Though Field still may be overrated in some quarters, there is little doubt that certain of his child lyrics, his homely philosophic ballads (in the vein which Harte and Riley popularized) and his brilliant burlesques will occupy a niche in American letters. Readers of all tastes will find much to surprise and delight them in A Little Book of Western Verse (1889), With Trumpet and Drum (1892), A Second Book of Verse (1893) and those remarkable versions (and perversions) of Horace, Echoes from the Sabine Farm (1893) written in collaboration with his equally adroit brother, Roswell M. Field. A complete one-volume edition of his verse was issued in 1910.
Field died in Chicago, Illinois, November 4, 1895.
OUR TWO OPINIONS[[9]]
Us two wuz boys when we fell out,—
Nigh to the age uv my youngest now;
Don’t rec’lect what ’twuz about,
Some small deeff’rence, I’ll allow.
Lived next neighbors twenty years,
A-hatin’ each other, me ’nd Jim,—
He having his opinyin uv me,