Then I passed it to Nye, Who repassed it to me. And we bandaged each eye Of that Billson—ez we Softly dropped that coin in his coat pocket, ez the hull crowd around us could see.

That was all. He'd one hand Locked in mine. Then he groped. We could not understand Why that minit Nye sloped, For we knew we'd the dead thing on Billson—even more than we dreamed of or hoped.

For he stood thar in doubt With his hand to his head; Then he turned, and lit out Through the door where Nye fled, Draggin' me and the rest of us arter, while we larfed till we thought we was dead,

Till he overtook Nye And went through him. Words fail For what follers! Kin I Paint our agonized wail Ez he drew from Nye's pocket that twenty wot we sworn was in his own coat-tail!

And it WAS! But, when found, It proved bogus and brass! And the question goes round How the thing kem to pass? Or, if PASSED, woz it passed thar by William; and I listens, and echoes "Alas!

"For the days when the skill Of the keerds was no blind, When no effort of will Could beat four of a kind, When the thing wot you held in your hand, Pard, was worth more than the thing in your mind."



THE SPELLING BEE AT ANGELS

(REPORTED BY TRUTHFUL JAMES)

Waltz in, waltz in, ye little kids, and gather round my knee, And drop them books and first pot-hooks, and hear a yarn from me. I kin not sling a fairy tale of Jinnys* fierce and wild, For I hold it is unchristian to deceive a simple child; But as from school yer driftin' by, I thowt ye'd like to hear Of a "Spelling Bee" at Angels that we organized last year.

It warn't made up of gentle kids, of pretty kids, like you, But gents ez hed their reg'lar growth, and some enough for two. There woz Lanky Jim of Sutter's Fork and Bilson of Lagrange, And "Pistol Bob," who wore that day a knife by way of change. You start, you little kids, you think these are not pretty names, But each had a man behind it, and—my name is Truthful James.

There was Poker Dick from Whisky Flat, and Smith of Shooter's Bend, And Brown of Calaveras—which I want no better friend; Three-fingered Jack—yes, pretty dears, three fingers—YOU have five. Clapp cut off two—it's sing'lar, too, that Clapp ain't now alive. 'Twas very wrong indeed, my dears, and Clapp was much to blame; Likewise was Jack, in after-years, for shootin' of that same.

The nights was kinder lengthenin' out, the rains had jest begun, When all the camp came up to Pete's to have their usual fun; But we all sot kinder sad-like around the bar-room stove Till Smith got up, permiskiss-like, and this remark he hove: "Thar's a new game down in Frisco, that ez far ez I can see Beats euchre, poker, and van-toon, they calls the 'Spellin' Bee.'"

Then Brown of Calaveras simply hitched his chair and spake, "Poker is good enough for me," and Lanky Jim sez, "Shake!" And Bob allowed he warn't proud, but he "must say right thar That the man who tackled euchre hed his education squar." This brought up Lenny Fairchild, the schoolmaster, who said He knew the game, and he would give instructions on that head.

"For instance, take some simple word," sez he, "like 'separate:' Now who can spell it?" Dog my skin, ef thar was one in eight. This set the boys all wild at once. The chairs was put in row, And at the head was Lanky Jim, and at the foot was Joe, And high upon the bar itself the schoolmaster was raised, And the bar-keep put his glasses down, and sat and silent gazed.

The first word out was "parallel," and seven let it be, Till Joe waltzed in his "double l" betwixt the "a" and "e;" For since he drilled them Mexicans in San Jacinto's fight Thar warn't no prouder man got up than Pistol Joe that night— Till "rhythm" came! He tried to smile, then said "they had him there," And Lanky Jim, with one long stride, got up and took his chair.

O little kids, my pretty kids, 'twas touchin' to survey These bearded men, with weppings on, like schoolboys at their play. They'd laugh with glee, and shout to see each other lead the van, And Bob sat up as monitor with a cue for a rattan, Till the Chair gave out "incinerate," and Brown said he'd be durned If any such blamed word as that in school was ever learned.

When "phthisis" came they all sprang up, and vowed the man who rung Another blamed Greek word on them be taken out and hung. As they sat down again I saw in Bilson's eye a flash, And Brown of Calaveras was a-twistin' his mustache, And when at last Brown slipped on "gneiss," and Bilson took his chair, He dropped some casual words about some folks who dyed their hair.

And then the Chair grew very white, and the Chair said he'd adjourn, But Poker Dick remarked that HE would wait and get his turn; Then with a tremblin' voice and hand, and with a wanderin' eye, The Chair next offered "eider-duck," and Dick began with "I", And Bilson smiled—then Bilson shrieked! Just how the fight begun I never knowed, for Bilson dropped, and Dick, he moved up one.

Then certain gents arose and said "they'd business down in camp," And "ez the road was rather dark, and ez the night was damp, They'd"—here got up Three-fingered Jack and locked the door and yelled: "No, not one mother's son goes out till that thar word is spelled!" But while the words were on his lips, he groaned and sank in pain, And sank with Webster on his chest and Worcester on his brain.

Below the bar dodged Poker Dick, and tried to look ez he Was huntin' up authorities thet no one else could see; And Brown got down behind the stove, allowin' he "was cold," Till it upsot and down his legs the cinders freely rolled, And several gents called "Order!" till in his simple way Poor Smith began with "O-r"—"Or"—and he was dragged away.

O little kids, my pretty kids, down on your knees and pray! You've got your eddication in a peaceful sort of way; And bear in mind thar may be sharps ez slings their spellin' square, But likewise slings their bowie-knives without a thought or care. You wants to know the rest, my dears? Thet's all! In me you see The only gent that lived to tell about the Spellin' Bee!

———

He ceased and passed, that truthful man; the children went their way With downcast heads and downcast hearts—but not to sport or play. For when at eve the lamps were lit, and supperless to bed Each child was sent, with tasks undone and lessons all unsaid, No man might know the awful woe that thrilled their youthful frames, As they dreamed of Angels Spelling Bee and thought of Truthful James.

* Qy. Genii.



ARTEMIS IN SIERRA

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

Poet. Philosopher. Jones of Mariposa.

POET

Halt! Here we are. Now wheel your mare a trifle Just where you stand; then doff your hat and swear Never yet was scene you might cover with your rifle Half as complete or as marvelously fair.

PHILOSOPHER

Dropped from Olympus or lifted out of Tempe, Swung like a censer betwixt the earth and sky! He who in Greece sang of flocks and flax and hemp,—he Here might recall them—six thousand feet on high!

POET

Well you may say so. The clamor of the river, Hum of base toil, and man's ignoble strife, Halt far below, where the stifling sunbeams quiver, But never climb to this purer, higher life!

Not to this glade, where Jones of Mariposa, Simple and meek as his flocks we're looking at, Tends his soft charge; nor where his daughter Rosa— (A shot.) Hallo! What's that?

PHILOSOPHER

A—something thro' my hat— Bullet, I think. You were speaking of his daughter?

POET

Yes; but—your hat you were moving through the leaves; Likely he thought it some eagle bent on slaughter. Lightly he shoots— (A second shot.)

PHILOSOPHER

As one readily perceives. Still, he improves! This time YOUR hat has got it, Quite near the band! Eh? Oh, just as you please— Stop, or go on.

POET

Perhaps we'd better trot it Down through the hollow, and up among the trees.

BOTH

Trot, trot, trot, where the bullets cannot follow; Trot down and up again among the laurel trees.

PHILOSOPHER

Thanks, that is better; now of this shot-dispensing Jones and his girl—you were saying—

POET

Well, you see— I—hang it all!—Oh! what's the use of fencing! Sir, I confess it!—these shots were meant for ME.

PHILOSOPHER

Are you mad!

POET

God knows, I shouldn't wonder! I love this coy nymph, who, coldly—as yon peak Shines on the river it feeds, yet keeps asunder— Long have I worshiped, but never dared to speak.

Till she, no doubt, her love no longer hiding, Waked by some chance word her father's jealousy; Slips her disdain—as an avalanche down gliding Sweeps flocks and kin away—to clear a path for ME.

Hence his attack.

PHILOSOPHER

I see. What I admire Chiefly, I think, in your idyl, so to speak, Is the cool modesty that checks your youthful fire,— Absence of self-love and abstinence of cheek!

Still, I might mention, I've met the gentle Rosa,— Danced with her thrice, to her father's jealous dread; And, it is possible, she's happened to disclose a— Ahem! You can fancy why he shoots at ME instead.

POET

YOU?

PHILOSOPHER

Me. But kindly take your hand from your revolver, I am not choleric—but accidents may chance. And here's the father, who alone can be the solver Of this twin riddle of the hat and the romance.

Enter JONES OF MARIPOSA.

POET

Speak, shepherd—mine!

PHILOSOPHER

Hail! Time-and-cartridge waster, Aimless exploder of theories and skill! Whom do you shoot?

JONES OF MARIPOSA

Well, shootin' ain't my taste, or EF I shoot anything—I only shoot to kill.

That ain't what's up. I only kem to tell ye— Sportin' or courtin'—trot homeward for your life! Gals will be gals, and p'r'aps it's just ez well ye Larned there was one had no wish to be—a wife.

POET

What?

PHILOSOPHER

Is this true?

JONES OF MARIPOSA

I reckon it looks like it. She saw ye comin'. My gun was standin' by; She made a grab, and 'fore I up could strike it, Blazed at ye both! The critter is SO shy!

POET

Who?

JONES OF MARIPOSA

My darter!

