TO brave Mark Twain, across the sea,
The years have brought his jubilee;
One hears it half with pain,
That fifty years have passed and gone
Since danced the merry star that shone
Above the babe, Mark Twain!
How many and many a weary day,
When sad enough were we, ‘Mark’s way’
(Unlike the Laureate’s Mark’s)
Has made us laugh until we cried,
And, sinking back exhausted, sighed,
Like Gargery, _Wot larx_!
We turn his pages, and we see
The Mississippi flowing free;
We turn again, and grin
O’er all _Tom Sawyer_ did and planned,
With him of the Ensanguined Hand,
With _Huckleberry Finn_!
Spirit of mirth, whose chime of bells
Shakes on his cap, and sweetly swells
Across the Atlantic main,
Grant that Mark’s laughter never die,
That men, through many a century,
May chuckle o’er Mark Twain!
III
POEMS
WRITTEN UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF WORDSWORTH