"Ten years to a day I've observed you slay, And I never have missed before Your jubilant peals as your crunching wheels Were spattered with human gore.

"Why is it, my boy, that you smother your joy, And why do you make no sign Of the merry mind that is dancing behind A solemner face than mine?"

The driver replied: "I would laugh till I cried If I had bisected you; But I'd like to explain, if I can for the pain, 'T is myself that I've cut in two."



TO A DEJECTED POET.

Thy gift, if that it be of God, Thou hast no warrant to appraise, Nor say: "Here part, O Muse, our ways, The road too stony to be trod."

Not thine to call the labor hard And the reward inadequate. Who haggles o'er his hire with Fate Is better bargainer than bard.

What! count the effort labor lost When thy good angel holds the reed? It were a sorry thing indeed To stay him till thy palm be crossed.

"The laborer is worthy"—nay, The sacred ministry of song Is rapture!—'t were a grievous wrong To fix a wages-rate for play.



A FOOL.

Says Anderson, Theosophist: "Among the many that exist In modern halls, Some lived in ancient Egypt's clime And in their childhood saw the prime Of Karnak's walls."

Ah, Anderson, if that is true 'T is my conviction, sir, that you Are one of those That once resided by the Nile, Peer to the sacred Crocodile, Heir to his woes.

My judgment is, the holy Cat Mews through your larynx (and your hat) These many years. Through you the godlike Onion brings Its melancholy sense of things, And moves to tears.

In you the Bull divine again Bellows and paws the dusty plain, To nature true. I challenge not his ancient hate But, lowering my knurly pate, Lock horns with you.

And though Reincarnation prove A creed too stubborn to remove, And all your school Of Theosophs I cannot scare— All the more earnestly I swear That you're a fool.

You'll say that this is mere abuse Without, in fraying you, a use. That's plain to see With only half an eye. Come, now, Be fair, be fair,—consider how It eases me!



THE HUMORIST.

"What is that, mother?" "The funny man, child. His hands are black, but his heart is mild."

"May I touch him, mother?" "'T were foolishly done: He is slightly touched already, my son."

"O, why does he wear such a ghastly grin?" "That's the outward sign of a joke within."

"Will he crack it, mother?" "Not so, my saint; 'T is meant for the Saturday Livercomplaint."

"Does he suffer, mother?" "God help him, yes!— A thousand and fifty kinds of distress."

"What makes him sweat so?" "The demons that lurk In the fear of having to go to work."

"Why doesn't he end, then, his life with a rope?" "Abolition of Hell has deprived him of hope."



MONTEFIORE.

I saw—'twas in a dream, the other night— A man whose hair with age was thin and white: One hundred years had bettered by his birth, And still his step was firm, his eye was bright.

Before him and about him pressed a crowd. Each head in reverence was bared and bowed, And Jews and Gentiles in a hundred tongues Extolled his deeds and spoke his fame aloud.

I joined the throng and, pushing forward, cried, "Montefiore!" with the rest, and vied In efforts to caress the hand that ne'er To want and worth had charity denied.

So closely round him swarmed our shouting clan He scarce could breathe, and taking from a pan A gleaming coin he tossed it o'er our heads, And in a moment was a lonely man!



A WARNING.

Cried Age to Youth: "Abate your speed!— The distance hither's brief indeed." But Youth pressed on without delay— The shout had reached but half the way.



DISCRETION.

SHE:

I'm told that men have sometimes got Too confidential, and Have said to one another what They—well, you understand. I hope I don't offend you, sweet, But are you sure that you're discreet?

HE:

'Tis true, sometimes my friends in wine Their conquests do recall, But none can truly say that mine Are known to him at all. I never, never talk you o'er— In truth, I never get the floor.



AN EXILE.

'Tis the census enumerator A-singing all forlorn: It's ho! for the tall potater, And ho! for the clustered corn. The whiffle-tree bends in the breeze and the fine Large eggs are a-ripening on the vine.

"Some there must be to till the soil And the widow's weeds keep down. I wasn't cut out for rural toil But they won't let me live in town! They 're not so many by two or three, As they think, but ah! they 're too many for me."

Thus the census man, bowed down with care, Warbled his wood-note high. There was blood on his brow and blood in his hair, But he had no blood in his eye.



THE DIVISION SUPERINTENDENT.

Baffled he stands upon the track— The automatic switches clack.

Where'er he turns his solemn eyes The interlocking signals rise.

The trains, before his visage pale, Glide smoothly by, nor leave the rail.

No splinter-spitted victim he Hears uttering the note high C.

In sorrow deep he hangs his head, A-weary—would that he were dead.

Now suddenly his spirits rise— A great thought kindles in his eyes.

Hope, like a headlight's vivid glare, Splendors the path of his despair.

His genius shines, the clouds roll back— "I'll place obstructions on the track!"



PSYCHOGRAPHS.

Says Gerald Massey: "When I write, a band Of souls of the departed guides my hand." How strange that poems cumbering our shelves, Penned by immortal parts, have none themselves!



TO A PROFESSIONAL EULOGIST.

Newman, in you two parasites combine: As tapeworm and as graveworm too you shine. When on the virtues of the quick you've dwelt, The pride of residence was all you felt (What vain vulgarian the wish ne'er knew To paint his lodging a flamboyant hue?) And when the praises of the dead you've sung, 'Twas appetite, not truth, inspired your tongue; As ill-bred men when warming to their wine Boast of its merit though it be but brine. Nor gratitude incites your song, nor should— Even charity would shun you if she could. You share, 'tis true, the rich man's daily dole, But what you get you take by way of toll. Vain to resist you—vermifuge alone Has power to push you from your robber throne. When to escape you he's compelled to die Hey! presto!—in the twinkling of an eye You vanish as a tapeworm, reappear As graveworm and resume your curst career. As host no more, to satisfy your need He serves as dinner your unaltered greed. O thrifty sycophant of wealth and fame, Son of servility and priest of shame, While naught your mad ambition can abate To lick the spittle of the rich and great; While still like smoke your eulogies arise To soot your heroes and inflame our eyes; While still with holy oil, like that which ran Down Aaron's beard, you smear each famous man, I cannot choose but think it very odd It ne'er occurs to you to fawn on God.



FOR WOUNDS.

O bear me, gods, to some enchanted isle Where woman's tears can antidote her smile.



ELECTION DAY.

Despots effete upon tottering thrones Unsteadily poised upon dead men's bones, Walk up! walk up! the circus is free, And this wonderful spectacle you shall see: Millions of voters who mostly are fools— Demagogues' dupes and candidates' tools, Armies of uniformed mountebanks, And braying disciples of brainless cranks. Many a week they've bellowed like beeves, Bitterly blackguarding, lying like thieves, Libeling freely the quick and the dead And painting the New Jerusalem red. Tyrants monarchical—emperors, kings, Princes and nobles and all such things— Noblemen, gentlemen, step this way: There's nothing, the Devil excepted, to pay, And the freaks and curios here to be seen Are very uncommonly grand and serene.

No more with vivacity they debate, Nor cheerfully crack the illogical pate; No longer, the dull understanding to aid, The stomach accepts the instructive blade, Nor the stubborn heart learns what is what From a revelation of rabbit-shot; And vilification's flames—behold! Burn with a bickering faint and cold.

Magnificent spectacle!—every tongue Suddenly civil that yesterday rung (Like a clapper beating a brazen bell) Each fair reputation's eternal knell; Hands no longer delivering blows, And noses, for counting, arrayed in rows.

Walk up, gentlemen—nothing to pay— The Devil goes back to Hell to-day.



THE MILITIAMAN.

"O warrior with the burnished arms— With bullion cord and tassel— Pray tell me of the lurid charms Of service and the fierce alarms: The storming of the castle, The charge across the smoking field, The rifles' busy rattle— What thoughts inspire the men who wield The blade—their gallant souls how steeled And fortified in battle."

"Nay, man of peace, seek not to know War's baleful fascination— The soldier's hunger for the foe, His dread of safety, joy to go To court annihilation. Though calling bugles blow not now, Nor drums begin to beat yet, One fear unmans me, I'll allow, And poisons all my pleasure: How If I should get my feet wet!"



"A LITERARY METHOD."

His poems Riley says that he indites Upon an empty stomach. Heavenly Powers, Feed him throat-full: for what the beggar writes Upon his empty stomach empties ours!



A WELCOME.

Because you call yourself Knights Templar, and There's neither Knight nor Temple in the land,— Because you thus by vain pretense degrade To paltry purposes traditions grand,—

Because to cheat the ignorant you say The thing that's not, elated still to sway The crass credulity of gaping fools And women by fantastical display,—

Because no sacred fires did ever warm Your hearts, high knightly service to perform— A woman's breast or coffer of a man The only citadel you dare to storm,—

Because while railing still at lord and peer, At pomp and fuss-and-feathers while you jeer, Each member of your order tries to graft A peacock's tail upon his barren rear,—

Because that all these things are thus and so, I bid you welcome to our city. Lo! You're free to come, and free to stay, and free As soon as it shall please you, sirs—to go.



