,— 
 But, jes' fer SWepty's sake, to sheer 
 Yer New Years. Shall I take a cheer? " 
 
 Well, blame-don ! ef I ever see 
 Sich impidence ! I couldn't say 
 
 Not nary word ! But Mother she 
 Sot out a cheer fer Tomps, an' they 
 
 Shuck hands an' turned their back on me. 
 
 Then I riz — mad as mad could be — 
 But Marg'et says,— 4 ' Now, Pap ! you set 
 Right where you're settin'! Don't you fret! 
 
 An' Tomps, you warm yer feet ! " says she, 
 
 "An' throw yer mitts an' comfort' on 
 The bed there ! Where is S'repty gone?— 
 The cabbage is a-scortchin' ! Ma, 
 Stop cryin' there an' stir the slaw ! " 
 
 Well ! — what was Mother cryiri fer ? — 
 I half riz up— but Marg'et's chin 
 Hit squared— an* I set down agin — 
 
 I alius was afeared o' her, 
 
 I was, by jucks ! So there I set, 
 
 Betwixt a sinkin'-chill an' sweat, 
 
 An' scuffled with my wrath, an' shet 
 
 My teeth to mighty tight, you bet ! 
 
A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S no 
 
 An' yit, fer all that I could do, 
 I eeched to jes' git up an' whet 
 
 The carvin'-knife a rasp er two 
 
 On Tomps's ribs — an' so would you !— 
 Fer he had riz an' faced around, 
 
 An' stood there, smilin', as they brung 
 The turkey in, all stuffed an' browned — 
 
 Too sweet fer nose er tooth er tongue ! 
 With sniffs 0' sage, an' p'raps a dash 
 
 Of old burnt brandy, steamin' hot, 
 Mixed kind 0' in with apple-mash, 
 
 An' mince-meat, an' the Lord knows what! 
 Nobody was a-talkin 5 then, 
 
 To 'filiate my awk'ardness — 
 
 No noise 0' any kind but jes' 
 The rattle 0' the dishes when 
 They'd fetch 'em in an 5 set 'em down, 
 An' fix aa' change 'em round an' round, 
 
 Like women does — Till mother says,— 
 " Vittels is ready ; Abner, call 
 
 Down S'repty — she's up-stairs, I guess." — 
 And Marg'et she says, " Ef you bawl 
 Like that, she'll not come down at all ! 
 Besides, we needn't wait till she 
 Gits down ! Here, Tomps, set down by me, 
 
 An' Pap : say grace ! " Well, there I was ! 
 
120 A NEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 What could I do ! I drapped my head 
 Behind my fists an' groaned, an' said : — 
 " Indulgent Parent! in Thy cause 
 
 We bow the head an' bend the knee, 
 An' break the bread, an' pour the wine, 
 Feelin' " — (The stair-door suddently 
 Went bang! an' S'repty flounced by me) — 
 " Feelin'," I says, "this feast is Thine— 
 
 This New Year's feast" — An' rap-rap-rap ! 
 Went Marg'et's case-knife on her plate — 
 An' next, I heerd a sasser drap, — 
 Then I looked up, an' strange to state, 
 There S'repty set in Tomps's lap— 
 
 An' huggin' him, as shore as fate ! 
 An' mother kissin' him k-slap !— 
 An' Marg'et — she chips in to drap 
 
 The ruther peert remark to me : — 
 " That ' grace ' o' yourn," she says, " wont ' gee '— 
 This haint no 'New Year' s feast J " says she,— 
 "This is a? INF AIR Dinner, Pap! " 
 
 An' so it was! — ben married fer 
 Purt'nigh a week !— 'Twas Marg'et planned 
 
 The whole thing fer 'em, through an' through. 
 I'm reconciled; an', understand, 
 I take things jes' as they occur,— 
 
 Ef Marg'et liked Tomps, Tomps 'ud do !— 
 
A KEW YEAR'S TIME AT WILLARDS'S 
 
 But I-says-I, a-holt his hand, — 
 " I'm glad you didn't marry HER — 
 'Cause Marg'et's my guardeen — Yes, sir! — 
 An' S'repty's good enough fer you ! " 
 
122 THE TOWn KARNTEEL 
 
 THE TOWN KARNTEEL 
 
 THE town Karnteel !— It's who'll reveal 
 
 Its praises jushtifiable? 
 For who can sing av anything 
 
 So lovely and reliable ? 
 Whin Summer, Spring, or Winter lies 
 
 From Malin's Head to Tipperary, 
 There's no such town for interprise 
 
 Bechuxt Youghal and Londonderry ! 
 
