Dog
By Edwin L. Sabin
The dog we have always with us; if not active in the garden or passive on the best bed, then gracing or disgracing himself in other domestic capacities. For the dog is a curious combination, wherein heredity constantly opposes culture; and therefore though your dog be a woolly dog or a smooth dog, a large dog or a small dog, a house-dog, yard-dog, hunting-dog or farm-dog, he will be ever a delight and a scandal according as he reveals the complexities of his character. Just as soon as you have decided that he is almost human, he will straightway unmistakably indicate that he is still very much dog.
As example, select, if you please, the most pampered and carefully nurtured dog in dog tribe: some lady's dog—beribboned King Charles, bejeweled poodle, befatted pug—and give him the luxury of a half-hour in the nearest genuine alley. Do you think that he turns up his delicate nose at the luscious smells there encountered? Do you think that because of his repeated scented baths he sedulously keeps to the middle of the narrow way? Do you venture to assert that he whose jaded palate has recently declined the breast of chicken is now nauseated by the prodigal waste encountered amidst the garbage cans?
Fie on him, the ingrate! Why, the little rascal fairly revels in the riot of débris, and ten to one he will even proudly return lugging the most unsavoury of bones filched from a particularly odorous repository! His lapse into atavism has been prompt and certain. I agree with Robert Louis Stevenson that every dog is a vagabond at heart; in adapting himself to the companionship of man and woman, and the comforts of board and lodging, he leads a double life.
In this respect the dog is far more servile than the cat, his contemporary. Generations of attempted coercion have little influenced the cat. She (it seems a proper distinction to speak of the cat as "she") steadfastly maintains the distance that shall divide cat life from man life. Without duress, and in spite of duress, she accepts the material favors of civilization and domesticity only to an extent that will not inconvenience her; she has no notion of responsibilities or indebtedness. Having achieved her demands for a warm nap or a full stomach, she then makes no false motions in following her own inclinations entirely. But the dog, occupying a limbo between his natural instincts and his acquired conscience, must always be a master of duplicity.
The dog (as again points out the admirable Stevenson) has become an accomplished actor. Observe his ceremonious approach to other dogs. Mark the mutual dignity, the stiff-leggedness, the self-conscious strut, the rivalrous emulation, all of which plainly says: "I amMisterSo-and-So; who in the deuce are you?" No dog so small, and only a few faint-hearts so squalid, that they do not carry a chip on their shoulder. Compare with their progenitors, the wolves in a city park. Here encounters are quick and decisive. The one wolf stands, the other cringes. Rank and character are recognized at once. The pretences of human society have not perverted wolf ethics.
Take a dog at his tricks: not the game of seeking and fetching, which he enjoys when in good humor, but parlor tricks. He has learned through fear of punishment and hope of reward. Having performed, either sheepishly or promptly, with what wrigglings and prancings and waggings, or else with what proud self-appreciation does he court approval. He knows very well that he is assuming not to be a dog, and trusts that you will admit he is smarter than mere dog. On the contrary, the cat tribe, jumping through a hoop, does it with a negligent, spontaneous grace that makes the act a condescension. The cat does not aspire to be human; she is fully content with being cat.
Elevate a dog to a seat in an automobile (any automobile), or even to the box of a rattle-trap farm-wagon. How it affects him, this promotion from walking to riding! It metamorphoses the meekest, humblest of so-called curs into a grandee aristocrat, who by supercilious look and offensive words insults every other dog that he passes. He calls upon the world about to witness that he is of man-kind, not of dog-kind. A dog riding abroad is to me the epitome of satisfied assumption.
It would be interesting to know how much, if any, the dog's brain has been increased by constant efforts to be humanized. The Boston bull is, I should judge, (and of course!) faster in his intellectual activities than is the ordinary English bull. And then I might refer to the truly marvelous feats of the sheep-dog, who will, when told, cut out any one sheep in a thousand; and I might refer to the finely bred setter, or pointer, and his almost human field work; and I can refer to my own dog, whose smartness, both natural and acquired, generally is extraordinary—although at times woefully askew, as when he buries pancakes in the fall expecting, if we may believe that he expects, to dig them up during the winter.
And there are dogs with great souls and dogs with small souls. We are told of dogs noble enough to sit by and let a needy dog gobble the meal from the platter—but I suspect that such dogs are complacent because comfortably fixed. We hear of dogs making valiant defenses of life and property—which perhaps is the development of the animal instinct to guard anything which the animal considers its own. And dogs sometimes effect heroic rescues, by orders or voluntarily—although one may query whether they consider all the consequences.
The dog's brain must be an oddly struggling mass of fact and fancy. We have done our best for him, and as a rule he creditably responds. I love my dog; he appears to love me; and by efforts of me and mine he has been humanized into a very adaptable personage. But I am certain that first principles remain the same with him as when he was a wolf-dog of cave age. He might grab me by the collar and swim ashore with me, but if on the desert island there was only one piece of meat between us and starvation, and he had it, I'd hate to have to risk getting my share without fighting for it.
The Unredeemed
The Ballad of the Lusitania Babes
By Emerson Hough
THE HOLY THREE BEHOLDGod the Father leaned out from Heaven,His white beard swept His knee;His eye was sad as He looked far out,Full on the face of the sea.Saith God the Father, "In My KingdomNever was thing like this;For yonder are sinless unredeemed,And they may not enter Our bliss."And Mary the Mother, She stood near by,Her eyes full sad and grieved.Saith Mary the Mother, "Alas! Alas!That they may not be received.Now never since Heaven began," saith She,"Hath sight like this meseemed,That there be sinless dead belowWho may not be redeemed!"And Jesu, the Saviour, He stood also,And aye! His eyes were wet.Saith Jesu the Saviour, "Since Time began,Never was this thing yet!For these be the Children, the Little Ones,Afloat on the icy sea.They are doomed, they are dead, they are perished,And they may not come unto Me!"