PHILOSOPHER

Rosa?

JONES OF MARIPOSA

Same! Good-by!



JACK OF THE TULES

(SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA)

Shrewdly you question, Senor, and I fancy You are no novice. Confess that to little Of my poor gossip of Mission and Pueblo You are a stranger!

Am I not right? Ah! believe me, that ever Since we joined company at the posada I've watched you closely, and—pardon an old priest— I've caught you smiling!

Smiling to hear an old fellow like me talk Gossip of pillage and robbers, and even Air his opinion of law and alcaldes Like any other!

Now!—by that twist of the wrist on the bridle, By that straight line from the heel to the shoulder, By that curt speech,—nay! nay! no offense, son,— You are a soldier?

No? Then a man of affairs? San Sebastian! 'Twould serve me right if I prattled thus wildly To—say a sheriff? No?—just caballero? Well, more's the pity.

Ah! what we want here's a man of your presence; Sano, Secreto,—yes, all the four S's, Joined with a boldness and dash, when the time comes, And—may I say it?—

One not TOO hard on the poor country people, Peons and silly vaqueros, who, dazzled By reckless skill, and, perchance, reckless largesse, Wink at some queer things.

No? You would crush THEM as well as the robbers,— Root them out, scatter them? Ah you are bitter— And yet—quien sabe, perhaps that's the one way To catch their leader.

As to myself, now, I'd share your displeasure; For I admit in this Jack of the Tules Certain good points. He still comes to confession— You'd "like to catch him"?

Ah, if you did at such times, you might lead him Home by a thread. Good! Again you are smiling: You have no faith in such shrift, and but little In priest or penitent.

Bueno! We take no offense, sir; whatever It please you to say, it becomes us, for Church sake, To bear in peace. Yet, if you were kinder— And less suspicious—

I might still prove to you, Jack of the Tules Shames not our teaching; nay, even might show you, Hard by this spot, his old comrade, who, wounded, Lives on his bounty.

If—ah, you listen!—I see I can trust you; Then, on your word as a gentleman—follow. Under that sycamore stands the old cabin; There sits his comrade.

Eh!—are you mad? You would try to ARREST him? You, with a warrant? Oh, well, take the rest of them: Pedro, Bill, Murray, Pat Doolan. Hey!—all of you, Tumble out, d—n it!

There!—that'll do, boys! Stand back! Ease his elbows; Take the gag from his mouth. Good! Now scatter like devils After his posse—four straggling, four drunken— At the posada.

You—help me off with these togs, and then vamos! Now, ole Jeff Dobbs!—Sheriff, Scout, and Detective! You're so derned 'cute! Kinder sick, ain't ye, bluffing Jack of the Tules!



IV. MISCELLANEOUS



A GREYPORT LEGEND

(1797)

They ran through the streets of the seaport town, They peered from the decks of the ships that lay; The cold sea-fog that came whitening down Was never as cold or white as they. "Ho, Starbuck and Pinckney and Tenterden! Run for your shallops, gather your men, Scatter your boats on the lower bay."

Good cause for fear! In the thick mid-day The hulk that lay by the rotting pier, Filled with the children in happy play, Parted its moorings and drifted clear, Drifted clear beyond reach or call,— Thirteen children they were in all,— All adrift in the lower bay!

Said a hard-faced skipper, "God help us all! She will not float till the turning tide!" Said his wife, "My darling will hear MY call, Whether in sea or heaven she bide;" And she lifted a quavering voice and high, Wild and strange as a sea-bird's cry, Till they shuddered and wondered at her side.

The fog drove down on each laboring crew, Veiled each from each and the sky and shore: There was not a sound but the breath they drew, And the lap of water and creak of oar; And they felt the breath of the downs, fresh blown O'er leagues of clover and cold gray stone, But not from the lips that had gone before.

They came no more. But they tell the tale That, when fogs are thick on the harbor reef, The mackerel fishers shorten sail— For the signal they know will bring relief; For the voices of children, still at play In a phantom hulk that drifts alway Through channels whose waters never fail.

It is but a foolish shipman's tale, A theme for a poet's idle page; But still, when the mists of Doubt prevail, And we lie becalmed by the shores of Age, We hear from the misty troubled shore The voice of the children gone before, Drawing the soul to its anchorage.



A NEWPORT ROMANCE

They say that she died of a broken heart (I tell the tale as 'twas told to me); But her spirit lives, and her soul is part Of this sad old house by the sea.

Her lover was fickle and fine and French: It was nearly a hundred years ago When he sailed away from her arms—poor wench!— With the Admiral Rochambeau.

I marvel much what periwigged phrase Won the heart of this sentimental Quaker, At what gold-laced speech of those modish days She listened—the mischief take her!

But she kept the posies of mignonette That he gave; and ever as their bloom failed And faded (though with her tears still wet) Her youth with their own exhaled.

Till one night, when the sea-fog wrapped a shroud Round spar and spire and tarn and tree, Her soul went up on that lifted cloud From this sad old house by the sea.

And ever since then, when the clock strikes two, She walks unbidden from room to room, And the air is filled that she passes through With a subtle, sad perfume.

The delicate odor of mignonette, The ghost of a dead-and-gone bouquet, Is all that tells of her story; yet Could she think of a sweeter way?

I sit in the sad old house to-night,— Myself a ghost from a farther sea; And I trust that this Quaker woman might, In courtesy, visit me.

For the laugh is fled from porch and lawn, And the bugle died from the fort on the hill, And the twitter of girls on the stairs is gone, And the grand piano is still.

Somewhere in the darkness a clock strikes two: And there is no sound in the sad old house, But the long veranda dripping with dew, And in the wainscot a mouse.

The light of my study-lamp streams out From the library door, but has gone astray In the depths of the darkened hall. Small doubt But the Quakeress knows the way.

Was it the trick of a sense o'erwrought With outward watching and inward fret? But I swear that the air just now was fraught With the odor of mignonette!

I open the window, and seem almost— So still lies the ocean—to hear the beat Of its Great Gulf artery off the coast, And to bask in its tropic heat.

In my neighbor's windows the gas-lights flare, As the dancers swing in a waltz of Strauss; And I wonder now could I fit that air To the song of this sad old house.

And no odor of mignonette there is, But the breath of morn on the dewy lawn; And mayhap from causes as slight as this The quaint old legend is born.

But the soul of that subtle, sad perfume, As the spiced embalmings, they say, outlast The mummy laid in his rocky tomb, Awakens my buried past.

And I think of the passion that shook my youth, Of its aimless loves and its idle pains, And am thankful now for the certain truth That only the sweet remains.

And I hear no rustle of stiff brocade, And I see no face at my library door; For now that the ghosts of my heart are laid, She is viewless for evermore.

But whether she came as a faint perfume, Or whether a spirit in stole of white, I feel, as I pass from the darkened room, She has been with my soul to-night!



SAN FRANCISCO

(FROM THE SEA)

Serene, indifferent of Fate, Thou sittest at the Western Gate;

Upon thy height, so lately won, Still slant the banners of the sun;

Thou seest the white seas strike their tents, O Warder of two continents!

And, scornful of the peace that flies Thy angry winds and sullen skies,

Thou drawest all things, small, or great, To thee, beside the Western Gate.

O lion's whelp, that hidest fast In jungle growth of spire and mast!

I know thy cunning and thy greed, Thy hard high lust and willful deed,

And all thy glory loves to tell Of specious gifts material.

Drop down, O Fleecy Fog, and hide Her skeptic sneer and all her pride!

Wrap her, O Fog, in gown and hood Of her Franciscan Brotherhood.

Hide me her faults, her sin and blame; With thy gray mantle cloak her shame!

So shall she, cowled, sit and pray Till morning bears her sins away.

Then rise, O Fleecy Fog, and raise The glory of her coming days;

Be as the cloud that flecks the seas Above her smoky argosies;

When forms familiar shall give place To stranger speech and newer face;

When all her throes and anxious fears Lie hushed in the repose of years;

When Art shall raise and Culture lift The sensual joys and meaner thrift,

And all fulfilled the vision we Who watch and wait shall never see;

Who, in the morning of her race, Toiled fair or meanly in our place,

But, yielding to the common lot, Lie unrecorded and forgot.



THE MOUNTAIN HEART'S-EASE

By scattered rocks and turbid waters shifting, By furrowed glade and dell, To feverish men thy calm, sweet face uplifting, Thou stayest them to tell

The delicate thought that cannot find expression, For ruder speech too fair, That, like thy petals, trembles in possession, And scatters on the air.

The miner pauses in his rugged labor, And, leaning on his spade, Laughingly calls unto his comrade-neighbor To see thy charms displayed.

But in his eyes a mist unwonted rises, And for a moment clear Some sweet home face his foolish thought surprises, And passes in a tear,—

Some boyish vision of his Eastern village, Of uneventful toil, Where golden harvests followed quiet tillage Above a peaceful soil.

One moment only; for the pick, uplifting, Through root and fibre cleaves, And on the muddy current slowly drifting Are swept by bruised leaves.

And yet, O poet, in thy homely fashion, Thy work thou dost fulfill, For on the turbid current of his passion Thy face is shining still!



GRIZZLY.

Coward,—of heroic size, In whose lazy muscles lies Strength we fear and yet despise; Savage,—whose relentless tusks Are content with acorn husks; Robber,—whose exploits ne'er soared O'er the bee's or squirrel's hoard; Whiskered chin and feeble nose, Claws of steel on baby toes,— Here, in solitude and shade, Shambling, shuffling plantigrade, Be thy courses undismayed!

