Chapter 5
What's that?--you "ne'er again will rob a stage"? What! did you do so? Faith, I didn't know it. Was _that_ what threw poor Themis in a rage? I thought you were convicted as a poet!
I own it was a comfort to my soul, And soothed it better than the deepest curses, To think they'd got one poet in a hole Where, though he wrote, he could not print, his verses.
I thought that Welcker, Plunkett, Brooks, and all The ghastly crew who always are begriming With villain couplets every page and wall, Might be arrested and "run in" for rhyming.
And then Parnassus would be left to me, And Pegasus should bear me up it gaily, Nor down a steep place run into the sea, As now he must be tempted to do daily.
Well, grab the lyre-strings, hearties, and begin: Bawl your harsh souls all out upon the gravel. I must endure you, for you'll never sin By robbing coaches, until dead men travel.
A "SCION OF NOBILITY"
Come, sisters, weep!--our Baron dear, Alas! has run away. If always we had kept him here He had not gone astray.
Painter and grainer it were vain To say he was, before; And if he were, yet ne'er again He'll darken here a door.
We mourn each matrimonial plan-- Even tradesmen join the cry: He was so promising a man Whenever he did buy.
He was a fascinating lad, Deny it all who may; Even moneyed men confess he had A very taking way.
So from our tables he is gone-- Our tears descend in showers; We loved the very fat upon. His kidneys, for 'twas ours.
To women he was all respect To duns as cold as ice; No lady could his suit reject, No tailor get its price.
He raised our hope above the sky; Alas! alack! and O! That one who worked it up so high Should play it down so low!
THE NIGHT OF ELECTION
"O venerable patriot, I pray Stand not here coatless; at the break of day We'll know the grand result--and even now The eastern sky is faintly touched with gray.
"It ill befits thine age's hoary crown-- This rude environment of rogue and clown, Who, as the lying bulletins appear, With drunken cries incarnadine the town.
"But if with noble zeal you stay to note The outcome of your patriotic vote For Blaine, or Cleveland, and your native land, Take--and God bless you!--take my overcoat."
"Done, pard--and mighty white of you. And now guess the country'll keep the trail somehow. I aint allowed to vote, the Warden said, But whacked my coat up on old Stanislow."
THE CONVICTS' BALL
San Quentin was brilliant. Within the halls Of the noble pile with the frowning walls (God knows they've enough to make them frown, With a Governor trying to break them down!) Was a blaze of light. 'Twas the natal day Of his nibs the popular John S. Gray, And many observers considered his birth The primary cause of his moral worth. "The ball is free!" cried Black Bart, and they all Said a ball with no chain was a novel ball; "And I never have seed," said Jimmy Hope, "Sech a lightsome dance withouten a rope." Chinamen, Indians, Portuguese, Blacks, Russians, Italians, Kanucks and Kanaks, Chilenos, Peruvians, Mexicans--all Greased with their presence that notable ball. None were excluded excepting, perhaps, The Rev. Morrison's churchly chaps, Whom, to prevent a religious debate, The Warden had banished outside of the gate. The fiddler, fiddling his hardest the while, "Called off" in the regular foot-hill style: "Circle to the left!" and "Forward and back!" And "Hellum to port for the stabbard tack!" (This great _virtuoso_, it would appear, Was Mate of the _Gatherer_ many a year.) "_Ally man_ left!"--to a painful degree His French was unlike to the French of Paree, As heard from our countrymen lately abroad, And his "_doe cee doe_" was the gem of the fraud. But what can you hope from a gentleman barred From circles of culture by dogs in the yard? 'Twas a glorious dance, though, all the same, The Jardin Mabille in the days of its fame Never saw legs perform such springs-- The cold-chisel's magic had given them wings. They footed it featly, those lades and gents: Dull care (said Long Moll) had a helly go-hence!
'Twas a very aristocratic affair: The _crême de la crême_ and _élite_ were there-- Rank, beauty and wealth from the highest sets, And Hubert Howe Bancroft sent his regrets.
A PRAYER
Sweet Spirit of Cesspool, hear a mother's prayer: Her terrors pacify and offspring spare! Upon Silurians alone let fall (And God in Heaven have mercy on them all!) The red revenges of your fragrant breath, Hot with the flames invisible of death. Sing in each nose a melody of smells, And lead them snoutwise to their several hells!
