THE OUTCAST
You ask me why I weep and moan, like some lost spirit in despair, and why I wonder [Transcriber's note: wander?] off alone, and paw the ground and tear my hair? You ask me why I pack this gun, all loaded up, prepared to shoot? Alas! my troubles have begun—the women folk are canning fruit! There is no place for me to eat, unless I eat upon the floor; and peelings get beneath my feet, and make me fall a block or more; the odors from the boiling jam, all day assail my weary snoot; you find me, then, the wreck I am—the women folk are canning fruit! O, they have peaches on the chairs, and moldy apples on the floor, and wormy plums upon the stairs, and piles of pears outside the door; and they are boiling pulp and juice, and you may hear them yell and hoot; a man's existence is the deuce—the women folk are canning fruit!
ODE TO KANSAS
Kansas: Where we've torn the shackles
From the farmer's leg;
Kansas: Where the hen that cackles,
Always lays an egg;
Where the cows are fairly achin'
To go on with record breakin',
And the hogs are raising bacon
By the keg!
DOMESTIC HAPPINESS
It is good to watch dear father as he blithely skips along, on his face no sign of bother, on his lips a cheerful song; peeling spuds and scraping fishes, putting doilies on the chairs, sweeping floors and washing dishes, busy with his household cares. Now the kitchen fire is burning; to get supper he will start—mother soon will be returning from her labors in the mart.
Poor tired mother! Daily toiling to provide our meat and bread! Where the eager crowd is moiling, struggling on with weary tread! Battling with stockjobbing ladies, meeting all their wiles and tricks, or embarking in the Hades of the city's politics! But forgotten is the pother, all the work day cares are gone, when she comes home to dear father with his nice clean apron on! There's your chair, he says; "sit in it; supper will be cooked eftsoons: I will dish it in a minute—scrambled eggs and shredded prunes." It is good to watch him moving round the stove with eager zeal, in his every action proving that his love goes with the meal.