Of busy mills and floury sacks;
Of cars oppressed with cumbrous loads,
Hard curving down their iron roads;
Of barges grounding on their way
Down winding streams to reach the bay;
Of vessels spreading to the breeze
Their snowy sails in stormy seas,
While bearing to some foreign strand
The products of this golden land.
Ye come again with cereal brows,
And crescent blade, to fill the mows;
And never fall thy feet too soon,
Oh, ever welcome, sunny June.
Once more I see your banner spread
Across the evening sky,
I see your trace in shallow brooks
That feebly ripple by.
I see your face in mirror-lakes,
In fields and forests old,
And in the gardens all arrayed
In crimson, blue and gold.
I hear your voice in twittering birds,
That round the gables wheel,
And in the humming monologues
Which from the meadows steal.
Oh, month of Love and plighted faith,
And airy castles high!
I hear you in the lover’s song
And in the maiden’s sigh.
And in the breeze that gently wakes
The leaves upon the bough,
I feel your soothing mother-touch
Caressing cheek and brow.
Oh, sweet as sunrise to the lark,
As noonday to the bee,
Or evening to the nightingale,
Is June’s return to me.
[Illustration]
THE ANNIVERSARY.
This is the anniversary of my departure from my native fields. As I sit
gazing by the fire, pondering over the event, thoughts of friends far
away and foes who are near, come crowding upon me numerous as spirits
around some favored medium.
Many years ago I turned my back upon all I loved and setting my face
against the sinking sun, cried:—
“Ho, sailors! spread your widest sails,
And court the strong impellent gales,
Until the stout and stubborn mast
Bends like a sapling to the blast;
And westward let your bearing be;
My fortune lies beyond the sea.”
What a ruinous rent fifteen or twenty years make in a person’s lease of
life. Why, bless my benighted understanding! the seal, the signature and
the better portion of the parchment are gone. There’s hardly enough
document remaining upon which to hinge a hope. Now, that I think of it,
what have the departed years neglected to bring me? No flaxen heads
cluster around my board; no nose is flattened against the window pane;
no eye strained to mark my coming, when the granite pave is chafed by
the homeward hastening feet.
No jute or mohair chignons lie around my room in rich profusion, adding
charms to the apartment that pictures cannot give.
When I muse upon the many blessings that the past years have failed to
furnish, I am inclined to sadness. But when I turn to contemplate what
they _have_ brought, my heart sinks down into its lowest recess and for
a time lies still. Aye! that’s the rub that makes me wince.
There is but little satisfaction in the thought that I am not alone in
this. I look around and I see others drifting down the stream as rapidly
as I. Time is cutting furrows in fairer brows than mine. He has brought
many a person during the last ten years—
A scattered sight, a limping gait,
Toothless gums and a shining pate.
Why should I squeal because I feel his hands? But where are those full
cheeks, those hopeful smiles, those luxuriant locks, and firm-set
grinders that once were mine?
Gone, like the life from a busted balloon,
Gone, like the soul from a ruptured bassoon,
Gone, like the sheen from a pock-pitted cheek,
Gone, like our change at the close of the week,
Gone!
But what has that to do with my sore heel, peeled to-day by the hoof of
a clergyman’s horse before I could get out of the way? The event called
forth the following lines, written while laboring under great mental
excitement:
How blest is he above the many
Who turns to-day a handsome penny,
By stating to the drowsy throng
The line dividing right and wrong!
Far richer pickings he commands
Than ears of corn rubbed in the hands.
How different now from days of yore,
When sandal-shod and spirit sore,
With stiffened joints and limber thews,
And garments damp with midnight dews,
The poor Apostles, staff in hand,
Went limping through a stranger’s land.
Now charge they up and down the way,
Like jockeys on the “Derby day;”
And we poor wights must waltz aside,
And let the pulpit princes glide;
Or have a phaeton o’er us wheeled,
Or have our heels adroitly peeled.
Oh, money! money! root and start
Of every sin, ’tis claimed thou art;
But let them doubt the fact who will,
’Tis money spreads the gospel still.
A COUNTRY TOUR.