TO ONE DETESTED
Sir, you're a veteran, revealed In history and fable As warrior since you took the field, Defeating Abel.
As Commissary later (or If not, in every cottage The tale is) you contracted for A mess of pottage.
In civil life you were, we read (And our respect increases) A man of peace--a man, indeed, Of thirty pieces.
To paying taxes when you turned Your mind, or what you call so, A wide celebrity you earned-- Saphira also.
In every age, by various names, You've won renown in story, But on your present record flames A greater glory.
Cain, Esau, and Iscariot, too, And Ananias, likewise, Each had peculiar powers, but who Could lie as Mike lies?
THE BOSS'S CHOICE
Listen to his wild romances: He advances foolish fancies, Each expounded as his "view"-- Gu.
In his brain's opacous clot, ah He has got a maggot! What a Man with "views" to overwhelm us!-- Gulielmus.
Hear his demagogic clamor-- Hear him stammer in his grammar! Teaching, he will learn to spell-- Gulielmus L.
Slave who paid the price demanded-- With two-handed iron branded By the boss--pray cease to dose us, Gulielmus L. Jocosus.
A MERCIFUL GOVERNOR
Standing within the triple wall of Hell, And flattening his nose against a grate Behind whose brazen bars he'd had to dwell A thousand million ages to that date, Stoneman bewailed his melancholy fate, And his big tear-drops, boiling as they fell, Had worn between his feet, the record mentions, A deep depression in the "good intentions."
Imperfectly by memory taught how-- For prayer in Hell is a lost art--he prayed, Uplifting his incinerated brow And flaming hands in supplication's aid. "O grant," he cried, "my torment may be stayed-- In mercy, some short breathing spell allow! If one good deed I did before my ghosting, Spare me and give Delmas a double roasting."
Breathing a holy harmony in Hell, Down through the appalling clamors of the place, Charming them all to willing concord, fell A Voice ineffable and full of grace: "Because of all the law-defying race One single malefactor of the cell Thou didst not free from his incarceration, Take thou ten thousand years of condonation."
Back from their fastenings began to shoot The rusted bolts; with dreadful roar, the gate Laboriously turned; and, black with soot, The extinguished spirit passed that awful strait, And as he legged it into space, elate, Muttered: "Yes, I remember that galoot-- I'd signed his pardon, ready to allot it, But stuck it in my desk and quite forgot it."
AN INTERPRETATION
Now Lonergan appears upon the boards, And Truth and Error sheathe their lingual swords. No more in wordy warfare to engage, The commentators bow before the stage, And bookworms, militant for ages past, Confess their equal foolishness at last, Reread their Shakspeare in the newer light And swear the meaning's obvious to sight. For centuries the question has been hot: Was Hamlet crazy, or was Hamlet not? Now, Lonergan's illuminating art Reveals the truth of the disputed "part," And shows to all the critics of the earth That Hamlet was an idiot from birth!
A SOARING TOAD
So, Governor, you would not serve again Although we'd all agree to pay you double. You find it all is vanity and pain-- One clump of clover in a field of stubble-- One grain of pleasure in a peck of trouble. 'Tis sad, at your age, having to complain Of disillusion; but the fault is whose When pigmies stumble, wearing giants' shoes?
I humbly told you many moons ago For high preferment you were all unfit. A clumsy bear makes but a sorry show Climbing a pole. Let him, judicious, sit With dignity at bottom of his pit, And none his awkwardness will ever know. Some beasts look better, and feel better, too, Seen from above; and so, I think, would you.
Why, you were mad! Did you suppose because Our foolish system suffers foolish men To climb to power, make, enforce the laws, And, it is whispered, break them now and then, We love the fellows and respect them when We've stilled the volume of our loud hurrahs? When folly blooms we trample it the more For having fertilized it heretofore.
Behold yon laborer! His garb is mean, His face is grimy, but who thinks to ask The measure of his brains? 'Tis only seen He's fitted for his honorable task, And so delights the mind. But let him bask In droll prosperity, absurdly clean-- Is that the man whom we admired before? Good Lord, how ignorant, and what a bore!