 There's not its likes in Ireland— 
 
 For twic't the week, be-gorries ! 
 They're playing jigs upon the band — 
 And joomping there in sacks — and — and- 
 And racing, wid wheel-borries ! 
 
 Karnteel — its there, like any fair, 
 
 The purty gurrls is plinty, sure !— 
 And, man-alive ! at forty-five 
 
 The legs av me air twinty, sure ! 
 I lave me cares, and hoein', too, 
 
 Behint me, as is sinsible, 
 And its Karnteel I'm goin' to, 
 
 To cilebrate in principle ! 
 
THE TOIVN KARNTEEL 123 
 
 For there's the town av all the land ! 
 
 And twic't the week, be-gorries ! 
 They're playing jigs upon the band, 
 And joomping there in sacks — and— and— 
 
 And racing, wid wheel-borries ! 
 
 And whilst I feel for owld Karnteel 
 
 That I've no phrases glorious, 
 It stands above the need av love 
 
 That boasts in voice uproarious ! — 
 Lave that for Cork, and Dublin, too, 
 
 And Armagh and Killarney, thin, — 
 And Karnteel won't be troublin' you 
 
 Wid any jilous blarney, thin ! 
 
 For there's the town av all the land 
 
 Where twic't the week, be-gorries ! 
 They're playing jigs upon the band — 
 And joomping there in sacks— and— and— 
 
 And racing, wid wheel-borries ! 
 
124 REG A RDM TERRY HUT 
 
 REGARDIN' TERRY HUT 
 
 SENCE I tuck holt o' Gibbses Churn 
 
 And ben a-handlin' the concern, 
 
 I've traveled round the grand old State 
 
 Of Indiany lots, of late! 
 
 I've canvassed Crawferdsville and sweat 
 
 Around the town of Lafayette ; 
 
 I've saw a many a County-seat 
 
 I ust to think was hard to beat : 
 
 At constant dreenage and expense 
 
 I've worked Greencastle and Vincennes— 
 
 Drapped out o' Putnam into Clay, 
 
 Owen, and on down thataway 
 
 Plum' into Knox, on the back-track 
 
 Fer home agin — and glad I'm back !— 
 
 I've saw these towns, as I say— but 
 
 They's none 'at beats ole Terry Hut ! 
 
 It's more'n likely you'll insist 
 I claim this 'cause I'm predjudist, 
 Bein' born'd here in ole Vygo 
 In sight o' Terry Hut;— but no, 
 Yer clean dead wrong !— and I maintain 
 They's nary drap in ary vein 
 O' mine but what's as free as air 
 To jest take issue with you there !— 
 
REGARDS TERRY HUT 125 
 
 'Cause, boy and man, fer forty year, 
 I've argied agtnst livin' here, 
 And jawed around and traded lies 
 About our lack 0' enterprise ; 
 And tuck and turned in and agreed 
 All other towns was in the lead, 
 When — drat my melts ! — they couldn't cut 
 No shine a-tall with Terry Hut ! 
 
 Take, even, statesmanship, and wit, 
 
 And ginerel git-up-and-git, 
 
 Ole Terry Hut is sound clean through ! — 
 
 Turn old Dick Thompson loose, er Dan 
 
 Vorehees — and where's they any man 
 
 Kin even hold a candle to 
 
 Their eloquence? And where's as clean 
 
 A fi-nan-seer as Rile' McKeen— 
 
 Er puorer, in his daily walk, 
 
 In railroad er in racein' stock ! 
 
