He minds me like a nigger. If he wuz only bigger He'd fotch a mighty figger, He would, I tell you! Yes, sah! See how he keeps a-clickin'! He's as gentle as a chicken, And nebber thinks o' kickin'— Whoa dar! Nebuchadnezzah!
Is this heah me, or not me? Or is de debbil got me? Wuz dat a cannon shot me? Hab I laid heah more 'n a week? Dat mule do kick amazin'! De beast was sp'iled in raisin'; But now I spect he's grazin' On de oder side de creek.
A LIFE'S LOVE.
I loved him in my dawning years— Far years, divinely dim; My blithest smiles, my saddest tears, Were evermore for him. My dreaming when the day began, The latest thought I had, Was still some little loving plan To make my darling glad.
They deemed he lacked the conquering wiles, That other children wear; To me his face, in frowns or smiles, Was never aught but fair. They said that self was all his goal, He knew no thought beyond; To me, I know, no living soul Was half so true and fond.
In love's eclipse, in friendship's dearth, In grief and feud and bale, My heart has learnt the sacred worth Of one that cannot fail; And come what must, and come what may. Nor power, nor praise, nor pelf, Shall lure my faith from thee to stray. My sweet, my own—Myself.
DARWIN.
There was an ape in the days that were earlier; Centuries passed, and his hair grew curlier; Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist, Then he was a Man and a Positivist.