Black Beetles in Amber Read online

  We thank Thee that Thou goest south to smite,

  And sparest San Francisco's loins, to crack

  Thy lash on Hermosillo's bleeding back—

  That o'er our homes Thine awful angel spread

  His wings in vain, and Guaymas weeps instead.

  We praise Thee, God, that Yellow Fever here

  His horrid banner has not dared to rear,

  Consumption's jurisdiction to contest,

  Her dagger deep in every second breast!

  Catarrh and Asthma and Congestive Chill

  Attest Thy bounty and perform Thy will.

  These native messengers obey Thy call—

  They summon singly, but they summon all.

  Not, as in Mexico's impested clime,

  Can Yellow Jack commit recurring crime.

  We thank Thee that Thou killest all the time.

  Thy tender mercies, Father, never end:

  Upon all heads Thy blessings still descend,

  Though their forms vary. Here the sown seeds yield

  Abundant grain that whitens all the field—

  There the smit corn stands barren on the plain,

  Thrift reaps the straw and Famine gleans in vain.

  Here the fat priest to the contented king

  Points out the contrast and the people sing—

  There mothers eat their offspring. Well, at least

  Thou hast provided offspring for the feast.

  An earthquake here rolls harmless through the land,

  And Thou art good because the chimneys stand—

  There templed cities sink into the sea,

  And damp survivors, howling as they flee,

  Skip to the hills and hold a celebration

  In honor of Thy wise discrimination.

  O God, forgive them all, from Stoneman down,

  Thy smile who construe and expound Thy frown,

  And fall with saintly grace upon their knees

  To render thanks when Thou dost only sneeze.

  THREE KINDS OF A ROGUE

  I

  Sharon, ambitious of immortal shame,

  Fame's dead-wall daubed with his illustrious name—

  Served in the Senate, for our sins, his time,

  Each word a folly and each vote a crime;

  Law for our governance well skilled to make

  By knowledge gained in study how to break;

  Yet still by the presiding eye ignored,

  Which only sought him when too loud he snored.

  Auspicious thunder!—when he woke to vote

  He stilled his own to cut his country's throat;

  That rite performed, fell off again to sleep,

  While statesmen ages dead awoke to weep!

  For sedentary service all unfit,

  By lying long disqualified to sit,

  Wasting below as he decayed aloft,

  His seat grown harder as his brain grew soft,

  He left the hall he could not bring away,

  And grateful millions blessed the happy day!

  Whate'er contention in that hall is heard,

  His sovereign State has still the final word:

  For disputatious statesmen when they roar

  Startle the ancient echoes of his snore,

  Which from their dusty nooks expostulate

  And close with stormy clamor the debate.

  To low melodious thunders then they fade;

  Their murmuring lullabies all ears invade;

  Peace takes the Chair; the portal Silence keeps;

  No motion stirs the dark Lethean deeps—

  Washoe has spoken and the Senate sleeps.

  II

  Lo! the new Sharon with a new intent,

  Making no laws, but keen to circumvent

  The laws of Nature (since he can't repeal)

  That break his failing body on the wheel.

  As Tantalus again and yet again

  The elusive wave endeavors to restrain

  To slake his awful thirst, so Sharon tries

  To purchase happiness that age denies;

  Obtains the shadow, but the substance goes,

  And hugs the thorn, but cannot keep the rose;

  For Dead Sea fruits bids prodigally, eats,

  And then, with tardy reformation—cheats.

  Alert his faculties as three score years

  And four score vices will permit, he nears—

  Dicing with Death—the finish of the game,

  And curses still his candle's wasting flame,

  The narrow circle of whose feeble glow

  Dims and diminishes at every throw.

  Moments his losses, pleasures are his gains,

  Which even in his grasp revert to pains.

  The joy of grasping them alone remains.

  III

  Ring up the curtain and the play protract!

  Behold our Sharon in his last mad act.

  With man long warring, quarreling with God,

  He crouches now beneath a woman's rod

  Predestined for his back while yet it lay

  Closed in an acorn which, one luckless day,

  He stole, unconscious of its foetal twig,

  From the scant garner of a sightless pig.

  With bleeding shoulders pitilessly scored,

  He bawls more lustily than once he snored.

  The sympathetic Comstocks droop to hear,

  And Carson river sheds a viscous tear,

  Which sturdy tumble-bugs assail amain,

  With ready thrift, and urge along the plain.

  The jackass rabbit sorrows as he lopes;

  The sage-brush glooms along the mountain slopes;

  In rising clouds the poignant alkali,

  Tearless itself, makes everybody cry.

  Washoe canaries on the Geiger Grade

  Subdue the singing of their cavalcade,

  And, wiping with their ears the tears unshed,

  Grieve for their family's unlucky head.

  Virginia City intermits her trade

  And well-clad strangers walk her streets unflayed.