 And there's 'Gene Debs — a man 'at stands 
 
 And jest holds out in his two hands 
 
 As warm a heart as ever beat 
 
 Betwixt here and the Jedgement Seat !— 
 
 All these is reasons why I put 
 
 Sich bulk 0' faith in Terry Hut. 
 
 So I've come back, with eyes 'at sees 
 My faults, at last,— to make my peace 
 
126 REGARDIhT TERRY HUT 
 
 With this old place, and truthful swear- 
 Like Gineral Tom Nelson does,— 
 
 " They haint no city anywhere 
 On God's green earth lays over us ! " 
 Our city govament is grand— 
 
 " Ner is they better farmin'-land 
 Sun-kissed "—as Tom goes on and says— 
 
 " Er dower'd with sich advantages ! " 
 And I've come back, with welcome tread, 
 From journeyin's vain, as I have said, 
 To settle down in ca'm content, 
 And cuss the towns where I have went, 
 And brag on ourn and boast and strut 
 Around the streets o' Terry Hut! 
 
LEEDLE DUTCH BABY 127 
 
 LEEDLE DUTCH BABY 
 
 LEEDLE Dutch baby haff come ter town ! 
 Jabber und jump till der day gone down — 
 Jabber und sphlutter und sphlit hees jaws- 
 Vot a Dutch baby dees Launsmon vas ! 
 I dink dose mout' vas leedle too vide 
 Ober he laugh fon dot also-side! 
 Haff got blenty off deemple und vrown — 
 Hey ! leedle Dutchman, come ter town ! 
 
 Leedle Dutch baby, I dink me proud 
 Ober your fader can schquall dot loud 
 Ven he vas leedle Dutch baby like you, 
 Und yoost don't gare like he alvays do ! — 
 Guess ven dey vean him on beer, you bet 
 Dot's der because dot he aind veaned yet!- 
 Vot you said off he drink you down ? 
 Hey ! leedle Dutchman, come ter town ! 
 
 Leedle Dutch baby, yoost schquall avay — 
 Schquall fon preakfast till gisterday ! 
 Better you all time gry und shout 
 Dan shmile me vonce fon der coffin out ! 
 Vot I gare off you keek my nose 
 Downside-up mit your heels unt toes — 
 Downside, oder der upside down. — 
 Hey ! leedle Dutchman, come ter town ! 
 
128 DOWN ON WRIGGLE CRICK 
 
 DOWN ON WRIGGLE CRICK 
 
 Best Time to Kill a Hog 's when He 's Fat.— Old Saw. 
 
 MOSTLY, folks is law abidin' 
 
 Down on Wriggle Crick,— 
 Seein' they's no 'Squire residin* 
 
 In our bailywick ; 
 No grand-juries — no suppeenies, 
 
 Ner no vested rights to pick 
 Out yer man, jerk up and jail ef 
 
 He's outragin' Wriggle Crick ! 
 
 Wriggle Crick haint got no lawin', 
 
 Ner no suits to beat ; 
 Ner no court-house gee-and-hawin' 
 
 Like a county-seat ; 
 Haint no waitin' round fer verdicks, 
 
 Ner non-gittin' witness-fees : 
 Ner no thiefs 'at gits " new hearin's," 
 
 By some lawyer slick as grease ! 
 
 Wriggle Cricks's leadin' spirit 
 
 Is old Johnts Culwell, — 
 Keeps postoffice, and right near it 
 
 Owns what's called " The Grand Hotel " 
 (Warehouse now) — buys wheat and ships it 
 Gits out ties, and trades in stock, 
 
DOWN ON WRIGGLE CRICK 129 
 
 And knows all the high-toned drummers 
 'Twixt South Bend and Mishawauk. 
 
 Last year comes along a feller — 
 
 Sharper 'an a lance, — 
 Stovepipe-hat, and silk umbreller, 
 
 And a boughten all-wool pants, — 
 Tinkerin' of clocks and watches ; 
 
 Says a trial's all he wants — 
 And rents out the tavern-office 
 
 Next to uncle Johnts. 
 