THE HOLY THREE BEHOLD
THE HOLY THREE BEHOLD
God the Father leaned out from Heaven,His white beard swept His knee;His eye was sad as He looked far out,Full on the face of the sea.Saith God the Father, "In My KingdomNever was thing like this;For yonder are sinless unredeemed,And they may not enter Our bliss."
God the Father leaned out from Heaven,
His white beard swept His knee;
His eye was sad as He looked far out,
Full on the face of the sea.
Saith God the Father, "In My Kingdom
Never was thing like this;
For yonder are sinless unredeemed,
And they may not enter Our bliss."
And Mary the Mother, She stood near by,Her eyes full sad and grieved.Saith Mary the Mother, "Alas! Alas!That they may not be received.Now never since Heaven began," saith She,"Hath sight like this meseemed,That there be sinless dead belowWho may not be redeemed!"
And Mary the Mother, She stood near by,
Her eyes full sad and grieved.
Saith Mary the Mother, "Alas! Alas!
That they may not be received.
Now never since Heaven began," saith She,
"Hath sight like this meseemed,
That there be sinless dead below
Who may not be redeemed!"
And Jesu, the Saviour, He stood also,And aye! His eyes were wet.Saith Jesu the Saviour, "Since Time began,Never was this thing yet!For these be the Children, the Little Ones,Afloat on the icy sea.They are doomed, they are dead, they are perished,And they may not come unto Me!"
And Jesu, the Saviour, He stood also,
And aye! His eyes were wet.
Saith Jesu the Saviour, "Since Time began,
Never was this thing yet!
For these be the Children, the Little Ones,
Afloat on the icy sea.
They are doomed, they are dead, they are perished,
And they may not come unto Me!"
THE CHILDREN CRY OUTThey float, forever unburied,Their faces turned to the sky;With their little hands uplifted,And their lips forever cry:"Oh, we are the helpless murdered ones,Blown far on the icy tide!No sin was ours, but through all the days,On the northern seas we ride.No cerements ever enshroud us,We know no roof of the sod;We float forever unburied,With our faces turned to God."So foul the deed that undid us,So damned in its dull disgrace,That even the sea refused us,And would not give us place.Nor ever a place in the sky—We are lost, we are dead, we are perished,Ah, Jesu, tell us why!"* * * * *Now the Three who heard They wept as one,But Their tears they might not cease.Saith God the Father, "While unavengedThese may not know Our peace!When the sons of men are men again,And have smitten full with the sword,At last these sinless but unredeemedShall enter unto their Lord."But deed like this is a common debt;It lies on the earth-race whole.Till these be avenged they be unredeemed—Each piteous infant soul.We must weep, We must weep, till the debt be paid,Te debt of the sons of men—But well avenged, they are aye redeemed;Ah, how shall We welcome them then!"
THE CHILDREN CRY OUT
THE CHILDREN CRY OUT
They float, forever unburied,Their faces turned to the sky;With their little hands uplifted,And their lips forever cry:
They float, forever unburied,
Their faces turned to the sky;
With their little hands uplifted,
And their lips forever cry:
"Oh, we are the helpless murdered ones,Blown far on the icy tide!No sin was ours, but through all the days,On the northern seas we ride.No cerements ever enshroud us,We know no roof of the sod;We float forever unburied,With our faces turned to God.
"Oh, we are the helpless murdered ones,
Blown far on the icy tide!
No sin was ours, but through all the days,
On the northern seas we ride.
No cerements ever enshroud us,
We know no roof of the sod;
We float forever unburied,
With our faces turned to God.
"So foul the deed that undid us,So damned in its dull disgrace,That even the sea refused us,And would not give us place.Nor ever a place in the sky—We are lost, we are dead, we are perished,Ah, Jesu, tell us why!"
"So foul the deed that undid us,
So damned in its dull disgrace,
That even the sea refused us,
And would not give us place.
Nor ever a place in the sky—
We are lost, we are dead, we are perished,
Ah, Jesu, tell us why!"
* * * * *
* * * * *
Now the Three who heard They wept as one,But Their tears they might not cease.Saith God the Father, "While unavengedThese may not know Our peace!When the sons of men are men again,And have smitten full with the sword,At last these sinless but unredeemedShall enter unto their Lord.
Now the Three who heard They wept as one,
But Their tears they might not cease.
Saith God the Father, "While unavenged
These may not know Our peace!
When the sons of men are men again,
And have smitten full with the sword,
At last these sinless but unredeemed
Shall enter unto their Lord.
"But deed like this is a common debt;It lies on the earth-race whole.Till these be avenged they be unredeemed—Each piteous infant soul.We must weep, We must weep, till the debt be paid,Te debt of the sons of men—But well avenged, they are aye redeemed;Ah, how shall We welcome them then!"
"But deed like this is a common debt;
It lies on the earth-race whole.
Till these be avenged they be unredeemed—
Each piteous infant soul.
We must weep, We must weep, till the debt be paid,
Te debt of the sons of men—
But well avenged, they are aye redeemed;
Ah, how shall We welcome them then!"