  Nay, all Nevada ceases work to weep

  And the recording angel goes to sleep.

  But in his dreams his goose-quill's creaking fount

  Augments the debits in the long account.

  And still the continents and oceans ring

  With royal torments of the Silver King!

  Incessant bellowings fill all the earth,

  Mingled with inextinguishable mirth.

  He roars, men laugh, Nevadans weep, beasts howl,

  Plash the affrighted fish, and shriek the fowl!

  With monstrous din their blended thunders rise,

  Peal upon peal, and brawl along the skies,

  Startle in hell the Sharons as they groan,

  And shake the splendors of the great white throne!

  Still roaring outward through the vast profound,

  The spreading circles of receding sound

  Pursue each other in a failing race

  To the cold confines of eternal space;

  There break and die along that awful shore

  Which God's own eyes have never dared explore—

  Dark, fearful, formless, nameless evermore!

  Look to the west! Against yon steely sky

  Lone Mountain rears its holy cross on high.

  About its base the meek-faced dead are laid

  To share the benediction of its shade.

  With crossed white hands, shut eyes and formal feet,

  Their nights are innocent, their days discreet.

  Sharon, some years, perchance, remain of life—

  Of vice and greed, vulgarity and strife;

  And then—God speed the day if such His will—

  You'll lie among the dead you helped to kill,

  And be in good society at last,

  Your purse unsilvered and your face unbrassed.

  A MAN

  Pennoyer, Governor
of Oregon,

  Casting to South his eye across the bourne

  Of his dominion (where the Palmiped,

  With leathers 'twixt his toes, paddles his marsh,

  Amphibious) saw a rising cloud of hats,

  And heard a faint, far sound of distant cheers

  Below the swell of the horizon. "Lo,"

  Cried one, "the President! the President!"

  All footed webwise then took up the word—

  The hill tribes and the tribes lacustrine and

  The folk riparian and littoral,

  Cried with one voice: "The President! He comes!"

  And some there were who flung their headgear up

  In emulation of the Southern mob;

  While some, more soberly disposed, stood still

  And silently had fits; and others made

  Such reverent genuflexions as they could,

  Having that climate in their bones. Then spake

  The Court Dunce, humbly, as became him: "Sire,

  If thou, as heretofore thou hast, wilt deign

  To reap advantage of a fool's advice

  By action ordered after nature's way,

  As in thy people manifest (for still

  Stupidity's the only wisdom) thou

  Wilt get thee straight unto to the border land

  To mark the President's approach with such

  Due, decent courtesy as it shall seem

  We have in custom the best warrant for."

  Pennoyer, Governor of Oregon,

  Eyeing the storm of hats which darkened all

  The Southern sky, and hearing far hurrahs

  Of an exulting people, answered not.

  Then some there were who fell upon their knees,

  And some upon their Governor, and sought

  Each in his way, by blandishment or force,

  To gain his action to their end. "Behold,"

  They said, "thy brother Governor to South

  Met him even at the gateway of his realm,

  Crook-kneed, magnetic-handed and agrin,

  Backed like a rainbow—all things done in form

  Of due observance and respect. Shall we

  Alone of all his servitors refuse

  Swift welcome to our master and our lord?"

  Pennoyer, Governor of Oregon,

  Answered them not, but turned his back to them

  And as if speaking to himself, the while

  He started to retire, said: "He be damned!"

  To that High Place o'er Portland's central block,

  Where the Recording Angel stands to view

  The sinning world, nor thinks to move his feet

  Aside and look below, came flocking up

  Inferior angels, all aghast, and cried:

  "Pennoyer, Governor of Oregon,

  Has said, O what an awful word!—too bad

  To be by us repeated!" "Yes, I know,"

  Said the superior bird—"I heard it too,

  And have already booked it. Pray observe."

  Splitting the giant tome, whose covers fell

  Apart, o'ershadowing to right and left

  The Eastern and the Western world, he showed

  The newly written entry, black and big,

  Upon the credit side of thine account,

  Pennoyer, Governor of Oregon.

  Y'E FOE TO CATHAYE

  O never an oathe sweares he,

  And never a pig-taile jerkes;

  With a brick-batte he ne lurkes

  For to buste y'e crust, perdie,

  Of y'e man from over sea,

  A-synging as he werkes.

  For he knows ful well, y's youth,

  A tricke of exceeding worth:

  And he plans withouten ruth

  A conflagration's birth!

  SAMUEL SHORTRIDGE

  Like a worn mother he attempts in vain

  To still the unruly Crier of his brain:

  The more he rocks the cradle of his chin

  The more uproarious grows the brat within.

  SURPRISED

  "O son of mine age, these eyes lose their fire:

  Be eyes, I pray, to thy dying sire."

  "O father, fear not, for mine eyes are bright—

  I read through a millstone at dead of night."