 Well.— He tacked up his k'dentials, 
 
 And got down to biz.— 
 Captured Johnts by cuttin' stencils 
 
 Fer them old wheat-sacks 0' his. — 
 Fixed his clock, in the postoffice— 
 
 Painted fer him, clean and slick, 
 'Crost his safe in gold-leaf letters, 
 "J. Cullwells's, Wriggle Crick." 
 
 Any kind 0' job you keered to 
 
 Resk him with, and bring, 
 He'd fix fer you— jest appeared to 
 
 Turn his hand to anything! — 
 Rings, er earbobs, er umbrellers — 
 
 Glue a cheer, er chany doll, — 
 W'y, of all the beatin' fellers, 
 
 He jest beat 'em all ! 
 
130 DOWN ON WRIGGLE CRICK 
 
 Made his friends, but wouldn't stop there,- 
 
 One mistake he learnt, 
 That was, sleepin' in his shop there.— 
 
 And one Sunday night it burnt! 
 Come in one o' jest a-sweepin' 
 
 All the whole town high and dry— 
 And that feller, when they waked him, 
 
 Suffocatin', mighty nigh ! 
 
 Johnts he drug him from the buildin', 
 
 Helpless— 'peared to be,— 
 And the women and the childern 
 
 Drenchin' him with sympathy ! 
 But I noticed Johnts helt on him 
 
 With a' extry lovin' grip, 
 And the men-folks gethered round him 
 
 In most warmest pardnership ! 
 
 That's the whole mess, grease and dopin' ! 
 
 Johnts's safe was saved, — 
 But the lock was found sprung open, 
 
 And the inside caved. 
 Was no trial — ner no jury — 
 
 Ner no jedge ner court-house-click.— 
 Circumstances alters cases 
 
 Down on Wriggle Crick ! 
 
IVHEN DE FOLKS IS GONE 131 
 
 WHEN DE FOLKS IS GONE 
 
 WHAT dat scratchin' at de kitchin do'? 
 
 Done heah'n dat foh an hour er mo' ! 
 
 Tell you, Mr. Niggah, das sho's yo' bo'n, 
 
 Hit's might lonesome waitin' when de folks is gone ! 
 
 Blame my trap ! how de wind do blow! 
 An' dis is das' de night for de witches, sho' ! 
 Dey's trouble gon' to waste when de old slut whine, 
 An' you heah de cat a-spittin' when de moon don't shine ! 
 
 Chune my fiddle, an' de bridge go " bang! " 
 An' I lef 'er right back whah she alius hang, 
 An' de tribble snap short an' de apern split 
 When dey no mortal man wah a-techin' hit! 
 
 Dah ! Now, what? How de ole j'ice cracks ! 
 'Spec' dis house, ef hit tell plain fac's, 
 'Ud talk about de ha'nts wid dey long tails on 
 What das'n't on'y come when de folks is gone ! 
 
 What I tuk an' done ef a sho'-nuff ghos' 
 Pop right up by de ole bed-pos' ? 
 What dat shinin' fru de front do' crack? .... 
 God bress de Lo'd ! hits de folks got back ! 
 
32 THE LITTLE TOIVN O' TAILHOLT 
 
 THE LITTLE TOWN O' TAILHOLT 
 
 You kin boast about yer cities, and their stiddy growth 
 
 and size, 
 And brag about yer county-seats, and business enterprise, 
 And railroads, and factories, and all sich foolery — 
 But the little Town o' Tailholt is big enough fer me ! 
 
 You can harp about yer churches, with their steeples in 
 
 the clouds, 
 And gas about yer graded streets, and blow about yer 
 
 crowds ; 
 You kin talk about yer theaters, and all you've got to 
 
 see — 
 But the little Town o' Tailholt is show enough fer me ! 
 
 They haint no style in our town— hit's little-like and 
 
 small — 
 They haint no churches, nuther, — jes' the meetin'-house 
 
 is all ; 
 They's no sidewalks, to speak of — but the highway's 
 
 alius free, 
 And the little Town o' Tailholt is wide enough fer me ! 
 
 Some finds itsdiscommodin'-like, I'm willin' to admit, 
 To hev but one postoffice, and a womern keepin' hit, 
 And the drugstore, and shoeshop, and grocery, all three— 
 But the little Town o' Tailholt is handy 'nough fer me ! 
 