A SERENADE.

"Sas agapo sas agapo," He sang beneath her lattice. "'Sas agapo'?" she murmured—"O, I wonder, now, what that is!"

Was she less fair that she did bear So light a load of knowledge? Are loving looks got out of books, Or kisses taught in college?

Of woman's lore give me no more Than how to love,—in many A tongue men brawl: she speaks them all Who says "I love," in any.



THE WISE AND GOOD.

"O father, I saw at the church as I passed The populace gathered in numbers so vast That they couldn't get in; and their voices were low, And they looked as if suffering terrible woe."

"'Twas the funeral, child, of a gentleman dead For whom the great heart of humanity bled."

"What made it bleed, father, for every day Somebody passes forever away? Do the newspaper men print a column or more Of every person whose troubles are o'er?"

"O, no; they could never do that—and indeed, Though printers might print it, no reader would read. To the sepulcher all, soon or late, must be borne, But 'tis only the Wise and the Good that all mourn."

"That's right, father dear, but how can our eyes Distinguish in dead men the Good and the Wise?"

"That's easy enough to the stupidest mind: They're poor, and in dying leave nothing behind."

"Seest thou in mine eye, father, anything green? And takest thy son for a gaping marine? Go tell thy fine tale of the Wise and the Good Who are poor and lamented to babes in the wood."

And that horrible youth as I hastened away Was building a wink that affronted the day.



THE LOST COLONEL.

"'Tis a woeful yarn," said the sailor man bold Who had sailed the northern-lakes— "No woefuler one has ever been told Exceptin' them called 'fakes.'"

"Go on, thou son of the wind and fog, For I burn to know the worst!" But his silent lip in a glass of grog Was dreamily immersed.

Then he wiped it on his sleeve and said: "It's never like that I drinks But what of the gallant gent that's dead I truly mournful thinks.

"He was a soldier chap—leastways As 'Colonel' he was knew; An' he hailed from some'rs where they raise A grass that's heavenly blue.

"He sailed as a passenger aboard The schooner 'Henery Jo.' O wild the waves and galeses roared, Like taggers in a show!

"But he sat at table that calm an' mild As if he never had let His sperit know that the waves was wild An' everlastin' wet!—

"Jest set with a bottle afore his nose, As was labeled 'Total Eclipse' (The bottle was) an' he frequent rose A glass o' the same to his lips.

"An' he says to me (for the steward slick Of the 'Henery Jo' was I): 'This sailor life's the very old Nick— On the lakes it's powerful dry!'

"I says: 'Aye, aye, sir, it beats the Dutch. I hopes you'll outlast the trip.' But if I'd been him—an' I said as much— I'd 'a' took a faster ship.

"His laughture, loud an' long an' free, Rang out o'er the tempest's roar. 'You're an elegant reasoner,' says he, 'But it's powerful dry ashore!'"

"O mariner man, why pause and don A look of so deep concern? Have another glass—go on, go on, For to know the worst I burn."

"One day he was leanin' over the rail, When his footing some way slipped, An' (this is the woefulest part o' my tale), He was accidental unshipped!

"The empty boats was overboard hove, As he swum in the 'Henery's wake'; But 'fore we had 'bouted ship he had drove From sight on the ragin' lake!"

"And so the poor gentleman was drowned— And now I'm apprised of the worst." "What! him? 'Twas an hour afore he was found— In the yawl—stone dead o' thirst!"



FOR TAT.

O, heavenly powers! will wonders never cease?— Hair upon dogs and feathers upon geese! The boys in mischief and the pigs in mire! The drinking water wet! the coal on fire! In meadows, rivulets surpassing fair, Forever running, yet forever there! A tail appended to the gray baboon! A person coming out of a saloon! Last, and of all most marvelous to see, A female Yahoo flinging filth at me! If 'twould but stick I'd bear upon my coat May Little's proof that she is fit to vote.



A DILEMMA.

Filled with a zeal to serve my fellow men, For years I criticised their prose and verges: Pointed out all their blunders of the pen, Their shallowness of thought and feeling; then Damned them up hill and down with hearty curses!

They said: "That's all that he can do—just sneer, And pull to pieces and be analytic. Why doesn't he himself, eschewing fear, Publish a book or two, and so appear As one who has the right to be a critic?

"Let him who knows it all forbear to tell How little others know, but show his learning." The public added: "Who has written well May censure freely"—quoting Pope. I fell Into the trap and books began out-turning,—

Books by the score—fine prose and poems fair, And not a book of them but was a terror, They were so great and perfect; though I swear I tried right hard to work in, here and there, (My nature still forbade) a fault or error.

'Tis true, some wretches, whom I'd scratched, no doubt, Professed to find—but that's a trifling matter. Now, when the flood of noble books was out I raised o'er all that land a joyous shout, Till I was thought as mad as any hatter!

(Why hatters all are mad, I cannot say. 'T were wrong in their affliction to revile 'em, But truly, you'll confess 'tis very sad We wear the ugly things they make. Begad, They'd be less mischievous in an asylum!)

"Consistency, thou art a"—well, you're paste! When next I felt my demon in possession, And made the field of authorship a waste, All said of me: "What execrable taste, To rail at others of his own profession!"

Good Lord! where do the critic's rights begin Who has of literature some clear-cut notion, And hears a voice from Heaven say: "Pitch in"? He finds himself—alas, poor son of sin— Between the devil and the deep blue ocean!



METEMPSYCHOSIS.

Once with Christ he entered Salem, Once in Moab bullied Balaam, Once by Apuleius staged He the pious much enraged. And, again, his head, as beaver, Topped the neck of Nick the Weaver. Omar saw him (minus tether— Free and wanton as the weather: Knowing naught of bit or spur) Stamping over Bahram-Gur. Now, as Altgeld, see him joy As Governor of Illinois!



THE SAINT AND THE MONK.

Saint Peter at the gate of Heaven displayed The tools and terrors of his awful trade; The key, the frown as pitiless as night, That slays intending trespassers at sight, And, at his side in easy reach, the curled Interrogation points all ready to be hurled.

Straight up the shining cloudway (it so chanced No others were about) a soul advanced— A fat, orbicular and jolly soul With laughter-lines upon each rosy jowl— A monk so prepossessing that the saint Admired him, breathless, until weak and faint, Forgot his frown and all his questions too, Forgoing even the customary "Who?"— Threw wide the gate and, with a friendly grin, Said, "'Tis a very humble home, but pray walk in."

The soul smiled pleasantly. "Excuse me, please— Who's in there?" By insensible degrees The impudence dispelled the saint's esteem, As growing snores annihilate a dream. The frown began to blacken on his brow, His hand to reach for "Whence?" and "Why?" and "How?" "O, no offense, I hope," the soul explained; "I'm rather—well, particular. I've strained A point in coming here at all; 'tis said That Susan Anthony (I hear she's dead At last) and all her followers are here. As company, they'd be—confess it—rather queer."

The saint replied, his rising anger past: "What can I do?—the law is hard-and-fast, Albeit unwritten and on earth unknown— An oral order issued from the Throne. By but one sin has Woman e'er incurred God's wrath. To accuse Them Loud of that would be absurd."

That friar sighed, but, calling up a smile, Said, slowly turning on his heel the while: "Farewell, my friend. Put up the chain and bar— I'm going, so please you, where the pretty women are."

1895.



THE OPPOSING SEX.

The Widows of Ashur Are loud in their wailing: "No longer the 'masher' Sees Widows of Ashur!" So each is a lasher Of Man's smallest failing. The Widows of Ashur Are loud in their wailing.

The Cave of Adullam, That home of reviling— No wooing can gull 'em In Cave of Adullam. No angel can lull 'em To cease their defiling The Cave of Adullam, That home of reviling.

At men they are cursing— The Widows of Ashur; Themselves, too, for nursing The men they are cursing. The praise they're rehearsing Of every slasher At men. They are cursing The Widows of Ashur.



A WHIPPER-IN.

[Commissioner of Pensions Dudley has established a Sunday-school and declares he will remove any clerk in his department who does not regularly attend.—N.Y. World.]

Dudley, great placeman, man of mark and note, Worthy of honor from a feeble pen Blunted in service of all true, good men, You serve the Lord—in courses, table d'hote: Au, naturel, as well as a la Nick— "Eat and be thankful, though it make you sick."

O, truly pious caterer, forbear To push the Saviour and Him crucified (Brochette you'd call it) into their inside Who're all unused to such ambrosial fare. The stomach of the soul makes quick revulsion Of aught that it has taken on compulsion.