Yesterday I took a trip to a quiet country resort. On entering the town
I was surprised at the scarcity of men in the place. There were plenty
of women—fashionably dressed and otherwise—to be seen in the houses or
gardens, but I rarely encountered one of the male sex in my travels
through the streets. This, I at first supposed, was owing to the number
of gentlemen residing there who carry on business in the city by the
sea, and are consequently in the latter place during the day. I was
informed, however, by the proprietor of the hotel at which I stopped,
that such was not the case. He assured me it was mainly owing to the
fact that the County Court commenced that morning, and most of the male
inhabitants, as was their custom on such occasions, had taken to the
surrounding woods and mountains to escape jury duty.
The place is beautifully situated between high green hills, and said to
possess the healthiest climate of any town in the State. During the
summer months people flock there from all parts of the country. Healthy
people pay high prices at the hotels for the privilege of living there,
and sickly people do likewise, for the privilege of dying there.
The peculiarities of the town, and the distinctive manners and customs
of the inhabitants, have been ably described by a poet whose effusions
have not yet been translated into the foreign languages. Following is a
part of the poem which bears directly on the town in question:—
“Here rest we now by sulphur well,
Where invalids and nurses dwell;
Where yelping dogs run through the street
Like wolves across a prairie wide,
And cattle wild as bison meet
You face to face, on every side;
With tails in air, and frothy nose,
And leveled horns, they round you close.
“Where people sit around the door,
In lazy groups of three or four,
And still their chronic thirst abate
With copious draughts of ‘sulphur straight.’”
There was quite an excitement in the town before I left. A fire broke
out in an ash barrel situated in the rear yard of the house at which I
was stopping, and for a time threatened to destroy the ashes. There is
no estimating the amount of damage the citizens might have suffered if
the fire had spread to a wash-tub that stood close by, and which at the
time contained a portion of the town’s washing. Business was generally
suspended, and stock in the insurance companies went down immediately.
The citizens breathed more freely, however, when the efficient and
energetic Fire Department turned out promptly as one man, and hastened
to the city water-works, situated on a slight eminence in the centre of
the town, and, turning on the water, succeeded in extinguishing the
flames. The only damage done was the partial burning of the barrel and
the scorching of the wash-tub and five dog-houses. The dogs were lying
under the kitchen stove at the time, and escaped injury.
[Illustration: THE FIRE DEPARTMENT.]
A TRIP ACROSS THE BAY.
I took a trip across the water this afternoon. The bay was so rough the
ferry-boat could scarcely make her trips. The passengers were nearly all
sea-sick, and, elbow to elbow, leaned over the side of the vessel. One
gentleman, while gazing into the sea, lost his hat overboard, but he was
so taken up with internal affairs that he cared little for outward
appearances, as one could readily observe.
I reached my destination, and was convinced that all the sorrows are not
on the sea. I saw a poor old woman thrown into terrible disorder by a
kick from the cow she was milking in her own yard. Judging by the
quantity of milk lying around loose, she must have been nearly through
her task, and was probably in the very act of complimenting the cow for
her generosity, when the spiteful animal gave the pail a hoist
completely over the woman’s head, like a huge helmet, while the lacteal
fluid ran down her body. The pail seemed to stick, despite her efforts
to remove it.
[Illustration: PEERING INTO THE DEPTHS.]
As I looked back, I could see her groping toward the house, her visage
still concealed in the blue bucket. She did look odd enough, as she felt
her way up the steps, decorated with that novel head-dress.
[Illustration: GOOD-BYE.]
There is a youth in this suburban town who bids fair to be a second
Landseer. As I passed his father’s residence, I saw the young aspirant
at work sketching from nature.
He had the foot of a little cur fast in the jaws of a steel-trap staked
in the orchard. The artist sat at a short distance sketching the poor
beast, as it stood on three legs gazing at the heavens and crying
piteously. He was eagerly striving to get the expression of pain upon
the dog’s face, and by the grin upon his own countenance I judged he was
succeeding.
[Illustration: SKETCHING FROM NATURE.]
There was something in the pair that reminded me of Parrhasius and the
Captive; and being in somewhat of a sketching mood myself at the time, I
produced my book and pencil, and leaning over the fence, sketched the
painter and his howling model.
[Illustration: SO SICK!]