THE LITTLE TOWN O 1 TAILHOLT 133 
 
 Vou kin smile and turn yer nose up, and joke and hev 
 
 yer fun, 
 And laugh and holler " Tail-holts is better holts 'n none !" 
 Ef the city suits you better, w'y, hits where you'd orto' be, 
 But the little Town 0' Tailholt 's good enough fer me ! 
 
©ur 
 
 IRccent 
 
 publications 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO, 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY 
 1895 
 
flew llBoofes of Bote 
 
 Nebraska Cropsey 
 
 Graded Exercises in Arithmetic 
 
 Fundamental operations, designed for 
 Primary Schools, third and fourth years. 
 Adapted to be used supplementary to any 
 series of arithmetic. Board covers, 25 cents, 
 or postpaid, 35 cents. 
 
 Martha Nicholson McKay 
 Literary Clubs of Indiana 
 
 Contains chapters on causes of organiza- 
 tion, kinds of organizations, number of asso- 
 ciations, typical clubs, influence on cultural 
 development of State, list of organizations, 
 etc. 8vo., cloth, 75 cents. 
 
 Catherine McLaen New 
 A Woman Reigns 
 
 A novel. 1 vol., i2mo., cloth, $1.00. 
 
 Harriet Newell Lodge 
 A Bit of Finesse 
 
 A story of fifty years ago. 1 vol., i2mo., 
 cloth, $1.25. j 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Militant Ux Bnglfsb 
 
 The Conquest of the Northwest 
 1778=1783, and Life of 
 General Geo. Rogers Clark 
 
 Hon. William H. English, whose name fif- 
 teen years ago was on every tongue, and who 
 stood with General Hancock as the standard- 
 bearer of the Democracy, has become equally 
 famous throughout the West and South dur- 
 ing the last decade as an antiquarian and col- 
 lector of Americana. 
 
 After a quarter century of research, the dis- 
 tinguished statesman now publishes a re- 
 markable narrative of our contest with the 
 British (1778-83), for the mastery and ulti- 
 mate possession " of the country northwest 
 of the River Ohio." His collection of his- 
 torical material relating to this romantic con- 
 quest is probably the largest extant. 
 
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fl&erefcitb IRfcbolson 
 
 Short Flights ; Poems and Sonnets 
 
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 dianapolis in 1836. By C. P. Ferguson. 
 
 Life of Ziba Foote. By Samuel Morrison. 
 
 No. 10. "Old Settlers." By Robert B. 
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 No. 11. French Settlements on the Wa- 
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IRfcbarb /l&alcolm Jobnston 
 
 Studies ; Literary and Socia l 
 
 r Second Series, i2mo, cloth, $1.25. Two vol- 
 umes, boxed, $2.50. 
 
 Includes the following essays: Edward 
 Hyde's Daughter; Benjamin D'Israeli, the 
 Jew; A Characteristic of Sir Thomas More; 
 A Martyr to Science; Some Heroes of Charles 
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 fore, mere companionable. There is rare 
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ttbe TKHorfes of 
 
 5ames TKHbitcomb IRiles 
 
 Neghborly Poems 
 
 Thirty-six poems in Hoosier dialect, includ- 
 ing "The Old Swimmin' Hole and ' Leven 
 More Poems, by Benjamin F. Johnson, of 
 Boone," with eight half-tone illustrations. 
 i2mo. cloth, $1.25; half calf, $2.50; full mo- 
 rocco, $?.oo. 
 
 Benjamin F. Johnson, of Boone — a " rare 
 Ben Johnson," indeed — fathered these cute 
 country whims, some of the best that the 
 truest poet of to-day has given the world, in 
 the quaint dressing of the Hoosier dialect. — 
 Evening News, Buffalo. 
 
 The poems included in this neat volume are 
 idiomatic, droll and charming. They depict 
 common things in an unusually natural way 
 and touch many sympathetic chords. — The 
 Treasury, New York. 
 