I search the Scriptures, but I do not find That e'er the Spirit beats with angry wings For entrance to the heart, but sits and sings To charm away the scruples of the mind. It says: "Receive me, please; I'll not compel"— Though if you don't you will go straight to Hell!

Well, that's compulsion, you will say. 'T is true: We cower timidly beneath the rod Lifted in menace by an angry God, But won't endure it from an ape like you. Detested simian with thumb prehensile, Switch me and I would brain you with my pencil!

Face you the Throne, nor dare to turn your back On its transplendency to flog some wight Who gropes and stumbles in the infernal night Your ugly shadow lays along his track. O, Thou who from the Temple scourged the sin, Behold what rascals try to scourge it in!



JUDGMENT.

I drew aside the Future's veil And saw upon his bier The poet Whitman. Loud the wail And damp the falling tear.

"He's dead—he is no more!" one cried, With sobs of sorrow crammed; "No more? He's this much more," replied Another: "he is damned!"

1885.



THE FALL OF MISS LARKIN.

Hear me sing of Sally Larkin who, I'd have you understand, Played accordions as well as any lady in the land; And I've often heard it stated that her fingering was such That Professor Schweinenhauer was enchanted with her touch; And that beasts were so affected when her apparatus rang That they dropped upon their haunches and deliriously sang. This I know from testimony, though a critic, I opine, Needs an ear that is dissimilar in some respects to mine. She could sing, too, like a jaybird, and they say all eyes were wet When Sally and the ranch-dog were performing a duet— Which I take it is a song that has to be so loudly sung As to overtax the strength of any single human lung. That, at least, would seem to follow from the tale I have to tell, Which (I've told you how she flourished) is how Sally Larkin fell.

One day there came to visit Sally's dad as sleek and smart A chap as ever wandered there from any foreign part. Though his gentle birth and breeding he did not at all obtrude It was somehow whispered round he was a simon-pure Dude. Howsoe'er that may have been, it was conspicuous to see That he was a real Gent of an uncommon high degree. That Sally cast her tender and affectionate regards On this exquisite creation was, of course, upon the cards; But he didn't seem to notice, and was variously blind To her many charms of person and the merits of her mind, And preferred, I grieve to say it, to play poker with her dad, And acted in a manner that in general was bad.

One evening—'twas in summer—she was holding in her lap Her accordion, and near her stood that melancholy chap, Leaning up against a pillar with his lip in grog imbrued, Thinking, maybe, of that ancient land in which he was a Dude.

Then Sally, who was melancholy too, began to hum And elongate the accordion with a preluding thumb. Then sighs of amorosity from Sally L. exhaled, And her music apparatus sympathetically wailed. "In the gloaming, O my darling!" rose that wild impassioned strain, And her eyes were fixed on his with an intensity of pain, Till the ranch-dog from his kennel at the postern gate came round, And going into session strove to magnify the sound. He lifted up his spirit till the gloaming rang and rang With the song that to his darling he impetuously sang! Then that musing youth, recalling all his soul from other scenes, Where his fathers all were Dudes and his mothers all Dudines, From his lips removed the beaker and politely, o'er the grog, Said: "Miss Larkin, please be quiet: you will interrupt the dog."



IN HIGH LIFE.

Sir Impycu Lackland, from over the sea, Has led to the altar Miss Bloatie Bondee. The wedding took place at the Church of St. Blare; The fashion, the rank and the wealth were all there— No person was absent of all whom one meets. Lord Mammon himself bowed them into their seats, While good Sir John Satan attended the door And Sexton Beelzebub managed the floor, Respectfully keeping each dog to its rug, Preserving the peace between poodle and pug. Twelve bridesmaids escorted the bride up the aisle To blush in her blush and to smile in her smile; Twelve groomsmen supported the eminent groom To scowl in his scowl and to gloom in his gloom. The rites were performed by the hand and the lip Of his Grace the Diocesan, Billingham Pip, Assisted by three able-bodied divines. He prayed and they grunted, he read, they made signs. Such fashion, such beauty, such dressing, such grace Were ne'er before seen in that heavenly place! That night, full of gin, and all blazing inside, Sir Impycu blackened the eyes of his bride.



A BUBBLE.

Mrs. Mehitable Marcia Moore Was a dame of superior mind, With a gown which, modestly fitting before, Was greatly puffed up behind.

The bustle she wore was ingeniously planned With an inspiration bright: It magnified seven diameters and Was remarkably nice and light.

It was made of rubber and edged with lace And riveted all with brass, And the whole immense interior space Inflated with hydrogen gas.

The ladies all said when she hove in view Like the round and rising moon: "She's a stuck up thing!" which was partly true, And men called her the Captive Balloon.

To Manhattan Beach for a bath one day She went and she said: "O dear! If I leave off this what will people say? I shall look so uncommonly queer!"

So a costume she had accordingly made To take it all nicely in, And when she appeared in that suit arrayed, She was greeted with many a grin.

Proudly and happily looking around, She waded out into the wet, But the water was very, very profound, And her feet and her forehead met!

As her bubble drifted away from the shore, On the glassy billows borne, All cried: "Why, where is Mehitable Moore? I saw her go in, I'll be sworn!"

Then the bulb it swelled as the sun grew hot, Till it burst with a sullen roar, And the sea like oil closed over the spot— Farewell, O Mehitable Moore!



A RENDEZVOUS.

Nightly I put up this humble petition: "Forgive me, O Father of Glories, My sins of commission, my sins of omission, My sins of the Mission Dolores."



FRANCINE.

Did I believe the angels soon would call You, my beloved, to the other shore, And I should never see you any more, I love you so I know that I should fall Into dejection utterly, and all Love's pretty pageantry, wherein we bore Twin banners bravely in the tumult's fore, Would seem as shadows idling on a wall. So daintily I love you that my love Endures no rumor of the winter's breath, And only blossoms for it thinks the sky Forever gracious, and the stars above Forever friendly. Even the fear of death Were frost wherein its roses all would die.



AN EXAMPLE.

They were two deaf mutes, and they loved and they Resolved to be groom and bride; And they listened to nothing that any could say, Nor ever a word replied.

From wedlock when warned by the married men, Maintain an invincible mind: Be deaf and dumb until wedded—and then Be deaf and dumb and blind.



REVENGE.

A spitcat sate on a garden gate And a snapdog fared beneath; Careless and free was his mien, and he Held a fiddle-string in his teeth.

She marked his march, she wrought an arch Of her back and blew up her tail; And her eyes were green as ever were seen, And she uttered a woful wail.

The spitcat's plaint was as follows: "It ain't That I am to music a foe; For fiddle-strings bide in my own inside, And I twang them soft and low.

"But that dog has trifled with art and rifled A kitten of mine, ah me! That catgut slim was marauded from him: 'Tis the string that men call E."

Then she sounded high, in the key of Y, A note that cracked the tombs; And the missiles through the firmament flew From adjacent sleeping-rooms.

As her gruesome yell from the gate-post fell She followed it down to earth; And that snapdog wears a placard that bears The inscription: "Blind from birth."



THE GENESIS OF EMBARRASSMENT.

When Adam first saw Eve he said: "O lovely creature, share my bed." Before consenting, she her gaze Fixed on the greensward to appraise, As well as vision could avouch, The value of the proffered couch. And seeing that the grass was green And neatly clipped with a machine— Observing that the flow'rs were rare Varieties, and some were fair, The posts of precious woods, besprent With fragrant balsams, diffluent, And all things suited to her worth, She raised her angel eyes from earth To his and, blushing to confess, Murmured: "I love you, Adam—yes." Since then her daughters, it is said, Look always down when asked to wed.



IN CONTUMACIAM.

Och! Father McGlynn, Ye appear to be in Fer a bit of a bout wid the Pope; An' there's divil a doubt But he's knockin' ye out While ye're hangin' onto the rope.

An' soon ye'll lave home To thravel to Rome, For its bound to Canossa ye are. Persistin' to shtay When ye're ordered away— Bedad! that is goin' too far!



RE-EDIFIED.

Lord of the tempest, pray refrain From leveling this church again. Now in its doom, as so you've willed it, We acquiesce. But you'll rebuild it.



A BULLETIN.

"Lothario is very low," So all the doctors tell. Nay, nay, not so—he will be, though, If ever he get well.



FROM THE MINUTES.

When, with the force of a ram that discharges its ponderous body Straight at the rear elevation of the luckless culler of simples, The foot of Herculean Kilgore—statesman of surname suggestive Or carnage unspeakable!—lit like a missile prodigious Upon the Congressional door with a monstrous and mighty momentum, Causing that vain ineffective bar to political freedom To fly from its hinges, effacing the nasal excrescence of Dingley, That luckless one, decently veiling the ruin with ready bandanna, Lamented the loss of his eminence, sadly with sobs as follows: "Ah, why was I ever elected to the halls of legislation, So soon to be shown the door with pitiless emphasis? Truly, I've leaned on a broken Reed, and the same has gone back on me meanly. Where now is my prominence, erstwhile in council conspicuous, patent? Alas, I did never before understand what I now see clearly, To wit, that Democracy tends to level all human distinctions!" His fate so untoward and sad the Pine-tree statesman, bewailing, Stood in the corridor there while Democrats freed from confinement Came trooping forth from the chamber, dissembling all, as they passed him, Hilarious sentiments painful indeed to observe, and remarking: "O friend and colleague of the Speaker, what ails the unjoyous proboscis?"



