The girls we used to walk with
Are far away, alas!
The feet that kissed its pavement
Are deep in country grass.
Along the scented hedge-rows,
Among the green old trees,
Are blooming city faces
'Neath rosy-lined pongees.
They're cottaging at Newport;
They're bathing at Cape May;
In Saratoga's ball-rooms
They dance the hours away.
Their voices through the quiet
Of haunted Catskill break;
Or rouse those dreamy dryads,
The nymphs of Echo Lake.
The hands we've led through Germans,
And squeezed, perchance, of yore,
Now deftly grasp the bridle,
The mallet, and the oar.
The eyes that wrought our ruin
On other men look down;
We're but the broken play-things
They've left behind in town.
Oh, happy Gran'dame Nature,
Whose wandering children come
To light with happy faces
The dear old mother-home,
Be tender with our darlings,
Each merry maiden bears
Such love and longing with her—
Men's lives are wrapped in theirs.
| "THE FEET THAT KISSED ITS PAVEMENT |
| ARE DEEP IN COUNTRY GRASS." —Page 59. |
THE "STAY-AT-HOME'S" PÆAN.
The evenings are damper and colder;
The maples and sumacs are red,
The wild Equinoctial is coming,
The flowers in the garden are dead.
The steamers are all overflowing,
The railroads are all loaded down,
And the beauties we've sighed for all Summer
Are hurrying back into town.