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Than a square mile o' larks in printer's ink,).

This makes 'em think our fust 'o May is May,

Which't ain't, for all the almanicks can say.

O little city-gals! don't never go it Blind on the word o' noospaper or poet!

They're apt to puff, an' May-day seldom looks

Up in the country ez it doos in books;

They're no more like than hornets' nests an' hives,

Or printed sarmons be to holy lives. I, with my trouses perched on cowhide boots,

Tuggin' my foundered feet out by the roots,

Hev seen ye come to fling on April's hearse

Your muslin nosegays from the milliner's,

Puzzlin' to find dry ground your queen to choose,

An' dance your throats sore in morocker shoes:

I've seen ye, an' felt proud, thet, come wut would,

Our Pilgrim stock wuz pithed with hardihood.

Pleasure doos make us Yankees kind o' winch,

Ez though 'twuz sunthin' paid for by

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haggle with their greens an' things,

An' when you 'most give up, 'ithout more words

Toss the fields full o' blossoms, leaves, an' birds:

Thet's Northun natur', slow, an' apt to doubt,

But when it doos git stirred, ther's no gin-out!

Fust come the blackbirds clatt'rin' in tall trees,

An' settlin' things in windy Congresses,

Queer politicians, though, for I'll be skinned

Ef all on 'em don't head against the wind.

'Fore long the trees begin to show belief,

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Grows stronger, fercer, tears out right an' left,

Then all the waters bow themselves an' come,

Suddin, in one great slope o' shedderin' foam,

Jes' so our Spring gits every thin' in tune,

An' gives one leap from April into June:

Then all comes crowdin' in; afore you think,

Young oak-leaves mist the side-hill woods with pink;

The cat-bird in the laylock-bush is loud;

The orchards turn to heaps o' rosy cloud;

Red-cedars blossom tu, though few folks know it,

An' look all dipt in sunshine like a poet;

The lime-trees pile their solid stacks o' shade,

An' drows'ly simmer with the bees' sweet trade;

In ellum-shrouds the flashin' hangbird clings

An' for the summer vy'ge his hammock slings:

All down the loose-walled lanes in archin' bowers

The barb'ry droops its strings o'

golden flowers,

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Thet drive me, when I git a chance, to walk

Off by myself to hev a privit talk With a queer critter thet can't seem to 'gree

Along o' me like most folks, - Mister Me.

Ther' is times when I'm unsoshile ez a stone,

An' sort o' suffocate to be alone, I'm crowded jes' to think thet folks are nigh,

An' can't bear nothin' closer than the sky;

Now the wind's full ez shifty in the mind

Ez wut it is ou'-doors, ef I ain't blind,

An, sometimes, in the fairest souwest weather,

My inward vane pints east for weeks together,

My natur' gits all goose-flesh, an' my sins Come drizzlin' on

my conscience sharp ez pins: Wal, et sech times I jes' slip out o' sight,

An' take it out in a fair stan' up fight With the one cuss I can't lay on the shelf,

The crook'dest stick in all the heap, myself.

'Twuz so las' Sabbath arter meetin'time:

Findin' my feelin's wouldn't noways rhyme

With nobody's, but off the hendle flew

An' took things from an east-wind pint o' view,

I started off to lose me in the hills Where the pines be, up back o' Siah's Mills:

Pines, ef you're blue, are the best friends I know,

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They mope an' sigh an' sheer your feelin's so, They hesh the ground beneath so, tu, I swan,

You half-forgit you've gut a body on. Ther's a small skool'us' there where

four roads meet,

The door-steps hollered out by little feet,

An' side-post carved with names whose owners grew

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be told

Thet Now's the only bird lays eggs o' gold.

A knee-high lad, I used to plot an' plan

An' think 'twuz life's cap-sheaf to be a man;

Now, gittin' gray, there's nothin' I enjoy

Like dreamin' back along into a boy:

So the ole school'us' is a place I choose

Afore all others, ef I want to muse; I set down where I used to set, an' git

My boyhood back, an' better things with it,

Faith, Hope, an' sunthin', ef it isn't Cherrity,

It's want o' guile, an' thet's ez gret a rerrity.