WOMAN IN POLITICS.

What, madam, run for School Director? You? And want my vote and influence? Well, well, That beats me! Gad! where are we drifting to? In all my life I never have heard tell Of such sublime presumption, and I smell A nigger in the fence! Excuse me, madam; We statesmen sometimes speak like the old Adam.

But now you mention it—well, well, who knows? We might, that's certain, give the sex a show. I have a cousin—teacher. I suppose If I stand in and you 're elected—no? You'll make no bargains? That's a pretty go! But understand that school administration Belongs to Politics, not Education.

We'll pass the teacher deal; but it were wise To understand each other at the start. You know my business—books and school supplies; You'd hardly, if elected, have the heart Some small advantage to deny me—part Of all my profits to be yours. What? Stealing? Please don't express yourself with so much feeling.

You pain me, truly. Now one question more. Suppose a fair young man should ask a place As teacher—would you (pardon) shut the door Of the Department in his handsome face Until—I know not how to put the case— Would you extort a kiss to pay your favor? Good Lord! you laugh? I thought the matter graver.

Well, well, we can't do business, I suspect: A woman has no head for useful tricks. My profitable offers you reject And will not promise anything to fix The opposition. That's not politics. Good morning. Stay—I'm chaffing you, conceitedly. Madam, I mean to vote for you—repeatedly.



TO AN ASPIRANT.

What! you a Senator—you, Mike de Young? Still reeking of the gutter whence you sprung? Sir, if all Senators were such as you, Their hands so crimson and so slender, too,— (Shaped to the pocket for commercial work, For literary, fitted to the dirk)— So black their hearts, so lily-white their livers, The toga's touch would give a man the shivers.



A BALLAD OF PIKEVILLE.

Down in Southern Arizona where the Gila monster thrives, And the "Mescalero," gifted with a hundred thousand lives, Every hour renounces one of them by drinking liquid flame— The assassinating wassail that has given him his name; Where the enterprising dealer in Caucasian hair is seen To hold his harvest festival upon his village-green, While the late lamented tenderfoot upon the plain is spread With a sanguinary circle on the summit of his head; Where the cactuses (or cacti) lift their lances in the sun, And incautious jackass-rabbits come to sorrow as they run, Lived a colony of settlers—old Missouri was the State Where they formerly resided at a prehistoric date.

Now, the spot that had been chosen for this colonizing scheme Was as waterless, believe me, as an Arizona stream.

The soil was naught but ashes, by the breezes driven free, And an acre and a quarter were required to sprout a pea. So agriculture languished, for the land would not produce, And for lack of water, whisky was the beverage in use— Costly whisky, hauled in wagons many a weary, weary day, Mostly needed by the drivers to sustain them on their way. Wicked whisky! King of Evils! Why, O, why did God create Such a curse and thrust it on us in our inoffensive state?

Once a parson came among them, and a holy man was he; With his ailing stomach whisky wouldn't anywise agree; So he knelt upon the mesa and he prayed with all his chin That the Lord would send them water or incline their hearts to gin.

Scarcely was the prayer concluded ere an earthquake shook the land, And with copious effusion springs burst out on every hand! Merrily the waters gurgled, and the shock which gave them birth Fitly was by some declared a temperance movement of the earth. Astounded by the miracle, the people met that night To celebrate it properly by some religious rite; And 'tis truthfully recorded that before the moon had sunk Every man and every woman was devotionally drunk. A half a standard gallon (says history) per head Of the best Kentucky prime was at that ceremony shed. O, the glory of that country! O, the happy, happy folk. By the might of prayer delivered from Nature's broken yoke! Lo! the plains to the horizon all are yellowing with rye, And the corn upon the hill-top lifts its banners to the sky! Gone the wagons, gone the drivers, and the road is grown to grass, Over which the incalescent Bourbon did aforetime pass. Pikeville (that's the name they've given, in their wild, romantic way, To that irrigation district) now distills, statistics say, Something like a hundred gallons, out of each recurrent crop, To the head of population—and consumes it, every drop!



A BUILDER.

I saw the devil—he was working free: A customs-house he builded by the sea. "Why do you this?" The devil raised his head; "Churches and courts I've built enough," he said.



AN AUGURY.

Upon my desk a single spray, With starry blossoms fraught. I write in many an idle way, Thinking one serious thought.

"O flowers, a fine Greek name ye bear, And with a fine Greek grace." Be still, O heart, that turns to share The sunshine of a face.

"Have ye no messages—no brief, Still sign: 'Despair', or 'Hope'?" A sudden stir of stem and leaf— A breath of heliotrope!



LUSUS POLITICUS.

Come in, old gentleman. How do you do? Delighted, I'm sure, that you've called. I'm a sociable sort of a chap and you Are a pleasant-appearing person, too, With a head agreeably bald. That's right—sit down in the scuttle of coal And put up your feet in a chair. It is better to have them there: And I've always said that a hat of lead, Such as I see you wear, Was a better hat than a hat of glass. And your boots of brass Are a natural kind of boots, I swear. "May you blow your nose on a paper of pins?" Why, certainly, man, why not? I rather expected you'd do it before, When I saw you poking it in at the door. It's dev'lish hot— The weather, I mean. "You are twins"? Why, that was evident at the start, From the way that you paint your head In stripes of purple and red, With dots of yellow. That proves you a fellow With a love of legitimate art. "You've bitten a snake and are feeling bad"? That's very sad, But Longfellow's words I beg to recall: Your lot is the common lot of all. "Horses are trees and the moon is a sneeze"? That, I fancy, is just as you please. Some think that way and others hold The opposite view; I never quite knew, For the matter o' that, When everything's been said— May I offer this mat If you will stand on your head? I suppose I look to be upside down From your present point of view. It's a giddy old world, from king to clown, And a topsy-turvy, too. But, worthy and now uninverted old man, You're built, at least, on a normal plan If ever a truth I spoke. Smoke? Your air and conversation Are a liberal education, And your clothes, including the metal hat And the brazen boots—what's that?

"You never could stomach a Democrat Since General Jackson ran? You're another sort, but you predict That your party'll get consummately licked?" Good God! what a queer old man!



BEREAVEMENT.

A Countess (so they tell the tale) Who dwelt of old in Arno's vale, Where ladies, even of high degree, Know more of love than of A.B.C, Came once with a prodigious bribe Unto the learned village scribe, That most discreet and honest man Who wrote for all the lover clan, Nor e'er a secret had betrayed— Save when inadequately paid. "Write me," she sobbed—"I pray thee do— A book about the Prince di Giu— A book of poetry in praise Of all his works and all his ways; The godlike grace of his address, His more than woman's tenderness, His courage stern and lack of guile, The loves that wantoned in his smile. So great he was, so rich and kind, I'll not within a fortnight find His equal as a lover. O, My God! I shall be drowned in woe!"

"What! Prince di Giu has died!" exclaimed The honest man for letters famed, The while he pocketed her gold; "Of what'?—if I may be so bold." Fresh storms of tears the lady shed: "I stabbed him fifty times," she said.



AN INSCRIPTION

FOR A STATUE OF NAPOLEON, AT WEST POINT.

A famous conqueror, in battle brave, Who robbed the cradle to supply the grave. His reign laid quantities of human dust: He fell upon the just and the unjust.



A PICKBRAIN.

What! imitate me, friend? Suppose that you With agony and difficulty do What I do easily—what then? You've got A style I heartily wish I had not. If I from lack of sense and you from choice Grieve the judicious and the unwise rejoice, No equal censure our deserts will suit— We both are fools, but you're an ape to boot!



CONVALESCENT.

"By good men's prayers see Grant restored!" Shouts Talmage, pious creature! Yes, God, by supplication bored From every droning preacher, Exclaimed: "So be it, tiresome crew— But I've a crow to pick with you."



THE NAVAL CONSTRUCTOR.

He looked upon the ships as they All idly lay at anchor, Their sides with gorgeous workmen gay— The riveter and planker—

Republicans and Democrats, Statesmen and politicians. He saw the swarm of prudent rats Swimming for land positions.

He marked each "belted cruiser" fine, Her poddy life-belts floating In tether where the hungry brine Impinged upon her coating.

He noted with a proud regard, As any of his class would, The poplar mast and poplar yard Above the hull of bass-wood.

