The Good Old Days: 62 Poems About a Simpler Time

The Old Country Store

by Ed Blair

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Oh, the old country store with the candy jars in it,
And the bag of green coffee that sat by the door;
The barrel of sorghum with plug driven in it,
That leaked every hour a few drops on the floor.
The barrel of crackers with cover beside it,
The cheese, where a patron could pilfer a bite.
The jugs and the jars with the straw in between them,
When I was a boy 'twas a source of delight.

Piled up on the counter, the "hickory shirting"—
A stripe and a plaid for the patrons to choose.
Some featherproof ticking, some ducking for "breeches,"
Some calicos, ginghams, a few pairs of shoes,
A barrel of kraut never spoiled in the making,
How good it did taste when I tiptoed a wee,
And the "gingersnap cookies" that came in the boxes,
What a treat to have one of them given to me.

The old country store, what a charm to the youngster
The hogshead of sugar (sometimes mixed with sand),
And if I was there when the "store man" was opening,
A lump of its sweetness was placed in my hand.
The coffee pots stood in a row on the shelving,
The old iron boilers and tubs down below,
A can of gunpowder and shot for the hunters
And the "waterproof" caps that ofttimes wouldn't go.

Oh, the old country store, what a joy there to visit
With postoffice boxes, 'mong cobwebs galore,
That gave us the letters and papers on Monday,
That rode in the mails for a fortnight or more.
Oh, never a city with street cars and bridges
And viaducts, factories—yea, all of these,
Can e'er beat the store at the cross roads on Cow creek
Where first I bought candy and crackers and cheese.

The Old Oaken Bucket

by Samuel Woodworth

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How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood,
When fond recollection presents them to view!
The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wild-wood,
And every loved spot which my infancy knew!
The wide-spreading pond, and the mill that stood by it,
The bridge, and the rock where the cataract fell,
The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it,
And e'en the rude bucket that hung in the well―
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well.

That moss-covered vessel I hailed as a treasure,
For often at noon, when returned from the field,
I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure,
The purest and sweetest that nature can yield.
How ardent I seized it, with hands that were glowing,
And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell;
Then soon, with the emblem of truth overflowing,
And dripping with coolness, it rose from the well―
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket arose from the well.

How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive it
As poised on the curb it inclined to my lips!
Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to leave it,
The brightest that beauty or revelry sips.
And now, far removed from the loved habitation,
The tear of regret will intrusively swell.
As fancy reverts to my father's plantation,
And sighs for the bucket that hangs in the well―
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket that hangs in the well!

The Family Doctor

by Edgar A. Guest

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I've tried the high-toned specialists, who doctor folks to-day;
I've heard the throat man whisper low "Come on now let us spray";
I've sat in fancy offices and waited long my turn,
And paid for fifteen minutes what it took a week to earn;
But while these scientific men are kindly, one and all,
I miss the good old doctor that my mother used to call.

The old-time family doctor! Oh, I am sorry that he's gone,
He ushered us into the world and knew us every one;
He didn't have to ask a lot of questions, for he knew
Our histories from birth and all the ailments we'd been through.
And though as children small we feared the medicines he'd send,
The old-time family doctor grew to be our dearest friend.

No hour too late, no night too rough for him to heed our call;
He knew exactly where to hang his coat up in the hall;
He knew exactly where to go, which room upstairs to find
The patient he'd been called to see, and saying: "Never mind,
I'll run up there myself and see what's causing all the fuss."
It seems we grew to look and lean on him as one of us.

He had a big and kindly heart, a fine and tender way,
And more than once I've wished that I could call him in to-day.
The specialists are clever men and busy men, I know,
And haven't time to doctor as they did long years ago;
But some day he may come again, the friend that we can call,
The good old family doctor who will love us one and all.

Old-Fashioned Letters

by Edgar A. Guest

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Old-fashioned letters! How good they were!
And nobody writes them now;
Never at all comes in the scrawl
On the written pages which told us all
The news of town and the folks we knew,
And what they had done or were going to do.
It seems we've forgotten how
To spend an hour with our pen in hand
To write in the language we understand.

Old-fashioned letters we used to get
And ponder each fond line o'er;
The glad words rolled like running gold,
As smoothly their tales of joy they told,
And our hearts beat fast with a keen delight
As we read the news they were pleased to write
And gathered the love they bore.
But few of the letters that come to-day
Are penned to us in the old-time way.

Old-fashioned letters that told us all
The tales of the far away;
Where they'd been and the folks they'd seen;
And better than any fine magazine
Was the writing too, for it bore the style
Of a simple heart and a sunny smile,
And was pure as the breath of May.
Some of them oft were damp with tears,
But those were the letters that lived for years.

Old-fashioned letters! How good they were!
And, oh, how we watched the mails;
But nobody writes of the quaint delights
Of the sunny days and the merry nights
Or tells us the things that we yearn to know—
That art passed out with the long ago,
And lost are the simple tales;
Yet we all would happier be, I think,
If we'd spend more time with our pen and ink.

A Time to Talk

by Robert Frost

When a friend calls to me from the road
And slows his horse to a meaning walk,
I don’t stand still and look around
On all the hills I haven’t hoed,
And shout from where I am, What is it?
No, not as there is a time to talk.
I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet tall,
And plod: I go up to the stone wall
For a friendly visit.

The Milkman

by Christopher Morley

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Early in the morning, when the dawn is on the roofs,
You hear his wheels come rolling, you hear his horse's hoofs;
You hear the bottles clinking, and then he drives away:
You yawn in bed, turn over, and begin another day!

The old-time dairy maids are dear to every poet's heart—
I'd rather be the dairy man and drive a little cart,
And bustle round the village in the early morning blue,
And hang my reins upon a hook, as I've seen Casey do.

The Furnace

by Christopher Morley

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At night I opened
The furnace door:
The warm glow brightened
The cellar floor.

The fire that sparkled
Blue and red,
Kept small toes cosy
In their bed.

As up the stair
So late I stole,
I said my prayer:
Thank God for coal!

The Country Schoolhouse

by Edwin L. Sabin

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The little country schoolhouse—you
Remember it; of course you do!
Within the angle snugly set,
Where two long yellow highways met,
And saplings planted here and there
About the yard, and boxed with care
As if to typify, in turn,
The youngsters caught and caged, to learn.

Around, the rolling pastures spread,
With woodland patches garlanded,
From which the breezes gladly bore
Sly invitations to the door.
Across the sills the bees' soft hum
Was mingled with the muttered sum,
And from their covert in the vale
In plaintive pleading piped the quail.

With basket and with pail equipped,
Clear-eyed, tan-cheeked and berry-lipped,
Athwart the pastures, down the road,
They trudged to learning's poor abode;
The pink sunbonnet, broad-brimmed straw;
The bare brown feet that knew no law
Of fashion's last; the bundled forms
That laughed aloud at cold and storms.

What tales the scarred desks might relate
Of triumphs gained with book and slate!
What lore the clapboards loose possess
Of feats at noontime and recess!
And doomed how oft the panes to see,
Back up the road, and o'er the lea,
Haste boy and girl, new worlds to find,
The little schoolhouse left behind.

O little country school! In vain
May critics hold you in disdain.
The greatest lessons that you taught
Were not by chalk and pencil wrought.
As oped your door on fields and sky,
So, likewise just as wide and high,
You opened to the eyes of youth
The principles of love and truth.

The Old Stone School House

by Ed. Blair

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I've seen once more the school house grounds
Where oft I spent sweet days,
Of mirth and joy and pleasure rare,
In childhood's pleasant ways,
I've stood upon the ground where then
The children used to play,
It still seemed that I ought to hear
Those voices passed away.

The playground seems not half so large,
The lane not half so wide,
The dear old walls so small, how could
So many get inside?
And dirt and stones now fill the well
That furnished water sweet,
And climbing vines have woven there
The song-birds' safe retreat.

The dear old house no longer stands,
It burned long years ago,
And all that's left are crumbling walls
That time is sinking low,
Oh, ruins! how like youthful hopes,
When time has fl.own and left
Declining years, with scattered friends,
And darling ones bereft.

The wild flower blooms there as of old,
But ah! how sad to me,
No barefoot boys or girls were there,
There loveliness to see.
No races for the soapstone bank
For finger rings we wore,
And pencils that we neatly cut
Like those bou ght from the store.

Those barefoot boys and girls are now
All men and women grown,
And scattered far, yes very far,
From the dear old house of stone,
And as I stood and gazed I seemed
To call them back once more,
And hear their shouts of laughter ring
As in the days of yore.

Song of the School Bell

by John Edward Everett

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Kind neighbors, you and I are friends.
And toiling for the selfsame ends,
To help the children wiser grow,
And teach them what they ought to know.

Day after day, the winter through,
I guard your sons and daughters true.
Each day at nine I say, "hello",
To the youthful world of joy and woe.
Each day at nine are loudly sung
Clear greetings from my iron tongue,
While children rush with romp and race,
As though to meet my fond embrace.
Then through the hours they ply the mind
To see what knowledge they may find—
Sometimes with smile and radiant eye,
Sometimes with frown and inward sigh.
'Tis now with bright, now downcast, looks
They bend their heads above their books.

Kind neighbors, you and I are friends.
And toiling for the selfsame ends,—
To help the children wiser grow,
And teach them what they ought to know.

Bringing Home the Cows

by Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts

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When potatoes were in blossom,
When the new hay filled the mows,
Sweet the paths we trod together,
Bringing home the cows.

What a purple kissed the pasture,
Kissed and blessed the alder-boughs,
As we wandered slow at sundown,
Bringing home the cows!

How the far-off hills were gilded
With the light that dream allows.
As we built our hopes beyond them,
Bringing home the cows!

How our eyes were bright with visions,
What a meaning wreathed our brows,
As we watched the cranes, and lingered,
Bringing home the cows!

Past the years, and through the distance,
Throbs the memory of our vows.
Oh, that we again were children,
Bringing home the cows!

The Homestead

by M. P. A. Crozier

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The years, like humming birds,
Just poised a moment on the wing,
To sip the nectar from the cup
Of life's sweet offering;

The homestead's old familiar halls,
The grassy meadow where I played,
The orchard with its melting fruit,
And soft refreshing shade;

The blacksmith-shop where, all day long,
My noble father toiled and sang,
Where in the morning and at eve,
The music of the anvil rang;

The garden with its spreading vines,
Its roses and its daffodils;
The dark old forest in the east;
Beyond the heaven-aspiring hills.

Living on a Farm

by Anonymous

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How brightly through the mist of years,
My quiet country home appears!
My father busy all the day
In plowing corn or raking hay;
My mother moving with delight
Among the milk pans, silver-bright;
We children, just from school set free,
Filling the garden with our glee.
The blood of life was flowing warm
When I was living on a farm.

I hear the sweet churchgoing bell,
As o'er the fields its music fell,
I see the country neighbors round
Gathering beneath the pleasant sound;
They stop awhile beside the door,
To talk their homely matters o'er
The springing corn, the ripening grain,
And "how we need a little rain;"
"A little sun would do no harm,
We want good weather for the farm."

When autumn came, what joy to see
The gathering of the husking bee,
To hear the voices keeping tune,
Of girls and boys beneath the moon,
To mark the golden corn ears bright,
More golden in the yellow light!
Since I have learned the ways of men,
I often turn to these again,
And feel life wore its highest charm.
When I was living on the farm.

Winters on the Farm

by Freeman E. Miller

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Glad winters on the olden farm!
How raptures from those early times
Commingle into fairy chimes
Which gently banish cries of harm!
My fainting soul finds rest the whiles
Within the arms of memory,
And tender scenes of boyish glee
Transform my sorrows into smiles.

How brightly beamed the pleasures then,
When frigid fingers came to throw
A wintry winding sheet of snow
Around the silent homes of men!
But happiness found no alarm,
For safe with cheer, secure with love,
She gladly grew and sweetly throve
Through winters on the olden farm.

With merry bells and busy sleighs,
That sung and flew o'er icy vales
And climbed the hills as fleet as gales,
Like singing phantoms died the days;
Or then with coat and muffler warm
Sweet children glided on the lake,
Or chased the rabbit through the brake,
In winters on the olden farm.

How glad the joys at eventide
When 'round the hearth-stone's pleasant heat
The simple song in music sweet
From loving voices floated wide!
The mellowed apples gave a charm,
While pop-corn white and cider bright
With worlds of laughter lent delight
To winters on the olden farm.