THE SONS OF MEN HEARKENAre ye worth the kiss of a woman?Were ye worth the roof of a womb?Are ye worth the price of your grave-clothes?Are ye worth the name on a tomb?Nay! None of these is your earning,And none of these be your meed,If the deathless wail of their yearningShall add to your pulse no speed.Never by hand of a warrior,Never by act of a man,Have the Little Ones thus perished,Since ever that Heaven began.Such deed and the beings who wrought it—Ah! deep must the cutting goTo cure the world of the memoryOf the Little Ones in woe.The Three watch high in Their Heaven,And aye! the Three be grieved;The sword is the key of Their Heaven,If the babes shall be received.Rise then, men of our banner—Speak in our ancient tone—Each of you for his mother,Each of you for his own!Smite full and fell and fearless,Till that these be set free—These, slain of the foulest slayingThat ever made red the sea.The sword of the Great AvengerIs now for the sons of men;It must redden in errand holyTill the babes be cradled again.
THE SONS OF MEN HEARKEN
THE SONS OF MEN HEARKEN
Are ye worth the kiss of a woman?Were ye worth the roof of a womb?Are ye worth the price of your grave-clothes?Are ye worth the name on a tomb?
Are ye worth the kiss of a woman?
Were ye worth the roof of a womb?
Are ye worth the price of your grave-clothes?
Are ye worth the name on a tomb?
Nay! None of these is your earning,And none of these be your meed,If the deathless wail of their yearningShall add to your pulse no speed.
Nay! None of these is your earning,
And none of these be your meed,
If the deathless wail of their yearning
Shall add to your pulse no speed.
Never by hand of a warrior,Never by act of a man,Have the Little Ones thus perished,Since ever that Heaven began.Such deed and the beings who wrought it—Ah! deep must the cutting goTo cure the world of the memoryOf the Little Ones in woe.
Never by hand of a warrior,
Never by act of a man,
Have the Little Ones thus perished,
Since ever that Heaven began.
Such deed and the beings who wrought it—
Ah! deep must the cutting go
To cure the world of the memory
Of the Little Ones in woe.
The Three watch high in Their Heaven,And aye! the Three be grieved;The sword is the key of Their Heaven,If the babes shall be received.
The Three watch high in Their Heaven,
And aye! the Three be grieved;
The sword is the key of Their Heaven,
If the babes shall be received.
Rise then, men of our banner—Speak in our ancient tone—Each of you for his mother,Each of you for his own!Smite full and fell and fearless,Till that these be set free—These, slain of the foulest slayingThat ever made red the sea.
Rise then, men of our banner—
Speak in our ancient tone—
Each of you for his mother,
Each of you for his own!
Smite full and fell and fearless,
Till that these be set free—
These, slain of the foulest slaying
That ever made red the sea.
The sword of the Great AvengerIs now for the sons of men;It must redden in errand holyTill the babes be cradled again.
The sword of the Great Avenger
Is now for the sons of men;
It must redden in errand holy
Till the babes be cradled again.
Copyrighted, 1917, by Emerson Hough
Tinkling Cymbals
By Helen Sherman Griffith
It was in the spring of 1915 that Margaret Durant came back to her home in Greenfield, Iowa, from a visit to friends in the East, and brought with her a clear, shining flame of patriotism, with which she proceeded to fire the town. Margaret had always been a leader, the foremost in civic betterment, in government reform, and in the activities of her church and woman's club. She was a born orator, and loved nothing better than haranguing—and swaying—a crowd.
A fund was started for the purchase of an ambulance, which, Margaret insisted, must be driven by a Greenfield man. And she expressed sorrow on every occasion—particularly in the hearing of the mothers of young men—that she had no son to offer. The Red Cross rooms became the centre of Greenfield social activity, and the young people never dreamed of giving an entertainment for any purpose save to benefit the Red Cross, the British Relief or the Lafayette Fund. This last became presently the object of Margaret's special activities, since her husband, Paul, some four generations previously, had come of French blood. "So that it is almost like working for my own country," Margaret said proudly. And she glowed with gratification whenever the French were praised.
So complete and self-sacrificing was her enthusiasm that she announced, as the spring advanced, her intention of taking no summer vacation, but to dedicate the money thus saved to the Lafayette Fund, and to work for that organization during the entire summer.
Her friends were thrilled with admiration at Margaret's attitude, and some of them emulated her heroic example. To be sure, staying at home that summer was a popular form of self-denial, since a good many families, even in Greenfield, Iowa, were beginning to feel the pinch of war.
One summer afternoon, Margaret strolled home from an animated meeting of the Lafayette Fund, exalted and tingling with emotion. She had addressed the meeting, and her speech had been declared the epitome of all that was splendid and noble. She had moved even herself to tears by her appeal for patriotism. She entered the house, still mentally enshrouded by intoxicating murmurs of "Isn't she wonderful!" "Doesn't she make you wish you were a man, to go yourself!" and so forth.
Softly humming the Marseillaise, she mounted the steps to her own room, to remove her hat. She stopped short on the threshhold with a sudden startled cry. Her husband was there, walking up and down the room, and also humming the Marseillaise. It was half an hour before his usual home-coming time, but that was not why Margaret cried out.
Paul was dressed in khaki! He was walking up and down in front of the cheval glass, taking in the effect from different angles. He looked around foolishly when he heard his wife.
"Just trying it on," he said lightly. "How do you like me?"