Here, where Nature makes thy bed, Let thy rude, half-human tread Point to hidden Indian springs, Lost in ferns and fragrant grasses, Hovered o'er by timid wings, Where the wood-duck lightly passes, Where the wild bee holds her sweets,— Epicurean retreats, Fit for thee, and better than Fearful spoils of dangerous man. In thy fat-jowled deviltry Friar Tuck shall live in thee; Thou mayst levy tithe and dole; Thou shalt spread the woodland cheer, From the pilgrim taking toll; Match thy cunning with his fear; Eat, and drink, and have thy fill; Yet remain an outlaw still!



MADRONO

Captain of the Western wood, Thou that apest Robin Hood! Green above thy scarlet hose, How thy velvet mantle shows! Never tree like thee arrayed, O thou gallant of the glade!

When the fervid August sun Scorches all it looks upon, And the balsam of the pine Drips from stem to needle fine, Round thy compact shade arranged, Not a leaf of thee is changed!

When the yellow autumn sun Saddens all it looks upon, Spreads its sackcloth on the hills, Strews its ashes in the rills, Thou thy scarlet hose dost doff, And in limbs of purest buff Challengest the sombre glade For a sylvan masquerade.

Where, oh, where, shall he begin Who would paint thee, Harlequin? With thy waxen burnished leaf, With thy branches' red relief, With thy polytinted fruit,— In thy spring or autumn suit,— Where begin, and oh, where end, Thou whose charms all art transcend?



COYOTE

Blown out of the prairie in twilight and dew, Half bold and half timid, yet lazy all through; Loath ever to leave, and yet fearful to stay, He limps in the clearing, an outcast in gray.

A shade on the stubble, a ghost by the wall, Now leaping, now limping, now risking a fall, Lop-eared and large-jointed, but ever alway A thoroughly vagabond outcast in gray.

Here, Carlo, old fellow,—he's one of your kind,— Go, seek him, and bring him in out of the wind. What! snarling, my Carlo! So even dogs may Deny their own kin in the outcast in gray.

Well, take what you will,—though it be on the sly, Marauding or begging,—I shall not ask why, But will call it a dole, just to help on his way A four-footed friar in orders of gray!



TO A SEA-BIRD

(SANTA CRUZ, 1869)

Sauntering hither on listless wings, Careless vagabond of the sea, Little thou heedest the surf that sings, The bar that thunders, the shale that rings,— Give me to keep thy company.

Little thou hast, old friend, that's new; Storms and wrecks are old things to thee; Sick am I of these changes, too; Little to care for, little to rue,— I on the shore, and thou on the sea.

All of thy wanderings, far and near, Bring thee at last to shore and me; All of my journeyings end them here: This our tether must be our cheer,— I on the shore, and thou on the sea.

Lazily rocking on ocean's breast, Something in common, old friend, have we: Thou on the shingle seek'st thy nest, I to the waters look for rest,— I on the shore, and thou on the sea.



WHAT THE CHIMNEY SANG

Over the chimney the night-wind sang And chanted a melody no one knew; And the Woman stopped, as her babe she tossed, And thought of the one she had long since lost, And said, as her teardrops back she forced, "I hate the wind in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang And chanted a melody no one knew; And the Children said, as they closer drew, "'Tis some witch that is cleaving the black night through, 'Tis a fairy trumpet that just then blew, And we fear the wind in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang And chanted a melody no one knew; And the Man, as he sat on his hearth below, Said to himself, "It will surely snow, And fuel is dear and wages low, And I'll stop the leak in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang And chanted a melody no one knew; But the Poet listened and smiled, for he Was Man and Woman and Child, all three, And said, "It is God's own harmony, This wind we hear in the chimney."



DICKENS IN CAMP

Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting, The river sang below; The dim Sierras, far beyond, uplifting Their minarets of snow.

The roaring camp-fire, with rude humor, painted The ruddy tints of health On haggard face and form that drooped and fainted In the fierce race for wealth;

Till one arose, and from his pack's scant treasure A hoarded volume drew, And cards were dropped from hands of listless leisure To hear the tale anew.

And then, while round them shadows gathered faster, And as the firelight fell, He read aloud the book wherein the Master Had writ of "Little Nell."

Perhaps 'twas boyish fancy,—for the reader Was youngest of them all,— But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar A silence seemed to fall;

The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows, Listened in every spray, While the whole camp with "Nell" on English meadows Wandered and lost their way.

And so in mountain solitudes—o'ertaken As by some spell divine— Their cares dropped from them like the needles shaken From out the gusty pine.

Lost is that camp and wasted all its fire; And he who wrought that spell? Ah! towering pine and stately Kentish spire, Ye have one tale to tell!

Lost is that camp, but let its fragrant story Blend with the breath that thrills With hop-vine's incense all the pensive glory That fills the Kentish hills.

And on that grave where English oak and holly And laurel wreaths entwine, Deem it not all a too presumptuous folly, This spray of Western pine!

July, 1870.



"TWENTY YEARS"

Beg your pardon, old fellow! I think I was dreaming just now when you spoke. The fact is, the musical clink Of the ice on your wine-goblet's brink A chord of my memory woke.

And I stood in the pasture-field where Twenty summers ago I had stood; And I heard in that sound, I declare, The clinking of bells in the air, Of the cows coming home from the wood.

Then the apple-bloom shook on the hill; And the mullein-stalks tilted each lance; And the sun behind Rapalye's mill Was my uttermost West, and could thrill Like some fanciful land of romance.

Then my friend was a hero, and then My girl was an angel. In fine, I drank buttermilk; for at ten Faith asks less to aid her than when At thirty we doubt over wine.

Ah, well, it DOES seem that I must Have been dreaming just now when you spoke, Or lost, very like, in the dust Of the years that slow fashioned the crust On that bottle whose seal you last broke.

Twenty years was its age, did you say? Twenty years? Ah, my friend, it is true! All the dreams that have flown since that day, All the hopes in that time passed away, Old friend, I've been drinking with you!



FATE

"The sky is clouded, the rocks are bare, The spray of the tempest is white in air; The winds are out with the waves at play, And I shall not tempt the sea to-day.

"The trail is narrow, the wood is dim, The panther clings to the arching limb; And the lion's whelps are abroad at play, And I shall not join in the chase to-day."

But the ship sailed safely over the sea, And the hunters came from the chase in glee; And the town that was builded upon a rock Was swallowed up in the earthquake shock.



GRANDMOTHER TENTERDEN

(MASSACHUSETTS SHORE, 1800)

I mind it was but yesterday: The sun was dim, the air was chill; Below the town, below the hill, The sails of my son's ship did fill,— My Jacob, who was cast away.

He said, "God keep you, mother dear," But did not turn to kiss his wife; They had some foolish, idle strife; Her tongue was like a two-edged knife, And he was proud as any peer.

Howbeit that night I took no note Of sea nor sky, for all was drear; I marked not that the hills looked near, Nor that the moon, though curved and clear, Through curd-like scud did drive and float.

For with my darling went the joy Of autumn woods and meadows brown; I came to hate the little town; It seemed as if the sun went down With him, my only darling boy.

It was the middle of the night: The wind, it shifted west-by-south,— It piled high up the harbor mouth; The marshes, black with summer drouth, Were all abroad with sea-foam white.

It was the middle of the night: The sea upon the garden leapt, And my son's wife in quiet slept, And I, his mother, waked and wept, When lo! there came a sudden light.

And there he stood! His seaman's dress All wet and dripping seemed to be; The pale blue fires of the sea Dripped from his garments constantly,— I could not speak through cowardness.

"I come through night and storm," he said. "Through storm and night and death," said he, "To kiss my wife, if it so be That strife still holds 'twixt her and me, For all beyond is peace," he said.

"The sea is His, and He who sent The wind and wave can soothe their strife And brief and foolish is our life." He stooped and kissed his sleeping wife, Then sighed, and like a dream he went.

Now, when my darling kissed not me, But her—his wife—who did not wake, My heart within me seemed to break; I swore a vow, nor thenceforth spake Of what my clearer eyes did see.

And when the slow weeks brought him not, Somehow we spake of aught beside: For she—her hope upheld her pride; And I—in me all hope had died, And my son passed as if forgot.

It was about the next springtide: She pined and faded where she stood, Yet spake no word of ill or good; She had the hard, cold Edwards' blood In all her veins—and so she died.

One time I thought, before she passed, To give her peace; but ere I spake Methought, "HE will be first to break The news in heaven," and for his sake I held mine back until the last.

And here I sit, nor care to roam; I only wait to hear his call. I doubt not that this day next fall Shall see me safe in port, where all And every ship at last comes home.

And you have sailed the Spanish Main, And knew my Jacob?... Eh! Mercy! Ah! God of wisdom! hath the sea Yielded its dead to humble me? My boy!... My Jacob!... Turn again!



GUILD'S SIGNAL

[William Guild was engineer of the train which on the 19th of April, 1813, plunged into Meadow Brook, on the line of the Stonington and Providence Railroad. It was his custom, as often as he passed his home, to whistle an "All's well" to his wife. He was found, after the disaster, dead, with his hand on the throttle-valve of his engine.]

Two low whistles, quaint and clear: That was the signal the engineer— That was the signal that Guild, 'tis said— Gave to his wife at Providence, As through the sleeping town, and thence, Out in the night, On to the light, Down past the farms, lying white, he sped!