On my way back to the city the bay seemed even rougher than in the
morning. There was hardly a passenger on board the ferry-boat but showed
symptoms of trouble. Although most of them would have been excellent
subjects for the artist of a comic pictorial, my attention was specially
directed towards an elderly lady who sat with folded arms, the elbows
resting upon her knees, and a most woe-begone expression upon her
wrinkled visage. Some passengers who were sick were able partly to
conceal their emotions; _she_ was not; every muscle of her face betrayed
her. She was sick and couldn’t help but show it.
[Illustration: AT THE RAIL.]
If any individual amongst that crowd of disquieted passengers knocked
louder at the door of human sympathy than did the old lady referred to,
it was unmistakably that woman who was sick and had to show it at the
vessel’s rail.
CHRISTMAS EVE.
Christmas Eve! I sit idly by my window, listening to the rapid patter of
the rain upon the shingles and the wild whistle of the wind as it plays
around the gables, or draws weird music from the telegraph wires
stretched between the house tops, and upon which dangles the ghost of
many a schoolboy’s kite. Christmas Eve! and I am not yet invited out to
dinner! what can this mean? Am I then left to wither for want of
attention, like some poor shrub plucked from a garden and planted in a
graveyard? Well, let it be so. Alone though I am, I nevertheless enjoy
myself hugely, and it requires considerable to enliven me now. There was
a time when I could be moved to mirth by very little. The desperate
efforts of a one-legged grasshopper describing circles while endeavoring
to leap straight ahead, would amuse me for hours together. But it is not
so now; I turn from such scenes to bury my eyes in the pages of profound
works, and it is meet and proper I should.
For the last half hour I have been watching an old washerwoman stealing,
as I think, a neighbor’s wood. It is barely possible that she is taking
this method of paying herself for services rendered at the tub. Be this
as it may, the wood is going. There is no mistake about that.
It is interesting to me, as it furnishes food for comment, and keeps the
mind from lagging too long around the saddening fact that Time is
writing lines upon my brow “with his antique pen.” Besides it is holiday
season, and though I am not able to be charitable to a great degree, I
can at least afford to be indifferent in this case.
The washerwoman is doubtless a hard-working and deserving old body, who
perhaps has sunk her whole week’s earnings in a Christmas turkey, that
her children’s hearts may be made glad and their stomachs full; and it
would be a great pity if it should be spoiled i’ the cooking for the
want of fuel.
I waive the crime, and speak of the facts from a disinterested
stand-point. I have been such a diligent scholar in the severe school of
experience, that I have learned to look upon my own misfortunes lightly,
and certainly can behold—with an unmoistened eye—my neighbor’s choicest
sticks noiselessly slipping into an adjoining yard. Besides, my neighbor
can afford to lose a few. To make my position good, I entrench myself
behind the following fact: To be in the fashion, he pays the price of a
good-sized farm for seats at the opera, where the language is as foreign
to his understanding as South Sea Island gibberish. While he
indifferently beholds such a wasteful running at the bung, why should I
assume the busybody’s _rôle_ and clap my finger on the dripping spigot?
Besides, I saw his wife last evening with fully four yards of expensive
satin trailing in the dust. It was my misfortune to be walking directly
behind her. As the crowd was pressing me onward, I was obliged to dance
a sailor’s hornpipe around the hall, in order to keep from treading upon
her skirts. It needed not the grins of lookers-on to assure me that I
was cutting a ridiculous figure.
I am now enjoying my revenge! Indirectly though it comes, it is none the
less sweet or acceptable. On the contrary, it is rather more gratifying,
as it calls for no action on my part, but simply to keep my mouth
hermetically sealed. The poet truly sings:—
“Time at last sets all things even.”
It has been in this case much quicker than I expected. As the skinny
white arm stretches up out of the gloom of the washerwoman’s yard, and
another billet shoots from the pile and disappears like a star from the
firmament of heaven, I feel that a load is lifted from my heart, and I
am reaping revenge.
Stay! what is this? a note, that all the evening escaped my notice. Lo!
an aroma issues from it, sweet as Cytherea’s breath! It is an
invitation, as I live, to help dissect a Christmas turkey! Sound the
timbrel, beat the tom-tom. I am not forgotten yet!
[Illustration]
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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. P. 319, changed “shovin’ of it” to “shovin’ all of it”.
2. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling.
3. Archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as printed.
4. Footnotes were re-indexed using numbers and collected together at
the end of the chapter.
5. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.