Thrice happy nights and happy days,
Sweet isles of pleasure in the past,
May long your hallowed moments cast
A sacred sunshine o'er my ways!
And where life leads me, gladly arm
My soul with angel songs of bliss,
With true embrace and holy kiss,
O, winters on the olden farm!

The Old Farm

by O. Henry

Just now when the whitening blossoms flare
On the apple trees and the growing grass
Creeps forth, and a balm is in the air;
With my lighted pipe and well-filled glass
Of the old farm I am dreaming,
And softly smiling, seeming
To see the bright sun beaming
Upon the old home farm.

And when I think how we milked the cows,
And hauled the hay from the meadows low;
And walked the furrows behind the plows,
And chopped the cotton to make it grow
I'd much rather be here dreaming
And smiling, only seeming
To see the hot sun gleaming
Upon the old home farm.

The Old Barn

by Madison Cawein

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Low, swallow-swept and gray,
Between the orchard and the spring,
All its wide windows overflowing hay,
And crannied doors a-swing,
The old barn stands to-day.

Deep in its hay the Leghorn hides
A round white nest; and, humming soft
On roof and rafter, or its log-rude sides,
Black in the sun-shot loft,
The building hornet glides.

Along its corn-crib, cautiously
As thieving fingers, skulks the rat;
Or in warped stalls of fragrant timothy,
Gnaws at some loosened slat,
Or passes shadowy.

A dream of drouth made audible
Before its door, hot, smooth, and shrill
All day the locust sings… What other spell
Shall hold it, lazier still
Than the long day's, now tell:—

Dusk and the cricket and the strain
Of tree-toad and of frog; and stars
That burn above the rich west's ribbéd stain;
And dropping pasture bars,
And cow-bells up the lane.

Night and the moon and katydid,
And leaf-lisp of the wind-touched boughs;
And mazy shadows that the fireflies thrid;
And sweet breath of the cows,
And the lone owl here hid.

The Stack Behind the Barn

by Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts

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September is here, with the ripened seeds,
And the homely smell of the autumn weeds,
My heart goes back to a vanished day,
And I am again a boy at play
In the stack behind the barn.

Dear memory of the old home-farm,—
The hedge-rows fencing the crops from harm,
The cows, too heavy with milk for haste,
The barn-yard, yellow with harvest waste,
And the stack behind the barn.

Dear, dear, dear the old garden-smell,
Sweet William and phlox that I loved so well,
And the seeding mint, and the sage turned grey,
But dearer the smell of the tumbled hay
In the stack behind the barn.

In the side of the stack we made our nest,
And there was the play-house we loved the best.
A thicket of goldenrod, bending and bright,
Filled us with glory and hid us from sight
In the stack behind the barn.

Then, when the stack, with the year, ran low,
And our frosty, morning cheeks were aglow,
When time had forgotten the dropping leaves,
What joy to drop from the barn's wide eaves
To the stack behind the barn!

O childhood years! Your heedless feet
Have slipped away with how much that's sweet!
But dreams and memory master you,
Till the make-believe of Life is through
I still may play as the children do
In the stack behind the barn.

The Old Homestead

by William Henry Venable

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Enshrined among roses
The Homestead reposes
With vines mantled o'er;
Ground-ivy and clover
Are running all over
The stone at the door.

Pinks, lilies, are blowing,
Blue violets showing
Gold hearts to the June;
Bees going and coming
Keep evermore humming
Their Hyblean tune.

'Twas here that I wasted
Youth's flower and tasted
Love's first honey-dew;
A boy here I slumbered,
By care unencumbered,
Long, balmy nights through.

The wood-birds each morning
Gave musical warning
For shadows to fly;
Their rhapsody choral
Foretold the auroral
First flush of the sky.

With rising emotion
Akin to devotion
The scene I behold;—
With fond recollections
Of tender affections
Too sweet to be told.

The Old Fire-Place

by Rev. John S. Mohler

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How sad is the memory of days that are gone
When parents and children in a circle at home
Around the Old Fire-place would cheerfully gather,
Away from the cold and inclemency of weather.

Around the Old Fire-place mother, all the day long,
Was toiling, and toiling with cheer and with song
For father and children preparing them food,
While nourishing and rearing her innocent brood.

At evening with treadle she was humming the wheel
While father was wrapping the yarn from the reel;
And brothers and sisters were reading their books,
Or merrily playing in their innocent sports.

As the embers on the hearth were dying away,
Our father more fuel would carefully lay,
Till the Old Fire-place blazed again in a roar,
Which caused us to widen our circle still more.

When the toils and the pleasures of evening were o'er,
We knelt 'round the Fire-place, God's mercy to implore,
From harm and from evil us safely would keep,
As defenseless we lay in the silence of sleep.

As the cold wintery winds were passing away,
And the gentle breeze sighed through the long summer day,
And the embers had died on the once blazing hearth,
Now vocal at evening with the cricket's soft chirp.

The Old Fire-place scenes, alas, I see them no more,
For its circle is scattered to far distant shores:
the wheel and the reel are covered with rust,
And parents and children are moldering to dust.

The hearth that once glowed with warmth and with cheer,
Is forsaken and desolate, cold and drear;
No prattling of children's sweet voices are there,
No songs of devotion, thanksgiving, or prayer.

Just a few broken links of the beautiful chain,
That bound us together on earth, yet remain;
But that circle complete I hope I shall view
In the day when the Lord maketh all things new.

The Old-Time Fire

by Samuel Harden

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"Talk about yer buildin's
That's het up by steam―
Give me the old oak fire
Where the old folks used to dream.

"The rickety dog-irons,
One-sided as could be;
The ashes banked with 'taters
That was roastin' there fer me.

"The dog on one side, drowsin', Or barkin' near the door;
The kitten cuttin' capers With the knittin' on the floor.

"An' me a little tow head
By mammy's side at night;
With both my cheeks a-burnin'
From the red flames leapin bright.

"These steam-het buildin's make me
Jest weary fer the blaze
That was heap more comfortable
In my childhood's nights and days.

"An I'd give the finest heater
In the buildin's het by steam
Fer the old-time chimbley corner
Where the old folks used to dream."

The Old Dutch Oven

Arthur Chapman

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Some sigh for cooks of boyhood days, but none of them for me;
One roundup cook was best of all—'twas with the XBar-T.
And when we heard the grub-pile call at morning, noon, and night,
The old Dutch oven never failed to cook the things just right.

'T was covered o'er with red-hot coals, and when we fetched her out,
The biscuits there were of the sort no epicure would flout.
I ain't so strong for boyhood grub, 'cause, summer, spring, or fall,
The old Dutch oven baked the stuff that tasted best of all.

Perhaps 't was 'cause our appetites were always mighty sharp—
The men who ride the cattle range ain't apt to kick or carp;
But, anyway, I find myself a-dreaming of that bread
The old Dutch oven baked for us beneath those coals so red.

The Old Hickory Wood Fire

by Evander A. Crewson

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As I sit by the stove, all polished and nickeled,
Where a carpet of velvet covers the floor,
I reckon I ought to feel wonderfully tickled
While the wind thumps and bangs at the door;
Yes, ought to feel glad—so much to admire,
But it all will not cure a longing desire
A fellow will have for the old hickory fire;
With its curling and snapping,
And its whirling and lapping;
That good old fashioned hickory wood fire.

Their anthracite coal don't have any snap;
No bright burning flame up the flue rolls;
I can't help missing the sweet hickory sap
Frying out of the fore-stick over the coals;
These new fangled fires are all very well,
But one thing I miss, and its easy to tell:
'Tis the good old fashioned hickory wood smell;
That old rustic perfume
Which filled up the room;
That good old fashioned hickory wood smell.

How often we'd sit by that wide open fire,
The wild winds howling and roaring outside;
The bright hickory flames mounting up higher,
Beaming on "linsey-woolsey" close to our side.
Yep, thoughts of it oft' my memory will throng
As I dream how, with apples and cider and song,
We'd while away evenings that never seemed long;
And when the fire burned low,
How it would tell of the snow
In the old winter evenings that never seemed long.

You can take your coal and your natural gas,
Which the tastes of to-day are made to desire;
The bright burnished stove in its nickel and brass,
But give me the old fashioned hickory wood fire;
Where, with apples and walnuts, before it we'd sit,
While father would doze and mother would knit,
And the flames would snap and sparkle and spit;
But the fire burned low
In the long, long ago,
And the ashes of years lie forever on it.

The Old Cane Mill

by Nellie Gregg Tomlinson

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"What's sorghum?" Don't you know sorghum?
My gran'son nigh sixteen,
Don t boys know nothin' nowadays?
Beats all I ever seen.
Why sorghum's the bulliest stuff
Wuz ever made ter eat.
You spread it thick on homemade bread;
It's most oncommon sweet.

"Come from?" Wall yer jist better bet
It don't come from no can.
Jus' b'iled down juice from sorghum cane,
Straight I'way 'lasses bran'.
"What's cane?" It's some like corn, yer know,
An' topped with plumes o' seed.
Grows straight an' tall on yaller clay
That wouldn't grow a weed.

Long in September when 'twuz ripe,
The cane-patch battle field
Wuz charged by boys with wooden swords,
Good temper wuz their shield.
They stripped the stalks of all their leaves,
Then men, with steel knives keen
Slashed off the heads and cut the stalks
An' piled them straight an' clean.

The tops wuz saved ter feed the hens,
Likewise fer nex' year's seed.
The farmer allus has ter save
Against the futur's need.
The neighbors cum from miles erbout
An' fetched the cane ter mill.
They stacked it high betwixt two trees,
At Gran'dads, on the hill.

An' ol' hoss turned the cane mill sweep,
He led hisself erroun.
The stalks wuz fed inter the press,
From them the sap wuz groun'.
This juice run through a little trough
Ter pans beneath a shed;
There it wuz b'iled an' skimmed and b'iled,
Till it wuz thick an' red.

Then it wuz cooled an' put in bar'ls
An' toted off to town
While us kids got ter lick the pan,
Which job wuz dun up brown.
Gee whiz! but we did hev good times
At taffy pullin' bees.
We woun' the taffy roun' girls' necks—
Bob wuz the biggest tease.

Inside the furnace, on live coals,
We het cane stalks red hot,
Then hit 'em hard out on the groun'—
Yer oughter hear 'em pop!
Sometimes a barefoot boy would step
Inter the skimmin's hole,
Er pinch his fingers in the mill,
Er fall off from the pole.

When winter winds went whis'lin' through
The door an' winder cracks,
An' piled up snow wuz driftin'
Till yer couldn't see yer tracks,
Then we all drawed roun' the table
An' passed the buckwheat cakes,
Er mebbe it wuz good corn bread.
"What's sorghum?" Good lan' sakes.

Wall, son, yer hev my symperthy;
Yer've missed a lot, I swan.
Oh, sure yer dance an' joy-ride
Frum ev'nin' untel dawn,
Yer've football, skates an' golf ter he'p
The passin' time ter kill,
But give me mem'ry's boyhood days,
Erroun' the ol' cane mill.

The Old Grist-Mill

by Richard Henry Stoddard

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Beside the stream the grist-mill stands,
With bending roof and leaning wall;
So old, that when the winds are wild,
The miller trembles lest it fall:
And yet it baffles wind and rain,
Our brave old Mill! and will again.

Its dam is steep, and hung with weeds:
The gates are up, the waters pour,
And tread the old wheel’s slippery round,
The lowest step forevermore.
Methinks they fume, and chafe with ire,
Because they cannot climb it higher.

From morn to night in autumn time,
When harvests fill the neighboring plains,
Up to the mill the farmers drive,
And back anon with loaded wains:
And when the children come from school
They stop, and watch its foamy pool.

The mill inside is small and dark;
But peeping in the open door
You see the miller flitting round,
The dusty bags along the floor,
The whirling shaft, the clattering spout,
And the yellow meal a-pouring out!

All day the meal is floating there,
Rising and falling in the breeze;
And when the sunlight strikes its mist
It glitters like a swarm of bees:
Or like the cloud of smoke and light
Above a blacksmith’s forge at night.

All day the meal is floating there,
Rising and falling in the breeze;
And when the sunlight strikes its mist
It glitters like a swarm of bees:
Or like the cloud of smoke and light
Above a blacksmith’s forge at night.