"But Paul—what—what does itmean?"
"Just what you have guessed. I've signed up. I'm to drive the Greenfield ambulance," he added with justifiable pride.
Margaret stared, gasped, tottered. She would have fallen if she had not sat down suddenly. Paul stared, too, astonished.
"Why, old girl, I thought it was what you wanted! I—you said——"
"Paul, Paul! You! It can't be! Why—why, you are all I have!"
"That is one reason the more for my going—we have no son to send."
"But Paul—it—I—the war is so far away! It isn't as if—as if we were at war."
"Almost—'France is the land of my ancestors'—your very words, Margaret."
"I know, but——"
"'And the cause is so just.'"
"But, Paul, I did not mean——"
"Did not mean what!" Paul turned and faced her sternly. "Margaret, your eloquence has sent a good many young men to the front. I wonder—" He paused, and a new expression dawned in his eyes; an expression that Margaret could not bear: an accusation, a suspicion.
Margaret cowered in her chair and hid her face.
"Oh, Paul, not that, not that! Leave me a moment, please. I—I want time to—to grasp it."
When she was alone she sat upright and faced the look she had seen in Paul's eyes.
"I am a canting hypocrite. I see it now, plainly. I read it in Paul's eyes. But I will show him he's mistaken. God! is hypocrisy always so cruelly punished? Merciful God, have pity upon me!"
Rising to her feet, Margaret staggered to the door and called. The enthusiasm, the exaltation, had faded from her face, leaving it pinched and gray. But in her eyes a new expression had been born, which lent a soft radiance to her features, the light of complete self-denial. Paul entered, gave one look, then knelt at his wife's feet.
"Forgive me, my love, for misunderstanding you. The fault was mine. You've been afraid I would not make good, and were testing me. Ah, my love."
For one terrible moment Margaret hesitated. Then she whispered:
"No, Paul, you were right at first; but love has conquered. Notourlove, but a greater, nobler sentiment: love of Right and Justice. Do you remember the verse: 'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.' I—I amnota tinkling cymbal, Paul. I—Oh, Paul, take me with you! I can be of some use over there. We will go together."
Paul rose and embraced her.
"My precious one! How Greenfield will honor you!"
Margaret winced and hid her face in his breast.
"No, Paul, no, no. Don't let them know! Let us go away quietly, in the night. Please, please, Paul. I—I could not bear any other way!"
Durant kissed her and said no more. And if he understood, he never let her know that he did.
The First Laugh
By Reuben F. Place
In the life of every baby there is a continuous succession of first impressions and adventures. The first tooth, the first crawl, the first step, the first word, each mark a milestone in the child's career. But more interesting than any of these is the first laugh—the first genuine, sustained, prolonged, whole-hearted laugh. If it is a tinkling, bubbling, echoing laugh, it sends its merry waves in all directions—the kind that brings smiles to sober faces.
What hope springs up in the parents' breasts at the sound of that first laugh! How thoroughly it denotes the future!
A hearty laugh or no laugh in later years may mean the difference between fame and obscurity, fortune and poverty, friends and enemies.
"How much lies in laughter: the cipher key, wherewith we decipher the whole man!" wrote Carlyle.
A good laugh is a charming, invaluable attribute. It saves the day, maintains the health, makes friends, soothes injured feelings, and saves big situations.
Laughter is a distinguishing mark between man and beast. It is the sign of character and the mirror in which is reflected disposition.
To laugh is to live.
The babe's first laugh is a precious family memory. A load of responsibility goes with it. It should be guarded and guided and cultivated until it becomes "Laughter that opens the lips and heart, that shows at the same time pearls and the soul."
The Freighter's Dream
By Ida M. Huntington
"Squeak! Squ-e-a-k! Scr-e-e-ch!" The shrill, monotonous sound rent the hot noontide air like a wail of complaint.
"Thar she goes ag'in, a-cussin' of her driver!" grumbled old Hi, as he walked at the head of his lead oxen, Poly and Bony, with Buck and Berry panting behind them. "Jest listen at her! An' 'twas only day afore yistiddy that I put in a hull half hour a-greasin of her. Wal, she'll hev to fuss till mornin'. We ain't got no time to stop a minute in this hot place. If we make the springs afore the beasteses gin out 'twill be more'n I look fer!"
Old Hi anxiously gazed ahead, trying to see through the shimmering haze of the desert the far-distant little spot of ground where bubbled up the precious spring by which they might halt for rest and refreshment. "G'lang, Poly! That's right, Bony! Keep it up, ol' fellers!" Hi strove to encourage the patient oxen as they plodded wearily along through the fearful heat and the suffocating clouds of fine alkali dust.
For weeks the long train of covered wagons had moved steadily westward over the dim trails. Starting away back in Ohio, loaded with necessities for the prospectors in the far West, they had crossed the fertile prairies, stuck in the muddy sloughs, forded the swollen rivers, rumbled over the plains and wound in and out the mountain passes. Now they were crawling over the desert, man and beast almost exhausted, even the seasoned wagons seeming to protest against the strain put upon them.
All that afternoon Hi walked with his oxen, talking and whistling, as much to keep up his own courage as to quicken their pace. For a few moments at a time they would rest, and then onward again towards the springs indicated on the map by which they traveled.
Half blind and dizzy from the dust and heat, sometimes Hi stumbled and staggered and nearly fell. He dared not turn to see how it fared with the men and teams behind him. Wrecks of wagons and bones of oxen by the side of the trail told an all-too-plain story. Some there were in every train who dropped by the way; men who raved in fever and died calling for water; faithful oxen who were shot to put them out of misery. Wagons were abandoned with their valuable freight when the teams could no longer pull them.