As a husband's greeting, scant, no doubt, Yet to the woman looking out, Watching and waiting, no serenade, Love-song, or midnight roundelay Said what that whistle seemed to say: "To my trust true, So, love, to you! Working or waiting, good-night!" it said.

Brisk young bagmen, tourists fine, Old commuters along the line, Brakemen and porters glanced ahead, Smiled as the signal, sharp, intense, Pierced through the shadows of Providence: "Nothing amiss— Nothing!—it is Only Guild calling his wife," they said.

Summer and winter the old refrain Rang o'er the billows of ripening grain, Pierced through the budding boughs o'erhead, Flew down the track when the red leaves burned Like living coals from the engine spurned; Sang as it flew, "To our trust true, First of all, duty. Good-night!" it said.

And then, one night, it was heard no more From Stonington over Rhode Island shore, And the folk in Providence smiled and said As they turned in their beds, "The engineer Has once forgotten his midnight cheer." ONE only knew, To his trust true, Guild lay under his engine, dead.



ASPIRING MISS DE LAINE

(A CHEMICAL NARRATIVE)

Certain facts which serve to explain The physical charms of Miss Addie De Laine, Who, as the common reports obtain, Surpassed in complexion the lily and rose; With a very sweet mouth and a retrousse nose; A figure like Hebe's, or that which revolves In a milliner's window, and partially solves That question which mentor and moralist pains, If grace may exist minus feeling or brains.

Of course the young lady had beaux by the score, All that she wanted,—what girl could ask more? Lovers that sighed and lovers that swore, Lovers that danced and lovers that played, Men of profession, of leisure, and trade; But one, who was destined to take the high part Of holding that mythical treasure, her heart,— This lover, the wonder and envy of town, Was a practicing chemist, a fellow called Brown.

I might here remark that 'twas doubted by many, In regard to the heart, if Miss Addie had any; But no one could look in that eloquent face, With its exquisite outline and features of grace, And mark, through the transparent skin, how the tide Ebbed and flowed at the impulse of passion or pride,— None could look, who believed in the blood's circulation As argued by Harvey, but saw confirmation That here, at least, Nature had triumphed o'er art, And as far as complexion went she had a heart.

But this par parenthesis. Brown was the man Preferred of all others to carry her fan, Hook her glove, drape her shawl, and do all that a belle May demand of the lover she wants to treat well. Folks wondered and stared that a fellow called Brown— Abstracted and solemn, in manner a clown, Ill dressed, with a lingering smell of the shop— Should appear as her escort at party or hop. Some swore he had cooked up some villainous charm, Or love philter, not in the regular Pharm- Acopoeia, and thus, from pure malice prepense, Had bewitched and bamboozled the young lady's sense; Others thought, with more reason, the secret to lie In a magical wash or indelible dye; While Society, with its censorious eye And judgment impartial, stood ready to damn What wasn't improper as being a sham.

For a fortnight the townfolk had all been agog With a party, the finest the season had seen, To be given in honor of Miss Pollywog, Who was just coming out as a belle of sixteen. The guests were invited; but one night before A carriage drew up at the modest back door Of Brown's lab'ratory, and, full in the glare Of a big purple bottle, some closely veiled fair Alighted and entered: to make matters plain, Spite of veils and disguises, 'twas Addie De Laine.

As a bower for true love, 'twas hardly the one That a lady would choose to be wooed in or won: No odor of rose or sweet jessamine's sigh Breathed a fragrance to hallow their pledge of troth by, Nor the balm that exhales from the odorous thyme; But the gaseous effusions of chloride of lime, And salts, which your chemist delights to explain As the base of the smell of the rose and the drain. Think of this, O ye lovers of sweetness! and know What you smell when you snuff up Lubin or Pinaud.

I pass by the greetings, the transports and bliss, Which of course duly followed a meeting like this, And come down to business,—for such the intent Of the lady who now o'er the crucible leant, In the glow of a furnace of carbon and lime, Like a fairy called up in the new pantomime,— And give but her words, as she coyly looked down In reply to the questioning glances of Brown: "I am taking the drops, and am using the paste, And the little white powders that had a sweet taste, Which you told me would brighten the glance of my eye, And the depilatory, and also the dye, And I'm charmed with the trial; and now, my dear Brown, I have one other favor,—now, ducky, don't frown,— Only one, for a chemist and genius like you But a trifle, and one you can easily do. Now listen: to-morrow, you know, is the night Of the birthday soiree of that Pollywog fright; And I'm to be there, and the dress I shall wear Is TOO lovely; but"— "But what then, ma chere?" Said Brown, as the lady came to a full stop, And glanced round the shelves of the little back shop. "Well, I want—I want something to fill out the skirt To the proper dimensions, without being girt In a stiff crinoline, or caged in a hoop That shows through one's skirt like the bars of a coop; Something light, that a lady may waltz in, or polk, With a freedom that none but you masculine folk Ever know. For, however poor woman aspires, She's always bound down to the earth by these wires. Are you listening? Nonsense! don't stare like a spoon, Idiotic; some light thing, and spacious, and soon— Something like—well, in fact—something like a balloon!"

Here she paused; and here Brown, overcome by surprise, Gave a doubting assent with still wondering eyes, And the lady departed. But just at the door Something happened,—'tis true, it had happened before In this sanctum of science,—a sibilant sound, Like some element just from its trammels unbound, Or two substances that their affinities found.

The night of the anxiously looked for soiree Had come, with its fair ones in gorgeous array; With the rattle of wheels and the tinkle of bells, And the "How do ye do's" and the "Hope you are well's;" And the crush in the passage, and last lingering look You give as you hang your best hat on the hook; The rush of hot air as the door opens wide; And your entry,—that blending of self-possessed pride And humility shown in your perfect-bred stare At the folk, as if wondering how they got there; With other tricks worthy of Vanity Fair. Meanwhile, the safe topic, the beat of the room, Already was losing its freshness and bloom; Young people were yawning, and wondering when The dance would come off; and why didn't it then: When a vague expectation was thrilling the crowd, Lo! the door swung its hinges with utterance proud! And Pompey announced, with a trumpet-like strain, The entrance of Brown and Miss Addie De Laine.

She entered; but oh! how imperfect the verb To express to the senses her movement superb! To say that she "sailed in" more clearly might tell Her grace in its buoyant and billowy swell. Her robe was a vague circumambient space, With shadowy boundaries made of point-lace; The rest was but guesswork, and well might defy The power of critical feminine eye To define or describe: 'twere as futile to try The gossamer web of the cirrus to trace, Floating far in the blue of a warm summer sky.

'Midst the humming of praises and glances of beaux That greet our fair maiden wherever she goes, Brown slipped like a shadow, grim, silent, and black, With a look of anxiety, close in her track. Once he whispered aside in her delicate ear A sentence of warning,—it might be of fear: "Don't stand in a draught, if you value your life." (Nothing more,—such advice might be given your wife Or your sweetheart, in times of bronchitis and cough, Without mystery, romance, or frivolous scoff.) But hark to the music; the dance has begun. The closely draped windows wide open are flung; The notes of the piccolo, joyous and light, Like bubbles burst forth on the warm summer night. Round about go the dancers; in circles they fly; Trip, trip, go their feet as their skirts eddy by; And swifter and lighter, but somewhat too plain, Whisks the fair circumvolving Miss Addie De Laine. Taglioni and Cerito well might have pined For the vigor and ease that her movements combined; E'en Rigelboche never flung higher her robe In the naughtiest city that's known on the globe. 'Twas amazing, 'twas scandalous; lost in surprise, Some opened their mouths, and a few shut their eyes.

But hark! At the moment Miss Addie De Laine, Circling round at the outer edge of an ellipse Which brought her fair form to the window again, From the arms of her partner incautiously slips! And a shriek fills the air, and the music is still, And the crowd gather round where her partner forlorn Still frenziedly points from the wide window-sill Into space and the night; for Miss Addie was gone! Gone like the bubble that bursts in the sun; Gone like the grain when the reaper is done; Gone like the dew on the fresh morning grass; Gone without parting farewell; and alas! Gone with a flavor of hydrogen gas!

When the weather is pleasant, you frequently meet A white-headed man slowly pacing the street; His trembling hand shading his lack-lustre eye, Half blind with continually scanning the sky. Rumor points him as some astronomical sage, Re-perusing by day the celestial page; But the reader, sagacious, will recognize Brown, Trying vainly to conjure his lost sweetheart down, And learn the stern moral this story must teach, That Genius may lift its love out of its reach.



A LEGEND OF COLOGNE

Above the bones St. Ursula owns, And those of the virgins she chaperons; Above the boats, And the bridge that floats, And the Rhine and the steamers' smoky throats; Above the chimneys and quaint-tiled roofs, Above the clatter of wheels and hoofs; Above Newmarket's open space, Above that consecrated place Where the genuine bones of the Magi seen are, And the dozen shops of the real Farina; Higher than even old Hohestrasse, Whose houses threaten the timid passer,— Above them all, Through scaffolds tall, And spires like delicate limbs in splinters, The great Cologne's Cathedral stones Climb through the storms of eight hundred winters.

Unfinished there, In high mid-air The towers halt like a broken prayer; Through years belated, Unconsummated, The hope of its architect quite frustrated. Its very youth They say, forsooth, With a quite improper purpose mated; And every stone With a curse of its own Instead of that sermon Shakespeare stated, Since the day its choir, Which all admire, By Cologne's Archbishop was consecrated.