I stand beside the stream of Life,
And watch the current sweep along:
And when the flood-gates of my heart
Are raised it turns the wheel of Song:
But scant, as yet, the harvest brought
From out the golden fields of Thought!

The Old Mill by the River

by Isaac McLellan

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Full Text

Here in the years when life was bright
With dewy mornings and sunset light,
In the pleasant season of leafy June,
In each idle, holiday afternoon
I lov'd to wander with willow wand—
I lov'd on the river border to stand
And take the trout or the yellow bream
That leap'd, that glanc'd athwart the stream.

With broken window, with hingeless door,
Thro' which the slanting sunbeams pour;
With leaning gable, and settling wall,
O'er which the draperied ivies fall;
With rafter moldy, worm-eaten beam,
O'er which the silken cobwebs stream,
Fast by the river-banks serene
The old forsaken mill is seen.
Its roof shows many a chasm and rent,
Its creaking vane is crack'd and bent,
In and out the swallows fly
Under the eaves their dwellings lie.
The leather-wing'd bats, when day is dim,
Thro' vacant rooms and granaries skim;
Its shingles that ages ago were new,
Splendid with painters' lavish hue,
Are faded now and swing in the gale,
Scarce held by the loosen'd rusty nail;
The clapboards rattle and clank amain
In gusts of the snow-fall and the rain,
For the dust of many a lapsing year
Hath writ its wasteful chronicle here.
The dam o'er which the waters pour
Is settling and crumbling by the shore;
The slippery logs and mossy stone
Yield to the current one by one;
And swift thro' many a rent abyss
The spouting rivulets foam and hiss,
And soon must the crazy fabric decay,
And the torrent sweep uncheck'd away.
The water-wheel so black and vast,
With beam like a battle-vessel's mast
That once would churn with mighty sweep
The boiling waters so dark and deep,
Lies now a wreck in humbled pride,
Trembling with each assault of the tide.
Under the crumbling, blacken'd wheel
The crystal bubbles circle and reel;
Over and under the eddies boil
Round molder'd timber and rotting post;
In many a circling ripple they coil
In sudden plunge, in wild turmoil,
Now seen an instant, then quickly lost.

"The Mill in the Forest"

by Douglas Malloch

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Full Text

A rendition in words of the musical idyl by Eilenberg.

While twittering songsters yet announce the morn
And all the wood is wondrous calm and still,
Upon the zephyr tremulous is borne
The waking rumble of the forest mill.

The great wheel moves; the foaming waters pour
On waiting sands in crystal melody;
The saw's high treble and the pulley's roar
Are mingled in a song of industry.

Now through the day the busy millwheel turns;
And through the day the saw untiring sings,
Nor rests till red and gold the sunset burns
And blaze and gilt on all the landscape flings.

But, as the orb of day slips down the west,
The waters turn to other ways more still;
The weary wheel at last subsides to rest
And peace comes down upon the silent mill.

A yellow moon arises o'er the trees,
The little stars, with eyes half-timid, peep;
Night brings her black and somber tapestries
And wraps the forest and the mill in sleep.

The Saw-mill on the Connecticut

by Grace Hazard Conkling

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Full Text

Where clear the river ponders
The marshes' slow maroon,
There floats a leveled forest
Upon a broad lagoon.

The bowl of spacious meadow
Is brimmed with trunks of trees
And there's a wilding fragrance
Embroidered on the breeze.

Along the azure water
Most patiently they lie,
And hear the shrieking saw-mill
And memorize the sky,

And see the impartial sunlight
They knew so well of old,
Turn shavings into satin
And saw-dust into gold.

All in the ripe September
I tried to pass today.
The smooth road beckoned Follow!
But the logs whispered . . . Stay!

And lest alone the tree-folk
Go sadly to their death,
I watched the pine surrender
Its rich and final breath,

And heard the oak's last murmur
Where poured its scented dust—
"I do but travel onward
As valiant farers must."

The Old Cider Press

by Robert McIntyre

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Full Text

O the old Cider Press, how its thin yellow thread
Runs backward to-night to the days that are dead,
When it fell from the mill with mellifluous sound,
Where the apples went in, and the oxen went round!
O the great honest eyes of the slow-moving steers
Seem to look at me now, like my own full of tears,
As I smell the sweet odor, which must be, I guess,
A breath of the past from the old Cider Press.

O the old Cider Press on the old orchard hill!
The brook was the hem and the forest the frill
Of that outskirt of Eden we called the "old farm,"
Where all knew the Lord and took hold of his arm.

The Old Cider Mill

by James Arthur Lodge

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Full Text

If I could be a boy again
For fifteen minutes, or even ten,
I'd make a bee-line for that old mill,
Hidden by tangled vines down by the rill;
Where the apples were piled in heaps all 'round,
Red, streaked and yellow all over the ground;
And the old sleepy horse goes round and round
And turns the wheels while the apples are ground.

Straight for that cider mill I'd start,
With light bare feet and lighter heart,
A smiling face, a big straw hat,
Hum-made breeches and all o' that.
And when I got there I would just take a peep,
To see if old cider mill John was asleep,
And if he was I'd go snooking round
'Till a great big round rye straw I'd found;
I'd straddle a barrel and quick begin
To fill with cider right up to my chin.

As old as I am, I can shut my eyes
And see the yellow jackets, bees and flies
A-swarming 'round the juicy cheese
And bung-holes; drinking as much as they please.
I can see the clear sweet cider flow
From the press above to the tub below,
And a'steaming up into my old nose
Comes the smell that only a cider mill knows.

You may talk about your fine old Crow,
Your champagne, sherry, and so and so,
But of all the drinks of press or still,
Give me the juice of that old cider mill.
A small boy's energy and suction power
For just ten minutes or quarter of an hour,
And the happiest boy you ever saw
You'd find at the end of that rye straw,
And I'll forego forevermore
All liquors known on this earthly shore.

Keepsake Mill

by Robert Louis Stevenson

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Full Text

Over the borders, a sin without pardon,
Breaking the branches and crawling below,
Out through the breach in the wall of the garden,
Down by the banks of the river, we go.

Here is the mill with the humming of thunder,
Here is the weir with the wonder of foam,
Here is the sluice with the race running under—
Marvellous places, though handy to home!

Sounds of the village grow stiller and stiller,
Stiller the note of the birds on the hill;
Dusty and dim are the eyes of the miller,
Deaf are his ears with the moil of the mill.

Years may go by, and the wheel in the river
Wheel as it wheels for us, children, to-day,
Wheel and keep roaring and foaming for ever
Long after all of the boys are away.

Home from the Indies and home from the ocean,
Heroes and soldiers we all shall come home;
Still we shall find the old mill wheel in motion,
Turning and churning that river to foam.

You with the bean that I gave when we quarrelled,
I with your marble of Saturday last,
Honoured and old and all gaily apparelled,
Here we shall meet and remember the past.

The Old Covered Bridge

by Lewis Lamar

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Full Text

Extract

The covered bridge is travel-worn
By massive loads across it borne,
Its sidings once were new and fair,
But time has wrought its mischief there.
The oaken floor on duty there,
A story tells of age and wear;
Its sill is patched, and here and there
Are seen rude traces of repair.

Those rudely cut, initials show
The rustic hand of years ago.
In cuts and crayons intertwined,
And diagrams the oddest kind
On frame and gabe' and everywhere
Are seen the marks of age and wear;
And on its ragged hulk appears
The gathered dust of many years.

Its high and handy walls afford
A ready advertising board,
And gaudy bills are posted thickly
To fool the green and fleece the sickly;
There quack'ry makes a great display,
It don't "verstehen," but quacks away,
Unblushingly, for gain and pay,
And busily barters life away.

How merrily the light and gay
Have tripped across it tunnel way,
And loving once have lingered there,
Perchance the envied kiss to share.
And little feet have pattered through
This bridge so trusty aud so true;
The halt and blind, oppressed and poor
Have freely crossed its dusty floor.

This bridge has seen year after year
The emerald hue of spring appear,
And summer full of life and cheer,
As well as autumn, brown and sere:

The Old Covered Bridge

by Richard Lee Dawson

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Full Text

O the old covered bridge! sixty years it has stood
Like a mother to nourish the town's babyhood
With the current of life that unceasingly flowed
Thro' its tunnel along the old National road,
And its moss-covered walls still triumphantly loom,
With their history hidden in cobwebs and gloom,
Like a grim silent sphinx with the future in view,
Or Colossus that spans the old times and the new.

O the old covered bridge! how the years whirl around
As I see it once more, and my life is unwound,
With its burdens and sorrows laid by, and I seem
To be standing again in the sweet happy dream
Of my childhood and watching with innocent glee
The birds and the waters that talked there with me,
While the trees were live giants and I but a midge,
As I lolled on the banks by the old covered bridge.

O the old covered bridge! how I wondered and feared
As far, far through its narrow foot-passage I peered,
And fancied it led to the end of the world
Or some dim distant country in mystery whirled,
And I climbed to the rail and gazed dizzily down
At the current with wrinkles of yellow and brown,
And I lingered till terror of dusk made me fly
And with tears bid the bridge and the river good-by

O the old covered bridge! may it never decay;
May the march of the ages just wear it away,
For it marks the proud growth of a city in fame
And the third generation still finds it the same;
And if ever a flood of the future uprears
To tear the old structure by force from its piers
May my spirit be with it and, perched on its ridge,
Sail away into space with the old covered bridge!

The Prairie-Schooner

Carl Holliday

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Full Text

All day the creeping caravan
Wound on its serpent-trailing way;
A thousand miles of wind-swept tan,
A thousand miles of cloudless gray.

Beneath the quivering summer-heat
The prairie-schooner creaked afar;
Some day, some time, the trail would meet
The Setting Sun, the Golden Bar.

The course is done; the servant old
Long stood in shivering rags, and gazed
Upon the mansions built of gold;
All wondering, by their splendor dazed.

The course is done; yet on and on
Beyond Time's wavering shadow-line
The prairie-schooner long has gone,
Forsaken, lost, with ne'er a shrine.

The Drovers

by John Greenleaf Whittier

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Full Text

Through heat and cold, and shower and sun,
Still onward cheerly driving!
There's life alone in duty done,
And rest alone in striving.
But see! the day is closing cool,
The woods are dim before us;
The white fog of the wayside pool
Is creeping slowly o'er us.

The night is falling, comrades mine,
Our footsore beasts are weary,
And through yon elms the tavern sign
Looks out upon us cheery.
The landlord beckons from his door,
His beechen fire is glowing;
These ample barns, with feed in store,
Are filled to overflowing.

From many a valley frowned across
By brows of rugged mountains;
From hillsides where, through spongy moss,
Gush out the river fountains;
From quiet farm-fields, green and low,
And bright with blooming clover;
From vales of corn the wandering crow
No richer hovers over;

Day after day our way has been
O'er many a hill and hollow;
By lake and stream, by wood and glen,
Our stately drove we follow.
Through dust-clouds rising thick and dun,
As smoke of battle o'er us,
Their white horns glisten in the sun,
Like plumes and crests before us.

We see them slowly climb the hill,
As slow behind it sinking;
Or, thronging close, from roadside rill,
Or sunny lakelet, drinking.
Now crowding in the narrow road,
In thick and struggling masses,
They glare upon the teamster's load,
Or rattling coach that passes.

Anon, with toss of horn and tail,
And paw of hoof, and bellow,
They leap some farmer's broken pale,
O'er meadow-close or fallow.
Forth comes the startled goodman; forth
Wife, children, house-dog, sally,
Till once more on their dusty path
The baffled truants rally.

We drive no starvelings, scraggy grown,
Loose-legged, and ribbed and bony,
Like those who grind their noses down
On pastures bare and stony—
Lank oxen, rough as Indian dogs,
And cows too lean for shadows,
Disputing feebly with the frogs
The crop of saw-grass meadows!

In our good drove, so sleek and fair,
No bones of leanness rattle;
No tottering hide-bound ghosts are there,
Or Pharaoh's evil cattle.
Each stately beeve bespeaks the hand
That fed him unrepining;
The fatness of a goodly land
In each dun hide is shining.

We've sought them where, in warmest nooks,
The freshest feed is growing,
By sweetest springs and clearest brooks
Through honeysuckle flowing;
Wherever hillsides, sloping south,
Are bright with early grasses,
Or, tracking green the lowland's drouth,
The mountain streamlet passes.

