And balmy waters singing glide —
So ninna and anninia!
"And thou shalt wear, trimmed up in points,
A famous jacket edged in red,
And, more than that, a peaked hat,
All decked in gold, upon thy head —
Ah! ninna and anninia!
"Then shalt thou carry gun and knife.
Nor shall the soldiers bully thee;
Perchance, beset by wrong or debt,
A mighty bandit thou shalt be —
So ninna and anninia!
"No woman yet of our proud race
Lived to her fourteenth year unwed;
The brazen churl that eyed a girl
Bought her the ring or paid his head —
So ninna and anninia!
"But once came spies (I know the thieves!)
And brought disaster to our race;
God heard us when our fifteen men
Were hanged within the market-place —
But ninna and anninia!
"Good men they were, my babe, and true, —
Right worthy fellows all, and strong;
Live thou and be for them and me
Avenger of that deadly wrong —
So ninna and anninia!"
THE CLINK OF THE ICE
NOTABLY fond of music, I dote on a sweeter tone
Than ever the harp has uttered or ever the lute has known.
When I wake at five in the morning with a feeling in my head
Suggestive of mild excesses before I retired to bed;
When a small but fierce volcano vexes me sore inside,
And my throat and mouth are furred with a fur that seemeth a buffalo hide, —
How gracious those dews of solace that over my senses fall
At the clink of the ice in the pitcher the boy brings up the hall!
Oh, is it the gaudy ballet, with features I cannot name,
That kindles in virile bosoms that slow but devouring flame?
Or is it the midnight supper, eaten before we retire,
That presently by combustion setteth us all afire?
Or is it the cheery magnum? – nay, I'll not chide the cup
That makes the meekest mortal anxious to whoop things up:
Yet, what the cause soever, relief comes when we call, —
Relief with that rapturous clinkety-clink that clinketh alike for all.
I've dreamt of the fiery furnace that was one vast bulk of flame,
And that I was Abednego a-wallowing in that same;
And I've dreamt I was a crater, possessed of a mad desire
To vomit molten lava, and to snort big gobs of fire;
I've dreamt I was Roman candles and rockets that fizzed and screamed, —
In short, I have dreamt the cussedest dreams that ever a human dreamed:
But all the red-hot fancies were scattered quick as a wink
When the spirit within that pitcher went clinking its clinkety-clink.
Boy, why so slow in coming with that gracious, saving cup?
Oh, haste thee to the succor of the man who is burning up!
See how the ice bobs up and down, as if it wildly strove
To reach its grace to the wretch who feels like a red-hot kitchen stove!
The piteous clinks it clinks methinks should thrill you through and through:
An erring soul is wanting drink, and he wants it p. d. q.!
And, lo! the honest pitcher, too, falls in so dire a fret
That its pallid form is presently bedewed with a chilly sweat.
May blessings be showered upon the man who first devised this drink
That happens along at five a. m. with its rapturous clinkety-clink!
I never have felt the cooling flood go sizzling down my throat
But what I vowed to hymn a hymn to that clinkety-clink devote;
So now, in the prime of my manhood, I polish this lyric gem
For the uses of all good fellows who are thirsty at five a. m.,
But specially for those fellows who have known the pleasing thrall
Of the clink of the ice in the pitcher the boy brings up the hall.
THE BELLS OF NOTRE DAME
WHAT though the radiant thoroughfare
Teems with a noisy throng?
What though men bandy everywhere
The ribald jest and song?
Over the din of oaths and cries
Broodeth a wondrous calm,
And mid that solemn stillness rise
The bells of Notre Dame.
"Heed not, dear Lord," they seem to say,
"Thy weak and erring child;
And thou, O gentle Mother, pray
That God be reconciled;
And on mankind, O Christ, our King,
Pour out Thy gracious balm," —
'Tis thus they plead and thus they sing,
Those bells of Notre Dame.
And so, methinks, God, bending down
To ken the things of earth,
Heeds not the mockery of the town
Or cries of ribald mirth;
For ever soundeth in His ears
A penitential psalm, —
'T is thy angelic voice He hears,
O bells of Notre Dame!
Plead on, O bells, that thy sweet voice
May still forever be
An intercession to rejoice
Benign divinity;
And that thy tuneful grace may fall
Like dew, a quickening balm,
Upon the arid hearts of all,
O bells of Notre Dame!
LOVER'S LANE, SAINT JO
SAINT JO, Buchanan County,
Is leagues and leagues away;
And I sit in the gloom of this rented room,
And pine to be there to-day.
Yes, with London fog around me
And the bustling to and fro,
I am fretting to be across the sea
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.
I would have a brown-eyed maiden
Go driving once again;
And I'd sing the song, as we snailed along,
That