 Mr. Riley, more than any other American 
 poet who has essayed this style of poetic 
 writing, has enriched this peculiar field with 
 gems that will constitute a permanent part 
 of our literature. — Omaha Bee. 
 
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XTbe TKIiorfes of 
 
 James Mbttcomb IRUes 
 
 Sketches in Prose 
 
 Originally published as "The Boss Girl 
 and Other Stories." Twelve graphic 
 stories, each prefaced by a poem. 12 mo. 
 cloth, $1.25; half calf, $2.50; full morocco, 
 $5.00. 
 
 When Mr. Riley publishes a new book the 
 people who read rejoice. This last volume of 
 his is as refreshing as a May morning, and is 
 full of charming pen pictures, dainty bits of 
 landscapes, homelike turnings of white paths 
 through green fields are suggested with an 
 almost pathetic vividness. There are some 
 more of his delightful child studies, the merit 
 of which lies somewhat in the wonderful 
 child dialect, but mainly in the accurate and 
 true interpretation of child -character. The 
 poet understands the child perfectly, and 
 places himself before us with absolute justice 
 and a splendid sympathy for his most child- 
 ish whims. Mr. Riley has discovered child- 
 lore, and he has shown the true child-lore, 
 and made us see the relation between it and 
 folk-lore,— Nassau Library Magazine, 
 
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 KANSAS CITY. 
 
XTbe movks ot 
 
 James Mbitcomb IRtlep 
 
 Pipes o* Pan 
 
 Five sketches and fifty poems. The sketches 
 are separated by four books of twelve poems 
 each, with frontispiece. i2mo. cloth, $1.25; 
 half calf, $2.50; full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 His work in prose is really exquisite, though 
 comparatively few are acquainted with it. 
 Here is the conclusion of one of his tales, 
 published in the " Pipes o' Pan at Zekes- 
 bury." It is as simply natural as fact, as 
 delicate as truth. It is at once so probable 
 and so artistic that no one would venture to 
 guess whether the writer created the incident 
 or whether the incident created the tale. 
 Here it is: 
 
 " Well, Annie had just stooped to lift up 
 one o' the little girls when the feller turned, 
 and the'r eyes met. 'Annie, my wife!' he 
 says: and Annie, she kind o' gave a little yelp 
 like, and come a flutterin' down in his arms, 
 and the jug of worter rolled clean acrost the 
 road, and turned a somerset and knocked the 
 cob out of its mouth, and jist laid back and 
 hollered 'good-good-good -good-good!' like ef 
 it knowed what was up, and was jist as glad 
 and tickled as the rest of us." — Omaha World- 
 Herald. 
 
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 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
XTbe morfes of 
 
 James Mbitcomb IRiles 
 
 Afterwhiles 
 
 Sixty-two poems and sonnets, serious, 
 pathetic, humorous and dialect, with frontis- 
 piece. i2mo. cloth, $1.25; half calf, $2.50; 
 full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 It is easy, from his book of poems, After- 
 whiles, to see how the work of Mr. James 
 Whitcomb Riley has grown so widely popu- 
 lar in the United States. Mostly his verse 
 resembles Poe. But much more than that 
 author he gives expression to the child-like 
 simplicity which distinguishes Brother Jona- 
 than among the nations in all matters of art. 
 The poems in dialect are more enjoyable than 
 the others for their humor and character. — 
 The Scotsman, Edinburg. 
 
 Mr. Riley has discovered the essential 
 beauty of nature in the fields, and of pathos 
 and sentiment in the heart of man, and has 
 interpreted it with a fidelity and simplicity 
 which will make his poetry live long after 
 the elegant transcription from books and the 
 inspirations from foreign life have faded away 
 into the nothingness which is the doom of all 
 artificial and imitation. — Providence Jour- 
 nal. 
 