But now the day is closing cool,
The woods are dim before us,
The white fog of the wayside pool
Is creeping slowly o'er us.
The cricket to the frog's bassoon
His shrillest time is keeping;
The sickle of yon setting moon
The meadow-mist is reaping.

The night is falling, comrades mine,
Our footsore beasts are weary,
And through yon elms the tavern sign
Looks out upon us cheery.
To-morrow, eastward with our charge
We'll go to meet the dawning,
Ere yet the pines of Kéarsarge
Have seen the sun of morning.

When snow-flakes o'er the frozen earth,
Instead of birds, are flitting;
When children throng the glowing hearth,
And quiet wives are knitting;
While in the fire-light strong and clear
Young eyes of pleasure glisten,
To tales of all we see and hear
The ears of home shall listen.

By many a Northern lake and hill,
From many a mountain pasture,
Shall Fancy play the Drover still,
And speed the long night faster.
Then let us on, through shower and sun,
And heat and cold, be driving;
There's life alone in duty done,
And rest alone in striving.

The Old Sheep Wagon

Arthur Chapman

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Full Text

I have heard men long for a palace, but I want no such abode,
For wealth is a source of trouble, and a jeweled crown is a load;
I'11 take my home in the open, with a mixture of sun and rain—
Just give me my old sheep wagon, on the boundless Wyoming plain.

With the calling sheep around me, and my collie's head on my knees,
I float my cigarette smoke on the sage-scented prairie breeze;
And at night, when the band is bedded, I creep, like a tired child,
To my tarp, in the friendly wagon, alone on the sheep range wild.

Music and art I am missing?—but what great symphony
Can equal the harps of nature that are twanged by the plains-wind free?
And where is the master of color to match, though for years he tried,
The purples that veil yon mesa, at the hour of eventide?

I have had my fill of mankind, and my dog is my only friend,
So I'm waiting, here in the sagebrush, for the judgment the Lord may send;
They'll find me dead in my wagon, out here on the hilltops brown,
But I reckon I'11 die as easy as I would in a bed in town!

The Old Log Church

by Lizzie F. Baldy

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Full Text

In the primitive days that have long past away,
When the sun shone as brightly as sun shines to-day,
Here the old church was built, and the settlement small
Held the stanch frontier heart, that would answer the call
To the volunteer ranks, when the foeman was near.
Leaping into their saddles as swift as the deer,
Pursuing the red warrior o'er plateau and dale,
Until night threw around them her dark star-gemmed vail,
Like a benison of peace bringing rest everywhere,
While the worshippers knelt in their quaint church of prayer.

Old Time holds his scepter, and beneath his stern sway
A city looms up in her stately array;
New churches have taken the place of the old,
New worshipers worship within the new fold,
Whose spires point to heaven; here the rich and the gay
Kneel low at their altars: do they all kneel to pray
With the reverence for God marking all of their moods,
As when the old church stood mid nature's solitudes;
When the faith of the people had hallowed the sod,
And they raised this rude temple to worship their God?

No fine garb of fashion, no carpeted aisles;
No cloak of vast riches, from which guilt oft smiles;
No soft cushioned pews in which sinners may rest,
Unheeding the future in the present's bequest;
No grand organ music, no fashionable choir,
But they sang the old tunes with a heartfelt desire.
The swift flowing river rolling down to the sea
Oft caught up the refrain in her wild minstrelsy;
And the wide answering paean went up on high,
Till the echo hath flown like birds to the sky.
The church is still there and the river flows on,
But the people who built it. Oh! where have they gone?

Many bridges hang over the river's dark wave,
Progress laughs at the failures she hides in the grave;
Her bidding the iron horse obeys with a bound,
His track like a girdle spans the continent round;
The lightning of heaven flashing o'er the wire,
Brings the news of a people as a single desire.
And here Commerce, twin sister, asserts her bold sway,
While success crowns her efforts with laurels each day,
But the little log church stands deserted, alone,
Like some ancient relic whose daytime hath flown.

Oh! church as you stand in your loneliness now,
Hath the dark hand of death pressed each worshiper's brow?
Did the sunlight of peace shine with joy on each face,
As they knelt round thy altar to ask for His grace?
Our God sends his blessing in hamlet and hall,
He sees not their riches, but heeds each low call;
The church may be humble, or stately and grand,
The last to be built, or the first in the land.
The old log church may crumble to dust bye-and-bye,
But God keeps the record of each up on high.

The Village Blacksmith

by Anna Marie Neis

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Full Text

Ho! the village blacksmith,
All the live-long day,
The ringing of his anvil,
Wears many hours away.

How manfully he lifts his arm,
And strikes the heavy blow,
The hammer beating perfect time,
As he swings it to and fro.

Listen to the anvil!
The sound is very dear,
As across the little park,
It rings out loud and clear.

'Tis the only chiming sound,
That keeps the village stirring,
For in the quiet little town,
There's nothing much occurring.

On a bright and sunny morning,
When the sky is blue,
And the grass is fresh and green,
And slightly wet with dew.

The farmer boy may be seen
Coming from afar,
With horse to shoe, wagon to fix,
And to get a box of tar.

Then a little chit-chat
In a loud and jolly tone,
The farmer boy hooks up his horse,
And hurries on toward home.

No sooner is he out of sight,
Than others come and go,
Thus keeping the village blacksmith's shop
In a continual glow.

The smith is known for many a mile,
And greatly esteemed it appears,
For he has been the village smith
For five and twenty years.

But things will change as time goes on
And cause us deep despair,
For in the little village shop,
The smith is no more there.

For sickness came as it will to all
Midst pleasure and midst mirth,
And sad to say in three short days
He departed from this earth.

The shock is great to all around,
Even those who knew him not,
His death casts a shadow,
Which will not be soon forgot.

In the quiet little churchyard
The smith was laid low,
Where the green grass and the flowers,
Will soon begin to grow.

The birds will sing their songs
In the bright and genial days,
Near the lonely grave where
The village blacksmith lays.

The Shoeing Forge

by J. R. Eastwood

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Full Text

A Stone's throw from the market town,
Close on the lane that wanders down
Between tall trees and hedgerows green,
The famous shoeing forge is seen;
Open it stands upon the road,
That day and night is overflowed
By ruddy light that leaps and falls
Along the rafters and the walls.

And often, halting on his way,
The idler from the town will stay
To hear the sharp, clear, ringing sound,
And watch the red sparks raining round,
And the bright fiery metal glow,
While the strong smith, with blow on blow,
Hammers it into shape—a sight
To rouse his wonder and delight.

Now in the smouldering fire once more
The bar is thrust; the bellows roar,
And fan the flame to fiercer light,
Until the metal waxes white;
Then, on the anvil placed again,
Ding-dong, the strokes descend amain;
Strong is the arm, the vision true,
Of him who shapes the iron shoe.

For thee, O reader, is the thought
That great success in life is wrought
Not by the idler as he stands
With wondering looks and empty hands,
But by the toiler who can take
Each adverse circumstance and make
It bend beneath the force and fire
Of firm resolve and high desire!

The Stake and Rider Fence

by W. E. Hutchinson

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Full Text

I love to let my fancy go wandering where it will,
To the happy days of boyhood, to the meadow and the hill;
To the brooks and quiet places, to the woods that seemed immense,
But they always linger fondly at the stake-and-rider fence.

Here, cicadas sing their loudest, and the crickets draw the bow,
And the 'hoppers and the locusts join the chorus, soft and low;
And you hear the bees a humming like a fiddle with one string,
While the air just seems to vibrate with a soothing kind of ring.

There the squirrel scolds and chatters as he runs along the rail,
And you hear the rain-crow calling, and the whistle of the quail;
And the catbird, and the blue jay, scold with vigor most intense,
As they build among the branches by the stake-and-rider fence.

There grew the tasseled milkweed with its bursting silken pods,
And the stately, waving branches of the yellow goldenrod;
The mullein stalk and asters, with teasels growing dense,
God's garden, in the angle of the stake-and-rider fence.

It was homely, but I loved it, and I wouldn't trade, would you?
For all the hothouse beauties that a florist ever knew.
Yes, I'd give up earthly honors, and count it recompense,
Just to wander through the meadow by the stake-and-rider fence.

Sleighing

by Helen Lee Carey

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Full Text

Here are we nestled, warm and snug,
Within the cutter's perfumed rug,
And swiftly o'er the light road skim
Toward the hills far and dim
Lie on the cold horizon's rim.

Away, away! the snow is white,
The air is clear, the moon is bright,
To backward glance the village spires,
Tipped with their pale up-pointing fires,
Fade as a holy thought expires.

Away! to-night our company
The spirits of the frost shall be;
We'll chase the flying bells whose play
On moonlit meadows far away
Is softened to a murmur gay.

Away through villages that lie
Like silver jewels, gliding by
The river's gleaming stream of steel,
Whose fringe of ice the waves conceal
That echo back our sleigh-bells' peal.

Here stands a quiet farm-house; there
A stretch of glistening fields lies bare;
Here thickets, robed in white array
Climb the sleep banks, and sharply lay
Dark shadows o'er our rapid way.

The shaken trees their crystals fling,
That shatter with an airy ring;
And hark! a mocking ripple swells
From where the covered streamlet wells
And tinkles through its icy cells.

Away again! yon pine-trees tall
Close round us a mysterious wall;
Through their great harps the solemn moan
Of winds is sweeping, long and lone,
In melancholy minor tone.

Away through spicy forests, hung
With mantles by the storm-winds flung,
From out whose solitude the sigh
Of breezes brings some weird, wild cry,
To scare us as we glimmer by.

Ah, see! the watch-fire on the lake,
Where merry skaters pleasure take!
Their voices, as we onward go,
Die to a light cadenza low,
As sounds through dreams of music flow.

The prospect widens; on before
Stretches the broad lake's dazzling floor;
And far, where pearly vapors rise,
Shine through a mist the peaceful skies
And azure hills of paradise.

The distance shuts like wings behind;
Before, it opens silver-lined;
The angel of the radiant night
Leads ever on before our flight,
And past us stream its robes of light.

Country Sleighing

by Edmund Clarence Stedman

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Full Text

In January, when down the dairy
The cream and clabber freeze,
When snow-drifts cover the fences over,
We farmers take our ease.
At night we rig the team,
And bring the cutter out;
Then fill it, fill it, fill it, fill it,
And heap the furs about.

Here friends and cousins dash up by dozens,
And sleighs at least a score;
There John and Molly, behind, are jolly,
Nell rides with me, before.
All down the village street
We range us in a row:
Now jingle, jingle, jingle, jingle,
And over the crispy snow!

The windows glisten, the old folks listen
To hear the sleigh-bells pass;
The fields grow whiter, the stars are brighter,
The road is smooth as glass.
Our muffled faces burn,
The clear north-wind blows cold,
The girls all nestle, nestle, nestle,
Each in her lover's hold.

Through bridge and gateway we're shooting straightway,
Their tollman was too slow!
He'll listen after our song and laughter
As over the hill we go.
The girls cry, "Fie! for shame!"
Their cheeks and lips are red,
And so, with kisses, kisses, kisses,
They take the toll instead.

Still follow, follow! across the hollow
The tavern fronts the road.
Whoa, now! all steady! the host is ready,—
He knows the country mode!
The irons are in the fire,
The hissing flip is got;
So pour and sip it, sip it, sip it,
And sip it while 't is hot.

Push back the tables, and from the stables
Bring Tom, the fiddler, in;
All take your places, and make your graces,
And let the dance begin.
The girls are beating time
To hear the music sound;
Now foot it, foot it, foot it, foot it,
And swing your partners round.

Last couple toward the left! all forward!
Cotillons through, let 's wheel:
First tune the fiddle, then down the middle
In old Virginia Reel.
Play Money Musk to close,
Then take the "long chassé,"
While in to supper, supper, supper,
The landlord leads the way.

The bells are ringing, the ostlers bringing
The cutters up anew;
The beasts are neighing; too long we 're staying,
The night is half-way through.
Wrap close the buffalo-robes,
We 're all aboard once more;
Now jingle, jingle, jingle, jingle,
Away from the tavern-door.

So follow, follow, by hill and hollow,
And swiftly homeward glide.
What midnight splendor! how warm and tender
The maiden by your side!
The sleighs drop far apart,
Her words are soft and low;
Now, if you love her, love her, love her,
'T is safe to tell her so.

"Sugaring Off"

by Hattie Howard

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Full Text

Round after round in rugged tramp,
But wholesome discipline,
By sturdy hands about the camp
The sap was gathered in;
When one perspiring, very red,
And sitting on a trough,
"To close the season," so he said,
Proposed to "sugar off."

