"
Thus shall ye learn from labors in the field
What honesty a farmer's life may yield,
And like G. Washington in early youth,
Though cherries fail, produce a crop of truth.
But think me not too strict, O followers of the plough;
Some place for fiction in your lives I would allow.
In January when the world is drear,
And bills come in, and no results appear,
And snow-storms veil the skies,
And ice the streamlet clogs,
Then may you warm your heart with pleasant lies
And revel in the seedsmen's catalogues!
What visions and what dreams are these
Of cauliflower obese,--
Of giant celery, taller than a mast,--
Of strawberries
Like red pincushions, round and vast,--
Of succulent and spicy gumbo,--
Of cantaloupes, as big as Jumbo,--
Of high-strung beans without the strings,--
And of a host of other wild, romantic things!
Why, then, should Doctor Starr declare
That modern habits mental force impair?
And why should H. Marquand complain
That jokes as good as his will never come again?
And why should Bridges wear a gloomy mien
About the lack of fiction for his Magazine?
The seedsman's catalogue is all we need
To stir our dull imaginations
To new creations,
And lead us, by the hand
Of Hope, into a fairy-land.
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