Ah! THAT was a day, One well might say, To be marked with the largest, whitest stone To be found in the towers of all Cologne! Along the Rhine, From old Rheinstein, The people flowed like their own good wine. From Rudesheim, And Geisenheim, And every spot that is known to rhyme; From the famed Cat's Castle of St. Goarshausen, To the pictured roofs of Assmannshausen, And down the track, From quaint Schwalbach To the clustering tiles of Bacharach; From Bingen, hence To old Coblentz: From every castellated crag, Where the robber chieftains kept their "swag," The folk flowed in, and Ober-Cassel Shone with the pomp of knight and vassal; And pouring in from near and far, As the Rhine to its bosom draws the Ahr, Or takes the arm of the sober Mosel, So in Cologne, knight, squire, and losel, Choked up the city's gates with men From old St. Stephen to Zint Marjen.

What had they come to see? Ah me! I fear no glitter of pageantry, Nor sacred zeal For Church's weal, Nor faith in the virgins' bones to heal; Nor childlike trust in frank confession Drew these, who, dyed in deep transgression, Still in each nest On every crest Kept stolen goods in their possession; But only their gout For something new, More rare than the "roast" of a wandering Jew; Or—to be exact— To see—in fact— A Christian soul, in the very act Of being damned, secundum artem, By the devil, before a soul could part 'em.

For a rumor had flown Throughout Cologne That the church, in fact, was the devil's own; That its architect (Being long "suspect") Had confessed to the Bishop that he had wrecked Not only his OWN soul, but had lost The VERY FIRST CHRISTIAN SOUL that crossed The sacred threshold: and all, in fine, For that very beautiful design Of the wonderful choir They were pleased to admire. And really, he must be allowed to say— To speak in a purely business way— That, taking the ruling market prices Of souls and churches, in such a crisis It would be shown— And his Grace must own— It was really a BARGAIN for Cologne!

Such was the tale That turned cheeks pale With the thought that the enemy might prevail, And the church doors snap With a thunderclap On a Christian soul in that devil's trap. But a wiser few, Who thought that they knew Cologne's Archbishop, replied, "Pooh, pooh! Just watch him and wait, And as sure as fate, You'll find that the Bishop will give checkmate."

One here might note How the popular vote, As shown in all legends and anecdote, Declares that a breach Of trust to o'erreach The devil is something quite proper for each. And, really, if you Give the devil his due In spite of the proverb—it's something you'll rue. But to lie and deceive him, To use and to leave him, From Job up to Faust is the way to receive him, Though no one has heard It ever averred That the "Father of Lies" ever yet broke HIS word, But has left this position, In every tradition, To be taken alone by the "truth-loving" Christian! Bom! from the tower! It is the hour! The host pours in, in its pomp and power Of banners and pyx, And high crucifix, And crosiers and other processional sticks, And no end of Marys In quaint reliquaries, To gladden the souls of all true antiquaries; And an Osculum Pacis (A myth to the masses Who trusted their bones more to mail and cuirasses)— All borne by the throng Who are marching along To the square of the Dom with processional song, With the flaring of dips, And bending of hips, And the chanting of hundred perfunctory lips; And some good little boys Who had come up from Neuss And the Quirinuskirche to show off their voice: All march to the square Of the great Dom, and there File right and left, leaving alone and quite bare A covered sedan, Containing—so ran The rumor—the victim to take off the ban.

They have left it alone, They have sprinkled each stone Of the porch with a sanctified Eau de Cologne, Guaranteed in this case To disguise every trace Of a sulphurous presence in that sacred place. Two Carmelites stand On the right and left hand Of the covered sedan chair, to wait the command Of the prelate to throw Up the cover and show The form of the victim in terror below. There's a pause and a prayer, Then the signal, and there— Is a WOMAN!—by all that is good and is fair!

A woman! and known To them all—one must own TOO WELL KNOWN to the many, to-day to be shown As a martyr, or e'en As a Christian! A queen Of pleasance and revel, of glitter and sheen; So bad that the worst Of Cologne spake up first, And declared 'twas an outrage to suffer one curst, And already a fief Of the Satanic chief, To martyr herself for the Church's relief. But in vain fell their sneer On the mob, who I fear On the whole felt a strong disposition to cheer.

A woman! and there She stands in the glare Of the pitiless sun and their pitying stare,— A woman still young, With garments that clung To a figure, though wasted with passion and wrung With remorse and despair, Yet still passing fair, With jewels and gold in her dark shining hair, And cheeks that are faint 'Neath her dyes and her paint. A woman most surely—but hardly a saint!

She moves. She has gone From their pity and scorn; She has mounted alone The first step of stone, And the high swinging doors she wide open has thrown, Then pauses and turns, As the altar blaze burns On her cheeks, and with one sudden gesture she spurns Archbishop and Prior, Knight, ladye, and friar, And her voice rings out high from the vault of the choir.

"O men of Cologne! What I WAS ye have known; What I AM, as I stand here, One knoweth alone. If it be but His will I shall pass from Him still, Lost, curst, and degraded, I reckon no ill; If still by that sign Of His anger divine One soul shall be saved, He hath blessed more than mine. O men of Cologne! Stand forth, if ye own A faith like to this, or more fit to atone, And take ye my place, And God give you grace To stand and confront Him, like me, face to face!"

She paused. Yet aloof They all stand. No reproof Breaks the silence that fills the celestial roof. One instant—no more— She halts at the door, Then enters!... A flood from the roof to the floor Fills the church rosy red. She is gone! But instead, Who is this leaning forward with glorified head And hands stretched to save? Sure this is no slave Of the Powers of Darkness, with aspect so brave!

They press to the door, But too late! All is o'er. Naught remains but a woman's form prone on the floor; But they still see a trace Of that glow in her face That they saw in the light of the altar's high blaze On the image that stands With the babe in its hands Enshrined in the churches of all Christian lands.

A Te Deum sung, A censer high swung, With praise, benediction, and incense wide-flung, Proclaim that the CURSE IS REMOVED—and no worse Is the Dom for the trial—in fact, the REVERSE; For instead of their losing A soul in abusing The Evil One's faith, they gained one of his choosing.

Thus the legend is told: You will find in the old Vaulted aisles of the Dom, stiff in marble or cold In iron and brass, In gown and cuirass, The knights, priests, and bishops who came to that Mass; And high o'er the rest, With her babe at her breast, The image of Mary Madonna the blest. But you look round in vain, On each high pictured pane, For the woman most worthy to walk in her train.

Yet, standing to-day O'er the dust and the clay, 'Midst the ghosts of a life that has long passed away, With the slow-sinking sun Looking softly upon That stained-glass procession, I scarce miss the one That it does not reveal, For I know and I feel That these are but shadows—the woman was real!



THE TALE OF A PONY

Name of my heroine, simply "Rose;" Surname, tolerable only in prose; Habitat, Paris,—that is where She resided for change of air; Aetat twenty; complexion fair; Rich, good looking, and debonnaire; Smarter than Jersey lightning. There! That's her photograph, done with care.

In Paris, whatever they do besides, EVERY LADY IN FULL DRESS RIDES! Moire antiques you never meet Sweeping the filth of a dirty street But every woman's claim to ton Depends upon The team she drives, whether phaeton, Landau, or britzka. Hence it's plain That Rose, who was of her toilet vain, Should have a team that ought to be Equal to any in all Paris!

"Bring forth the horse!" The commissaire Bowed, and brought Miss Rose a pair Leading an equipage rich and rare. Why doth that lovely lady stare? Why? The tail of the off gray mare Is bobbed, by all that's good and fair! Like the shaving-brushes that soldiers wear, Scarcely showing as much back hair As Tam O'Shanter's "Meg,"—and there, Lord knows, she'd little enough to spare.

That stare and frown the Frenchman knew, But did as well-bred Frenchmen do: Raised his shoulders above his crown, Joined his thumbs with the fingers down, And said, "Ah, Heaven!"—then, "Mademoiselle, Delay one minute, and all is well!" He went—returned; by what good chance These things are managed so well in France I cannot say, but he made the sale, And the bob-tailed mare had a flowing tail.

All that is false in this world below Betrays itself in a love of show; Indignant Nature hides her lash In the purple-black of a dyed mustache; The shallowest fop will trip in French, The would-be critic will misquote Trench; In short, you're always sure to detect A sham in the things folks most affect; Bean-pods are noisiest when dry, And you always wink with your weakest eye: And that's the reason the old gray mare Forever had her tail in the air, With flourishes beyond compare, Though every whisk Incurred the risk Of leaving that sensitive region bare. She did some things that you couldn't but feel She wouldn't have done had her tail been real.

Champs Elysees: time, past five. There go the carriages,—look alive! Everything that man can drive, Or his inventive skill contrive,— Yankee buggy or English "chay," Dog-cart, droschky, and smart coupe, A desobligeante quite bulky (French idea of a Yankee sulky); Band in the distance playing a march, Footman standing stiff as starch; Savans, lorettes, deputies, Arch- Bishops, and there together range Sous-lieutenants and cent-gardes (strange Way these soldier-chaps make change), Mixed with black-eyed Polish dames, With unpronounceable awful names; Laces tremble and ribbons flout, Coachmen wrangle and gendarmes shout— Bless us! what is the row about? Ah! here comes Rosy's new turnout! Smart! You bet your life 'twas that! Nifty! (short for magnificat). Mulberry panels,—heraldic spread,— Ebony wheels picked out with red, And two gray mares that were thoroughbred: No wonder that every dandy's head Was turned by the turnout,—and 'twas said That Caskowhisky (friend of the Czar), A very good whip (as Russians are), Was tied to Rosy's triumphal car, Entranced, the reader will understand, By "ribbons" that graced her head and hand.