Beyond the farm-house still and white,
Beyond the poplar bars,
A lignous pile emitted light
That paled the brighest stars;
Where caldrons hung, like those of which
The Bard of Avon told,
With ebullition contents rich
Above the flame of gold.

A score or more of beaux and belles
On toothsomeness intent,
Like buzzing bees in flower-dells
Inhaled the maple scent;
Who danced around in impish glee
Like witches in Macbeth,
And stirred the sweet consistency,
And laughed till out of breath.

In fidget spells, by trial sips
Of liquid boiling hot,
How many burned their saucy lips;
And pouted at the thought
Of strips of plaster stretched across
Each rosy orifice,
Or sighed in secret o'er the loss
Of some prospective kiss.

Anon, the mass like melted wax
Electrified their hopes,
Who followed out diversion's tracks
By making candy ropes;
That by mysterous lasso twirls—
How, record never tells—
Glued ribbon-bows and spiral curls
To overcoat lapels.

How many lads in languid pose
Leaned later 'gainst the trees,
The sticky syrup on their clothes,
The 'lasses on their knees—
That is, the sugar!—never yet
Hath language run so fast—
But one can never quite forget
What happened decades past.

Such fun beyond the curfew hour
A Puritan might rue,
Or like an unbelieving Giaour
Deny the statement true;
But so it was—till Pater (and A lantern) caused surprise,
Who quite broke up the festive band
And captured their supplies.

O, with a wild remembrance-thrill
My heart in rapture beats!
The egg-shell cups again I fill
With granulated sweets,
And mold in scalloped patty-pans
Delicious maple cakes
As yellow as the golden sands,
But pure as snowy flakes.

I've been, as by the drift of chance,
A wanderer for years
From those delightful, happy haunts
That memory endears;
But never life hath been so bright
As when, upon a trough
With Peter Stump, one blessed night
I helped to "sugar off."

* * * * *

And for his sake, where'er he is,
This rustic ode I pen
To stir his risibilities;
The jolliest of men,
Though Prelate of the Holy See;
Who dreams sometimes I know
Of sweetness, sap, and sorcery—
O, years and years ago!

The Old Sugar Camp

by Helen M. Johnson

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Come let us away to the old Sugar Camp;
The sky is serene though the ground may be damp,—
And the little bright streams, as they frolic and run,
Turn a look full of thanks to the ice-melting sun;
While the warm southern winds, wherever they go,
Leave patches of brown 'mid the glittering snow.

The oxen are ready, and Carlo and Tray
Are watching us, ready to be on the way,
While a group of gay children, with platter and spoon,
And faces as bright as the roses of June,
O'er fences and ditches exultingly spring,
Light-hearted and careless as birds on the wing.

Where's Edwin? Oh, here he comes, loading his gun;
Look out for the partridges—hush! there is one!
Poor victim! a bang and a flutter—'tis o'er,—
And those fair dappled wings shall expand nevermore;
It was shot for one invalid sister at home,
Yet we sigh as beneath the tall branches we roam.

Our cheeks all aglow with the long morning tramp,
We soon come in sight of the old Sugar Camp;
The syrup already is placed in the pan,
And we gather around it as many as can,—
We try it on snow; when we find it is done
We fill up a mold for a dear absent one.

Oh, gayest and best of all parties are these,
That meet in the Camp 'neath the old maple trees,
Renewing the love and the friendship of years,—
They are scenes to be thought of with smiles and with tears
When age shall have furrowed each beautiful cheek,
And left in dark tresses a silvery streak.

Here brothers and sisters and lovers have met,
And cousins and friends we can never forget;
The prairie, the ocean, divide us from some,
Yet oft as the seasons for sugaring come,
The cup of bright syrup to friendship we'll drain,
And gather them home to our bosom again.

Dear Maple, that yieldeth a nectar so rare,
So useful in spring, and in summer so fair,—
Of autumn acknowledged the glory and queen,
Attendant on every Canadian scene,
Enshrined in our homes it is meet thou shouldst be
Of our country the emblem, O beautiful Tree!

The Sugar Camp

by Robert McIntyre

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When you want a treat, delicious to eat, pass by the poor old bees;
Slip out and go, thro' a late March snow, to a bush of sugar-trees;
Step down the hill, when all is still, and soft blue smoke is curled
In the frosty haze, where ice-gems blaze, when sundown takes the world.
No honey of flowers in this world of ours, no sap of the Southern cane,
Melts on the lip like the sweets that drip from a wounded maple's grain;
And if you take up a gourd or a cup of the plain old-fashioned stamp,
And sip some juice, you will then turn loose and shout in the sugar camp.

The giants there have strength to spare; their seed no man has sown;
But the Lord, who willed our good, has tilled and tended them alone.
One hundred years of smiles and tears—of the sunshine and the dew—
Have gone to build the tree that spilled its blood today for you.
O to wander free, as I used to be, through that grand primeval grove,
Meandering slow, as I used to go, with the sled and the team I drove!
Don't talk to me of the barley-bree, that steeps in a stillhouse damp;
There never was wine came out of the vine like the sap of a sugar camp.

What are stately palms in the Syrian calms, or gardens of olives dim,
To one who goes where the mighty rows of the maples make way for him,
When the sap runs free as the melody of the robin above the shed,
With the whole white earth beneath him and the whole blue sky o'erhead?
For the happy man looks into the pan where the amber sweetness swirls,
And sees the face and lightsome grace of the best of the country girls,
And he seems to see that home to be, where, under the well-trimmed lamp,
His wife doth wait, when he comes home late from work in the sugar camp.

So he drives his sleigh down a winding way, along the moonlit lanes,
To where the light of a farmhouse, bright, shines from the window-panes;
Then, cuddled snug in the ample rug, o'er the snowy roads they whirr,
While his sweetheart eats the spicy sweets he made that day for her.
With tinkle of bells and song that swells, how gleaming miles unroll;
And he tastes, so plain, the flavor again as he takes his lover's toll;
For the sleigh is narrow, and one swift arrow from Cupid, the rosy scamp,
Strikes man and maid from his ambuscade as they circle the sugar camp.

How he smiles next day, as he toils away stirring the bubbling trough;
For he must wait to know his fate till the night of the sugaring-off.
Cupid makes his bows of wood that grows in the sugar-thicket's shade,
And dips each shaft, clear down to the haft, in the syrup when 't is made.
So all ends right, and I say to-night, though we have suffered and toiled,
We could both forget our sorrows yet in a dipper of sap half-boiled.
When we get to heaven we'll kiss our folks, then start for a happy tramp
Up toward the headwaters of Paradise, just to work in the sugar camp.

Sugaring

by Raymond Holden

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A man may think wild things under the moon—
In March when there is a tapping in the pails
Hung breast-high on the maples. Though you sink
To boot-tops only in the uncrusted snow,
And feel last autumn's leaves a short foot down,
There will be one among the men you meet
To say the snow lies six feet level there.
"Not here!" you say; and he says, "In the woods"—
Implying woods that he knows where to find.
Well, such a moon may be miraculous,
And if it has the power to make one man
Believe a common February snow
The great storm-wonder he would talk about
For years if once he saw it, there may be
In the same shimmering sickle over the hill
Vision of other things for other men.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The moon again
Playing tonight with vapors that go up
And out into the silver. The brown sap works
Its foamy bulk over the great log fire.
Colors of flame light up a man, who kneels
With sticks upon his arm, and in his face
A grimace of resistance to the glow.
All that is burning is not under here
Boiling the early sap—I wonder why.
It is as calm as a dream of paradise
Out there among the trees, where runnels make
The only music heard above the sway
Of branches fingering the leaning moon.
And yet a man must go, when the sap has thickened,
Up and away to sleep a tired sleep,
And dream of dripping from a rotting roof
Back into sap that once was rid of him.
I wonder why, I wonder why, I wonder . . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Close the iron doors and let the fire die,
And the faint night-wind blow through the broken walls.
The sugar thickens, and the moon is gone,
And frost threads up the singing rivulets.
I am going up the mountain toward the stars,
But I should like to lie near earth tonight—
Earth that has borne the furious grip of winter
And given a kind of birth to beauty at last.
Look! — the old breath thrills through her once again
And there will be passion soon, shaking her veins
And driving her spirit upward till the buds
Burst overhead, and swallows find the eaves
Of the sugar-house untroubled by the talk
Of men gone off with teams to mend the roads.
I think I shall throw myself down here in the snow
So to be very near her when she stirs.

The Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving

by Edgar Albert Guest

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It may be I am getting old and like too much to dwell
Upon the days of bygone years, the days I loved so well;
But thinking of them now I wish somehow that I could know
A simple old Thanksgiving Day, like those of long ago,
When all the family gathered round a table richly spread,
With little Jamie at the foot and grandpa at the head,
The youngest of us all to greet the oldest with a smile,
With mother running in and out and laughing all the while.

It may be I'm old-fashioned, but it seems to me to-day
We're too much bent on having fun to take the time to pray;
Each little family grows up with fashions of its own;
It lives within a world itself and wants to be alone.
It has its special pleasures, its circle, too, of friends;
There are no get-together days; each one his journey wends,
Pursuing what he likes the best in his particular way,
Letting the others do the same upon Thanksgiving Day.

I like the olden way the best, when relatives were glad
To meet the way they used to do when I was but a lad;
The old home was a rendezvous for all our kith and kin,
And whether living far or near they all came trooping in
With shouts of "Hello, daddy!" as they fairly stormed the place
And made a rush for mother, who would stop to wipe her face
Upon her gingham apron before she kissed them all,
Hugging them proudly to her breast, the grownups and the small.

Then laughter rang throughout the home, and, Oh, the jokes they told;
From Boston, Frank brought new ones, but father sprang the old;
All afternoon we chatted, telling what we hoped to do,
The struggles we were making and the hardships we'd gone through;
We gathered round the fireside. How fast the hours would fly—
It seemed before we'd settled down 'twas time to say good-bye.
Those were the glad Thanksgivings, the old-time families knew
When relatives could still be friends and every heart was true.

Spinning Tow

by Ellen P. Allerton

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A little maiden with braided hair
Walks to and fro
Before a wheel. What does she there?
The child is spinning tow.

In through the open window comes
The scented breeze;
With drowsy wing the wild bee hums
Out in the orchard trees.

The blue sky bends, the flowers are sweet,
As children know;
Yet with deft hands and steady feet,
This child keeps spinning tow,

Still works she; steady mounts the sun
Through the skies of May,—
The small task ends; the skein is spun;
The girl bounds out to play.

She learns life's lesson young you say?
'Tis better so.
That life is toil as well as play,
She learns here spinning tow.

Years pass. Beside her own hearthstone
A woman stands
With steady eye and cheerful tone,
Brave heart and willing hands.

This matron, who on household ways
Glides to and fro,
Learned when a child, on soft spring days,
Life's lesson, spinning tow.

My Mother's Wheel

by Ellen P. Allerton

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Full Text

Broken, dismantled! would that it were mine:
I would not keep it in that dusty nook,
Where tangled cobwebs cross and intertwine,
And old, grim spiders from their corners look.

From distaff, band, and polished rim, are hung
The dusty meshes. Black the spindle is,
Crooked, and rusty—a dead, silent tongue,
That once made whispering music—there it lies.

Ah, dear to me is the forsaken thing!
I gaze upon it and my eyes grow dim;
For I can see my mother, hear her sing,
As winds the shining thread, and whirls the rim.

So sweet she sang—her youngest on her knee—
Now a low warble, now some grand old hymn,
Sublime, exultant, full of victory,
Triumphant as the songs of seraphim.

Sweet toiler! through her life of crowded care,
While grief came oft, and pain, and weariness,
Still swelled the anthem, still was breathed the prayer,
Till death came clasping with its cold caress.

She sings no more; beside the chimney wide
No more she spins. Years come and go;
Above her grave on the lone hillside,
The snow drifts lie, the summer grasses grow.

The Old Flax-Wheel

by Virgil Viraldini Twitchell

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Grandma sat there in her old arm-chair, humming her favorite tune,
Her head was white but her face as bright as a leafless rose in June;
She tapped her heel as she turned her reel, in a sing-song way so queer,
I can hear her yet, and I'll never forget, though I live a hundred year,
The distaff's rebound as it turned around, and grandma's cry, "Take care!"
'Twas always my fate, I found too late, the "old thing" pulling my hair.