All afternoon they crept forward; the reiterating "Squeak! Squ-e-a-k! Scr-e-e-ch!" of the wagon sounded like a maddened human voice to poor Hi, fevered and half delirious.
At last the sun sank like a ball of fire in the haze. A cool breath of air sighed across the plain. The prairie dogs barked from their burrows. The coyotes yapped in the distance. But not yet could the long train stop, for rest without water meant death.
Far into the night the white-topped wagons crept on like specters. No sound was heard except that of the plodding feet of the oxen, the rumble of the heavy wagons and the "Squeak! Squ-e-a-k! Scr-e-e-ch!" that had troubled Hi since noon. Suddenly the oxen lifted their heads, sniffed the air eagerly, and without urging quickened their pace.
"What is it, ol' fellers?" asked Hi, as hope revived. "Is it the water ye are smellin'? Stiddy, thar! Stiddy!"
A few moments more, and Hi gave a shout of joy that was taken up and sounded down the line. "The spring! The spring!"
A halt was made. Every drop of the precious water was carefully portioned out so that each might have his share. Preparations were made for the night. The wagons were pulled up in a circle. The oxen were carefully secured that they might not wander away. Here and there a flickering little fire was seen as the scanty "grub" was cooked. After Hi had bolted his share he wrapped himself in his blanket and lay down near his wagon. The large white top loomed dimly before him in the darkness.
A little while he stretched and twisted and turned uneasily until his tired muscles relaxed. In his ears yet seemed to sound the "Squeak! Squ-e-a-k! Scr-e-e-ch!" of the complaining wagon as it had bothered him all afternoon. "Darn ye! Won't ye ever shet up?" he muttered as he drifted off to sleep.
"Won't I ever shet up? I won't till I git good and ready!" The sharp, shrill voice made Hi open his eyes with a start. Above him leaned the huge form of an old woman in a white cap drawn close about her wrinkled, seamed face, only partly distinguishable in the darkness. As he lay blinking, trying to see her more plainly, the high falsetto voice continued its plaint.
"Won't I ever shet up? A nice way thet is to talk to me, Hi Smith! Do I iver grumble and snarl when ye treat me right? Hain't I been faithful to ye through thick an' thin? Hain't I made a home fer ye all this hull endurin' trip? Hain't I looked after yer grub and yer blankets and done ever'thin' I could to make ye comfortable? Hain't I kep' the rain offen ye at night? An' thet time the Injuns was after ye, didn't I stand atween ye an' the redskins and pertect ye? Didn't I keep ye from gittin' drownded when ye crossed thet river whar the current swep' the beasteses offen their feet? Didn't I watch over ye and shield ye from the sun when ye lay sick of the fever and hadn't nary wife to look after ye? Hain't I follered after them dumb beasteses through mud and water and over gravel and through clouds of alkali dust thick enough to choke a person, and niver said a word? An' now, jest bekase I'm fair swizzled up with the heat and ye fergit to give me some grease to rub on my achin' j'ints, ye cuss me! Yis, I heerd ye! Ye needn't deny it! A-cussin' of me who has taken the place of home an' mother to ye fer years! I heerd ye! I he-e-rd ye! What d'ye mean, I say!" And the tirade ended in a perfect screech of anger.
Thoroughly aroused, Hi rolled over and jumped hastily to his feet. He looked all around. The old woman had mysteriously vanished. A coyotte sneaked past him. Day was breaking in the east. The first gleam of light fell on the white-topped wagon drawn up beside him.
He rubbed his eyes. "Wal, I swan!" he muttered, as he gazed bewilderedly at the close-drawn white top looming above him. "Glad I woke up airly! I'll hev time ter grease that thar wagon afore we start!"
A Box From Home
By Helen Cowles LeCron
I'll send to you in France, my dear,A box with treasures in it:The patch of sky that meets our hillAnd changes every minute,The grape-vine that you taught to grow—My pansies young with dew,The plum-tree by the kitchen door—These things I'll send to you.I'll pack with care our fragile dawn—The dawn we laughed to greet;I'll send the comfort of the grassThat once caressed your feet.No yearning love of mine I'll sendTo tear your heart in two—Just earth-peace—home-peace—still and strong—These things I'll send to you.For you must tire of flags, and guns,And courage high, and pain,And long to rest your heart uponThe common things again,And so I'll send no prayers, no tears,No longings—only dewAnd garden-rows, and goldenrodAnd country roads to you!Since life has given you to knowThe gentle tendernessOf growing things, I cannot thinkThat death would give you less!Hold fast, hold fast within your heartThe earth-sweet hours we knew,And keep, my dear, where'er you areThese things I send to you.
I'll send to you in France, my dear,A box with treasures in it:The patch of sky that meets our hillAnd changes every minute,The grape-vine that you taught to grow—My pansies young with dew,The plum-tree by the kitchen door—These things I'll send to you.
I'll send to you in France, my dear,
A box with treasures in it:
The patch of sky that meets our hill
And changes every minute,
The grape-vine that you taught to grow—
My pansies young with dew,
The plum-tree by the kitchen door—
These things I'll send to you.
I'll pack with care our fragile dawn—The dawn we laughed to greet;I'll send the comfort of the grassThat once caressed your feet.No yearning love of mine I'll sendTo tear your heart in two—Just earth-peace—home-peace—still and strong—These things I'll send to you.
