"There comes Philothea, her face all a-glow, She has just been dividing some poor creature's woe And can't tell which pleases her most, to relieve She knows well that silence is sorrow's best food, And that talking draws off from the heart its black blood, So she'll listen with patience and let you unfold Your bundle of rags as 'twere pure cloth of gold, Which, indeed, it all turns to as soon as she's touched it, And, (to borrow a phrase from the nursery,) muched it, She has such a musical taste, she will go Any distance to hear one who draws a long bow; She will swallow a wonder by mere might and main And thinks it geometry's fault if she's fain To consider things flat, inasmuch as they're plain; Facts with her are accomplished, as Frenchmen would say, They will prove all she wishes them to either way, And, as fact lies on this side or that, we must try, If we're seeking the truth, to find where it don't lie; I was telling her once of a marvellous aloe That for thousands of years had looked spindling and sallow, And, though nursed by the fruitfullest powers of mud, Had never vouchsafed e'en so much as a bud, For he wished to exhibit the plant, and designed That its blowing should help him in raising the wind; At last it was told him that if he should water It would blow as the obstinate breeze did when by a Like decree of her father died Iphigenia; At first he declared he himself would be blowed Ere his conscience with such a foul crime he would load, But the thought, coming oft, grew less dark than before, And he mused, as each creditor knocked at his door, If this were but done they would dun me no more; I told Philothea his struggles and doubts, And how he considered the ins and the outs Of the visions he had, and the dreadful dyspepsy, How he went to the seer that lives at Po'keepsie, For writing Dum, Hum, on his wristbands and collars; Three years and ten days these dark words he had studied When the daughter was missed, and the aloe had budded; I told how he watched it grow large and more large, And wondered how much for the show he should charge, She had listened with utter indifference to this, till I told how it bloomed, and discharging its pistil The botanical filicide dead on the spot; It had blown, but he reaped not his horrible gains, For it blew with such force as to blow out his brains, And the crime was blown also, because on the wad, Which was paper, was writ 'Visitation of God,' Which the coroner kindly allowed me to read. "Well, my friend took this story up just, to be sure, As one might a poor foundling that's laid at one's door; She combed it and washed it and clothed it and fed it, And as if 'twere her own child most tenderly bred it, Laid the scene (of the legend, I mean,) far away a- clare I have read it all thrice, and, perhaps I am weak, But I found every time there were tears on my cheek. "The pole, science tells us, the magnet controls, But she is a magnet to emigrant Poles, And folks with a mission that nobody knows, Throng thickly about her as bees round a rose; She can fill up the carets in such, make their scope Converge to some focus of rational hope, And, with sympathies fresh as the morning, their woman, Hast thou not found one shore where those tired drooping feet Could reach firm mother-earth, one full heart on whose beat The soothed head in silence reposing could hear The chimes of far childhood throb back on the ear? Ah, there's many a beam from the fountain of day That to reach us unclouded, must pass, on its way, Through the soul of a woman, and hers is wide ope To the influence of Heaven as the blue eyes of Hope; Yes, a great soul is hers, one that dares to go in 'Tis but richer for that when the tide ebbs agen, Overflows with a second broad deluge of grain; What a wealth would it bring to the narrow and sour Could they be as a Child but for one little hour! "What! Irving? thrice welcome, warm heart and fine brain, You bring back the happiest spirit from Spain, And the gravest sweet humor, that ever were there Since Cervantes met death in his gentle despair; Nay, don't be embarrassed, nor look so beseeching, I shan't run directly against my own preaching, Go to setting you up beside matchless Cervantes; With the whole of that partnership's stock and good will, Mix well, and while stirring, hum o'er, as a spell, The fine old English Gentleman, simmer it well, Sweeten just to your own private liking, then strain, That only the finest and clearest remain, Let it stand out of doors till a soul it receives From the warm lazy sun loitering down through green leaves, And you'll find a choice nature, not wholly deserving A name either English or Yankee,—just Irving. "There goes, but stet nominis umbra,—his name You'll be glad enough, some day or other, to claim, And will all crowd about him and swear that you knew him If some English hack-critic should chance to review him The old porcos ante ne projiciatis MARGARITAS, for him you have verified gratis ; What matters his name? Why, it may be Syl vester, Judd, Junior, or Junius, Ulysses, or Nestor, |