In the Saddle: A Collection of Poems on Horseback-Riding

BOSTON HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street The Riverside Press, Cambridge 1882 Copyright, 1882, By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co.


Look, when a painter would surpass the life, In limning out a well-proportioned steed, His art with nature's workmanship at strife, As if the dead the living should exceed; So did this horse excel a common one, In shape, in courage, color, pace, and bone.
Round-hoofed, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long, Broad breast, full eye, small head, and nostril wide, High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing strong, Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide: Look, what a horse should have, he did not lack, Save a proud rider on so proud a back.
Venus and Adonis.

'Mid tangled forest and o'er grass plains wide, By many a devious path and bridle-way, Through the short brightness of an Indian day, In middle winter 'twas my lot to ride, Skirting the round-topped, pine-clad mountain side, While far away upon the steely blue Horizon, half concealèd, half in view, Himalay's peaks upreared their snow-crowned pride, In utter purity and vast repose. I, ere the first faint flush of morning glowed Within her eastern chamber, took the road, And, slowly riding between day and night, I marked how, through the wan, imperfect light, Ghost-like and gray loomed the eternal snows.
So near they seemed, each crack and crevice small Like bas-relief work showed, while in the light Of ruddy morn, gray changed through pink to white. But soon the sun, up-climbing, flooded all The heavens, and then a thin and misty pall Of exhalations rose, and pale of hue And fainter ever those far summits grew, Until the day waned low, and shadows tall Sloped eastward. Then once more, in radiance clear, Of setting sunlight, beautiful as brief, Each peak and crag stood out in bold relief, Till, slowly, pink faded to ghostly gray. So through life's morning, noontide, evening, may Ideal hopes dawn, fade, and reappear.