She'd sit upright from morn till night, nor think it was a tax,
With toe and heel she'd turn the wheel and finger the glossy flax;
The old black cat asleep on the mat, the clock so tall and queer
Its tick, tick, tick, and the wheels' click, click, were musical sounds to hear;
The fiery blaze from the fire-place made shadows on the wall
Of revolving reel and spinning wheel, with grandma over all.

The Old Wooden Tub

by Edgar A. Guest

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I like to get to thinking of the old days that are gone,
When there were joys that never more the world will look upon,
The days before inventors smoothed the little cares away
And made, what seemed but luxuries then, the joys of every day;
When bathrooms were exceptions, and we got our weekly scrub
By standing in the middle of a little wooden tub.

We had no rapid heaters, and no blazing gas to burn,
We boiled the water on the stove, and each one took his turn.
Sometimes to save expenses we would use one tub for two;
The water brother Billy used for me would also do,
Although an extra kettle I was granted, I admit,
On winter nights to freshen and to warm it up a bit.

We carried water up the stairs in buckets and in pails,
And sometimes splashed it on our legs, and rent the air with wails,
But if the nights were very cold, by closing every door
We were allowed to take our bath upon the kitchen floor.
Beside the cheery stove we stood and gave ourselves a rub,
In comfort most luxurious in that old wooden tub.

But modern homes no more go through that joyous weekly fun,
And through the sitting rooms at night no half-dried children run;
No little flying forms go past, too swift to see their charms,
With shirts and underwear and things tucked underneath their arms;
The home's so full of luxury now, it's almost like a club,
I sometimes wish we could go back to that old wooden tub.

Knitting

by Ellen P. Allerton

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An old-time kitchen, an open door,
Sunshine lying across the floor;
A little maid, feet bare and brown,
Cheeks like roses, a cotton gown,
Rippling masses of shining hair,
And a childish forehead smooth and fair.

The child is knitting. The open door
Wooes her, tempts her, more and more.
The sky is cloudless, the air is sweet
And sadly restless the bare brown feet.
Still, as she wishes her task were done,
She counts the rounds off, one by one.

Higher yet mounts the sun of June;
But one round more!—a joyous tune
Ripples out from the childish lips,
While swift and swifter the finger-tips
Play out and in, till I hear her say,
"Twenty rounds! I'm going to play!"

Up to the hedge where the sweet-brier blows,
Down to the bank where the brooklet flows,
Chasing the butterflies, watching the bees,
Wading in clover up to her knees,
Mocking the bobolinks; oh, what fun
It is to be free when the task is done!

Years and years have glided away.
The child is a woman, and threads of gray
One by one creep into her hair,
And I see the prints of the feet of care.
Yet I like to watch har. To-night she sits
By her household fire, and as then she knits.

Swiftly the needles glance, and the thread
Glides through her fingers, white and red.
'Tis a baby's stocking. To and fro
And out and in as the needles go,
She sings as she sang that day in June,
But the low, soft strain is a nursery tune.

Closely beside her the baby lies,
Slowly closing his sleepy eyes.
Forward, backward, the cradle swings,
Touched by her foot as she softly sings.
And now in silence har watch she keeps;
The song is hushed, for the baby sleeps.

Up from the green, through the twilight gray,
Comes the shouts of a troop at play.
Blue eyes, black eyes, golden curls—
These are all hers—her boys and girls.
Then wonder not at the prints of care,
Or the silver threads in her braided hair.

Does she ever pine for the meadow brook,
The sweet-brier hedge, the clover nook?
When sweet winds woo, when smiles the sun,
Does she ever wish that her task was done?
Would you know? Than watch her where she sits
Smiling dreamily, while she knits.

The Sewing Circle

by Evander A. Crewson

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Sewing, sewing, busy sewing;
Hear the scissors rattle, rattle;
Everybody's tongue agoing—
Tittle-tattle, tittle-tattle.

Good intentions, glorious cause—
Willing angels in life's battle;
Picking out the little flaws—
Tittle-tattle, tittle-tattle.

Making some poor mother clothes;
Helping buy the baby's rattle;
Hitting friends and hitting foes—
Tittle-tattle, tittle-tattle.

Willing hearts and willing hands:
Generals all in life's battle;
Laying bare each other's plans—
Tittle-tattle, tittle-tattle.

The Patchwork Quilt

by Margaret Mason

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Full Text

Light and shadows rise and fall
In the room with the rosy-papered wall,
Room to me that is best of all.

Wind, lift up the muslin screen!
Let in the light that comes between
The maple leaves of shining green.

Fall soft upon the patchwork spread,
Quilt of blue and white and red,
Upon a carved old-fashioned bed.

Your worn-out squares are quilted through
With thoughts of all I used to do,
When I wore the dresses now in you.

I was a girl with braided hair,—
I think of the time I gave the tear,
The zigzag rent beyond repair,—

As I went through the fields a girlish rover,
In dress of white all dotted over
With sprigs of wheat, and sprays of clover.

Oh, dress! that once was mine to wear,
Your clover blooms are scattered there
In the pink and white of that patchwork square.

Wind, lift up the muslin screen!
Let in the light that comes between
The maple leaves of shining green.

Fall soft upon the patchwork spread;
For a little child that now is dead,
Sewed your squares of white and red.

One summer's day she wrought in you,
And left her needle half-way through,
With a knotted, twisted thread of blue.

Before she slept that summer's night,
She laid away, and out of sight,
Your folded squares of red and white.

She sought for blooms that fadeless grow,
And left for other hands to sew
The clover blossoms here below.

And still the light through windows small,
Throws shadows on the rosy wall,
On the quaint old-fashioned bedstead tall;

And falls in waving bars of gold
Across each faded, wrinkled fold
Of clover blossoms growing old;

While into Life's great patchwork square,
With knotted threads of thought and care,
I sew my dreams and fancies fair.

When night shall deeper shadows throw,
I will leave my work, and softly go
To seek for blooms that fadeless grow.

What matters it? I will not grieve,
If other hands shall interweave
And smooth the tangled threads I leave.

Beyond the dark, in fields of bliss,
I'll gather flowers, and will not miss
The clover blossoms left in this.

I will backward look through all the shade,
To see in full completeness laid
The patchwork squares that I have made.

Patchwork

by Lucy Wiggin

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Little Miss Margery sits and sews,
Painfully creaking her needle goes,
As the moist little fingers push it through.
Such a long stint she has got to do!
"What is the good," she says with a sigh,
"Of making more quilts to just lay by?

"Up in the press lies row on row;
Who are they for? I should like to know.
'You'll be glad some day,' says Aunt Pauline,
'That you made so many.' What can she mean?
Pretty white spreads, I think, look best;
And, anyway, little girls want some rest."

The small brass thimble gleefully rolled
(Margery likes to play 'tis gold),
Scissors and spool with a clatter fell;
Solemn old clock, now don't you tell!
Over the sill see Margery lean,
Heedless of patchwork and Aunt Pauline.

Clover-heads with their horns of honey,
Daisies with gold and silver money,
Strings of strawberries yet to be,
Yellow butterflies, gay and free,
Sun and wind, and a chance to play,—
All these scarcely a rod away.

She knows she could find a fourleafed clover
Before she had hunted the field half over;
And, oh ! by the way that sparrow flew,
She must have a nest there, certain true!
Only a thin white wall between!—
When suddenly in walked Aunt Pauline.

The high-backed chairs grew straighter still,
The clock began to tick with a will,
Even the foolish half-moon face
Checked itself in a broad grimace,
While a vagrant bee who was buzzing through
Out of the window quickly flew.

Guilty Margery, quite aghast,
Straightens up and sews very fast.
But all in vain, however she tries,
To cheat for a moment those keen eyes
Under their spectacles looking through
Body and soul—and patchwork, too.

"What is the matter," she asks, "today?
You want to go out in the field and play?
If I were so silly I wouldn't have told—
A great, big girl nearly twelve years old.
Let me see your work. Well, I do declare,
'Twould disgrace a baby, Margery Ware!

"It must all come out. Here, take this pin;
Sit beside me, while you begin.
Remember, you must not leave your seat
Until it is done all true and neat.
You'll be thankful yet that you learned to sew,"
With a glance at Margery's face of woe.

"When I was a girl," says Aunt Pauline,
"An idle minute was seldom seen;
You've no idea of the pains we'd take,
Our beautiful patchwork squares to make.
For prints were precious, and thread was high,
And little enough could our parents buy.

"You could sew if you only tried;
What in the world do you see outside?
Grass wants cutting; the corn looks dry;
Signs of rain, I think, in the sky.
Carefully, child, don't hurry so.
Set your stitches exact and slow."

Margery swings her restless feet,
Clover blossoms do smell so sweet;
Smooth little fing-er-tips grow rough,
Won't she ever have done enough?
Well, she must bear it while she's small;
Grown-up folks needn't sew at all.

The Basket Weaver

by Douglas Malloch

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No flashing loom is hers; no shuttle flies
To do the bidding of her hands and eyes.
No needle glides to designated place,
As weave her sisters overseas the lace.
Hers is a simpler workshop in the leaves;
This is a simpler pattern that she weaves,
Her woof the splinter of the forest tree,
The ash so white, the elm and hickory,
Her dyes the blood of marish weeds and bark
With tints as ruddy as her features dark—
These are her simple implements of toil,
The ready products of the woodland soil.

Yet who shall say her skill is aught the less
Than that of her who weaves the princess' dress?
For generations women of her race
Have woven baskets in this quiet place,
And she who weaves beneath the ancient trees
Reveals the skill of toilsome centuries.

Into the basket weaves she more than wood—
For weaves she in the romance of her blood,
Yea, weaves she in the moonlight and the sun,
The westward's burning rays when day is done,
The verdant tints of winter's evergreen,
The lily's whiteness and the willow's sheen,
The regal purple of her honored chief,
The simple beauty of her God-belief.

So, through its time, the basket that she makes
Shall sing to me of brooks and sylvan lakes,
Shall sing the glory of the vanished Red,
Shall sing a requiem for peoples dead,
Shall sing of tree, of flower and of sod—
Shall sing of Nature and the place of God.

First of May

by Nicholas Lester

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The winter's breath of snow and sleet
No longer on our faces beat,
And loungers have resumed the street;
To work the house-wife quick will go
House cleaning, that the world may know
She is to dirt a deadly foe.

The house she'll rummage through through,
The bed-rooms and the closets too;
Mid-floor their contents she will pile,
And greet her lord with winning smile
While she demands a carpet new.

Each table, bedstead, stand and chair.
Of scrubbing gets an ample share,
And soon the spouse becomes aware
The carpets from the floors are ripped,
And he must put them out to air;
(Let him remonstrate if he dare,)
And see that they are whipp'd.

The bureaus, brackets, stands and cases,
Must occupy some new-found places
For the ensuing year;
The parlor stove removed must be,
The pipes from soot be shaken free;
The pictures from the walls be taken;
The blankets, rugs and bed-quilts shaken;
And every nook with suds be drenched,
The kitchen fire remaining quench'd,
For dinner he in vain may look,
And should he grumble at the cook,
A flea gets in his ear.

The Cabin in the Clearing

by Benjamin S. Parker

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Backward gazing through the shadows.
As the evening fades away,
I perceive the little footprints,
Where the morning sunlight lay,
Warm and mellow, on the pathway
Leading to the open door
Of the cabin in the clearing,
Where my soul reclines once more.

Oh! that cabin in the clearing,
Where my Mary came, a bride,
Where our children grew to love us,
Where our little Robbie died:
Still in memory blooms the redbud
By the doorway, and the breeze
Tingles with the spicewood's odor
And the catbird's melodies.

And I mind the floor of puncheons,
Rudely laid on joist and sill,
And the fireplace shaped and beaten
From the red clay on the hill;
With the chimney standing outside,
Like a blind man asking alms,
Wrought of sticks and clay and fashioned
By the builder's ready palms.

Half way up the flue, wide-throated,
Does the hickory crosstree rest,
Whence depend the pot and kettle,
Where the great fire blazes best.
Oh! I smell the savory venison,
Hear the hominy simmer low,
As my Mary stirs the embers
That were ashes long ago.

Once again I hurry homeward,
When the day of toil is o'er,
And my heart leaps up in gladness,
For in this wide open door,
Mary in her homespun habit,
With her hand above her eyes,
Gazes all around the clearing
Till my coming form she spies.