Better for you that thoughtless men had said (Noting your fitness in the humbler sphere): "Why don't they make him Governor?" instead Of, "Why the devil did they?" But I fear My words on your inhospitable ear Are wasted like a sermon to the dead. Still, they may profit you if studied well: You can't be taught to think, but may to spell.
AN UNDRESS UNIFORM
The apparel does _not_ proclaim the man-- Polonius lied like a partisan, And Salomon still would a hero seem If (Heaven dispel the impossible dream!) He stood in a shroud on the hangman's trap, His eye burning holes in the black, black cap. And the crowd below would exclaim amain: "He's ready to fall for his country again!"
THE PERVERTED VILLAGE
AFTER GOLDSMITH
Sweet Auburn! liveliest village of the plain, Where Health and Slander welcome every train, Whence smiling innocence, its tribute paid, Retires in terror, wounded and dismayed-- Dear lovely bowers of gossip and disease, Whose climate cures us that thy dames may tease, How often have I knelt upon thy green And prayed for death, to mitigate their spleen! How often have I paused on every charm With mingled admiration and alarm-- The brook that runs by many a scandal-mill, The church whose pastor groans upon the grill, The cowthorn bush with seats beneath the shade, Where hearts are struck and reputations flayed; How often wished thine idle wives, some day, Might more at whist, less at the devil, play.
Unblest retirement! ere my life's decline (Killed by detraction) may I witness thine. How happy she who, shunning shades like these, Finds in a wolf-den greater peace and ease; Who quits the place whence truth did earlier fly, And rather than come back prefers to die! For her no jealous maids renounce their sleep, Contriving malices to make her weep; No iron-faced dames her character debate And spurn imploring mercy from the gate; But down she lies to a more peaceful end, For wolves do not calumniate, but rend-- Sinks piecemeal to their maws, a willing prey, While resignation lubricates the way, And all her prospects brighten at the last: To wolves, not women, an approved repast.
_1884_.
MR. SHEETS
The Devil stood before the gate Of Heaven. He had a single mate: Behind him, in his shadow, slunk Clay Sheets in a perspiring funk. "Saint Peter, see this season ticket," Said Satan; "pray undo the wicket." The sleepy Saint threw slight regard Upon the proffered bit of card, Signed by some clerical dead-beats: "Admit the bearer and Clay Sheets." Peter expanded all his eyes: "'Clay Sheets?'--well, I'll be damned!" he cries. "Our couches are of golden cloud; Nothing of earth is here allowed. I'll let you in," he added, shedding On Nick a smile--"but not your bedding."
A JACK-AT-ALL-VIEWS
So, Estee, you are still alive! I thought That you had died and were a blessed ghost I know at least your coffin once was bought With Railroad money; and 'twas said by most Historians that Stanford made a boast The seller "threw you in." That goes for naught-- Man takes delight in fancy's fine inventions, And woman too, 'tis said, if they are French ones.
Do you remember, Estee--ah, 'twas long And long ago!--how fierce you grew and hot When anything impeded the straight, strong, Wild sweep of the great billow you had got Atop of, like a swimmer bold? Great Scott! How fine your wavemanship! How loud your song Of "Down with railroads!" When the wave subsided And left you stranded you were much divided.
Then for a time you were content to wade The waters of the "robber barons'" moat. To fetch, and carry was your humble trade, And ferry Stanford over in a boat, Well paid if he bestowed the kindly groat And spoke you fair and called you pretty maid. And when his stomach seemed a bit unsteady You got your serviceable basin ready.
Strange man! how odd to see you, smug and spruce, There at Chicago, burrowed in a Chair, Not made to measure and a deal too loose, And see you lift your little arm and swear Democracy shall be no more! If it's a fair And civil question, and not too abstruse, Were you elected as a "robber baron," Or as a Communist whose teeth had hair on?
MY LORD POET
"Who drives fat oxen should himself be fat;" Who sings for nobles, he should noble be. There's no _non sequitur_, I think, in that, And this is logic plain as a, b, c. Now, Hector Stuart, you're a Scottish prince, If right you fathom your descent--that fall From grace; and since you have no peers, and since You have no kind of nobleness at all, 'Twere better to sing little, lest you wince When made by heartless critics to sing small. And yet, my liege, I bid you not despair-- Ambition conquers but a realm at once: For European bays arrange your hair-- Two continents, in time, shall crown you Dunce!