Alas! the hour you think would crown Your highest wishes should let you down! Or Fate should turn, by your own mischance, Your victor's car to an ambulance, From cloudless heavens her lightnings glance! (And these things happen, even in France.) And so Miss Rose, as she trotted by, The cynosure of every eye, Saw to her horror the off mare shy, Flourish her tail so exceedingly high That, disregarding the closest tie, And without giving a reason why, She flung that tail so free and frisky Off in the face of Caskowhisky.

Excuses, blushes, smiles: in fine, End of the pony's tail, and mine!



ON A CONE OF THE BIG TREES

(SEQUOIA GIGANTEA)

Brown foundling of the Western wood, Babe of primeval wildernesses! Long on my table thou hast stood Encounters strange and rude caresses; Perchance contented with thy lot, Surroundings new, and curious faces, As though ten centuries were not Imprisoned in thy shining cases.

Thou bring'st me back the halcyon days Of grateful rest, the week of leisure, The journey lapped in autumn haze, The sweet fatigue that seemed a pleasure, The morning ride, the noonday halt, The blazing slopes, the red dust rising, And then the dim, brown, columned vault, With its cool, damp, sepulchral spicing.

Once more I see the rocking masts That scrape the sky, their only tenant The jay-bird, that in frolic casts From some high yard his broad blue pennant. I see the Indian files that keep Their places in the dusty heather, Their red trunks standing ankle-deep In moccasins of rusty leather.

I see all this, and marvel much That thou, sweet woodland waif, art able To keep the company of such As throng thy friend's—the poet's—table: The latest spawn the press hath cast,— The "modern popes," "the later Byrons,"— Why, e'en the best may not outlast Thy poor relation—Sempervirens.

Thy sire saw the light that shone On Mohammed's uplifted crescent, On many a royal gilded throne And deed forgotten in the present; He saw the age of sacred trees And Druid groves and mystic larches; And saw from forest domes like these The builder bring his Gothic arches.

And must thou, foundling, still forego Thy heritage and high ambition, To lie full lowly and full low, Adjusted to thy new condition? Not hidden in the drifted snows, But under ink-drops idly spattered, And leaves ephemeral as those That on thy woodland tomb were scattered?

Yet lie thou there, O friend! and speak The moral of thy simple story: Though life is all that thou dost seek, And age alone thy crown of glory, Not thine the only germs that fail The purpose of their high creation, If their poor tenements avail For worldly show and ostentation.



LONE MOUNTAIN

(CEMETERY, SAN FRANCISCO)

This is that hill of awe That Persian Sindbad saw,— The mount magnetic; And on its seaward face, Scattered along its base, The wrecks prophetic.

Here come the argosies Blown by each idle breeze, To and fro shifting; Yet to the hill of Fate All drawing, soon or late,— Day by day drifting;

Drifting forever here Barks that for many a year Braved wind and weather; Shallops but yesterday Launched on yon shining bay,— Drawn all together.

This is the end of all: Sun thyself by the wall, O poorer Hindbad! Envy not Sindbad's fame: Here come alike the same Hindbad and Sindbad.



ALNASCHAR

Here's yer toy balloons! All sizes! Twenty cents for that. It rises Jest as quick as that 'ere, Miss, Twice as big. Ye see it is Some more fancy. Make it square Fifty for 'em both. That's fair.

That's the sixth I've sold since noon. Trade's reviving. Just as soon As this lot's worked off, I'll take Wholesale figgers. Make or break,— That's my motto! Then I'll buy In some first-class lottery One half ticket, numbered right— As I dreamed about last night.

That'll fetch it. Don't tell me! When a man's in luck, you see, All things help him. Every chance Hits him like an avalanche. Here's your toy balloons, Miss. Eh? You won't turn your face this way? Mebbe you'll be glad some day. With that clear ten thousand prize This 'yer trade I'll drop, and rise Into wholesale. No! I'll take Stocks in Wall Street. Make or break,— That's my motto! With my luck, Where's the chance of being stuck? Call it sixty thousand, clear, Made in Wall Street in one year.

Sixty thousand! Umph! Let's see! Bond and mortgage'll do for me. Good! That gal that passed me by Scornful like—why, mebbe I Some day'll hold in pawn—why not?— All her father's prop. She'll spot What's my little game, and see What I'm after's HER. He! he!

He! he! When she comes to sue— Let's see! What's the thing to do? Kick her? No! There's the perliss! Sorter throw her off like this. Hello! Stop! Help! Murder! Hey! There's my whole stock got away, Kiting on the house-tops! Lost! All a poor man's fortin! Cost? Twenty dollars! Eh! What's this? Fifty cents! God bless ye, Miss!



THE TWO SHIPS

As I stand by the cross on the lone mountain's crest, Looking over the ultimate sea, In the gloom of the mountain a ship lies at rest, And one sails away from the lea: One spreads its white wings on a far-reaching track, With pennant and sheet flowing free; One hides in the shadow with sails laid aback,— The ship that is waiting for me!

But lo! in the distance the clouds break away, The Gate's glowing portals I see; And I hear from the outgoing ship in the bay The song of the sailors in glee. So I think of the luminous footprints that bore The comfort o'er dark Galilee, And wait for the signal to go to the shore, To the ship that is waiting for me.



ADDRESS

(OPENING OF THE CALIFORNIA THEATRE, SAN FRANCISCO, JANUARY 19, 1870)

Brief words, when actions wait, are well: The prompter's hand is on his bell; The coming heroes, lovers, kings, Are idly lounging at the wings; Behind the curtain's mystic fold The glowing future lies unrolled; And yet, one moment for the Past, One retrospect,—the first and last.

"The world's a stage," the Master said. To-night a mightier truth is read: Not in the shifting canvas screen, The flash of gas or tinsel sheen; Not in the skill whose signal calls From empty boards baronial halls; But, fronting sea and curving bay, Behold the players and the play.

Ah, friends! beneath your real skies The actor's short-lived triumph dies: On that broad stage of empire won, Whose footlights were the setting sun, Whose flats a distant background rose In trackless peaks of endless snows; Here genius bows, and talent waits To copy that but One creates.

Your shifting scenes: the league of sand, An avenue by ocean spanned; The narrow beach of straggling tents, A mile of stately monuments; Your standard, lo! a flag unfurled, Whose clinging folds clasp half the world,— This is your drama, built on facts, With "twenty years between the acts."

One moment more: if here we raise The oft-sung hymn of local praise, Before the curtain facts must sway; HERE waits the moral of your play. Glassed in the poet's thought, you view What money can, yet cannot do; The faith that soars, the deeds that shine, Above the gold that builds the shrine.

And oh! when others take our place, And Earth's green curtain hides our face, Ere on the stage, so silent now, The last new hero makes his bow: So may our deeds, recalled once more In Memory's sweet but brief encore, Down all the circling ages run, With the world's plaudit of "Well done!"



DOLLY VARDEN

Dear Dolly! who does not recall The thrilling page that pictured all Those charms that held our sense in thrall Just as the artist caught her,— As down that English lane she tripped, In bowered chintz, hat sideways tipped, Trim-bodiced, bright-eyed, roguish-lipped,— The locksmith's pretty daughter?

Sweet fragment of the Master's art! O simple faith! O rustic heart! O maid that hath no counterpart In life's dry, dog-eared pages! Where shall we find thy like? Ah, stay! Methinks I saw her yesterday In chintz that flowered, as one might say, Perennial for ages.

Her father's modest cot was stone, Five stories high; in style and tone Composite, and, I frankly own, Within its walls revealing Some certain novel, strange ideas: A Gothic door with Roman piers, And floors removed some thousand years, From their Pompeian ceiling.

The small salon where she received Was Louis Quatorze, and relieved By Chinese cabinets, conceived Grotesquely by the heathen; The sofas were a classic sight,— The Roman bench (sedilia hight); The chairs were French in gold and white, And one Elizabethan.

And she, the goddess of that shrine, Two ringed fingers placed in mine,— The stones were many carats fine, And of the purest water,— Then dropped a curtsy, far enough To fairly fill her cretonne puff And show the petticoat's rich stuff That her fond parent bought her.

Her speech was simple as her dress,— Not French the more, but English less, She loved; yet sometimes, I confess, I scarce could comprehend her. Her manners were quite far from shy. There was a quiet in her eye Appalling to the Hugh who'd try With rudeness to offend her.

"But whence," I cried, "this masquerade? Some figure for to-night's charade, A Watteau shepherdess or maid?" She smiled and begged my pardon: "Why, surely you must know the name,— That woman who was Shakespeare's flame Or Byron's,—well, it's all the same: Why, Lord! I'm Dolly Varden!"



TELEMACHUS VERSUS MENTOR

Don't mind me, I beg you, old fellow,—I'll do very well here alone; You must not be kept from your "German" because I've dropped in like a stone. Leave all ceremony behind you, leave all thought of aught but yourself; And leave, if you like, the Madeira, and a dozen cigars on the shelf.

As for me, you will say to your hostess—well, I scarcely need give you a cue. Chant my praise! All will list to Apollo, though Mercury pipe to a few. Say just what you please, my dear boy; there's more eloquence lies in youth's rash Outspoken heart-impulse than ever growled under this grizzling mustache.