I'll pack with care our fragile dawn—
The dawn we laughed to greet;
I'll send the comfort of the grass
That once caressed your feet.
No yearning love of mine I'll send
To tear your heart in two—
Just earth-peace—home-peace—still and strong—
These things I'll send to you.
For you must tire of flags, and guns,And courage high, and pain,And long to rest your heart uponThe common things again,And so I'll send no prayers, no tears,No longings—only dewAnd garden-rows, and goldenrodAnd country roads to you!
For you must tire of flags, and guns,
And courage high, and pain,
And long to rest your heart upon
The common things again,
And so I'll send no prayers, no tears,
No longings—only dew
And garden-rows, and goldenrod
And country roads to you!
Since life has given you to knowThe gentle tendernessOf growing things, I cannot thinkThat death would give you less!Hold fast, hold fast within your heartThe earth-sweet hours we knew,And keep, my dear, where'er you areThese things I send to you.
Since life has given you to know
The gentle tenderness
Of growing things, I cannot think
That death would give you less!
Hold fast, hold fast within your heart
The earth-sweet hours we knew,
And keep, my dear, where'er you are
These things I send to you.
The Spirit of Spring
By Laura L. Hinkley
Margaret Hazeltine sat on her porch with the spring wind blowing over her elusive wafts of fragrance—plum-blossom, apple-blossom, young grass, budding wood scents, pure, growing earth-smells.
"It is like breathing poetry," Margaret thought.
She was sewing, but now and then her hands fell in her lap while she lifted her head, catching in some wandering sweetness with a sharp breath, like a sigh.
It was four o'clock in the afternoon. Sunshine mellowed the new greenness of short, tender grass on the lawns. It shone upon all the bare, budded branches up and down the street, seeking, caressing, stimulating. It lay kindly, genially, on the mid-road dust.
Margaret's father was pottering about the garden. He was a very old man, with stooping shoulders, but tall and slender like his daughter. He came up to the porch and stood leaning on his hoe. The wind fluttered his shabby garden-coat and thin, white beard. He rested his wrinkled old hands on the top of his hoe handle, and cast up his faded, sunken eyes to the intense young blue of the sky with its fleecy clouds floating.
Mr. Hazeltine addressed his daughter in the strain of conversational piety habitual with him, and in a voice which age and earnestness made tremulous:
"Seems like every spring I get more certain of my eternal home up yonder!"
Margaret smiled acquiescently. Long since she had silently drifted outside the zone of her father's simple, rigid creed; but to-day its bald egoism did not repel her. It seemed at one with the sweet will to live all about them.
Mr. Hazeltine went back to the garden. A girl appeared on the porch of the house opposite. The Hazeltine house was small and old and not lately painted. The house opposite was large, fresh, trim, and commodious in every visible detail. White cement walks enclosed and divided its neatly kept lawns and parking. Its fruit-trees breathed out of the unfolding whiteness of their bosoms the sweetest of those perfumes that drifted across to Margaret. The girl on the porch pushed the wicker chairs about for a moment, then, disdaining them all, sat down on the cement steps and rested her chin in her palm.
After a quick look and smile Margaret sewed busily, affecting not to see the other. She felt a little sympathetic flutter of pleasure and suspense. "Jean is waiting for Frank," she said to herself.
A piano began to play in a house up the street. Through the open windows rang joyous, vibrant music. White moths fluttered across the street and the lawn and parking opposite, veering vaguely over scattered yellow dandelion heads. Around the house opposite on the cement walk strutted a very young kitten on soft paws, its short tail sticking straight up, its gray coat still rough from its mother's tongue.
"Me-ow!" said the kitten plaintively, appalled at its own daring.
Jean sprang up, laughing, snatched up the kitten and carried it back to her seat, cuddling it under her chin.
Down the street came a young girl wheeling a baby's cab. The girl was but just past childhood, and she had been a homely child. But of late she had bloomed as mysteriously and almost as quickly as the plum-trees. She wore a light summer dress with a leaf-brown design upon it, in which her girlish form still half-confessed the child. Her complexion was clear and bright, the cheeks flushed; and the strongly-marked features seemed ready to melt and fuse to a softer mould. Her brown eyes had grown wistful and winning.
As they advanced, Margaret ran down the rickety wooden walk.
"Oh, is that the new baby?" she cried delightedly. "May I look?"
The girl smiled assent.
Softly Margaret drew back the woolly carriage robe and gazed adoringly. The baby was about six weeks old. Its tiny face was translucent, pinky white, the closed eyelids with their fringe of fine lashes inconceivably delicate. Its wee hands cuddled about its head; the curled, pink fingers, each tipped with its infinitesimal, dainty nail, were perfection in miniature. The formless mouth, pinker than the rest of the face, moved in sleep, betraying the one dream the baby knew.
Margaret drew a long, still breath of rapture, hanging over the little pink pearl of humanity.
"Will he wake if I kiss him?" she pleaded.
The girl smiled doubtfully. "Maybe," she said.
She was equally indifferent to the baby and to Margaret. Her wistful eyes wandered eagerly down the street, watching each sidewalk, and the glow in her cheeks and eyes seemed to kindle and waver momently.
Margaret did not kiss the baby. She only bent her head close over his, close enough to feel his warm, quick breathing, to catch the rhythm of his palpitating little life.
When she came back to her porch, after the girl had gone on, Margaret saw that Jean's caller had come.
