is arming for the fray,
And Colonel Mark McDonald has resigned!
We know not by what instinct he divined
The coming trouble—maybe, like the steed
Described by Job, he smelled the fight afar.
Howe’er it be, he left, and for that deed
Is an aspirant to the G.A.R.
When cannon flame along the Rio Grande
A citizen’s commission will be handy.
The Gates Ajar
The Day of Judgment spread its glare
O’er continents and seas.
The graves cracked open everywhere,
Like pods of early peas.
Up to the Court of Heaven sped
The souls of all mankind;
Republicans were at the head
And Democrats behind.
Reub Lloyd was there before the tube
Of Gabriel could call:
The dead in Christ rise first, and Reub
Had risen first of all.
He sat beside the Throne of Flame
As, to the trumpet’s sound,
Four statesmen of the Party came
And ranged themselves around—
Pure spirits shining like the sun,
From taint and blemish free—
Great William Stow was there for one,
And George A. Knight for three.
Souls less indubitably white
Approached with anxious air,
Judge Blake at head of them by right
Of having been a Mayor.
His ermine he had donned again,
Long laid away in gums.
’Twas soiled a trifle by the stains
Of politicians’ thumbs.
Then Knight addressed the Judge of Heaven:
“Your Honor, would it trench
On custom here if Blake were given
A seat upon the Bench?”
’Twas done. “Tom Shannon!” Peter cried.
He came, without ado,
In forma pauperis was tried,
And was acquitted, too!
Stow rose, remarking: “I concur.”
Lloyd added: “That suits us.
I move Tom’s nomination, sir,
Be made unanimous.”
To a Bully
They say, George Perry, you’re a lawyer. Well,
At least that’s your profession, but in fact,
Law’s like religion (though, the truth to tell,
The likeness is not otherwise exact)
In this, that in them both, my learned brother,
Profession’s one thing, practice quite another.
But you do practice, for the other day
I saw you mentioned in a case in court,
Cross-questioning a witness. I must say
You did it as a cat that loves to sport
With an unworthy mouse all too unwilling
To accept the justice of repeated killing.
This witness, so the tale is told to me,
Fatigued of your attempt upon his life—
I mean his reputation—made him free
With yours, affirming that you beat your wife.
If that is true (they say that it upset you)
She must be monstrous cowardly to let you!
You hold it right to torture men who come
(Heaven knows unwillingly) to aid the law,
So that by terror of your tongue made dumb
They can’t tell rightly what they heard or saw,
“Impeaching credibility,” you call it
When, seeing an honest looking head, you maul it.
Well, witnesses are fallible—involved
Sometimes in scandals; and ’tis true that they
Are factors in the problem to be solved,
The judge and jury led by what they say.
But lawyers—they are factors too, their problem
Being foolish clients and how best to rob them.
They’ve more to say than witnesses, and more
Important ’tis that they be truthful, too.
Were’t not, then, right the witness take the floor
And mercilessly cross-examine you?
Were truth your jewel (bless us! what a setting!)
I’ve certain questions that would set you sweating!
Nay, don’t be fidgeting; to ask them here
Were perilous, for I no license hold
To be a blackguard; and no judge is near
To jail you for replies too sharp and bold.
Besides, it were no easy task to shame you,
And till I’m paid a fee I’ll not defame you.
You see I lack advantages that you
Possess, and therefore cannot be so brave.
Who has, and uses, them’s respected; who
Has not, yet bullies, is a scurril knave—
Though, faith, the difference is narrow, very,
By which a knave’s distinguished from a Perry.
You served, if rightly I remember, once
A term in the State Legislature, where
You figured merely as a harmless dunce,
Save when, ambitious, in the larger air
Of rhetoric you held the floor a season
To give yourself for sin sufficient reason.
Thus a great bird whose nature is in doubt
With difficulty rises from the earth,
His wide wings spreading with an effort out,
And shows by his unconscionable girth
E’er yet the agitated air insult your
Resentful nose, he’s but a glutted vulture.
Touching these matters I would fain inquire
If I but had you on the witness-grill,
Over the slow but efficacious fire
Of cross-examination; and I’d kill
The worm with quite insensible gradation,
And quench the fire with great deliberation.
What, you’re no worse than other lawyers? Well,
I never said you were, my little man.
Do you suppose I run this private Hell
For one small soul? ’Tis your entire clan
I’m trying to barbecue, despite their pleadings.
Get out, you brat! you hamper the proceedings!
A Land Fight
Great Dewey, mightiest of men,
To sink or take a ship,
Shows the white flag and feather when
He hears the guns of Grip.
Great Grip! Great Dewey! Oh, my heart,
There’s less tempestuous weather
When they are leagues and leagues apart
Than when they get together.
The air is full of uniform—
Gold lace with buttons blent!—
And then a voice succeeds the storm:
“I’ve downed that festive gent.”
Long shall the tale be told by brave
And high-born cavaliers,
And old Montojo from the grave
Shall rise with all his ears.
Compliance
Said Rockefeller, senior, to his boy:
“Be good and you shall have eternal joy.”
Said Rockefeller, junior, to his dad:
“I never do a single thing that’s bad.”
Said Rockefeller, senior—long gone gray
In service at the altar: “Ever pray.”
And Rockefeller, junior, being bid.
Upon his knees and neighbors ever did.
You may say they won’t grow, and say they’ll decay—
Say it again till you’re sick of the say,
Get up on your ear, blow your blaring bazoo
And hire a hall to proclaim it; and you
May stand on a stump with a lifted hand
As a pine may stand or a redwood stand,
And stick to your story and cheek it through.
But I point with pride to
