With a heart for any fate.
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait."
I remember hearing these lines read at a gathering in the Second Baptist Church of Presto, N.J., when I was a young man, by the Reverend Harley N. Ankle. It was said at the time among his parishioners that he himself wrote them and on being questioned on the matter he did not deny it, simply smiling and saying, "I'm glad if you liked them." They were henceforth known in Presto as "Dr. Ankle's verse" and were set to music and sung at his funeral.
"THE DECEMBER BRIDE, OR OLD ROBIN"
Charles B. Rennit, Boston, N.H.—The whole poem wanted by "H.J.O." is as follows, and appeared in Hostetter's Annual in 1843.[pg 204]
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"'Twas in the bleak December that I took her for my bride;
How well do I remember how she fluttered by my side;
My Nellie dear, it was not long before you up and died,