'Tis for her I am a hunter,
And the fleet deer's sudden bound
Tells how swift and sure my aim is,
Ere his life-tide dyes the ground;
'Tis for her I am an angler,
And the spotted beauties woo
From their paradise of waters,
Ere the sun has dried the dew.

And the wild rose and the bluebell
That I pluck with gentle care,
Are for her who rules the cabin-
Mary, of the raven hair;
'Tis for her I smite the forest
Day by day with myriad blows;
'Tis for her the cornstalk tassels,
And the golden pumpkin grows.

Often, winding through the woodlands,
Neighbors come with song and shout,
Eager for a day of pleasure
Where the latch-string hangeth out.
And with ready hands assist us
At our labors, while the zest
Of our conversation heightens
Till the sun goes down the west.

Aye, and once again I see them,
On a sad, sweet summer day
When the robin on the maple
Seems to sing his soul away;
And the clearing swims around me
In a tangled dream of woe,
And my weeping Mary whispers,
"Tell me why he had to go?"

"Why he had to go?" O Heaven!
"Did God want our little boy?"
'Tis the old, unanswered question,
Cankering in the heart of joy,
And subduing many a pleasure,
As I see those friends of old,
Hiding tenderly our darling
In the forest's virgin mold.

Now, that cabin in the clearing
Is but dust, blown here and there,
Where the palpitating engines
Breathe their darkness on the air;
Where my forests towered in beauty,
Now a smoky village stands,
And the rows of factories cluster
Grimly on my fertile lands.

Scarcely room enough is left me
For this double, clustering rose,
Where the baby and its mother
Side by side in earth repose;
Soon the last fond trace will vanish
Which proclaims that they have been;
But no matter—heaven's gateway
Opened wide to let them in.

Yet with Mary oft I linger,
Where the well-sweep slanteth low,
Planning over all our labors,
When to plant and what to sow,
How to ride to Sunday meeting—
Fixing on a proper day
For the rolling and the quilting,
And the young folks' evening play.

"Eighty, and a memory only!"
Is that what you speak of me?
Well, the memory is a blessing,
And its pictures fair to see;
While the fairest and the sweetest
Lingers with me evermore—
'Tis the cabin in the clearing,
And my Mary at the door.

The Cabin Days of Kansas

by Ed Blair

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Full Text

In the cabin days of Kansas,
Oh! 'twas great to live here then,
When we heard the morning cackle
Of the prairie chicken hen;
And the drum like noise of roosters,
Coming from the prairie near,
In the early days of Kansas—
Days that always will be dear.

How we visited with neighbors,
Living miles and miles away,
In a bobsled or a wagon,
For the trip, the entire day.
How we welcomed all the strangers,
As they drove up to the yard,
And they shared our every comfort,
Though the best sometimes was hard.

In the twilight father's "fiddle"
Used to pour the music sweet
Of the "Devil's Dream" and others,
While the foot ne'er lost a beat.
And the "Sweet Tobacco Posey,"
Alabama's dearest rose,
Always came in for a feature
Ere the evening would close,

Oh! the old time songs he gave us—
Could a child of his e'er roam?
"Bobbie Burns," his favorite ballads,
Best of all, "No Place Like Home."
And the songs of war-time heroes,
In each line a thrill of love
For the Union Flag forever,
On the ramparts far above.

How the music soothed a youngster,
As the creaking trundle bed,
Cuddled me between the comforts,
And the "Good Night" words were said,
And I lay there drifting, dreaming,
On the wings of peaceful sleep.
With no thought of stern tomorrow's
Climbing up Life's Hill so steep.

"Turn your backs" would come the warning,
As the women left the hearth,
(Breaking up the happy circle
'Round the fireplace) for their berth.
Then the last was father's winding
Of the old Seth Thomas clock,
Like the katydid's false warning.
Latch string in. Asleep his flock.

Good Old Days

by Floyd D. Raze

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O, give me back the good old days
When all the world was mine;
My palace home, the rude log hut,
Half hidden 'neath the pine.
O let me scent the woodbine sweet
That clustered 'round the eaves,
And, dropping, hid the moss-grown logs
Beneath its thousand leaves.

How gladly would I turn my back
Upon the setting sun,
To view those well-remembered joys
Of all the years agone.
I fain would trace my journey back
To greet the rising morn,
E'en from the rude, old cottage,
Now empty and forlorn.

What are the joys of hoarded wealth?
Vain, transitory, vain—
O give me back the golden age
Of boyhood's time again!
The wondrous forest and the fields
Where I was wont to be,
And let the summer flowers bud
And bloom again for me.

The dear ones long departed,
O bring them back once more,
And let me hear my mother's song
Sound from the cottage door.
And let my sister come again
To play beneath the pine—
O give me back the good old days
When all the world was mine!

The Kansas That Was

by Albert Stroud

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Full Text

There was a state called Kansas, it's a place I used to know,
And I'd like right well to see it if I knew which way to go;
Its prairies they were level and as far as eye could see
There wasn't any house but ours, and not a fence or tree.
We had a field of second sod where tumble weeds would grow
And in the fall when they were dry I liked to watch them blow.
They made the nicest herd of cows for little girls and boys
Who didn't have—and didn't need—a lot of costly toys.
We hadn't any berries so we made sheep-sorrel pie;
We sliced our pumpkins into strips and hung them up to dry,
And in the winter they were fine, cooked with a hunk of meat;
Those were the days when anything seemed mighty good to eat.
The sunsets out in Kansas were not clouded o'er with smoke
And when we went to take a walk there was no dust to choke;
I could name a hundred reasons, as I live those times again,
Why Kansas was a paradise for women folks and men.
I ought to go back there once more, I thought I heard you say;
Why, sure, I'd like to do it—but I never moved away.

The Man With the Axe

by Horace Dumont Herr

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Full Text

The Summer has come and the Summer is past,
And "the man with the hoe," he is out of a job,
The pastures are bare and are swept by the blast,
And the cattle for grass must eat "corn on the cob,"
While scraggy-haired colts are turned out to the stalks,
But the woodman he whistles a tune as he walks.

The Summer brings harvest of oats and of wheat,
And the meadows are strewn with the fragrant new hay;
And Autumn gives apples, and pumpkin and beet,
And the fruits and the nuts make the gatherers gay;
But fruits for the cellar and wheat for the stacks
Have a rival in the harvest of the wood chopper's ax.

The scythe is keen edged and the sword is a power,
And the reaper, old Time, mows a path thro' the years,
And age falls in ripeness and childhood in flower,
And the sword hews a channel for blood and for tears;
But the woodman he smites with a stroke that ne'er tires,
For his ax cleaves the wood for the home-altar fires.

The snowflakes have wrapped in white down the dark earth,
And the woods a black fringe show against the cold sky;
When all appears dead that in Summer had birth,
And there's not a bird songster a solo to try,
Then cheery as notes of the robin in Spring
Does the ax of the woodman re-echo and ring.

A man of wood-craft the good axman is he,
He knows well the name and the nature of wood,
Can chip, and make fall any sort of a tree
In the very direction he willed that it should;
And when it is down on its body he stands,
And he severs the giant, with the ax in his hands.

This man of the woods is a surgeon of trees,
He can chop a straight cut or a flying slant chip,
He can halve with his wedge, if it so should him please,
And can quarter, and heart, and around the knot slip,
'Til body and limbs into cordwood he racks,
For an artist is he with the wedge and the ax.

He swings his great maul like the hammer of Thor,
And the cord-lengths fly open of oak and of beach,
'Till the clearing at last is with wood scattered o'er,
And heaped up as high as the chopper can reach
Are the tepees of brush that the axman has made
In the places where trees by his ax were low laid.

All corded and straight thro' the Summer shall lie
All the wood that the woodman in Winter has chopped,
In wind and in sun will the sticks slowly dry,
And when Winter again plow and reaper has stopped,
The farmer to sheds with his horses will draw
What the axman has cut for the buck and the saw.

And often the farmer, the evening before,
Will upon his red wagon pile up a good load
To haul it to town for some dwelling or store,
And the wheels of his broad-tread will sing on the road,
With four horses drawing it over the snow,
For the axman's dry wood to the city must go.

The Good Old Ways

by Ellwood Roberts

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Full Text

Who has not been disgusted oft
Because of senseless change;
And rising indignation felt
At fashions new and strange?
How much unlike the customs old
Are those of modern days!
No wonder they sometimes complain,
Who love the good old ways.

The men and women years ago,
Were happy in their way;
They had their troubles, great and small,
But not like ours to-day.
They came and went as pleased themselves,
And gave but little care
To trifling matters such as vex
And drive us to despair.

Decrees of fashion in their day,
Were held in light esteem;
Just like their fathers did before,
They floated down life's stream.
They viewed with more respect than we
The customs of the past;
A race too slow were they, I own;
May we not live too fast?

Each generation, we are told,
Is wiser than the last;
We would not, if we could, recall
The years forever past;
Where'er we go, from day to day,
We find improvements vast;
And thankful we our lot on earth
In such an age was cast.

But much we see, around us here,
That merits little praise;
The simpler forms of speech are gone,
The unaffected phrase.
Mankind love change; they lightly hold
Bequests of former days,
Nor think how much of good they lose
In leaving good old ways.

Some live, 'tis said, before their time,
And others much too late;
Let not these last bewail the fact,
Nor murmur at their fate;
For still we will to them concede—
These changeful modern days—
That they must not be blamed because
They love the good old ways.

The Farmhouse Garret

by Ellwood Roberts

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Full Text

Afar from the city's dust and noise,
Beside a grand old wood—
Away from the busy haunts of men—
The ancient farmhouse stood.
By low hills girt was the well-tilled vale,
A picture ever fair;
The fields were green and the skies were blue,
And all was peaceful there.

A building quaint was that farmhouse old.
In the days so long gone by,
And its dearest nook to us children all,
The garret, strange and high.
The roof ran up to a peak above,
The rafters all were bare,
No plaster covered the space between,
We saw the shingles there.

Life then was new and the world unknown;
A paradise to me
That garret old, with its treasures heaped,
Its wonders, strange to see.
Its worn old books had a charm, indeed,
I read them, hour by hour;
No stories like theirs I find to-day,
Not one has half their power.

We children played in that garret old
From noon till twilight fell;
To our young hearts it was fairy-land;
How weird yet seems the spell!
Sometimes we heard on the roof outside,
The pattering rain-drops fall;
But what cared we for the world beyond,
To whom our play was all?

The hours flew swiftly, unheeded, by,
And all too soon came night;
While there we mimicked the ways of men,
With sense of keen delight.
The years fled fast, and the happy days
Of childhood passed away;
Time came when we left the farmhouse old,
And ended all our play.

From that wonder-land, so full of joy,
Shut out, we scarce know how,
All, all is changed, and the mimic fun
Is sober earnest, now.
The world and its ways familiar grown—
Its marvels understood—
Recalled are days in the farmhouse spent,
Beside the grand old wood.

The farm is sold and the house pulled down;
A mansion, stately, tall,
Stands now in place of the farmhouse old;
How changed, indeed, is all!
And they who played in the garret there,
Are scattered, far away;
So busy they with the cares of life,
They rarely meet, to-day.

The fields are green and the skies are blue,
The valley still is fair;
The treasures heaped and the books are gone,
There's none can tell me where.
Long years have passed, and I look in vain
For what I used to see,—
When life was new, and the garret old
Was all the world to me.

And, glancing back o'er the days of youth,
I drop a silent tear
For the happy days, in the years gone by,
Within that attic dear.
For sweetest still are the times long past,
The faces gone for aye;
And Memory's treasures far outweigh
All those we hold to-day.

The Village May-Day

by J. R. Eastwood

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Full Text

Piled up with sacks, to yonder town
The great mill waggon lumbers down:
Drawn by three horses, tall and strong,
The great mill waggon rolls along.

The miller's smock is clean and new,
And smart with ribbons, red and blue;
And tinkling bells on bridle rein
Have made the stately horses vain.

And every year the First of May
Is made the village holiday:
The school is closed: the children run
In meadows smiling with the sun.

And now before the mill they wait,
While some, impatient, climb the gate,
And shout with glee, when drawing near
The loudly rumbling wheels they hear.

And soon the horses loom in sight,
With gay rosettes, and harness bright,
While dose beside the leader's head,
The miller walks with sturdy tread.

