[51]
FROM history’s truthful page,
We all of us may know
My first was strongly built
Thousands of years ago.
The books of ancient lore
We read again and see
That long before my first
My whole was said to be.
And people who lived then,
Had surely never heard
Of the 20th century
My second and my third.
[52]
MY grandsire in the Mayflower came across the raging waters,
And so I sought to join the Revolutionary Daughters.
I studied up my pedigree, and when my search was ended,
I learned to my chagrin that from my first I had descended.
The cashier left his books in wild confusion and disorder,
And started to my last across the far Canadian border.
My whole is used by artisans of every clime and nation,
The blacksmith’s need, the mason’s pride, the school-girl’s detestation.