He saw the Eastlake frigate tall, With quaintly carven gable, Hip-roof and dormer-window—all With ivy formidable.

In short, he saw our country's hope In best of all conditions— Equipped, to the last spar and rope, By working politicians.

He boarded then the noblest ship And from the harbor glided. "Adieu, adieu!" fell from his lip. Verdict: "He suicided."

1881.



DETECTED.

In Congress once great Mowther shone, Debating weighty matters; Now into an asylum thrown, He vacuously chatters.

If in that legislative hall His wisdom still he 'd vented, It never had been known at all That Mowther was demented.



BIMETALISM.

Ben Bulger was a silver man, Though not a mine had he: He thought it were a noble plan To make the coinage free.

"There hain't for years been sech a time," Said Ben to his bull pup, "For biz—the country's broke and I'm The hardest kind of up.

"The paper says that that's because The silver coins is sea'ce, And that the chaps which makes the laws Puts gold ones in their place.

"They says them nations always be Most prosperatin' where The wolume of the currency Ain't so disgustin' rare."

His dog, which hadn't breakfasted, Dissented from his view, And wished that he could swell, instead, The volume of cold stew.

"Nobody'd put me up," said Ben, "With patriot galoots Which benefits their feller men By playin' warious roots;

"But havin' all the tools about, I'm goin' to commence A-turnin' silver dollars out Wuth eighty-seven cents.

"The feller takin' 'em can't whine: (No more, likewise, can I): They're better than the genooine, Which mostly satisfy.

"It's only makin' coinage free, And mebby might augment The wolume of the currency A noomerous per cent."

I don't quite see his error nor Malevolence prepense, But fifteen years they gave him for That technical offense.



THE RICH TESTATOR.

He lay on his bed and solemnly "signed," Gasping—perhaps 'twas a jest he meant: "This of a sound and disposing mind Is the last ill-will and contestament."



TWO METHODS.

To bucks and ewes by the Good Shepherd fed The Priest delivers masses for the dead, And even from estrays outside the fold Death for the masses he would not withhold. The Parson, loth alike to free or kill, Forsakes the souls already on the grill, And, God's prerogative of mercy shamming, Spares living sinners for a harder damning.



FOUNDATIONS OF THE STATE

Observe, dear Lord, what lively pranks Are played by sentimental cranks! First this one mounts his hinder hoofs And brays the chimneys off the roofs; Then that one, with exalted voice, Expounds the thesis of his choice, Our understandings to bombard, Till all the window panes are starred! A third augments the vocal shock Till steeples to their bases rock, Confessing, as they humbly nod, They hear and mark the will of God. A fourth in oral thunder vents His awful penury of sense Till dogs with sympathetic howls, And lowing cows, and cackling fowls, Hens, geese, and all domestic birds, Attest the wisdom of his words. Cranks thus their intellects deflate Of theories about the State. This one avers 'tis built on Truth, And that on Temperance. This youth Declares that Science bears the pile; That graybeard, with a holy smile, Says Faith is the supporting stone; While women swear that Love alone Could so unflinchingly endure The heavy load. And some are sure The solemn vow of Christian Wedlock Is the indubitable bedrock.

Physicians once about the bed Of one whose life was nearly sped Blew up a disputatious breeze About the cause of his disease: This, that and t' other thing they blamed. "Tut, tut!" the dying man exclaimed, "What made me ill I do not care; You've not an ounce of it, I'll swear. And if you had the skill to make it I'd see you hanged before I'd take it!"



AN IMPOSTER.

Must you, Carnegie, evermore explain Your worth, and all the reasons give again Why black and red are similarly white, And you and God identically right? Still must our ears without redress submit To hear you play the solemn hypocrite Walking in spirit some high moral level, Raising at once his eye-balls and the devil? Great King of Cant! if Nature had but made Your mouth without a tongue I ne'er had prayed To have an earless head. Since she did not, Bear me, ye whirlwinds, to some favored spot— Some mountain pinnacle that sleeps in air So delicately, mercifully rare That when the fellow climbs that giddy hill, As, for my sins, I know at last he will, To utter twaddle in that void inane His soundless organ he will play in vain.



UNEXPOUNDED.

On Evidence, on Deeds, on Bills, On Copyhold, on Loans, on Wills, Lawyers great books indite; The creaking of their busy quills I've never heard on Right.



FRANCE.

Unhappy State! with horrors still to strive: Thy Hugo dead, thy Boulanger alive; A Prince who'd govern where he dares not dwell, And who for power would his birthright sell— Who, anxious o'er his enemies to reign, Grabs at the scepter and conceals the chain; While pugnant factions mutually strive By cutting throats to keep the land alive. Perverse in passion, as in pride perverse— To all a mistress, to thyself a curse; Sweetheart of Europe! every sun's embrace Matures the charm and poison of thy grace. Yet time to thee nor peace nor wisdom brings: In blood of citizens and blood of kings The stones of thy stability are set, And the fair fabric trembles at a threat.



THE EASTERN QUESTION.

Looking across the line, the Grecian said: "This border I will stain a Turkey red." The Moslem smiled securely and replied: "No Greek has ever for his country dyed." While thus each patriot guarded his frontier, The Powers stole all the country in his rear.



A GUEST.

Death, are you well? I trust you have no cough That's painful or in any way annoying— No kidney trouble that may carry you off, Or heart disease to keep you from enjoying Your meals—and ours. 'T were very sad indeed To have to quit the busy life you lead.

You've been quite active lately for so old A person, and not very strong-appearing. I'm apprehensive, somehow, that my bold, Bad brother gave you trouble in the spearing. And my two friends—I fear, sir, that you ran Quite hard for them, especially the man.

I crave your pardon: 'twas no fault of mine; If you are overworked I'm sorry, very. Come in, old man, and have a glass of wine. What shall it be—Marsala, Port or Sherry? What! just a mug of blood? That's funny grog To ask a friend for, eh? Well, take it, hog!



A FALSE PROPHECY.

Dom Pedro, Emperor of far Brazil (Whence coffee comes and the three-cornered nut), They say that you're imperially ill, And threatened with paralysis. Tut-tut! Though Emperors are mortal, nothing but A nimble thunderbolt could catch and kill A man predestined to depart this life By the assassin's bullet, bomb or knife.

Sir, once there was a President who freed Ten million slaves; and once there was a Czar Who freed five times as many serfs. Sins breed The means of punishment, and tyrants are Hurled headlong out of the triumphal car If faster than the law allows they speed. Lincoln and Alexander struck a rut; You freed slaves too. Paralysis—tut-tut!

1885.



TWO TYPES.

Courageous fool!—the peril's strength unknown. Courageous man!—so conscious of your own.



SOME ANTE-MORTEM EPITAPHS.

STEPHEN DORSEY.

Fly, heedless stranger, from this spot accurst, Where rests in Satan an offender first In point of greatness, as in point of time, Of new-school rascals who proclaim their crime. Skilled with a frank loquacity to blab The dark arcana of each mighty grab, And famed for lying from his early youth, He sinned secure behind a veil of truth. Some lock their lips upon their deeds; some write A damning record and conceal from sight; Some, with a lust of speaking, die to quell it. His way to keep a secret was to tell it.

STEPHEN J. FIELD.

Here sleeps one of the greatest students Of jurisprudence. Nature endowed him with the gift Of the juristhrift. All points of law alike he threw The dice to settle. Those honest cubes were loaded true With railway metal.

GENERAL B.F. BUTLER.

Thy flesh to earth, thy soul to God, We gave, O gallant brother; And o'er thy grave the awkward squad Fired into one another!

Beneath this monument which rears its head. A giant note of admiration—dead, His life extinguished like a taper's flame. John Ericsson is lying in his fame. Behold how massive is the lofty shaft; How fine the product of the sculptor's craft; The gold how lavishly applied; the great Man's statue how impressive and sedate! Think what the cost-was! It would ill become Our modesty to specify the sum; Suffice it that a fair per cent, we're giving Of what we robbed him of when he was living.

Of Corporal Tanner the head and the trunk Are here in unconsecrate ground duly sunk. His legs in the South claim the patriot's tear, But, stranger, you needn't be blubbering here.

Jay Gould lies here. When he was newly dead He looked so natural that round his bed

The people stood, in silence all, to weep. They thought, poor souls! that he did only sleep.

Here Ingalls, sorrowing, has laid The tools of his infernal trade— His pen and tongue. So sharp and rude They grew—so slack in gratitude, His hand was wounded as he wrote, And when he spoke he cut his throat.

Within this humble mausoleum Poor Guiteau's flesh you'll find. His bones are kept in a museum, And Tillman has his mind.

Stranger, uncover; here you have in view The monument of Chauncey M. Depew. Eater and orator, the whole world round For feats of tongue and tooth alike renowned. Pauper in thought but prodigal in speech, Nothing he knew excepting how to teach. But in default of something to impart He multiplied his words with all his heart: When least he had to say, instructive most— A clam in wisdom and in wit a ghost.