  "My son, O tell me, who are those men,

  Rushing like pigs to the feeding-pen?"

  "Welcomers they of a statesman grand.

  They'll shake, and then they will pocket; his hand."

  "Sagacious youth, with the wondrous eye,

  They seem to throw up their headgear. Why?"

  "Because they've thrown up their hands until, O,

  They're so tired!—and dinners they've none to throw."

  "My son, my son, though dull are mine ears,

  I hear a great sound like the people's cheers."

  "He's thanking them, father, with tears in his eyes,

  For giving him lately that fine surprise."

  "My memory fails as I near mine end;

  How did they astonish their grateful friend?"

  "By letting him buy, like apples or oats,

  With that which has made him so good, the votes

  Which make him so wise and grand and great.

  Now, father, please die, for 'tis growing late."

  POSTERITY'S AWARD

  I'd long been dead, but I returned to earth.

  Some small affairs posterity was making

  A mess of, and I came to see that worth

  Received its dues. I'd hardly finished waking,

  The grave-mould still upon me, when my eye

  Perceived a statue standing straight and high.

  'Twas a colossal figure—bronze and gold—

  Nobly designed, in attitude commanding.

  A toga from its shoulders, fold on fold,

  Fell to the pedestal on which 'twas standing.

  Nobility it had and splendid grace,

  And all it should have had—except a face!

  It showed no features: not a trace nor sign

  Of any eyes or nose could be detected—

  On the smooth oval of its front no line

  Where sites for mouths are commonly selected.

  All blank and blind its faulty head it reared.

  Let this be said: 'twas generously eared.

  Seeing these things, I straight began to guess

  For whom this mighty image was intended.

  "The head," I cried, "is Upton's, and the dress

  Is Parson Bartlett's own." True, his cloak ended

  Flush with his lowest vertebra, but no

  Sane sculptor ever made a toga so.

  Then on the pedestal these words I read: "Erected Eighteen Hundred Ninety-seven" (Saint Christofer! how fast the time had sped! Of course it naturally does in Heaven) "To ——" (here a blank space for the name began) "The Nineteenth Century's Great Foremost Man!"

  "Completed" the inscription ended, "in

  The Year Three Thousand"—which was just arriving.

  By Jove! thought I, 'twould make the founders grin

  To learn whose fame so long has been surviving—

  To read the name posterity will place

  In that blank void, and view the finished face.

  Even as I gazed, the year Three Thousand came,

  And then by acclamation all the people

  Decreed whose was our century's best fame;

  Then scaffolded the statue like a steeple,

  To make the likeness; and the name was sunk

  Deep in the pedestal's metallic trunk.

  Whose was it? Gentle reader, pray excuse

  The seeming rudeness, but I can't consent to

  Be so forehanded with important news.

  'Twas neither yours nor mine—let that content you.

  If not, the name I must surrender, which,

  Upon a dead man's word, was George K. Fitch!

  AN ART CRITIC

  Ira P. Rankin
, you've a nasal name—

  I'll sound it through "the speaking-trump of fame,"

  And wondering nations, hearing from afar

  The brazen twang of its resounding jar,

  Shall say: "These bards are an uncommon class—

  They blow their noses with a tube of brass!"

  Rankin! ye gods! if Influenza pick

  Our names at christening, and such names stick,

  Let's all be born when summer suns withstand

  Her prevalence and chase her from the land,

  And healing breezes generously help

  To shield from death each ailing human whelp!

  "What's in a name?" There's much at least in yours

  That the pained ear unwillingly endures,

  And much to make the suffering soul, I fear,

  Envy the lesser anguish of the ear.

  So you object to Cytherea! Do,

  The picture was not painted, sir, for you!

  Your mind to gratify and taste address,

  The masking dove had been a dove the less.

  Provincial censor! all untaught in art,

  With mind indecent and indecent heart,

  Do you not know—nay, why should I explain?

  Instruction, argument alike were vain—

  I'll show you reasons when you show me brain.

  THE SPIRIT OF A SPONGE

  I dreamed one night that Stephen Massett died,

  And for admission up at Heaven applied.

  "Who are you?" asked St. Peter. Massett said:

  "Jeems Pipes, of Pipesville." Peter bowed his head,

  Opened the gates and said: "I'm glad to know you,

  And wish we'd something better, sir, to show you."

  "Don't mention it," said Stephen, looking bland,

  And was about to enter, hat in hand,

  When from a cloud below such fumes arose

  As tickled tenderly his conscious nose.

  He paused, replaced his hat upon his head,

  Turned back and to the saintly warden said,

  O'er his already sprouting wings: "I swear

  I smell some broiling going on down there!"

  So Massett's paunch, attracted by the smell,

  Followed his nose and found a place in Hell.

  ORNITHANTHROPOS

  "Let John P. Irish rise!" the edict rang

  As when Creation into being sprang!