TO THE FOOL-KILLER
Ah, welcome, welcome! Sit you down, old friend; Your pipe I'll serve, your bottle I'll attend. 'Tis many a year since you and I have known Society more pleasant than our own In our brief respites from excessive work-- I pointing out the hearts for you to dirk. What have you done since lately at this board We canvassed the deserts of all the horde And chose what names would please the people best, Engraved on coffin-plates--what bounding breast Would give more satisfaction if at rest? But never mind--the record cannot fail: The loftiest monuments will tell the tale.
I trust ere next we meet you'll slay the chap Who calls old Tyler "Judge" and Merry "Cap"-- Calls John P. Irish "Colonel" and John P., Whose surname Jack-son speaks his pedigree, By the same title--men of equal rank Though one is belly all, and one all shank, Showing their several service in the fray: One fought for food and one to get away. I hope, I say, you'll kill the "title" man Who saddles one on every back he can, Then rides it from Beërsheba to Dan! Another fool, I trust, you will perform Your office on while my resentment's warm: He shakes my hand a dozen times a day If, luckless, I so often cross his way, Though I've three senses besides that of touch, To make me conscious of a fool too much. Seek him, friend Killer, and your purpose make Apparent as his guilty hand you take, And set him trembling with a solemn: "Shake!"
But chief of all the addle-witted crew Conceded by the Hangman's League to you, The fool (his dam's acquainted with a knave) Whose fluent pen, of his no-brain the slave, Strews notes of introduction o'er the land And calls it hospitality--his hand May palsy seize ere he again consign To me his friend, as I to Hades mine! Pity the wretch, his faults howe'er you see, Whom A accredits to his victim, B. Like shuttlecock which battledores attack (One speeds it forward, one would drive it back) The trustful simpleton is twice unblest-- A rare good riddance, an unwelcome guest. The glad consignor rubs his hands to think How duty is commuted into ink; The consignee (his hands he cannot rub-- He has the man upon them) mutters: "Cub!" And straightway plans to lose him at the Club. You know, good Killer, where this dunce abides-- The secret jungle where he writes and hides-- Though no exploring foot has e'er upstirred His human elephant's exhaustless herd. Go, bring his blood! We'll drink it--letting fall A due libation to the gods of Gall. On second thought, the gods may have it all.
ONE AND ONE ARE TWO
The trumpet sounded and the dead Came forth from earth and ocean, And Pickering arose and sped Aloft with wobbling motion.
"What makes him fly lop-sided?" cried A soul of the elected. "One ear was wax," a rogue replied, "And isn't resurrected."
Below him on the pitted plain, By his abandoned hollow, His hair and teeth tried all in vain The rest of him to follow.
Saint Peter, seeing him ascend, Came forward to the wicket, And said: "My mutilated friend, I'll thank you for your ticket."
"The _Call_," said Pickering, his hand To reach the latch extended. Said Peter, affable and bland: "The free-list is suspended--
"What claim have you that's valid here?" That ancient vilifier Reflected; then, with look austere, Replied: "I am a liar."
Said Peter: "That is simple, neat And candid Anglo-Saxon, But--well, come in, and take a seat Up there by Colonel Jackson."
MONTAGUE LEVERSON
As some enormous violet that towers Colossal o'er the heads of lowlier flowers-- Its giant petals royally displayed, And casting half the landscape into shade; Delivering its odors, like the blows Of some strong slugger, at the public nose; Pride of two Nations--for a single State Would scarce suffice to sprout a plant so great; So Leverson's humility, outgrown The meaner virtues that he deigns to own, To the high skies its great corolla rears, O'ertopping all he has except his ears.
THE WOFUL TALE OF MR. PETERS
I should like, good friends, to mention the disaster which befell Mr. William Perry Peters, of the town of Muscatel, Whose fate is full of meaning, if correctly understood-- Admonition to the haughty, consolation to the good.
It happened in the hot snap which we recently incurred, When 'twas warm enough to carbonize the feathers of a bird, And men exclaimed: "By Hunky!" who were bad enough to swear, And pious persons supervised their adjectives with care.
Mr. Peters was a pedagogue of honor and repute, His learning comprehensive, multifarious, minute. It was commonly conceded in the section whence he came That the man who played against him needed knowledge of the game.
