Bumour.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1115, 5 August 1882, Page 6 (Supplement)

Bumour.

THE POET. “Is the literary editor out ?” asked a rather subdued-looking young man as he gently a opened the door of the editorial rooms and peered furtively into the apartment. “ You bet he’s out,” replied the trotting* horse reporter, “ somebody sent in for review a book on how to compute logarithms, and the literary editor is allowing the full effulgence of his raidant brain to illumine that little work just now—you’ll see a daisy notice of it in the paper next Saturday.” “ What I want to know,” said the mildlooking young man, “was whether ” “ Oh, I know what ails you,” interrupted the young man who once attempted to convince the editor that Iroquois was of more value than a protective tariff, when it came to keeping British gold in this country ; “ that tablecloth collar of yours and the little thimble hat on your head gave away your racket to me the minute you turned into the homestretch so that I could get a good look at you. Unless you are a ringer, and .trotting out of your class, you have in the right-hand inside pocket of your coat a poem which you would like to have printed in Sunday’s paper. It is written on foolscap paper, in a very plain hand. All this is dead-certain, and we are prepared to bet seven to four on it to any amount. Am I giving it to you right ?” and the biographer of Goldsmith Maid smiled affably. “You are certainly correct, sir,” said the young man, “ and if you would be so kind as to ”

“ Don’t say any more,” was the response. “ I can see by the way you score down for the word exactly what class you arc in. Just plant yourself in the comer over there and hoot forth your madrigal or song-and-dance, or whatever it is. I can pipe you off from here all right.” The young man looked somewhat surprised, but took the position indicated, and read as follows: Ah ! ne’er can I forget that happy day When you and I—not thinking it amiss, And no one seeing us who might betray— Each to the other gave a rapturous kiss. I felt the passing pulses of your heart Besponsive like an echo to my own; Your dreamy eyes and dewy lips apart O’erwhelmed me with a thrill I ne’er had known.

Since then, I know not whether thou hast kept The kiss I gave; nor whether, in my nightly rest, Dreaming, thy arms have wondered while thou slept, Seeking again to fold me to thy breast, I only feel that thou art strangely changed; As thou wert warm, so art thou calm and cold; While I, unconscious why thou art estranged, Burn with the passion I gave thee of old. “It reads pretty smooth, doesn’t it?’’ said the self-constituted critic to the law reporter. The latter individual nodded assent. “But that’s just the kind of gruel that’s easy to write,” continued the critic. “Almost anybody can grind out slush like that—something that will rhyme every other line, and not shift its gait. I could make a pretty fair bluff at it myself.” “ Allow me to suggest, sir,” said the mild young man who had been doing the reading, “ that poesy is the flower of the soul—a tender plant which thrives only where genius exists. I may venture to assert that no person, unless gifted with the true poetic fire, can write verses.” “ Well, my pony-sucker,” replied the exponent of turf law, “ just to show you how far from the pole you are trotting, I will give you a little exhibition of speed. Gimme a pencil, somebody.” The pencil was produced, and the trotting, horse reporter began to write. In a few minutes he had finished. “ Now this stuff,” he said to the poet, “ is in just the same meter as yours. Every other line rhymes, just like yours, and it tells the story exactly as well.” He then read as follows:— Ah! ne’er can I forget that summer night When I went up—not noticing the pup, Nor thinking that the little brute would bite—

To the front gate—and latchet lifted up. I felt the passion pulses of my heart > Responsive to the bulldog’s savage bark I braced myself and got a running start, And showed a 2*lo clip across the park. Since then I know not whether thou hast kept The dog tied up; nor whether you imagine At jumping gates I have become adept, [that Or can move on the fly, like midnight bat. I only know that I am not a chump; No steeple-chase for me, my bonnie lass; I nevermore will leave you on the jump— When bulldogs deal the cards I always pass. “ Well,” said the poet, in a hesitating manner, “of course that isn’t bad—for a parody—but in the essential points of poesy it is hardly equal to my verses.” “Perhaps not,” replied St. Julien’s friend, “ but there's one place where I lay over you.” “ Where is that ?” “ My verses came out of my head and yours were stolen.” .* • • * • • “ It’s a cold day when the trotting-horse reporter gets left,” said the law reporter to the managing editor later in the day. “ That’s so,” was the reply, “ and that reminds me that it must have been pretty chilly around Rochester, N. Y., last July. I sent him down there to report a big race on the Fourth, and he never showed up in Chicago until the Bth. He said he got left.”— Chicago Tribune*

ILLUSTRATING THE OLD-TIME ADAGE THAT ALL IS FAIII IN LOVE Oil WAIL Two hours have passed. So have seven or eight horse cars, but the one for which Vivian is wasting finally comes along and soorf lands him at the door of Pericles O’Bourke’s house. Ethelberta is sitting in her boudoir (hightoned word for room), sewing some foamy lace into the neck of a velvet dress, as the young man entered. I have bad news for you, my darling,” Vivian says in sad tones, while a don't-bluff-or-you-will-be-called look comes over his face. Bertie nestled her little dimpled hands confidingly in his. “ Tell it to meat once, sweet,” she said, “ only with you alive and well nothing could be so very dreadful.” Vivian looked at herjvith a wonderful grave tenderness in his blue eyes. He was sizing her up. “ My father and I have quarrelled, and he has disinherited me. I have”—and here his voice quivered slightly—“ been given the g. b. on your account. lam a beggar, Bertie.” Her soft, dusky eyes grew wider and more serious.

“ Yes,” continued the sucker, “ I am poor, But I would’nt care if it wasn’t for yon, darling. It means that I must give you up, for I cannot ask you to share life with me on a thousand a year.” She looked at him with a rich crimson flush surging into her cheeks. If it had been a full .Vivian would probably have gone under, but a flush could never scare him. “Vivian,” she said, passionately, “do you think I will let you give me up ? I love you too well for that. A beggar or a prince, you are all the same to me—my king, my lover.” And lie folded her to his heart with a great, almost speechless tenderness and joy. “ My darling, my precious,” he whispered. Three months later, on a golden December afternoon, with a blue sky as in June, there was a grand wedding at the O’Rourke mansion. As Vivian and Kthelberta were entering the carriage that was to bear them to the depot she looked at him with a weirdly precious smile. “ And so you would not desert me darling,” he said, “ even when you thought that 1 was poor?” “ No, my precious one,” was the reply. “ I learned long ago that a sucker once off the' hook will never bite again, and vpur father and I put up the job so as to land you a little quicker. ’ ’ — Chicago Tribu nc. 278.