Now, 'fore I knowed, thet Sabbath

arternoon

Thet I sot out to tramp myself in tune,

I found me in the school'us' on my

seat,

Drummin' the march to No-wheres with my feet.

Thinkin' o' nothin', I've heerd ole

folks say,

Is a hard kind o' dooty in its way: It's thinkin' every thin' you ever knew,

Or ever hearn, to make your feelins blue.

I sot there tryin' thet on for a spell: I thought o' the Rebellion, then o' Hell,

Which some folks tell ye now is jes' a metterfor,

(A the'ry, p'raps, it wun't feel none the better for);

I thought o' Reconstruction, wut we'd win

Patchin' our patent self-blow-up agin:

I thought of this 'ere milkin' o' the wits,

So

Ef

much a month, warn't givin' Natur' fits,

folks warn't druv, findin' their own milk fail,

To work the cow thet hes an iron tail, An' ef idees 'thout ripenin' in the

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Though mos' folks write ez ef they hoped jes' quickenin'

The churn would argoo skim-milk into thickenin';

But skim-milk ain't a thing to change its view

O' wut it's meant for more'n a smoky flue.

But du pray tell me, 'fore we furder go,

How in all Natur' did you come to know

'Bout our affairs," sez I, "in Kingdom Come?".

"Wal, I worked round at sperrit rappin' some,

An' danced the tables till their legs wuz gone,

In hopes o' larnin' wut wuz goin'

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It's safe to trust its say on certin pints:

It knows the wind's opinions to a T, An' the wind settles wut the weather'll be.”

"I never thought a scion of our stock

Could grow the wood to make a weathercock;

When I wuz younger'n you, skurce more'n a shaver,

No airthly wind," sez he, "could make me waver!” (Ez he said this, he clinched his jaw an' forehead,

Hitchin' his belt to bring his swordhilt forrard.) — "Jes' so it wuz with me," sez I,

"I sWOW,

When I wuz younger'n what you

see me now,

Nothin' from Adam's fall to Huldy's

bonnet,

Thet I warn't fuli-cocked with my jedgment on it;

But now I'm gittin' on in life, I find It's a sight harder to make up my mind,

Nor I don't often try tu, when

events

Will du it for me free of all expense. The moral question's ollus plain enough,

It's jes' the human-natur' side thet's tough;

Wut's best to think mayn't puzzle me nor you,

The pinch comes in decidin' wut to du;

Ef you read History, all runs smooth ez grease,

Coz there the men ain't nothin' more'n idees,

But come to make it, ez we must today,

Th' idees hev arms an' legs, an' stop the way:

It's easy fixin' things in facts an' figgers, They can't

resist, nor warn't brought up with niggers; But come to try your the'ry on,why, then

Your facts an' figgers change to

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We hain't to punish only, but to keep,

An' the cure's gut to go a cent❜ry deep."

"Wal, milk-an'-water ain't the best o' glue,'

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Sez he, "an' so you'll find before you're thru;

Ef reshness venters sunthin', shillyshally

Lozes ez often wut's ten times the vally.

Thet exe of ourn, when Charles's neck gut split,

Opened a gap thet ain't bridged over yit:

Slav'ry's your Charles, the Lord hez gin the exe"

"Our Charles," sez I, "hez gut eight million necks.

The hardest question ain't the black man's right,

The trouble is to 'mancipate the white;

One's chained in body an' can be sot

free,

But t'other's chained in soul to an idee:

It's a long job, but we shall worry thru it;

Ef bag'nets fail, the spellin'-book must du it."

"Hosee," sez he, "I think you're goin' to fail:

The rettlesnake ain't dangerous in the tail;

This 'ere rebellion's nothin' but the rettle,

You'll stomp on thet an' think you've won the bettle; Slavery thet's the fangs an' thinkin' head,

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It's

An'

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ef you want selvation, cresh it dead,

An' cresh it suddin, or you'll larn by waitin'

Thet Chance wun't stop to listen to debatin'!

"God's truth!" sez 1,-"an' ef I held the club,

An' knowed jes' where to strike,
but there's the rub!"
"Strike soon," sez he,

deadly ailin',

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or you'll be

Folks thet's afeared to fail are sure

o' failin';

God hates your sneakin' creturs thet

believe

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