Select Poetry.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 475, 11 February 1881, Page 3

Select Poetry.

BILL GIBBON'S DELIVERANCE.

Dv Annum Matthiso.v,

Never heerd tell o' Bill Gibbon ? Why yer've kinder been out of existence, I don't believe some on you'd think, If it warn't for a little assistance.

I ain't w over-smart" not myself ; Well who Haiil I was? whafs it matter? To know Bill wa? n I guess, kinder 'cute, So let's have no more c' that chatter.

v What did he do ? " Well, I'm darned If yet , worPt,pretty soon f raiee lay dander, For yer ought to know Bill just as well As the geese oh the uotid knows the gander.

Wai, there! ye needn't git riled } Smooth yer feathers back, steady, I'll tell mates-* Tel! yer one o£ his feats o 1 the wood, A braver feat never befell, mates.

In Wisconsin's big forests, one diiy, We w>B UKikin' n clenrin , in Fall time ; An' die thing as Hill Gibbon done then I, for one, shall remember for all time. A brond-shoulder'd coon was old Bill, With a will, like lih muscles, of iron ; He'd a tackled a buffiUo bull, And at choppiu'—well, warn't Uo a spry 'un!

It was clioppm 1 as brought it about, boys, For Rill had begun on a whopper— A two-hundred foot mighty pine. As was doomed to sure death by hie chopper.

We\\ nil on us stopp'd—work was done; Ilo'd finish, 44 Dog-gorned if he wouldn't," An' we quit him, ftll full of our ehsiff, An' laugliin, an' sayin , ho couldn't. He buried his axe in the tree : Wo set off for our cabin, us others; *' I'll kill him afore eight," he cries, '• Hi:n. and p'raps one or two of his brothers."

On the floor of his hut " afore eight" lie lay, and he told us all, gasping, How it happ'd—his voice broke ; His rough, big brown hand my own grasping.

Fast and strong fell his strokes on the tree, It sway'd, an 1 it creaked, an'it quivor'd, It toppled, it fell—then snys he— As lie spoke, why, we all on us shiver'd— *'I struck the last blow with such force That the tree, in a second, was timber, And I fell to the earth just as ylifE As the minu'ie before I'd been limber.

Swoop upon me the giant tree ; Fiercely fell on my right leg and broke Ml

An , it seemed to shriek out fur revenge ; IJevengc! just us if il hud spoke it. * lli'lp,' 1 cried ; but a lon* hour had gone i&itce I'd wen you Ooj'h homeward ail file «iff,

And a bugle's Voice wouldn't bin heard In them thick woods and bushes a mile

I couldn't liv there nil night, So L luaile m> my mind in a second— I knowM as tho li-fj intirit c'oiuo oil", So to d« it myscli', I iwkon'd.

One Hlnikc ! —what was li-ft of t!icWas iic-cd i'niiii the tree and its branches."

And what poor Hill CJihbon then said— Why, at tho thought of it now,my check l>lai»vlu's.

My heart knoik* aloud at 1113' rilis, Tlwuuli I nin't in the least white livcr'd,

"When I think what he did on that niftlit, 15/ his right hand how he .van deliveiM. He tried with a pluck, nil his own, To crawl, inch l>j" inch, to his cabin : Though each move as he made on the ro.* d Was, Ave'd most on «3 think, just like fitabbin. i

When he found he couldn't get on, Because hia two legs wasn't wjual, A bold thought comes into bis head As you'll see, when I tell you flic sequel A word and a blow 'twas with Bill, He'd act on a thought s<son as catch it, His right leg was off, his nxe gleamed. And he cut oil hid left leg to match it.

lie sturdily etmnpM to his but, A glasrf of hot nun quick ho mixes ; v Overcome!" —there's not one of us speaks As his torn limbs we splices and fixes!

" A 6tout constitoo'lnin !"" Well, yes! A hero, too, birtli, bone, and breeding. What's that you say, you out there, How he did fur to stop all the bleeding?

Oh, didn't I mention? that's od'l! 'Bout them limbs as was torn into ribbons ;

Wai, yer see, didn't matter to him. They was woodin legp, mates, was Bill Gibbon's!