The following poem can be given entire, as it is short:
THE FROST AND THE FOREST.
The Frost King came in the dead of night—
Came with jewels of silver sheen—
To woo by the spinster Dian's light,
The pride of the South—the Forest Queen.
He wooed till morn, and he went away;
Then I heard the Forest faintly sigh,
And she blushed like a girl on her wedding day,
And her blush grew deeper as time went by.
Alas, for the Forest! the cunning Frost
Her ruin sought, when he came to woo;
She moans all day her glory lost,
And her blush has changed to a death-like hue.
Perhaps Mr. Berryhill's best known poem is one that is personal and yet quite fanciful. It can be found in Miss Clarke's "Songs of the South." Two or three stanzas will be sufficient:
MY CASTLE.
They do not know who sneer at me because I'm poor and lame,
And round my brow has never twined the laurel wreath of fame—
They do not know that I possess a castle old and grand,
With many an acre broad attached of fair and fertile land;
With hills and dales, and lakes and streams, and fields of waving grain,
And snowy flocks, and lowing herds, that browse upon the plain.
In sooth, it is a good demesne—how would my scorners stare,
Could they behold the splendors of my castle in the air!
The room in which I am sitting now is smoky, bare and cold,
But I have gorgeous, stately chambers in my palace old.
Rich paintings by the grand old masters hang upon the wall
And marble busts and statues stand around the spacious hall.
A chandelier of silver pure, and golden lamps illume,
With rosy light, on festal nights the great reception room.
When wisdom, genius, beauty, wit, are all assembled there,
And strains of sweetest music fill my castle in the air.
Little remains to be said. This singular life, with an estimate of the quality and quantity of its work has been unfolded as faithfully as possible.
With greater interest, the dominant motive of the author, so frankly stated, may now be joined, without comment, to his mournful retrospect of his life work. The first is found in the lines from Mrs. Hemans inscribed on the title page of "Backwoods Poems."