Go, don the dress coat of our tyrant,—youth's panoplied armor for fight,— And tie the white neckcloth that rumples, like pleasure, and lasts but a night; And pray the Nine Gods to avert you what time the Three Sisters shall frown, And you'll lose your high-comedy figure, and sit more at ease in your gown.

He's off! There's his foot on the staircase. By Jove, what a bound! Really now Did I ever leap like this springald, with Love's chaplet green on my brow? Was I such an ass? No, I fancy. Indeed, I remember quite plain A gravity mixed with my transports, a cheerfulness softened my pain.

He's gone! There's the slam of his cab door, there's the clatter of hoofs and the wheels; And while he the light toe is tripping, in this armchair I'll tilt up my heels. He's gone, and for what? For a tremor from a waist like a teetotum spun; For a rosebud that's crumpled by many before it is gathered by one.

Is there naught in the halo of youth but the glow of a passionate race—'Midst the cheers and applause of a crowd—to the goal of a beautiful face? A race that is not to the swift, a prize that no merits enforce, But is won by some faineant youth, who shall simply walk over the course?

Poor boy! shall I shock his conceit? When he talks of her cheek's loveliness, Shall I say 'twas the air of the room, and was due to carbonic excess? That when waltzing she drooped on his breast, and the veins of her eyelids grew dim, 'Twas oxygen's absence she felt, but never the presence of him?

Shall I tell him first love is a fraud, a weakling that's strangled in birth, Recalled with perfunctory tears, but lost in unsanctified mirth? Or shall I go bid him believe in all womankind's charm, and forget In the light ringing laugh of the world the rattlesnake's gay castanet?

Shall I tear out a leaf from my heart, from that book that forever is shut On the past? Shall I speak of my first love—Augusta—my Lalage? But I forget. Was it really Augusta? No. 'Twas Lucy! No. Mary! No. Di! Never mind! they were all first and faithless, and yet—I've forgotten just why.

No, no! Let him dream on and ever. Alas! he will waken too soon; And it doesn't look well for October to always be preaching at June. Poor boy! All his fond foolish trophies pinned yonder—a bow from HER hair, A few billets-doux, invitations, and—what's this? My name, I declare!

Humph! "You'll come, for I've got you a prize, with beauty and money no end: You know her, I think; 'twas on dit she once was engaged to your friend; But she says that's all over." Ah, is it? Sweet Ethel! incomparable maid! Or—what if the thing were a trick?—this letter so freely displayed!—

My opportune presence! No! nonsense! Will nobody answer the bell? Call a cab! Half past ten. Not too late yet. Oh, Ethel! Why don't you go? Well? "Master said you would wait"— Hang your master! "Have I ever a message to send?" Yes, tell him I've gone to the German to dance with the friend of his friend.



WHAT THE WOLF REALLY SAID TO LITTLE RED RIDING-HOOD

Wondering maiden, so puzzled and fair, Why dost thou murmur and ponder and stare? "Why are my eyelids so open and wild?" Only the better to see with, my child! Only the better and clearer to view Cheeks that are rosy and eyes that are blue.

Dost thou still wonder, and ask why these arms Fill thy soft bosom with tender alarms, Swaying so wickedly? Are they misplaced Clasping or shielding some delicate waist? Hands whose coarse sinews may fill you with fear Only the better protect you, my dear!

Little Red Riding-Hood, when in the street, Why do I press your small hand when we meet? Why, when you timidly offered your cheek, Why did I sigh, and why didn't I speak? Why, well: you see—if the truth must appear— I'm not your grandmother, Riding-Hood, dear!



HALF AN HOUR BEFORE SUPPER

"So she's here, your unknown Dulcinea, the lady you met on the train, And you really believe she would know you if you were to meet her again?"

"Of course," he replied, "she would know me; there never was womankind yet Forgot the effect she inspired. She excuses, but does not forget."

"Then you told her your love?" asked the elder. The younger looked up with a smile: "I sat by her side half an hour—what else was I doing the while?

"What, sit by the side of a woman as fair as the sun in the sky, And look somewhere else lest the dazzle flash back from your own to her eye?

"No, I hold that the speech of the tongue be as frank and as bold as the look, And I held up herself to herself,—that was more than she got from her book."

"Young blood!" laughed the elder; "no doubt you are voicing the mode of To-Day: But then we old fogies at least gave the lady some chance for delay.

"There's my wife (you must know),—we first met on the journey from Florence to Rome: It took me three weeks to discover who was she and where was her home;

"Three more to be duly presented; three more ere I saw her again; And a year ere my romance BEGAN where yours ended that day on the train."

"Oh, that was the style of the stage-coach; we travel to-day by express; Forty miles to the hour," he answered, "won't admit of a passion that's less."

"But what if you make a mistake?" quoth the elder. The younger half sighed. "What happens when signals are wrong or switches misplaced?" he replied.

"Very well, I must bow to your wisdom," the elder returned, "but submit Your chances of winning this woman your boldness has bettered no whit.

"Why, you do not at best know her name. And what if I try your ideal With something, if not quite so fair, at least more en regle and real?

"Let me find you a partner. Nay, come, I insist—you shall follow— this way. My dear, will you not add your grace to entreat Mr. Rapid to stay?

"My wife, Mr. Rapid— Eh, what! Why, he's gone—yet he said he would come. How rude! I don't wonder, my dear, you are properly crimson and dumb!"



WHAT THE BULLET SANG

O joy of creation To be! O rapture to fly And be free! Be the battle lost or won, Though its smoke shall hide the sun, I shall find my love,—the one Born for me!

I shall know him where he stands, All alone, With the power in his hands Not o'erthrown; I shall know him by his face, By his godlike front and grace; I shall hold him for a space, All my own!

It is he—O my love! So bold! It is I—all thy love Foretold! It is I. O love! what bliss! Dost thou answer to my kiss? O sweetheart! what is this Lieth there so cold?



THE OLD CAMP-FIRE

Now shift the blanket pad before your saddle back you fling, And draw your cinch up tighter till the sweat drops from the ring: We've a dozen miles to cover ere we reach the next divide. Our limbs are stiffer now than when we first set out to ride, And worse, the horses know it, and feel the leg-grip tire, Since in the days when, long ago, we sought the old camp-fire.

Yes, twenty years! Lord! how we'd scent its incense down the trail, Through balm of bay and spice of spruce, when eye and ear would fail, And worn and faint from useless quest we crept, like this, to rest, Or, flushed with luck and youthful hope, we rode, like this, abreast. Ay! straighten up, old friend, and let the mustang think he's nigher, Through looser rein and stirrup strain, the welcome old camp-fire.

You know the shout that would ring out before us down the glade, And start the blue jays like a flight of arrows through the shade, And sift the thin pine needles down like slanting, shining rain, And send the squirrels scampering back to their holes again, Until we saw, blue-veiled and dim, or leaping like desire, That flame of twenty years ago, which lit the old camp-fire.

And then that rest on Nature's breast, when talk had dropped, and slow The night wind went from tree to tree with challenge soft and low! We lay on lazy elbows propped, or stood to stir the flame, Till up the soaring redwood's shaft our shadows danced and came, As if to draw us with the sparks, high o'er its unseen spire, To the five stars that kept their ward above the old camp-fire,—

Those picket stars whose tranquil watch half soothed, half shamed our sleep. What recked we then what beasts or men around might lurk or creep? We lay and heard with listless ears the far-off panther's cry, The near coyote's snarling snap, the grizzly's deep-drawn sigh, The brown bear's blundering human tread, the gray wolves' yelping choir Beyond the magic circle drawn around the old camp-fire.

And then that morn! Was ever morn so filled with all things new? The light that fell through long brown aisles from out the kindling blue, The creak and yawn of stretching boughs, the jay-bird's early call, The rat-tat-tat of woodpecker that waked the woodland hall, The fainter stir of lower life in fern and brake and brier, Till flashing leaped the torch of Day from last night's old camp-fire!

Well, well! we'll see it once again; we should be near it now; It's scarce a mile to where the trail strikes off to skirt the slough, And then the dip to Indian Spring, the wooded rise, and—strange! Yet here should stand the blasted pine that marked our farther range; And here—what's this? A ragged swab of ruts and stumps and mire! Sure this is not the sacred grove that hid the old camp-fire!

Yet here's the "blaze" I cut myself, and there's the stumbling ledge, With quartz "outcrop" that lay atop, now leveled to its edge, And mounds of moss-grown stumps beside the woodman's rotting chips, And gashes in the hillside, that gape with dumb red lips. And yet above the shattered wreck and ruin, curling higher— Ah yes!—still lifts the smoke that marked the welcome old camp-fire!

Perhaps some friend of twenty years still lingers there to raise To weary hearts and tired eyes that beacon of old days. Perhaps but stay; 'tis gone! and yet once more it lifts as though To meet our tardy blundering steps, and seems to MOVE, and lo! Whirls by us in a rush of sound,—the vanished funeral pyre Of hopes and fears that twenty years burned in the old camp-fire!

For see, beyond the prospect spreads, with chimney, spire, and roof,— Two iron bands across the trail clank to our mustang's hoof; Above them leap two blackened threads from limb-lopped tree to tree, To where the whitewashed station speeds its message to the sea. Rein in! Rein in! The quest is o'er. The goal of our desire Is but the train whose track has lain across the old camp-fire!



THE STATION-MASTER OF LONE PRAIRIE

An empty bench, a sky of grayest etching, A bare, bleak shed in blackest silhouette, Twelve years of platform, and before them stretching Twelve miles of prairie glimmering through the wet.

