SECRETARY EVARTS AND MARY'S LITTLE LAMB.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1834, 8 January 1880, Page 3

SECRETARY EVARTS AND MARY'S LITTLE LAMB.

Few poems have been more generally admired or paraphracd in the various tongue i of earth than that commencing with the lines !•

" Mary had a little limb, Its fleece was white as snow, And every where that Mary went This lamb was sure to go."

Well, the story is now current, at the national capital, that the distinguished Secretary of State, when recently in a jocular crowd of his friends, was desired to condense into prose these immortal verses'. Urgently solicicited, Mr Evarts yielded and wrote as follows :

" Mary, a female judged to be of the race of man, whose family name is unknown, whether of native or foreign birth, of lofty or lowly lineage, and whose appearance, manners and mental cultivation are involved in the moat profound mystery, which probably never will be fully ascertained, unless through the most profound researches of f n historian admirably trained in his profession, who shall devote the ablest efforts of his life to the investigation of the subject, uninfluenced by either passion or prejudice, and having only in view the sacred truth, at the same time being utterly regardless of the plaudits or censures of the world, we are informed by one who, it has been stated, at one time while living in that part of the United States of America known as Massachusetts, whose fishermen have frequently been involved in difficulties with the authorities of her Majesty Queen Victoria, Qaeeu of Great Britain and Empress of the Indies, whose domains extend over a large share of the habitable globe, thereby endangering the peace which should so happily exist between nations of the same blood and language, bad an infant sheep, of which there are many millions, of various stocks and qualities, now in our country, constantly adding wealth and prosperity to our republic and enabling us to be entirely independent of all other nations for our supply of wool, now ample for the use of fact; r eg already busily employed, and for those which ere long will be constructed in all parts of our land, workiDg both by water and steam power, and in whatever direction the said Mary traveled, this animal whese fleece was snow white, even as the lofty mountain regions in the silent solitudes of eternal winter, as the ethereal vapours which often float over an autumnal sky, ' darkly, deeply, beautifully blue,' or as the lacteal fluid, covered with masses of delicate froth, found in the buckets of the rosy dairymaid, whether meandering through the meadows in midsummer, gathering the luscious strawberry, strolling in the woodland paths, in search of wild flowers, visit! Dg the church with her uncles, cousins, and aunts, to listen to the inspired words which came from the lips of the minister of the sanctuary, or when retiring to her blissful couch, to seek rest and enjoy sweet repose after the cares and labors of the day, in fact, ' everywhere that Mary went' this youthful sheep, influenced, doubtless, by that affection which is oft so conspicuously manifested by the lower animals in their association with human beings, was ever observed to accompany her." It is stated that, when the pause in the sentence came, the Secretary, who had read it without an inspiration, resumed his stolid diplomatic countenance, and all mirtbfulness had departed from the faces of that once happy company.