Volume Iv Part 6 (2/2)
Busts, cameos, gems,--such things as these, Which others often show for pride, I value for their power to please, And selfish churls deride;-- One Stradivarius, I confess, Two meerschaums, I would fain possess.
Wealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn, Nor ape the glittering upstart fool;-- Shall not carved tables serve my turn, But all must be of buhl?
Give grasping pomp its double share,-- I ask but one rec.u.mbent chair.
Thus humble let me live and die, Nor long for Midas' golden touch; If Heaven more generous gifts deny, I shall not miss them much,-- Too grateful for the blessing lent Of simple tastes and mind content!
Oliver Wendell Holmes [1809-1894]
THE BOYS
Has there any old fellow got mixed with the boys?
If there has, take him out, without making a noise.
Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite!
Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night!
We're twenty! We're twenty! Who, says we are more?
He's tipsy,--young jackanapes!--show him the door!
”Gray temples at twenty?”--Yes! white if we please!
Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there's nothing can freeze!
Was it snowing I spoke of? Excuse the mistake!
Look close,--you will not see a sign of a flake!
We want some new garlands for those we have shed,-- And these are white roses in place of the red.
We've a trick, we young fellows, you may have been told, Of talking (in public) as if we were old:-- That boy we call ”Doctor,” and this we call ”Judge;”
It's a neat little fiction,--of course it's all fudge.
That fellow's the ”Speaker,”--the one on the right; ”Mr. Mayor,” my young one, how are you to-night?
That's our ”Member of Congress,” we say when we chaff; There's the ”Reverend” What's his name?--don't make me laugh.
That boy with the grave mathematical look Made believe he had written a wonderful book, And the ROYAL SOCIETY thought it was true!
So they chose him right in; a good joke it was, too!
There's a boy, we pretend, with a three-decker brain, That could harness a team with a logical chain; When he spoke for our manhood in syllabled fire, We called him ”The Justice,” but now he's ”The Squire.”
And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,-- Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith; But he shouted a song for the brave and the free,-- Just read on his medal, ”My country,” ”of thee!”
You hear that boy laughing?--You think he's all fun; But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done; The children laugh loud as they troop to his call, And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all!
<script>