And some there were who whispered, in the town of Muscatel, That besides the game of Draw he knew Orthography as well; Though, the school directors, frigidly contemning that as stuff, Thought that Draw (and maybe Spelling, if it pleased him) was enough.
Withal, he was a haughty man--indubitably great, But too vain of his attainments and his power in debate. His mien was contumelious to men of lesser gift: "It's only _me_," he said, "can give the human mind a lift.
"Before a proper audience, if ever I've a chance, You'll see me chipping in, the cause of Learning to advance. Just let me have a decent chance to back my mental hand And I'll come to center lightly in a way they'll understand."
Such was William Perry Peters, and I feel a poignant sense Of grief that I'm unable to employ the present tense; But Providence disposes, be our scheming what it may, And disposed of Mr. Peters in a cold, regardless way.
It occurred in San Francisco, whither Mr. Peters came In the cause of Education, feeling still the holy flame Of ambition to assist in lifting up the human mind To a higher plane of knowledge than its Architect designed.
He attended the convention of the pedagogic host; He was first in the Pavilion, he was last to leave his post. For days and days he narrowly observed the Chairman's eye, His efforts ineffectual to catch it on the fly.
The blessed moment came at last: the Chairman tipped his head. "The gentleman from ah--um--er," that functionary said. The gentleman from ah--um--er reflected with a grin: "They'll know me better by-and-by, when I'm a-chipping in."
So William Perry Peters mounted cheerfully his feet-- And straightway was aglow with an incalculable heat! His face was as effulgent as a human face could be, And caloric emanated from his whole periphery;
For he felt himself the focus of non-Muscatelish eyes, And the pain of their convergence was a terror and surprise. As with pitiless impaction all their heat-waves on him broke He was seen to be evolving awful quantities of smoke!
"Put him out!" cried all in chorus; but the meaning wasn't clear Of that succoring suggestion to his obfuscated ear; And it notably augmented his incinerating glow To regard himself excessive, or in any way _de trop_.
Gone was all his wild ambition to lift up the human mind!-- Gone the words he would have uttered!--gone the thought that lay behind! For "words that burn" may be consumed in a superior flame, And "thoughts that breathe" may breathe their last, and die a death of shame.
He'd known himself a shining light, but never had he known Himself so very luminous as now he knew he shone. "A pillar, I, of fire," he'd said, "to guide my race will be;" And now that very inconvenient thing to him was he.
He stood there all irresolute; the seconds went and came; The minutes passed and did but add fresh fuel to his flame. How long he stood he knew not--'twas a century or more-- And then that incandescent man levanted for the door!
He darted like a comet from the building to the street, Where Fahrenheit attested ninety-five degrees of heat. Vicissitudes of climate make the tenure of the breath Precarious, and William Perry Peters froze to death!
TWIN UNWORTHIES
Ye parasites that to the rich men stick, As to the fattest sheep the thrifty tick-- Ed'ard to Stanford and to Crocker Ben (To Ben and Ed'ard many meaner men, And lice to these)--who do the kind of work That thieves would have the honesty to shirk-- Whose wages are that your employers own The fat that reeks upon your every bone And deigns to ask (the flattery how sweet!) About its health and how it stands the heat,-- Hail and farewell! I meant to write about you, But, no, my page is cleaner far without you.
ANOTHER PLAN
Editor Owen, of San Jose, Commonly known as "our friend J.J." Weary of scribbling for daily bread, Weary of writing what nobody read, Slept one day at his desk and dreamed That an angel before him stood and beamed With compassionate eyes upon him there.
Editor Owen is not so fair In feature, expression, form or limb But glances like that are familiar to him; And so, to arrive by the shortest route At his visitor's will he said, simply: "Toot." "Editor Owen," the angel said, "Scribble no more for your daily bread. Your intellect staggers and falls and bleeds, Weary of writing what nobody reads. Eschew now the quill--in the coming years Homilize man through his idle ears. Go lecture!" "Just what I intended to do," Said Owen. The angel looked pained and flew.
Editor Owen, of San Jose, Commonly known as "our friend J.J." Scribbling no more to supply his needs, Weary of writing what nobody reads, Passes of life each golden year Speaking what nobody comes to hear.
A POLITICAL APOSTATE