Songs of Friendship | Page 7

My Henry--headpiece]
MY HENRY
He's jes' a great, big, awk'ard, hulkin'
Feller,--humped, and sort o'
sulkin'--
Like, and ruther still-appearin'--
Kind-as-ef he wuzn't
keerin'
Whether school helt out er not--
That's my Henry, to a dot!
Allus kind o' liked him--whether
Childern, er growed-up together!

Fifteen year' ago and better,
'Fore he ever knowed a letter,
Run
acrosst the little fool
In my Primer-class at school.
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[Illustration: Nothin' that boy wouldn't resk!]
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When the Teacher wuzn't lookin',
He'd be th'owin' wads; er crookin'

Pins; er sprinklin' pepper, more'n
Likely, on the stove; er borin'

Gimlet-holes up thue his desk--
Nothin' _that_ boy wouldn't resk!
But, somehow, as I was goin'
On to say, he seemed so knowin',

_Other_ ways, and cute and cunnin'--
Allus wuz a notion runnin'

Thue my giddy, fool-head he
Jes' had be'n cut out fer me!
Don't go much on _prophesyin'_,
But last night whilse I wuz fryin'


Supper, with that man a-pitchin'
Little Marthy round the kitchen,

Think-says-I, "Them baby's eyes
Is my Henry's, jes' p'cise!"
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[Illustration: A letter to a friend--headpiece]
A LETTER TO A FRIEND
The past is like a story
I have listened to in dreams
That vanished in
the glory
Of the Morning's early gleams;
And--at my shadow
glancing--
I feel a loss of strength,
As the Day of Life advancing

Leaves it shorn of half its length.
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But it's all in vain to worry
At the rapid race of Time--
And he flies
in such a flurry
When I trip him with a rhyme,
I'll bother him no
longer
Than to thank you for the thought
That "my fame is growing
stronger
As you really think it ought."
And though I fall below it,
I might know as much of mirth
To live
and die a poet
Of unacknowledged worth;
For Fame is but a
vagrant--
Though a loyal one and brave,
And his laurels ne'er so
fragrant
As when scattered o'er the grave.
[Illustration: A letter to a friend--tailpiece]
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[Illustration: The old-fashioned Bible--headpiece]
THE OLD-FASHIONED BIBLE
How dear to my heart are the scenes of my childhood
That now but in
mem'ry I sadly review;
The old meeting-house at the edge of the
wildwood,
The rail fence, and horses all tethered thereto;
The low,

sloping roof, and the bell in the steeple,
The doves that came
fluttering out overhead
As it solemnly gathered the God-fearing
people
To hear the old Bible my grandfather read.
The
old-fashioned Bible--
The dust-covered Bible--
The leathern-bound
Bible my grandfather read.
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[Illustration: The blessed old volume]
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The blessed old volume! The face bent above it--
As now I recall
it--is gravely severe,
Though the reverent eye that droops downward
to love it
Makes grander the text through the lens of a tear,
And, as
down his features it trickles and glistens,
The cough of the deacon is
stilled, and his head
Like a haloed patriarch's leans as he listens
To
hear the old Bible my grandfather read.
The old-fashioned Bible--

The dust-covered Bible--
The leathern-bound Bible my grandfather
read.
Ah! who shall look backward with scorn and derision
And scoff the
old book though it uselessly lies
In the dust of the past, while this
newer revision
Lisps on of a hope and a home in the skies?
Shall
the voice of the Master be stifled and riven?
Shall we hear but a tithe
of the words He has said,
When so long He has, listening, leaned out
of Heaven
To hear the old Bible my grandfather read?
The
old-fashioned Bible--
The dust-covered Bible--
The leathern-bound
Bible my grandfather read.
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[Illustration: Good-by er howdy-do--headpiece]
GOOD-BY ER HOWDY-DO

Say good-by er howdy-do--
What's the odds betwixt the two?

Comin'--goin', ev'ry day--
Best friends first to go away--
Grasp of
hands you'd ruther hold
Than their weight in solid gold
Slips their
grip while greetin' you.--
Say good-by er howdy-do!
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Howdy-do, and then, good-by--
Mixes jes' like laugh and cry;

Deaths and births, and worst and best,
Tangled their contrariest;

Ev'ry jinglin' weddin'-bell
Skeerin' up some funer'l knell.--
Here's
my song, and there's your sigh.--
Howdy-do, and then, good-by!
Say good-by er howdy-do--
Jes' the same to me and you;
'Taint
worth while to make no fuss,
'Cause the job's put up on us!
Some
One's runnin' this concern
That's got nothin' else to learn:
Ef _He's_
willin', we'll pull through--
Say good-by er howdy-do!
[Illustration: Good-by er howdy-do--tailpiece]
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WHEN WE THREE MEET
When we three meet? Ah! friend of mine
Whose verses well and flow
as wine,--
My thirsting fancy thou dost fill
With draughts delicious,
sweeter still
Since tasted by those lips of thine.
I pledge thee, through the chill sunshine
Of autumn, with a warmth
divine,
Thrilled through as only I shall thrill
When we three meet.
I pledge thee, if we fast or dine,
We yet shall loosen, line by line,

Old ballads, and the blither trill
Of our-time singers--for there will

Be with us all the Muses nine
When we three meet.

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[Illustration: "The little man in the tinshop"--headpiece]
"THE LITTLE MAN IN THE TINSHOP"
When I was a little boy, long ago,
And spoke of the theater as the
"show,"
The first one that I went to see,
Mother's brother it was
took me--
(My uncle, of course, though he seemed to be
Only a
boy--I loved him so!)
And ah, how pleasant he made it all!
And the
things he knew that _I_ should know!--
The stage,