The young man sat beside Jean. His head was bare, his black hair brushed stiffly up from his forehead pompadour-fashion, his new spring suit palpably in its original creases. He and Jean talked eagerly, sometimes with shouts of young laughter, at which Margaret smiled sympathetically; sometimes with swift, earnest interchange; sometimes with lazy, contented intervals of silence. Occasionally he put out his hand to pat or tease the kitten which lay in Jean's lap. She defended it. Whenever their fingers chanced to touch they started consciously apart—covertly to tempt the chance again.
Two little girls came skipping down the street, their white dresses tossed about their knees. Their loose hair, of the dusky fairness of brunette children, tossed about their shoulders and an immense white ribbon bow quivered on the top of each little bare head. Their dress and their dancing run gave them the look and the wavering allure of butterflies.
They were on Jean's side of the street. They fluttered past the house unnoticed by the two on the porch, who were in the midst of an especially interesting quarrel about the kitten. The little girls passed over the crossing with traces of conscientious care for their white slippers, and came up on Margaret's side. Opposite her they paused in consultation.
"Won't you come in," she called to them, "and talk to me a minute?"
The two advanced hesitatingly and stood before her at a little distance on the young grass in attitudes clearly tentative. They were shy little misses, and had not lived long on that street.
"Someone told me," said Margaret, "that your names were Enid and Elaine. Which is which?"
The taller one pointed first to her embroidered bosom, then to her sister.
"I'm Enid; she's Elaine."
"I've read about you in a book of poetry," observed Margaret—"it must have been you! I suppose if you had a little sister her name would be Guinevere?"
The large dark eyes of the two exchanged glances of denial. The small Elaine shook her head decidedly.
"Wegota little sister!" announced Enid, "but her name ain't that; it's Katherine."
They were both pretty with the adorable prettiness of small girls, half baby's beauty, and half woman's. But Enid's good looks would always depend more or less upon happy accident—her time of life, her flow of spirits, her fortune in costume. Her face was rather long, with chin and forehead a trifle too pronounced. But the little Elaine was nature's darling. Her softly rounded person and countenance were instinct with charm. Even her little brown hands had delicacy and character. Her white-stockinged legs, from the fine ankles to the rounded knees at her skirt's edge, were turned to a sculptor's desire. Beside them, Enid's merely serviceable legs looked like sticks. The white bows in their hair shared the ensemble effect of each: Enid's perched precisely in the middle, its loops and ends vibrantly and decisively erect; Elaine's drooped a little at one side, its crispness at once confessing and defying evanescence and fragility.
Margaret thrilled with the child's loveliness, but for some subtle reason she smiled chiefly on Enid.
That little lady concluded she must be a person worthy of confidence.
"My doll's name is Clara," she imparted. "An' hers is Isabel, only she calls it 'Ithabel'!"
The color deepened in Elaine's dainty cheek. She was stung to protest; which she did with all the grace in the world, hanging her head at one side and speaking low.
"I don't either!" she murmured. "I thay Ithabel!"
"Either way is very nice," Margaret hastened to say.
"We've been to Miss Eaton's Sunday school children's party," Enid informed her. "These are our best dresses, and our white kid slippers. Don't you think they're pretty? Mine tie with ribbons, but hers only button like a baby's."
Elaine looked down grievingly at the offensively infantile slippers, turning her exquisite little foot.
"I'm going to speak a piece for Easter," Enid pursued, "all alone by myself; and she's going to speak one in concert with a class."
"Oh, I hope you will come and speak them for me some time," Margaret invited; "and bring Clara and Isabel."
"Maybe we will," answered Enid. "We must go now. Come on, Elaine."
Margaret watched them until they stopped beside a flowerbed along the sidewalk where the first tulips of the season were unfolding. Elaine bent over to examine them. Margaret reproached herself that, though Elaine had spoken but once, it was her image that lingered uppermost. Why should she add even the weight of her preference to that child in whose favor the dice were already so heavily loaded? For in Margaret's eyes, beauty was always the chief gift of the gods.
As she resumed her sewing, a sudden, fantastic fear shot across her thoughts—the fear that Elaine would die. She recognized it, in a moment, for the heart's old, sad prevision of impermanence in beauty, its rooted unbelief in fortune's constancy.
A quick glance up the street showed Elaine still stooping over the tulip bed, her stiff little skirts sticking out straight behind her. The grotesqueness was somehow reassuring. Margaret smiled, half at the absurd little figure, half at her own absurdly tragic fancy.
On the other porch Frank was taking his leave—a process of some duration. First he stood on the lower steps talking at length with Jean who stood on the top step. Then he raised his cap and started away, only to remember something before he reached the corner and to run back across the lawn. There he stood talking while Jean sat on the porch railing, suggesting a faint Romeo and Juliet effect. The next time, Jean called him back. They met halfway down the cement walk and conversed earnestly and lengthily.
With an exquisite sympathy Margaret watched these maneuvers from under discreet eyelids. She was glad for them both, with a clear-souled, generous joy. And yet she felt a sensitive pleasure that walked on the edge of pain. In the young man especially she took a quick delight—in his supple length of limb, the spread of his shoulders, his close-cropped black hair, his new clothes, the way he thrust his hands deep in his trousers' pockets while he swung on the balls of his feet, the attentive bend of his head toward Jean; she reveled in all his elastic, masculine youth which she knew for the garb of a straight, strong, kindly, honorable soul. But out of the revel grew a trouble, as if some strange spirit prisoned in her own struggled to tear itself free, to fling itself, wailing, in the dust.