Dining his way to eminence, he rowed With knife and fork up water-ways that flowed From lakes of favor—pulled with all his force And found each river sweeter than the source. Like rats, obscure beneath a kitchen floor, Gnawing and rising till obscure no more, He ate his way to eminence, and Fame Inscribes in gravy his immortal name. A trencher-knight, he, mounted on his belly, So spurred his charger that its sides were jelly. Grown desperate at last, it reared and threw him, And Indigestion, overtaking, slew him.

Here the remains of Schuyler Colfax lie; Born, all the world knows when, and Heaven knows why. In '71 he filled the public eye, In '72 he bade the world good-bye, In God's good time, with a protesting sigh, He came to life just long enough to die.

Of Morgan here lies the unspirited clay, Who secrets of Masonry swore to betray. He joined the great Order and studied with zeal The awful arcana he meant to reveal. At last in chagrin by his own hand he fell— There was nothing to learn, there was nothing to tell.



A HYMN OF THE MANY.

God's people sorely were oppressed, I heard their lamentations long;— I hear their singing, clear and strong, I see their banners in the West!

The captains shout the battle-cry, The legions muster in their might; They turn their faces to the light, They lift their arms, they testify:

"We sank beneath the Master's thong, Our chafing chains were ne'er undone;— Now clash your lances in the sun And bless your banners with a song!

"God bides his time with patient eyes While tyrants build upon the land;— He lifts his face, he lifts his hand, And from the stones his temples rise.

"Now Freedom waves her joyous wing Beyond the foemen's shields of gold. March forward, singing, for, behold, The right shall rule while God is king!"



ONE MORNING.

Because that I am weak, my love, and ill, I cannot follow the impatient feet Of my desire, but sit and watch the beat Of the unpitying pendulum fulfill The hour appointed for the air to thrill And brighten at your coming. O my sweet, The tale of moments is at last complete— The tryst is broken on the gusty hill! O lady, faithful-footed, loyal-eyed, The long leagues silence me; yet doubt me not; Think rather that the clock and sun have lied And all too early, you have sought the spot. For lo! despair has darkened all the light, And till I see your face it still is night.



AN ERROR.

Good for he's old? Ah, Youth, you do not dream How sweet the roses in the autumn seem!



AT THE "NATIONAL ENCAMPMENT."

You 're grayer than one would have thought you: The climate you have over there In the East has apparently brought you Disorders affecting the hair, Which—pardon me—seems a thought spare.

You'll not take offence at my giving Expression to notions like these. You might have been stronger if living Out here in our sanative breeze. It's unhealthy here for disease.

No, I'm not as plump as a pullet. But that's the old wound, you see. Remember my paunching a bullet?— And how that it didn't agree With—well, honest hardtack for me.

Just pass me the wine—I've a helly And horrible kind of drouth! When a fellow has that in his belly Which didn't go in at his mouth He's hotter than all Down South!

Great Scott! what a nasty day that was— When every galoot in our crack Division who didn't lie flat was Dissuaded from further attack By the bullet's felicitous whack.

'Twas there that our major slept under Some cannon of ours on the crest, Till they woke him by stilling their thunder, And he cursed them for breaking his rest, And died in the midst of his jest.

That night—it was late in November— The dead seemed uncommonly chill To the touch; and one chap I remember Who took it exceedingly ill When I dragged myself over his bill.

Well, comrades, I'm off now—good morning. Your talk is as pleasant as pie, But, pardon me, one word of warning: Speak little of self, say I. That's my way. God bless you. Good-bye.



THE KING OF BORES.

Abundant bores afflict this world, and some Are bores of magnitude that-come and—no, They're always coming, but they never go— Like funeral pageants, as they drone and hum Their lurid nonsense like a muffled drum, Or bagpipe's dread unnecessary flow. But one superb tormentor I can show— Prince Fiddlefaddle, Duc de Feefawfum. He the johndonkey is who, when I pen Amorous verses in an idle mood To nobody, or of her, reads them through And, smirking, says he knows the lady; then Calls me sly dog. I wish he understood This tender sonnet's application too.



HISTORY.

What wrecked the Roman power? One says vice, Another indolence, another dice. Emascle says polygamy. "Not so," Says Impycu—"'twas luxury and show." The parson, lifting up a brow of brass, Swears superstition gave the coup de grace, Great Allison, the statesman-chap affirms 'Twas lack of coins (croaks Medico: "'T was worms") And John P. Jones the swift suggestion collars, Averring the no coins were silver dollars. Thus, through the ages, each presuming quack Turns the poor corpse upon its rotten back, Holds a new "autopsy" and finds that death Resulted partly from the want of breath, But chiefly from some visitation sad That points his argument or serves his fad. They're all in error—never human mind The cause of the disaster has divined. What slew the Roman power? Well, provided You'll keep the secret, I will tell you. I did.



THE HERMIT.

To a hunter from the city, Overtaken by the night, Spake, in tones of tender pity For himself, an aged wight:

"I have found the world a fountain Of deceit and Life a sham. I have taken to the mountain And a Holy Hermit am.

"Sternly bent on Contemplation, Far apart from human kind—— In the hill my habitation, In the Infinite my mind.

"Ten long years I've lived a dumb thing, Growing bald and bent with dole. Vainly seeking for a Something To engage my gloomy soul.

"Gentle Pilgrim, while my roots you Eat, and quaff my simple drink, Please suggest whatever suits you As a Theme for me to Think."

Then the hunter answered gravely: "From distraction free, and strife, You could ponder very bravely On the Vanity of Life."

"O, thou wise and learned Teacher, You have solved the Problem well— You have saved a grateful creature From the agonies of hell.

"Take another root, another Cup of water: eat and drink. Now I have a Subject, brother, Tell me What, and How, to think."



TO A CRITIC OF TENNYSON.

Affronting fool, subdue your transient light; When Wisdom's dull dares Folly to be bright: If Genius stumble in the path to fame, 'Tis decency in dunces to go lame.



THE YEARLY LIE.

A merry Christmas? Prudent, as I live!— You wish me something that you need not give.

Merry or sad, what does it signify? To you 't is equal if I laugh, or die.

Your hollow greeting, like a parrot's jest, Finds all its meaning in the ear addressed.

Why "merry" Christmas? Faith, I'd rather frown Than grin and caper like a tickled clown.

When fools are merry the judicious weep; The wise are happy only when asleep.

A present? Pray you give it to disarm A man more powerful to do you harm.

'T was not your motive? Well, I cannot let You pay for favors that you'll never get.

Perish the savage custom of the gift, Founded in terror and maintained in thrift!

What men of honor need to aid their weal They purchase, or, occasion serving, steal.

Go celebrate the day with turkeys, pies, Sermons and psalms, and, for the children, lies.

Let Santa Claus descend again the flue; If Baby doubt it, swear that it is true.

"A lie well stuck to is as good as truth," And God's too old to legislate for youth.

Hail Christmas! On my knees and fowl I fall: For greater grace and better gravy call. Vive l'Humbug!—that's to say, God bless us all!



COOPERATION.

No more the swindler singly seeks his prey; To hunt in couples is the modern way— A rascal, from the public to purloin, An honest man to hide away the coin.



AN APOLOGUE.

A traveler observed one day A loaded fruit-tree by the way. And reining in his horse exclaimed: "The man is greatly to be blamed Who, careless of good morals, leaves Temptation in the way of thieves. Now lest some villain pass this way And by this fruit be led astray To bag it, I will kindly pack It snugly in my saddle-sack." He did so; then that Salt o' the Earth Rode on, rejoicing in his worth.



DIAGNOSIS.

Cried Allen Forman: "Doctor, pray Compose my spirits' strife: O what may be my chances, say, Of living all my life?

"For lately I have dreamed of high And hempen dissolution! O doctor, doctor, how can I Amend my constitution?"

The learned leech replied: "You're young And beautiful and strong— Permit me to inspect your tongue: H'm, ah, ahem!—'tis long."



FALLEN.

O, hadst thou died when thou wert great, When at thy feet a nation knelt To sob the gratitude it felt And thank the Saviour of the State, Gods might have envied thee thy fate!

Then was the laurel round thy brow, And friend and foe spoke praise of thee, While all our hearts sang victory. Alas! thou art too base to bow To hide the shame that brands it now.



DIES IRAE.