Long may the festive day come round
And find the miller hale and sound,
And may his goods increase, and still
The great wheel turn his busy mill.

The Village Wedding

by J. R. Eastwood

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Full Text

The weeks and months, with long delay,
Have brought at last the wedding day;
And pealing bells, with merry din,
The joyful morn have ushered in!

And now the church begins to fill;
And all are seated, pleased and still,
While matron looks rebuke the boys
Who move their feet with shuffling noise.

And village girls, with whispered talk,
And smiling lips, have lined the walk,
And ready stand, on either side,
To scatter flowers before the bride.

And soon she comes, with modest grace,
The bridegroom waiting in his place;
The ring is on, the words are said,
They kneel to pray, and they are wed.

Thanksgiving

by J. R. Eastwood

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Full Text

The village church, a quaint old pile,
Stands where the quiet meadows smile,
Dotted with sheep, and, reaped and bare,
The stubble fields, and orchards fair.

Pleasant it was that Sabbath morn
To see the mighty stacks of corn,
And joyful on that blessed day
To feel that toil was put away.

Sweet, in the church, it was to hear
The harvest anthem rising clear,
And in those tuneful strains outpoured
To join the praises of the Lord.

For from our hearts that song arose
To Him whose loving kindness flows
To crown with joy a thousand lands,
And bless the labour of our hands.

The anthem ceased, and still I thought
On all the mercies God had wrought:
And in my heart I took away
This lesson of that Sabbath day.

The sweetest song can ill declare
The praises of the worshipper;
The life of service must express
The heart's desire of thankfulness.

The Shoemaker

by Evander A. Crewson

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Full Text

The shoemaker sat on his bench of leather
Pegging away on a half-worn shoe;
Whatever the times or state of the weather,
He pegged away, the whole day through.

Sometimes he'd whistle, sometimes he'd sing;
He cut his patch to fit the hole,
And he always had some one on the "string,"
While hammering down another man's "sole."

Some said his leather was "tan-barked" and old;
Some said his calf was poorly "revealed,"
Others said the shoemaker was only "half-souled,"
Others said he was mighty well "heeled."

Each trade that he made brought him some "boot,"
No happier man could well be born;
Though even the farmer he failed to suit,
He always had a share in his "corn."

Though people at him would "bristle" and "wax,"
And "button-hook" him as he passed,
Still they finally paid the shoemaker's "tacks,"
For he got them down at the "last."

The Passenger Pigeons

by Douglas Malloch

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Full Text

Where roam ye now, ye nomads of the air.
The old-time heralds of our old-time Springs?
Once, when we heard the thunder of your wings,
We looked upon the world—and Spring was there.

One time your armies swept across the sky,
Your feathered millions in a mighty march
Filling with life and music all the arch
Where now a lonely swallow flutters by.

Where roam ye now, ye nomads of the air?
In what far land? What undiscovered place?
Ye may have found the refuge of the race
That mortals visit but in dream and prayer.

Perhaps in some blest land ye wing your flight,
Now undisturbed by murder and by greed,
And there await the coming of the freed
Who shall emerge, like ye, from earth and night.

The Old Brush Heap

by James Russel Price

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Full Text

Old brush heap of my boyhood days,
I saw you in my dreams last night;
Your scraggy limbs and thorny trims
So vividly appeared in sight.
For years you served your purpose well;
How oft I wished you free from brier
That I might as a barefoot boy
Help grandpa pile you still up higher.

From apple trees that stood so near
The ripened fruit would often fall,
Zigzagging down, from top to base,
Where mice and rats and snakes would crawl.
The speckled hen would find a place,
Meandering through the crooked sticks,
To make a nest and lay her eggs
And hateh for us a dozen chicks.

My mother early placed her wash
Upon your bulging sides to dry;
If neath the brush I'd lose my ball,
Then she would say: "My boy, don't cry."
Long years have passed, old brown brush heap
Since I have seen your spiky dome;
Beholding you in vision now
Reminds me of my dear old home.

Things Olden

by Helen Smales

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Full Text

Old houses, abandoned, forgotten,
Grown weird with the spell of old fears;
Old rafters, now heavy with secrets
Of sorrows and hopes, or of tears:
These weave a mystic attraction,
The wrecks of dead lives and spent years.

Old paths with their moss-covered flag-stone,
Old cities of peoples unknown;
Strange relics, queer pictures, odd writings
Of civilizations outgrown—
Whose heart thrills not at things ancient
Of times far removed from our own?

The Old Apple Tree

by Henry Harvey Fuson

Just beside the forest great,
Close to a path traveled a generation ago,
Stands the old apple tree to wait
The final summons to go.
Amid a new grown forest, with vines
Entwined about his stooping form,
He ever clings to life, but pines
For the good old days that are gone.
Like an old man who has spent
His allotted time in service true,
With the ranks of his generation rent
By death, in a generation that is new,
He holds to life that to him is dear
And approaches the end without fear.

Old Wooden Church in the Grove

by John B. Ketchum

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Full Text

A song for the old wooden church in the grove,
And that hour of hallowed repose,
When the Spirit comes down within the old walls,
In the hush of the Sabbath-day's close;
When the sun sinks low in the far distant west
And the shadows of night are falling,
As the calm of the even steals over all,
And the bell is lovingly calling.

In fancy I sit in the pew by the wall,
And my spirit is pensive and grieves;—
And I hear the low prayers that trembled and rose
As the summer-wind sang thro' the eaves:—
I hear the same voices that chanted in tune
In the days of the long, long ago,
Yet singing those hymns as the eve closes in,
And the music comes sweetly and low.

Though absent and distant an exile I roam,
I will think of those hours and the time,
And memory keep green the little, old church,
And preserve it in story and rhyme:—
Let them bury me where the tones of the bell,
There my spirit forever will move,
Where the voice of the worshiper riseth in praise,
From the old wooden church in the grove.

The Village Bells

by Eugene J. Hall

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Full Text

Once more, once more, my native shore
In beauty greets my gaze:
Again I walk the cottage floor,
To dream of bygone days.
The leaves are bright with silver light,
And through the evening air
Once more I hear the village bells,
That sound the hour of prayer.
Tolling, rolling,
Twanging, clanging,
At the close of day;
O'er hill and hollow sounding,
From rock to rock rebounding,
Their echoes die away.

O cheerful chimes of better times!
I'm growing old and gray,
My feet, through other lands and climes,
Have wandered far away;
I gladly hear your carols clear
In many a joyous strain;
You come like music to my ear
To greet me home again.
Tolling, rolling,
Twanging, clanging,
At the close of day;
O'er hill and hollow sounding,
From rock to rock rebounding,
Your echoes die away.

The Happy Village

by Kane O'Donnell

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Full Text

As often I pass the roadside,
When wearily falls the day,
I turn to look from the hill-top
At the mountains far away.

The red sun through the forests
Throws hither his parting beams,
And far in the quiet valley
The happy village gleams.

There the lamp is lit in the cottage
As the husbandman's labors cease,
And I think that all things are gathered
And folded in twilight peace.

But the sound of merry voices
Is heard in the village street,
While pleased the grandame watches
The play of the little feet.

And at night to many a fireside
The rosy children come:
To tales of the bright-eyed fairies
They listen and are dumb.

There seems it a joy forever
To labor and to learn,
For love, with an eye of magic,
Is patient to discern.

And the father blesses the mother,
And the children bless the sire,
And the cheer and joy of the hearthstone
Is as light from an altar fire.

Oh, flowers of rarest beauty
In that green valley grow!
And whether 'twere earth or heaven,
Why shouldst thou care to know?

Save that thy brow is troubled,
And dim is thy helpmate's eye,
And graves are green in the valley,
And the stars are bright in the sky.

Grandfather's Barn

by R. J. Burdette

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Oh, don't you remember our grandfather's barn,
Where our cousins and we met to play:
How we climbed on the beams and the scaffolds high,
Or tumbled at will on the hay?
How we sat in a row on the bundles of straw,
And riddles and witch stories told,
While the sunshine came in through the cracks of the south,
And turned all the dust into gold?

How we played hide-and-seek in each cranny and nook,
Wherever a child could be stowed;
Then we made us a coach of a hogshead of rye,
And on it to "Boston" we rode?
And then we kept store, and sold barley and oats,
And corn by the bushel or bin;
And straw for our sisters to braid into hats,
And flax, for our mothers to spin.

Then we played we were biddies, and cackled and crowed,
Till grandmother in haste came to see
If the weasles were killing the old speckled hen,
Or whatever the matter might be;
How she patted our heads when she saw her mistake,
And called us her sweet "chicken-dears!"
While a tear dimmed her eye as the picture recalled
The scenes of her own vanished years.

How we tittered and swung, and played meeting and school,
And Indian, and soldier, and bear!
While up on the rafter the swallows kept house,
Or sailed through the soft summer air.
How we longed to peep into their curious nests!
But they were too far overhead;
So we wished we were giants, or winged like the birds,
And then we'd do wonders, we said.

And don't you remember the racket we made
When selling at auction the hay;
And how we wound up with a keelover leap
From the scaffold down into the bay?
When we went in to supper, our grandfather said,
If he had not once been a boy,
He should thought that the Hessians were sacking the town,
Or an earthquake had come to destroy.

The Old Barn

by Anonymous

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Full Text

Rickety, old and crazy,
Shingleless, lacking some doors;
Bad in the upper story,
Wanting boards in the floors;
Beams strung thick with cobwebs,
Ridge-pole yellow and gray,
Hanging in helpless innocence
Over the mows of hay.

How the winds turned around it—
Winds of a stormy day—
Scattering the fragrant hay seed,
Whisking the straws away;
Streaming in at the crannies,
Spreading the clover smell,
Changing the dark old granary
Into a flowery dell.

Oh, how I loved the shadows,
That clung to the silent roof,
Day-dreams wove with the quiet,
Many a glittering woof;
I climbed to the highest rafters,
And watched the swallows at play,
Admired the knots in the boarding,
And rolled in the billows of hay.

Palace of king couldn't match it;
The Vatican loses its charm,
When placed in my memory's balance,
Beside the old gray barn!
And I'd rather scent the clover,
Piled in the barn's roomy mows,
Than sit in the breath of the highlands
Poured from Apennine prows!

Father's Old Log Barn

by John Mortimer

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Full Text

Dear relic of the silent past,
Old barn, my father’s pride,
When such as thou graced hill and dale
O’er all the woodland wide.

Fondly on thy last remnant still
My partial eyes are bent
Though to the highway passer by
It is no ornament.

For half a hundred years and more
How bravely didst thou stand
Until it seemed that time alone
Could blot thee from the land.

No flying brand from forest fire
Nor lightning’s kindling stroke
Bade thy strong rafters and stout walls
Go up in flame and smoke.

No sudden storm whose rending power
Wrecked many modern kin—
One breathless day at noontide hour
We heard thy roof crash in.

The roof that in the early days
Sheltered my father's grain
When through the doors the long-horned steeds
Drew in the loaded wain,

And oft, well shielded from the cold
In homespun coat of mail,
I sat within thy wondrous walls
And watched the sounding flail.

The old horsepower machine shall hum
And shake thy roof no more
Nor boys crawl out with egg-filled hat
From 'neath thy stout plank floor,

That floor is gone and thy old walls
Are disappearing fast
And soon thou shalt exist alone
In visions of the past.

But ne'er while I can think a thought
Or spin the bairns a yarn
Shall I forget long vanished days
And father's old log barn.

Children Bringing Water from a Spring

by Lydia Sigourney

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Full Text

Ye have found the wealth of the gushing spring,
Where the verdant branches meet,
And your simple vases have freely fill'd
With its sparkling waters sweet.

While watching, perchance, at the cottage door,
Your mother exults to see
Her beautiful ones, returning home
With their innocent smile of glee.

And when the heat of the noon is high,
Your father, amid his care,
Will lean on the top of his shining spade,
And bless the draught ye bear.

But ye are drinking of childhood's spring,
Whose bubbling waters clear,
Have never a poisonous weed to sting,
Or a dreg of guilt and fear.

Have ye heard of a spring that doth never fail,
'Mid the summer's parching heat?
Which Winter hath never had power to seal,
Or to staunch with his icy feet?

Have ye heard of a fount that can cleanse the heart,
And peace to the lost restore?
Go seek for it now, in the dawn of your life,
And taste it, and thirst no more.

Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

– John 4:9-11
The Bible, KJV

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Poems About Life in the Good Old Days

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