"Egotism!" said Margaret to herself, curling her lip, sewing very fast. The fluttering spirit lay tombed and still.
When Frank was finally gone, Jean sauntered across the street to Margaret's porch. She perched on the rail and pulled at the leafless vine-stems beside her, talking idly and desultorily of things she was not interested in.
She was an attractive girl, more wholesome than beautiful. Her bronze-brown hair coiled stylishly about her head, gleamed in the late sun. There were some tiny freckles across her nose. She wore a pale blue summer-dress with short sleeves out of which her young arms emerged, fresh and tender from their winter seclusion.
The two maidens circled warily about the topic they were both longing to talk of. Margaret noted in Jean a new aloofness. Every time she threw Frank's name temptingly into the open Jean purposely let it lie.
At last, with a little gasp of laughter, looking straight before her, Jean exclaimed: "I guess I'm sort of scared!"
"What I like about Frank," said Margaret, "is that he's so true and reliable. He's a fellow you can trust!"
"Yes," assented Jean. "Don't you think he looks—nice in that new suit?"
"Splendid! Frank's a handsome boy."
"Isn't he?" sighed Jean.
"He'll always be constant to anyone he cares for. And, I think—he does care for someone."
"What makesyouthink so?" demanded Jean, her blue eyes suddenly intent on Margaret.
"What makes you think so?" Margaret parried.
Jean sat up instantly very straight and stiff.
"Who said I thought anything?"
"Oh, no, no!" Margaret disclaimed hastily. "I didn't mean that. I meant anyone would think so!"
Jean lapsed into a placated limpness, resting her lithe young figure in its summer blue against the dingy house-wall.
"Isn't it funny," she mused, "how you can resolve you won't think, and keep yourself from thinking, and really not think, because you've made up your mind you wouldn't—and all the time youknow!"
Margaret was searching in her mind for some tenderest phrase of warning when Jean anticipated her.
"Well, it's a good thing I don't care!—I thought at first I didn't like his hair that way, but I do now—better than the other way. He was telling about college."
"He finishes this year, doesn't he?"
"Yes. He's going in with his father next year—unless he makes up his mind to go to Yale. But he doesn't think he will. His father wants him here; and he's about decided that's best."
"Marg'ret," called a thin, querulous, broken voice from within the house; "ain't it time you was gettin' supper?"
Margaret opened the door to call back in a loud, clear voice: "Not yet, Mother."
Jean slipped off the railing. "I must go."
"It really isn't time yet. Mother gets nervous, sitting all day. And she doesn't care to read any more. Stay a little longer."
These snatches of Jean's confidence were delicious to her.
"Oh, I've got to go."
Jean suddenly put both arms around Margaret's waist and clasped her in a swift embrace.
"I wish," she said, "some awfully nice old widower or bachelor would come along and marry you!"
As Jean crossed the street with the lowering sun making a nimbus in her chestnut-golden hair, she began to sing. The words sprang joyous and clear as a bobolink's note—
"What's this dull town to me?Robin's not here!"
"What's this dull town to me?Robin's not here!"
"What's this dull town to me?
Robin's not here!"
But a sudden waft of consciousness smote them to a vague humming that passed swiftly into—
"My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream;Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream."
"My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream;Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream."
"My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream;
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream."
In the scented dark of the spring evening, Margaret came to the porch again. A little curved moon sailed the sky—less a light-giver than a shining ornament on the breast of night. A while before children's laughter and skurrying footfalls had echoed down the sidewalks. Boys had played ball in the middle of the street, with running and violent contortions, and shouts and calls rejoicing in the release of their animal energies. But these sounds had ceded to silence as the soft darkness fell. Then young strollers, two and two, had passed; but these also were gone. A gentle wind rustled very softly in the dead vine-stalks. The world was alone with the fragrant wind and the dreaming dusk and the little silver scimitar of moon.
The house opposite was all dark, except for a line of lamplight beside the drawn blind of a side window. Earlier, Jean had turned on the porch lights and sat under them in the most graceful of the wicker chairs, reading, or affecting to read, and Frank, coming down the street, had seen her in all that glow. Then they had turned off the lights and gone away together, and the house had sunk into shadowy repose. Vague lines of wanness betrayed the place of the cement walks. The fruit-trees were dim, withdrawn, half-hinted shapes of whiteness, but their perfume, grown bolder in darkness, wandered the winds with poignant, sweet desire.
Margaret leaned against the weather-worn corner-post of the porch; her hand passed over its cracked, paint-blistered surface with, a soft, absent touch. She felt to her finger-tips the wooing lure of the night. In the spring of her pulses she was aware of Frank and Jean somewhere together in the dusky, fragrant, crescent-clasped folds of it. She seemed to draw in with her breath and gather subtly through the pores of her flesh all the shy, sweet, youthful yearning of the world—and, behind that, wordlessly she knew the driven sap, the life-call, the procreant urge. She sighed and stirred restlessly. The strand of pain that runs in the pleasure of such moods began to ache gently like an old wound touched with foreknowledge of evil weather. She shared the pang that lies at the heart of spring.
Words of poetry pressed into her mind, voices of the great interpreters. She was not a cultivated woman, hardly to be called educated; her horizon, even of books, was chance-formed and narrow; but what circumstance had given her she remembered well. The groping, vain longing that stirred in her fell on speech, and moved among the haunted echoes of the world.