A recent republication of the late Gen. John A. Dix's disappointing translation of this famous medieval hymn, together with some researches into its history which I happened to be making at the time, induces me to undertake a translation myself. It may seem presumption in me to attempt that which so many eminent scholars of so many generations have attempted before me; but the conspicuous failure of others encourages me to hope that success, being still unachieved, is still achievable. The fault of previous translations, from Lord Macaulay's to that of Gen. Dix, has been, I venture to think, a too strict literalness, whereby the delicate irony and subtle humor of the immortal poem—though doubtless these admirable qualities were well appreciated by the translators—have been utterly sacrificed in the result. In none of the English versions that I have examined is more than a trace of the mocking spirit of insincerity pervading the whole prayer,—the cool effrontery of the suppliant in enumerating his demerits, his serenely illogical demands of salvation in spite, or rather because, of them, his meek submission to the punishment of others, and the many similarly pleasing characteristics of this amusing work, being most imperfectly conveyed. By permitting myself a reasonable freedom of rendering—in many cases boldly supplying that "missing link" between the sublime and the ridiculous which the author, writing for the acute monkish apprehension of the 13th century, did not deem it necessary to insert—I have hoped at least partially to liberate the lurking devil of humor from his fetters, letting him caper, not, certainly, as he does in the Latin, but as he probably would have done had his creator written in English. In preserving the metre and double rhymes of the original, I have acted from the same reverent regard for the music with which, in the liturgy of the Church, the verses have become inseparably wedded that inspired Gen. Dix; seeking rather to surmount the obstacles to success by honest effort, than to avoid them by the adoption of an easier versification which would have deprived my version of all utility in religious service.

I must bespeak the reader's charitable consideration in respect of the first stanza, the insuperable difficulties of which seem to have been purposely contrived in order to warn off trespassers at the very boundary of the alluring domain. I have got over the inhibition—somehow—but David and the Sibyl must try to forgive me if they find themselves represented merely by the names of those conspicuous personal qualities to which they probably owed, respectively, their powers of prophecy, as Samson's strength lay in his hair.

DIES IRAE.

Dies irae! dies ilia! Solvet saeclum in favilla Teste David cum Sibylla.

Quantus tremor est futurus, Quando Judex est venturus. Cuncta stricte discussurus.

Tuba mirum spargens sonum Per sepulchra regionem, Coget omnes ante thronum.

Mors stupebit, et Natura, Quum resurget creatura Judicanti responsura.

Liber scriptus proferetur, In quo totum continetur, Unde mundus judicetur.

Judex ergo quum sedebit, Quicquid latet apparebit, Nil inultum remanebit.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus, Quem patronem rogaturus, Quum vix justus sit securus?

Rex tremendae majestatis, Qui salvandos salvas gratis; Salva me, Fons pietatis

Recordare, Jesu pie Quod sum causa tuae viae; Ne me perdas illa die.

Quarens me sedisti lassus Redimisti crucem passus, Tantus labor non sit cassus.

Juste Judex ultionis, Donum fac remissionis Ante diem rationis.

Ingemisco tanquam reus, Culpa rubet vultus meus; Supplicanti parce, Deus.

Qui Mariam absolvisti Et latronem exaudisti, Mihi quoque spem dedisti.

Preces meae non sunt dignae, Sed tu bonus fac benigne Ne perenni cremer igne.

Inter oves locum praesta. Et ab haedis me sequestra, Statuens in parte dextra.

Confutatis maledictis, Flammis acribus addictis, Voca me cum benedictis.

Oro supplex et acclinis, Cor contritum quasi cinis; Gere curam mei finis.

Lacrymosa dies illa Qua resurgent et favilla, Judicandus homo reus Huic ergo parce, Deus!

THE DAY OF WRATH.

Day of Satan's painful duty! Earth shall vanish, hot and sooty; So says Virtue, so says Beauty.

Ah! what terror shall be shaping When the Judge the truth's undraping! Cats from every bag escaping!

Now the trumpet's invocation Calls the dead to condemnation; All receive an invitation.

Death and Nature now are quaking, And the late lamented, waking, In their breezy shrouds are shaking.

Lo! the Ledger's leaves are stirring, And the Clerk, to them referring, Makes it awkward for the erring.

When the Judge appears in session, We shall all attend confession, Loudly preaching non-suppression.

How shall I then make romances Mitigating circumstances? Even the just must take their chances.

King whose majesty amazes. Save thou him who sings thy praises; Fountain, quench my private blazes.

Pray remember, sacred Savior, Mine the playful hand that gave your Death-blow. Pardon such behavior.

Seeking me fatigue assailed thee, Calvary's outlook naught availed thee: Now 't were cruel if I failed thee.

Righteous judge and learned brother, Pray thy prejudices smother Ere we meet to try each other.

Sighs of guilt my conscience gushes, And my face vermilion flushes; Spare me for my pretty blushes.

Thief and harlot, when repenting, Thou forgav'st—be complimenting Me with sign of like relenting.

If too bold is my petition I'll receive with due submission My dismissal—from perdition.

When thy sheep thou hast selected From the goats, may I, respected, Stand amongst them undetected.

When offenders are indicted, And with trial-flames ignited, Elsewhere I'll attend if cited.

Ashen-hearted, prone, and prayerful, When of death I see the air full, Lest I perish, too, be careful.

On that day of lamentation, When, to enjoy the conflagration. Men come forth, O, be not cruel. Spare me, Lord—make them thy fuel.



ONE MOOD'S EXPRESSION.

See, Lord, fanatics all arrayed For revolution! To foil their villainous crusade Unsheathe again the sacred blade Of persecution.

What though through long disuse 't is grown A trifle rusty? 'Gainst modern heresy, whose bone Is rotten, and the flesh fly-blown, It still is trusty.

Of sterner stuff thine ancient foes, Unapprehensive, Sprang forth to meet thy biting blows; Our zealots chiefly to the nose Assume the offensive.

Then wield the blade their necks to hack, Nor ever spare one. Thy crowns of martyrdom unpack, But see that every martyr lack The head to wear one.



SOMETHING IN THE PAPERS.

"What's in the paper?" Oh, it's dev'lish dull: There's nothing happening at all—a lull After the war-storm. Mr. Someone's wife Killed by her lover with, I think, a knife. A fire on Blank Street and some babies—one, Two, three or four, I don't remember, done To quite a delicate and lovely brown. A husband shot by woman of the town— The same old story. Shipwreck somewhere south. The crew, all saved—or lost. Uncommon drouth Makes hundreds homeless up the River Mud— Though, come to think, I guess it was a flood. 'T is feared some bank will burst—or else it won't They always burst, I fancy—or they don't; Who cares a cent?—the banker pays his coin And takes his chances: bullet in the groin— But that's another item—suicide— Fool lost his money (serve him right) and died. Heigh-ho! there's noth—Jerusalem! what's this: Tom Jones has failed! My God, what an abyss Of ruin!—owes me seven hundred clear! Was ever such a damned disastrous year!



IN THE BINNACLE.

[The Church possesses the unerring compass whose needle points directly and persistently to the star of the eternal law of God.—Religious Weekly.]

The Church's compass, if you please, Has two or three (or more) degrees Of variation; And many a soul has gone to grief On this or that or t'other reef Through faith unreckoning or brief Miscalculation. Misguidance is of perils chief To navigation.

The obsequious thing makes, too, you'll mark, Obeisance through a little arc Of declination; For Satan, fearing witches, drew From Death's pale horse, one day, a shoe, And nailed it to his door to undo Their machination. Since then the needle dips to woo His habitation.



HUMILITY.

Great poets fire the world with fagots big That make a crackling racket, But I'm content with but a whispering twig To warm some single jacket.



ONE PRESIDENT.

"What are those, father?" "Statesmen, my child— Lacrymose, unparliamentary, wild."

"What are they that way for, father?" "Last fall, 'Our candidate's better,' they said, 'than all!'"

"What did they say he was, father?" "A man Built on a straight incorruptible plan— Believing that none for an office would do Unless he were honest and capable too."

"Poor gentlemen—so disappointed!" "Yes, lad, That is the feeling that's driving them mad; They're weeping and wailing and gnashing because They find that he's all that they said that he was."



THE BRIDE.

"You know, my friends, with what a brave carouse I made a second marriage in my house— Divorced old barren Reason from my bed And took the Daughter of the Vine to spouse."

So sang the Lord of Poets. In a gleam Of light that made her like an angel seem, The Daughter of the Vine said: "I myself Am Reason, and the Other was a Dream."



STRAINED RELATIONS.

Says England to Germany: "Africa's ours." Says Germany: "Ours, I opine." Says Africa: "Tell me, delectable Pow'rs, What is it that ought to be mine?"



THE MAN BORN BLIND.

A man born blind received his sight By a painful operation; And these are things he saw in the light Of an infant observation.

He saw a merchant, good and wise. And greatly, too, respected, Who looked, to those imperfect eyes, Like a swindler undetected.

He saw a patriot address A noisy public meeting. And said: "Why, that's a calf. I guess. That for the teat is bleating."

A doctor stood beside a bed And shook his summit sadly. "O see that foul assassin!" said The man who saw so badly.

He saw a lawyer pleading for A thief whom they'd been jailing, And said: "That's an accomplice, or My sight again is failing."

