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"It doesn't foller thet he can

swaller

Prescriptions signed 'J. B.'
Put up by you an' me!"

We own the ocean, tu, John:

You mus'n' take it hard,
Ef we can't think with you, John,
It's jest your own back-yard.

Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess,
Ef thet's his claim," sez he,
"The fencin'-stuff'll cost enough
To bust up friend J. B.,
Ez wal ez you an' me!"

Why talk so dreffle big, John,
Of honor, when it meant
You didn't care a fig, Jolin,
But jest for ten per cent?

Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess,
He's like the rest," sez he:
"When all is done, it's number

one

Thet's nearest to J. B.,

Ez wal ez you an' me!"

We give the critters back, John,

Coz Abra'm thought 'twas right; It warn't your bullyin' clack, John, Provokin' us to fight.

Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess
We've a hard row," sez he,
"To hoe just now: but thet,
somehow,

May happen to J. B.,

Ez wal ez you an' me!"

We ain't so weak an' poor, John,
With twenty million people,
An' close to every door, John,

A school-house an' a steeple.
Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess
It is a fact," sez he,

"The surest plan to make a Man
Is, Think him so, J. B.,
Ez much ez you or me!”

Our folks believe in Law, John:
An' it's for her sake, now,
They've left the axe an' saw, John,
The anvil an' the plough.

Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess,
Ef't warn't for law," sez he,
"There'd be one shindy from
here to Indy;
An' thet don't suit J. B.,
(When 'tain't 'twixt you an'
me!")

We know we've gut a cause, John,
Thet's honest, just, an' true;
We thought 'twould win applause,
John,

Ef nowheres else, from you.
Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess
His love of right," sez he,
"Hangs by a rotten fibre o cotton:
There's natur' in J. B.,

Ez wal ez you an' me!"

The South says, “ Poor folks down!” John,

An' "All men up!" say we, — White, yaller, black, an' brown,John: Now which is your idee?

Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess,
John preaches wal," sez he:
"But, sermon thru, an' come to
du,

Why, there's the ole J. B.
A-crowdin' you an' me!"

Shall it be love or hate, John?
It's you thet's to decide:
Ain't your bonds held by Fate, John,
Like all the world's beside ?

Ole Uncle S. sez he, “I guess
Wise men forgive," sez he,
"But not forget; an' sometime
yet

The truth may strike J. B.,
Ez wal ez you an' me!"

God means to make this land, John,
Clear thru, from sea to sea,
Believe an' understand, John,
The wuth o' bein' free.

Ole Uncle S, sez he, "I guess,
God's price is high," sez he:
"But nothin' else than wut he
sells

Wears long, an' thet J. B.
May larn like you an' me!"
J. R. LOWELL: Mason and Slidell.

THE FLAG.

THERE'S a flag hangs over my threshold, whose folds are more dear to me Than the blood that thrills in my bosom its earnest of liberty; And dear are the stars it harbors in its sunny field of blue As the hope of a further heaven that lights all our dim lives through.

But now should my guests be merry, the house is in holiday guise, Looking out, through its burnished

windows like a score of wel

coming eyes. Come hither, my brothers who wander in saintliness and in sin! Come hither, ye pilgrims of Nature!

my heart doth invite you in.

My wine is not of the choicest, yet bears it an honest brand; And the bread that I bid you lighten

I break with no sparing hand; But pause, ere you pass to taste it,

one act must accomplished be: Salute the flag in its virtue, before ye sit down with me.

The flag of our stately battles, not

struggles of wrath and greed: Its stripes were a holy lesson, its spangles a deathless creed; 'Twas red with the blood of freemen, and white with the fear of the foe,

And the stars that fight in their courses 'gainst tyrants its symbols know.

Come hither, thou son of my mother! we were reared in the selfsame arms;

Thou hast many a pleasant gesture, thy mind hath its gifts and charms,

But my heart is as stern to question as mine eyes are of sorrows full:

Salute the flag in its virtue, or pass on where others rule.

Thou lord of a thousand acres, with

heaps of uncounted gold, The steeds of thy stall are haughty, thy lackeys cunning and bold: I envy no jot of thy splendor, I rail at thy follies none: Salute the flag in its virtue, or leave my poor house alone.

Fair lady with silken trappings, high

waving thy stainless plume, We welcome thee to our numbers, a flower of costliest bloom: Let a hundred maids live widowed to furnish thy bridal bed; But pause where the flag doth question, and bend thy triumphant head.

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"What make we, murmur'st thou, and what are we?

When empires must be wound, we bring the shroud,

The time-old web of the implacable Three:

Is it too coarse for him, the young and proud?

Earth's mightiest deigned to wear it; why not he?"

"Is there no hope?" I moaned. "So strong, so fair!

Our Fowler, whose proud bird would brook erewhile

No rival's swoop in all our western air!

Gather the ravens, then, in funeral file For him, life's morn-gold bright yet in his hair!

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The alarum of drums swept past,
Or a bugle blast

From the camp on the shore.

Then far away to the south uprose A little feather of snow-white smoke,

And we knew that the iron ship of our foes

Was steadily steering its course
To try the force

Of our ribs of oak.

Down upon us heavily runs,

Silent and sullen, the floating fort; Then comes a puff of smoke from her guns,

And leaps the terrible death,
With fiery breath,
From each open port.

We are not idle, but send her straight

Defiance back in a full broadside! As hail rebounds from a roof of slate,

Rebounds our heavier hail
From each iron scale
Of the monster's hide.

"Strike your flag!" the rebel cries, In his arrogant old plantation strain.

"Never!" our gallant Morris replies:

"It is better to sink than to yield!"

And the whole air pealed With the cheers of our men.

Then, like a kraken huge and black, She crushed our ribs in her iron grasp!

Down went the Cumberland all a wrack,

With a sudden shudder of death,
And the cannon's breath
For her dying gasp.

Next morn, as the sun rose over the bay,

Still floated our flag at the main-
mast-head.

Lord, how beautiful was thy day!
Every waft of the air
Was a whisper of prayer,
Or a dirge for the dead.

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ONCE git a smell o' musk into a draw,

An' it clings hold like precerdents in law:

Your gra'ma'am put it there,when, goodness knows, To jes' this-worldify her Sundayclo'es;

But the old chist wun't sarve her gran'son's wife,

(For, 'thout new funnitoor, wut good in life?)

An' so ole clawfoot, from the precinks dread

O' the spare chamber, slinks into the shed,

Where, dim with dust, it fust or last subsides

To holdin' seeds, an' fifty things besides;

But better days stick fast in heart an' husk,

An' all you keep in't gits a scent o' musk.

Jes' so with poets: wut they've airly read

Gits kind o' worked into their heart an' head,

So's't they can't seem to write but jest on sheers

With furrin countries or played-out ideers,

Nor hev a feelin', ef it doesn't smack

O' wut some critter chose to feel 'way back:

This makes 'em talk o' daises, larks,

an' things,

Ez though we'd nothin' here that blows an' sings, (Why, I'd give more for one live bobolink

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