Let croaking stop, let discord cease,
Lift high your town above the mire,
For soon success will bring you peace,
And warm your hearts with furnace fire.
With courage strong and cheerful face,
Push on your work with might and main,
Prosperity will win the race
And bless your town. Fear not, Lorain.
THE TEACHER.
Trees in the forest grow stately and grand,
Some are beautiful and others are tall,
Each is the product of one mighty hand,
But the teacher’s art can improve them all.
The grass of the fields is useful for food,
And provides dumb beasts a bountiful store,
And the teacher who saw that grass was good,
Made two blades grow where but one grew before.
The wheat and the corn, and all kinds of grain,
Grow wild and scattered without any plan,
And the harvest is poor and reaped with pain,
Until improved by the teaching of man.
The fruits of the trees grow stinted and small,
And meager the crop when the pickers come,
But the skilled hand of the teacher can call,
A mighty response from the things that are dumb.
Then the cultured tree is laden with fruit,
The sweet and the tart according to plan,
The epicure finds a taste to his suit,
And learns that teachers are blessings to man.
Beautiful flowers, God’s tokens of love,
Grow sickly and pale for want of man’s care,
When the training hand like balm from above,
Restores them to health and beauty most rare.