Upon the Bench a Justice sat, With nothing to restrain him; "'Tis strange," said the observer, "that They ventured to unchain him."

With theologic works supplied, He saw a solemn preacher; "A burglar with his kit," he cried, "To rob a fellow creature."

A bluff old farmer next he saw Sell produce in a village, And said: "What, what! is there no law To punish men for pillage?"

A dame, tall, fair and stately, passed, Who many charms united; He thanked his stars his lot was cast Where sepulchers were whited.

He saw a soldier stiff and stern, "Full of strange oaths" and toddy; But was unable to discern A wound upon his body.

Ten square leagues of rolling ground To one great man belonging, Looked like one little grassy mound With worms beneath it thronging.

A palace's well-carven stones, Where Dives dwelt contented, Seemed built throughout of human bones With human blood cemented.

He watched the yellow shining thread A silk-worm was a-spinning; "That creature's coining gold." he said, "To pay some girl for sinning."

His eyes were so untrained and dim All politics, religions, Arts, sciences, appeared to him But modes of plucking pigeons.

And so he drew his final breath, And thought he saw with sorrow Some persons weeping for his death Who'd be all smiles to-morrow.



A NIGHTMARE.

I dreamed that I was dead. The years went by: The world forgot that such a man as I Had ever lived and written: other names Were hailed with homage, in their turn to die.

Out of my grave a giant beech upgrew. Its roots transpierced my body, through and through, My substance fed its growth. From many lands Men came in troops that giant tree to view.

'T was sacred to my memory and fame— My monument. But Allen Forman came, Filled with the fervor of a new untruth, And carved upon the trunk his odious name!



A WET SEASON.

Horas non numero nisi serenas.

The rain is fierce, it flogs the earth, And man's in danger. O that my mother at my birth Had borne a stranger! The flooded ground is all around. The depth uncommon. How blest I'd be if only she Had borne a salmon.

If still denied the solar glow 'T were bliss ecstatic To be amphibious—but O, To be aquatic! We're worms, men say, o' the dust, and they That faith are firm of. O, then, be just: show me some dust To be a worm of.

The pines are chanting overhead A psalm uncheering. It's O, to have been for ages dead And hard of hearing! Restore, ye Pow'rs, the last bright hours The dial reckoned; 'Twas in the time of Egypt's prime— Rameses II.



THE CONFEDERATE FLAGS.

Tut-tut! give back the flags—how can you care You veterans and heroes? Why should you at a kind intention swear Like twenty Neroes?

Suppose the act was not so overwise— Suppose it was illegal— Is 't well on such a question to arise And pinch the Eagle?

Nay, let's economize his breath to scold And terrify the alien Who tackles him, as Hercules of old The bird Stymphalian.

Among the rebels when we made a breach Was it to get their banners? That was but incidental—'t was to teach Them better manners.

They know the lesson well enough to-day; Now, let us try to show them That we 're not only stronger far than they. (How we did mow them!)

But more magnanimous. You see, my lads, 'T was an uncommon riot; The warlike tribes of Europe fight for "fads," We fought for quiet.

If we were victors, then we all must live With the same flag above us; 'Twas all in vain unless we now forgive And make them love us.

Let kings keep trophies to display above Their doors like any savage; The freeman's trophy is the foeman's love, Despite war's ravage.

"Make treason odious?" My friends, you'll find You can't, in right and reason, While "Washington" and "treason" are combined— "Hugo" and "treason."

All human governments must take the chance And hazard of sedition. O, wretch! to pledge your manhood in advance To blind submission.

It may be wrong, it may be right, to rise In warlike insurrection: The loyalty that fools so dearly prize May mean subjection.

Be loyal to your country, yes—but how If tyrants hold dominion? The South believed they did; can't you allow For that opinion?

He who will never rise though rulers plods His liberties despising How is he manlier than the sans culottes Who's always rising?

Give back the foolish flags whose bearers fell Too valiant to forsake them. Is it presumptuous, this counsel? Well, I helped to take them.



HAEC FABULA DOCET.

A rat who'd gorged a box of bane And suffered an internal pain, Came from his hole to die (the label Required it if the rat were able) And found outside his habitat A limpid stream. Of bane and rat 'T was all unconscious; in the sun It ran and prattled just for fun. Keen to allay his inward throes, The beast immersed his filthy nose And drank—then, bloated by the stream, And filled with superheated steam, Exploded with a rascal smell, Remarking, as his fragments fell Astonished in the brook: "I'm thinking This water's damned unwholesome drinking!"



EXONERATION.

When men at candidacy don't connive, From that suspicion if their friends would free 'em, The teeth and nails with which they did not strive Should be exhibited in a museum.



AZRAEL.

The moon in the field of the keel-plowed main Was watching the growing tide: A luminous peasant was driving his wain, And he offered my soul a ride.

But I nourished a sorrow uncommonly tall, And I fixed him fast with mine eye. "O, peasant," I sang with a dying fall, "Go leave me to sing and die."

The water was weltering round my feet, As prone on the beach they lay. I chanted my death-song loud and sweet; "Kioodle, ioodle, iay!"

Then I heard the swish of erecting ears Which caught that enchanted strain. The ocean was swollen with storms of tears That fell from the shining swain.

"O, poet," leapt he to the soaken sand, "That ravishing song would make The devil a saint." He held out his hand And solemnly added: "Shake."

We shook. "I crave a victim, you see," He said—"you came hither to die." The Angel of Death, 't was he! 't was he! And the victim he crove was I!

'T was I, Fred Emerson Brooks, the bard; And he knocked me on the head. O Lord! I thought it exceedingly hard, For I didn't want to be dead.

"You'll sing no worser for that," said he, And he drove with my soul away, O, death-song singers, be warned by me, Kioodle, ioodle, iay!



AGAIN.

Well, I've met her again—at the Mission. She'd told me to see her no more; It was not a command—a petition; I'd granted it once before.

Yes, granted it, hoping she'd write me. Repenting her virtuous freak— Subdued myself daily and nightly For the better part of a week.

And then ('twas my duty to spare her The shame of recalling me) I Just sought her again to prepare her For an everlasting good-bye.

O, that evening of bliss—shall I ever Forget it?—with Shakespeare and Poe! She said, when 'twas ended: "You're never To see me again. And now go."

As we parted with kisses 'twas human And natural for me to smile As I thought, "She's in love, and a woman: She'll send for me after a while."

But she didn't; and so—well, the Mission Is fine, picturesque and gray; It's an excellent place for contrition— And sometimes she passes that way.

That's how it occurred that I met her, And that's ah there is to tell— Except that I'd like to forget her Calm way of remarking: "I'm well."

It was hardly worth while, all this keying My soul to such tensions and stirs To learn that her food was agreeing With that little stomach of hers.



HOMO PODUNKENSIS.

As the poor ass that from his paddock strays Might sound abroad his field-companions' praise, Recounting volubly their well-bred leer, Their port impressive and their wealth of ear, Mistaking for the world's assent the clang Of echoes mocking his accurst harangue; So the dull clown, untraveled though at large, Visits the city on the ocean's marge, Expands his eyes and marvels to remark Each coastwise schooner and each alien bark; Prates of "all nations," wonders as he stares That native merchants sell imported wares, Nor comprehends how in his very view A foreign vessel has a foreign crew; Yet, faithful to the hamlet of his birth, Swears it superior to aught on earth, Sighs for the temples locally renowned— The village school-house and the village pound— And chalks upon the palaces of Rome The peasant sentiments of "Home, Sweet Home!"



A SOCIAL CALL.

Well, well, old Father Christmas, is it you, With your thick neck and thin pretense of virtue? Less redness in the nose—nay, even some blue Would not, I think, particularly hurt you. When seen close to, not mounted in your car, You look the drunkard and the pig you are.

No matter, sit you down, for I am not In a gray study, as you sometimes find me. Merry? O, no, nor wish to be, God wot, But there's another year of pain behind me. That's something to be thankful for: the more There are behind, the fewer are before.

I know you, Father Christmas, for a scamp, But Heaven endowed me at my soul's creation With an affinity to every tramp That walks the world and steals its admiration. For admiration is like linen left Upon the line—got easiest by theft.

Good God! old man, just think of it! I've stood, With brains and honesty, some five-and-twenty Long years as champion of all that's good, And taken on the mazzard thwacks a-plenty. Yet now whose praises do the people bawl? Those of the fellows whom I live to maul!

Why, this is odd!—the more I try to talk Of you the more my tongue grows egotistic To prattle of myself! I'll try to balk Its waywardness and be more altruistic. So let us speak of others—how they sin, And what a devil of a state they 're in!

That's all I have to say. Good-bye, old man. Next year you possibly may find me scolding— Or miss me altogether: Nature's plan Includes, as I suppose, a final folding Of these poor empty hands. Then drop a tear To think they'll never box another ear.

THE END