THE cold wet rain kept sloshing down, and flooded yard and street. My
uncle cried: “Don’t sigh and frown! It’s splendid for the wheat!” I
slipped and fell upon the ice, and made my forehead bleed. “Gee whiz!”
cried uncle, “this is nice! Just what the icemen need!” A windstorm blew
my whiskers off while I was writing odes. My uncle said: “Don’t scowl
and scoff—’twill dry the muddy roads!” If fire my dwelling should
destroy, or waters wash it hence, my uncle would exclaim, with joy: “You
still have got your fence!” When I was lying, sick to death, expecting
every day that I must draw my final breath, I heard my uncle say, “Our
undertaker is a jo, and if away you fade, it ought to cheer you up to
know that you will help his trade.” And if we study uncle’s graft, we
find it good and fair; how often, when we might have laughed, we wept
and tore our hair! Such logic from this blooming land should drive away
all woe; the thing that’s hard for you to stand, is good for Richard
Roe.
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