North, south, east, west,—the same dull gray persistence, The tattered vapors of a vanished train, The narrowing rails that meet to pierce the distance, Or break the columns of the far-off rain.

Naught but myself; nor form nor figure breaking The long hushed level and stark shining waste; Nothing that moves to fill the vision aching, When the last shadow fled in sullen haste.

Nothing beyond. Ah yes! From out the station A stiff, gaunt figure thrown against the sky, Beckoning me with some wooden salutation Caught from his signals as the train flashed by;

Yielding me place beside him with dumb gesture Born of that reticence of sky and air. We sit apart, yet wrapped in that one vesture Of silence, sadness, and unspoken care:

Each following his own thought,—around us darkening The rain-washed boundaries and stretching track,— Each following those dim parallels and hearkening For long-lost voices that will not come back.

Until, unasked,—I knew not why or wherefore,— He yielded, bit by bit, his dreary past, Like gathered clouds that seemed to thicken there for Some dull down-dropping of their care at last.

Long had he lived there. As a boy had started From the stacked corn the Indian's painted face; Heard the wolves' howl the wearying waste that parted His father's hut from the last camping-place.

Nature had mocked him: thrice had claimed the reaping, With scythe of fire, of lands she once had sown; Sent the tornado, round his hearthstone heaping Rafters, dead faces that were like his own.

Then came the War Time. When its shadow beckoned He had walked dumbly where the flag had led Through swamp and fen,—unknown, unpraised, unreckoned,— To famine, fever, and a prison bed.

Till the storm passed, and the slow tide returning Cast him, a wreck, beneath his native sky; Here, at his watch, gave him the chance of earning Scant means to live—who won the right to die.

All this I heard—or seemed to hear—half blending With the low murmur of the coming breeze, The call of some lost bird, and the unending And tireless sobbing of those grassy seas.

Until at last the spell of desolation Broke with a trembling star and far-off cry. The coming train! I glanced around the station, All was as empty as the upper sky!

Naught but myself; nor form nor figure waking The long hushed level and stark shining waste; Naught but myself, that cry, and the dull shaking Of wheel and axle, stopped in breathless haste!

"Now, then—look sharp! Eh, what? The Station-Master? THAR'S NONE! We stopped here of our own accord. The man got killed in that down-train disaster This time last evening. Right there! All aboard!"



THE MISSION BELLS OF MONTEREY

O bells that rang, O bells that sang Above the martyrs' wilderness, Till from that reddened coast-line sprang The Gospel seed to cheer and bless, What are your garnered sheaves to-day? O Mission bells! Eleison bells! O Mission bells of Monterey!

O bells that crash, O bells that clash Above the chimney-crowded plain, On wall and tower your voices dash, But never with the old refrain; In mart and temple gone astray! Ye dangle bells! Ye jangle bells! Ye wrangle bells of Monterey!

O bells that die, so far, so nigh, Come back once more across the sea; Not with the zealot's furious cry, Not with the creed's austerity; Come with His love alone to stay, O Mission bells! Eleison bells! O Mission bells of Monterey!

* This poem was set to music by Monsieur Charles Gounod.



"CROTALUS"

(RATTLESNAKE BAR, SIERRAS)

No life in earth, or air, or sky; The sunbeams, broken silently, On the bared rocks around me lie,—

Cold rocks with half-warmed lichens scarred, And scales of moss; and scarce a yard Away, one long strip, yellow-barred.

Lost in a cleft! 'Tis but a stride To reach it, thrust its roots aside, And lift it on thy stick astride!

Yet stay! That moment is thy grace! For round thee, thrilling air and space, A chattering terror fills the place!

A sound as of dry bones that stir In the dead Valley! By yon fir The locust stops its noonday whir!

The wild bird hears; smote with the sound, As if by bullet brought to ground, On broken wing, dips, wheeling round!

The hare, transfixed, with trembling lip, Halts, breathless, on pulsating hip, And palsied tread, and heels that slip.

Enough, old friend!—'tis thou. Forget My heedless foot, nor longer fret The peace with thy grim castanet!

I know thee! Yes! Thou mayst forego That lifted crest; the measured blow Beyond which thy pride scorns to go,

Or yet retract! For me no spell Lights those slit orbs, where, some think, dwell Machicolated fires of hell!

I only know thee humble, bold, Haughty, with miseries untold, And the old Curse that left thee cold,

And drove thee ever to the sun, On blistering rocks; nor made thee shun Our cabin's hearth, when day was done,

And the spent ashes warmed thee best; We knew thee,—silent, joyless guest Of our rude ingle. E'en thy quest

Of the rare milk-bowl seemed to be Naught but a brother's poverty, And Spartan taste that kept thee free

From lust and rapine. Thou! whose fame Searchest the grass with tongue of flame, Making all creatures seem thy game;

When the whole woods before thee run, Asked but—when all was said and done— To lie, untrodden, in the sun!



ON WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT

DEAD AT PITTSFIELD, MASS., 1876

O poor Romancer—thou whose printed page, Filled with rude speech and ruder forms of strife, Was given to heroes in whose vulgar rage No trace appears of gentler ways and life!—

Thou who wast wont of commoner clay to build Some rough Achilles or some Ajax tall; Thou whose free brush too oft was wont to gild Some single virtue till it dazzled all;—

What right hast thou beside this laureled bier Whereon all manhood lies—whereon the wreath Of Harvard rests, the civic crown, and here The starry flag, and sword and jeweled sheath?

Seest thou these hatchments? Knowest thou this blood Nourished the heroes of Colonial days— Sent to the dim and savage-haunted wood Those sad-eyed Puritans with hymns of praise?

Look round thee! Everywhere is classic ground. There Greylock rears. Beside yon silver "Bowl" Great Hawthorne dwelt, and in its mirror found Those quaint, strange shapes that filled his poet's soul.

Still silent, Stranger? Thou who now and then Touched the too credulous ear with pathos, canst not speak? Hast lost thy ready skill of tongue and pen? What, Jester! Tears upon that painted cheek?

Pardon, good friends! I am not here to mar His laureled wreaths with this poor tinseled crown— This man who taught me how 'twas better far To be the poem than to write it down.

I bring no lesson. Well have others preached This sword that dealt full many a gallant blow; I come once more to touch the hand that reached Its knightly gauntlet to the vanquished foe.

O pale Aristocrat, that liest there, So cold, so silent! Couldst thou not in grace Have borne with us still longer, and so spare The scorn we see in that proud, placid face?

"Hail and farewell!" So the proud Roman cried O'er his dead hero. "Hail," but not "farewell." With each high thought thou walkest side by side; We feel thee, touch thee, know who wrought the spell!



THE BIRDS OF CIRENCESTER

Did I ever tell you, my dears, the way That the birds of Cisseter—"Cisseter!" eh? Well "Ciren-cester"—one OUGHT to say, From "Castra," or "Caster," As your Latin master Will further explain to you some day; Though even the wisest err, And Shakespeare writes "Ci-cester," While every visitor Who doesn't say "Cissiter" Is in "Ciren-cester" considered astray.

A hundred miles from London town— Where the river goes curving and broadening down From tree-top to spire, and spire to mast, Till it tumbles outright in the Channel at last— A hundred miles from that flat foreshore That the Danes and the Northmen haunt no more— There's a little cup in the Cotswold hills Which a spring in a meadow bubbles and fills, Spanned by a heron's wing—crossed by a stride— Calm and untroubled by dreams of pride, Guiltless of Fame or ambition's aims, That is the source of the lordly Thames! Remark here again that custom contemns Both "Tames" and Thames—you must SAY "Tems!" But WHY? no matter!—from them you can see Cirencester's tall spires loom up o'er the lea.

A. D. Five Hundred and Fifty-two, The Saxon invaders—a terrible crew— Had forced the lines of the Britons through; And Cirencester, half mud and thatch, Dry and crisp as a tinder match, Was fiercely beleaguered by foes, who'd catch At any device that could harry and rout The folk that so boldly were holding out.

For the streets of the town—as you'll see to-day— Were twisted and curved in a curious way That kept the invaders still at bay; And the longest bolt that a Saxon drew Was stopped ere a dozen of yards it flew, By a turn in the street, and a law so true That even these robbers—of all laws scorners!— Knew you couldn't shoot arrows AROUND street corners.

So they sat them down on a little knoll, And each man scratched his Saxon poll, And stared at the sky, where, clear and high, The birds of that summer went singing by, As if, in his glee, each motley jester Were mocking the foes of Cirencester, Till the jeering crow and the saucy linnet Seemed all to be saying: "Ah! you're not in it!"

High o'er their heads the mavis flew, And the "ouzel-cock so black of hue;" And the "throstle," with his "note so true" (You remember what Shakespeare says—HE knew); And the soaring lark, that kept dropping through Like a bucket spilling in wells of blue; And the merlin—seen on heraldic panes— With legs as vague as the Queen of Spain's;

And the dashing swift that would ricochet From the tufts of grasses before them, yet— Like bold Antaeus—would each time bring New life from the earth, barely touched by his wing; And the swallow and martlet that always knew The straightest way home. Here a Saxon churl drew His breath—tapped his forehead—an idea had got through!

So they brought them some nets, which straightway they filled With the swallows and martlets—the sweet birds who build In the houses of man—all that innocent guild Who sing at their labor on eaves and in thatch— And they stuck on their feathers a rude lighted match Made of resin and tow. Then they let them all go To be free! As a child-like diversion? Ah, no! To work Cirencester's red ruin and woe.