 THE BOWEN- MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
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TTfoe Morfts of 
 
 James Wbftcomb IRiles 
 
 Rhymes of Childhood 
 
 One hundred and two dialect and serious 
 poems. Not for children only, but of child- 
 hood days, with frontispiece. i2mo. cloth, 
 $1.25; half calf, $2.50; full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 r James Whitcomb Riley's Rhymes of 
 Childhood would be pronounced as ad- 
 dressed to grown people, rather than to chil- 
 dren of the age and experience of those whose 
 thoughts and feelings figure in these pages. 
 It is a delightful book from cover to cover, 
 and displays a rare insight into the habits of 
 mind of the child. The dialect, too, is true to 
 nature, and seldom, if ever, overdrawn. — 
 Overland Monthly. 
 
 It is impossible not to give a hearty wel- 
 come to this bundle of rhyme, with its tender 
 human love and its irresistible humor. Mr. 
 Riley, at his best and in his narrow but at- 
 tractive field, is inimitable. No poet since 
 Burns has sung so close to the ear of the com- 
 mon people of the country. His " Hoosier" 
 lyrics and his Rhymes of Childhood come 
 very near to the line of perfection. — New 
 Tork Independent. 
 
 THE BOIVEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
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Ube TPOlorfes of 
 
 5ames Mbiteomb 1RUe$ 
 
 The Flying Islands of the Night 
 
 A weird and grotesque drama in verse. 
 Fantastic, quaint and ingenious. i2mo. cloth, 
 $1.25; half calf, $2.50; full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 As the author states, this is "Thynge of 
 Wytchencrof — an Idle Dreme." This latest 
 production of the popular Western author 
 is a dramatic poem in three acts. The verse, 
 while being neither heroic nor lyric, partakes 
 of the character of both. The entire poem is 
 of the nature of a burlesque Q-pic.—-PJiiladel- 
 phi a Item. 
 
 A weird and grotesque drama in verse. 
 In this book Mr. Riley's peculiar genius dis- 
 plays a force and continuity not intimated in 
 any previous work. The argument and plot 
 are radically different from any known drama, 
 fantastical in the highest degree, and beyond 
 question, his most remarkably quaint and 
 peculiar work, since in it he displays a spirit 
 of ingenuity together with a depth and height 
 of imagination that his work has never hith- 
 erto suggested.— 'Baltimore News, 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO, 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Ube Worfes of 
 
 James Mbftcomb IRiles 
 
 Green Fields and Running Brooks 
 
 One hundred and two poems and sonnets, 
 dialect, humorous and serious. i2mo. cloth, 
 $1.25; half calf, $2.50; full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 Green Fields and Running Brooks 
 is the latest volume of James Whitcomb 
 Riley's poems we receive from the Bowen- 
 Merrill Company, of Indianapolis. It is an 
 enticing title, and its promise and allurement 
 is well fulfilled in its pages. Mr. Riley is a 
 singer by nature, and of nature human and 
 extrahuman, and he has given no truer and 
 sweeter songs to us than are in this book. — 
 Republican, Springfield. 
 
 Under the pretty title, Green Fields and 
 Running Brooks — a phrase which almost 
 insists on continuing itself into " Sermons 
 in Stones" — the most recent productions of 
 James Whitcomb Riley come to us, and prove 
 the Hoosier bard to be very prolific, as well 
 as a very sweet singer. — Christian Union, 
 New York, 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Uhc TKllorfes of 
 
 James Wbttcomb iRiles 
 
 Armazindy 
 
 Contains some of Mr. Riley's latest and best 
 dialect and serious work, including "Arma- 
 zindy" and the famous Poe Poem. r2mo. 
 cloth, uniform with his other books, $1.25; 
 half calf, $2.50; full morocco, $5.00. 
 
 "Mr. Riley's new book of poems, "Arma- 
 zindy," includes verses in dialect and verses 
 in straight English, verses to touch the heart 
 and verses to tickle the ribs, verses of homely 
 sentiment, and nonsense verses which are 
 truly reckless and altogether delightful. 'Ar- 
 mazindy' is a characteristic poem in the 
 Hoosier dialect, and there are some seventy 
 other poems, and one prose sketch written 
 after the style of Dickens." — Current His- 
 tory. 
 
 James Whitcomb Riley's simple verse has 
 won a lasting place in the hearts of old and 
 young, and the reasons for this are plain. He 
 has a quick and fine appreciation of the beau- 
 ties of what might seem to some only the 
 commonplace and humdrum side of nature, 
 and he opens our eyes to see the poetry in the 
 very things that have seemed to us the dullest 
 of prose. — Public Opinion, Washington, D. C. 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Ube IMorfes of 
 
 James TOMtcomb IRiles 
 
 Armazindy— -Holiday Edition 
 
 It is square i2mo. in size, printed on hand- 
 made paper, with uncut edges and gilt top. 
 The illustrations consist of a new portrait of 
 the author and five country scenes in photo- 
 gravure. Cloth, $2.00 ; half calf, $4.00 ; full 
 calf, $5.00. 
 
 I have felt more interest in the Hoosier 
 poet's work of late than in almost anything else 
 which has appeared in a literary way. I tell 
 you, James Whitcomb Riley is nothing short 
 of a born poet and a veritable genius. He gets 
 down into the heart of a man, and in a most 
 telling way, too. I think he is a later Hosea 
 Biglow, quite as original as the latter and 
 more versatile in certain respects. I own 
 a good deal of enthusiasm for this later prod- 
 duct of Indiana soil. This delineator of 
 lowly humanity, who sings with so much 
 fervor, pathos, humor and grace, and who has 
 done things, is it not correct to say, which 
 will long be remembered, perhaps, which 
 will outlast the more laborious work of some 
 of the older and more pretentious poets. — 
 Oliver Wendell Holmes, 
 
 THE BOWEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Uhc XPOlorfes of 
 
 James Wbitcomb IRiles 
 
 Old Fashioned Roses 
 
 Sixty-one selected poems and sonnets, pub- 
 lished in England. It is a dainty i6mo. 
 printed on hand-made paper, with untrimmed 
 edges, gilt top, and very tastefully bound in 
 blue and white cloth. It contains a great 
 variety of serious, humorous and dialect 
 pieces, and makes a handsome presentation 
 edition of some of Mr. Riley's choicest poems. 
 i6mo. cloth, gilt top, untrimmed, $1.75. 
 
 The first thing that strikes the reader with 
 James Whitcomb Riley is his originality. 
 Here, evidently, is a man who would have 
 felt the impulse to speak tunefully and to 
 touch the springs of humor and of pathos had 
 he lived before the invention of alphabets. 
 In the absence of books, the lessons to be 
 drawn from nature and from human life 
 would have sufficed. With his own hand has 
 been garnered his knowledge of the outer 
 and of the inner world. He has seen with 
 .lis own eyes, listened with his own ears, 
 known in his own heart the sorrows and joys 
 that he depicted. His landscapes are tran- 
 scripts of his native woods and fields. — JVezv 
 Tork Sun. 
 
 THE BOIVEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY. 
 
Uhc Morfts of 
 
 James Wbttcomb 1RUe£ 
 
 An Old Sweetheart of Mine 
 
 Illustrated with colored and monotint plates. 
 The engravings are by the best artists of Bos- 
 ton, and the book is handsomely bound in 
 cloth. This favorite poem, so thoroughly en- 
 joyed by the thousands of Mr. Riley's admir- 
 ers, has been sympathetically sketched and 
 portrayed with such artistic skill as to make 
 it one of the most beautiful books yet pub- 
 lished. 10x12 flat quarto, colored and mono- 
 tint plates, combination cloth, full gilt, $2.50. 
 
 Among the daintiest of dainty holiday 
 books is the gift edition of James Whitcomb 
 Riley's An Old Sweetheart of Mine. 
 The text is in quaint lettering, with every 
 page enriched by pretty designs from pen and 
 b ru s h . — Ba It i more A m e r ica n . 
 
 Each stanza fills a page, and is accompanied 
 by an exquisite illustration. The paper, let- 
 ter press, binding and illustrations are all of 
 the finest, and the whole is an excellent speci- 
 men of the bookmaker's art, and forms a fit 
 setting for a poetic gem of the first water. — 
 Indianapolis Sentinel. 
 
 THE BOIVEN-MERRILL CO. 
 INDIANAPOLIS AND 
 KANSAS CITY.