"But is there nothing in thy track
To bid thee fondly stay,
While the swift seasons hurry back
To find the wished-for day?"
- Ah, truest soul of womankind!
Without thee, what were life?
One bliss I cannot leave behind:
I'll take--my--precious wife!
- The angel took a sapphire pen
And wrote in rainbow dew,
"The man would be a boy again,
And be a husband too!"
- "And is there nothing yet unsaid
Before the change appears?
Remember, all their gifts have fled
With those dissolving years!"
Why, yes; for memory would recall
My fond paternal joys;
I could not bear to leave them all;
I'll take--my--girl--and--boys!
The smiling angel dropped his pen, -
"Why this will never do;
The man would be a boy again,
And be a father too!"
And so I laughed,--my laughter woke
The household with its noise, -
And wrote my dream, when morning broke,
To please the gray-haired boys.
CHAPTER IV
[I am so well pleased with my boarding-house that I intend to
remain there, perhaps for years. Of course I shall have a great
many conversations to report, and they will necessarily be of
different tone and on different subjects. The talks are like the
breakfasts,--sometimes dipped toast, and sometimes dry. You must
take them as they come. How can I do what all these letters ask me
to? No. 1. want serious and earnest thought. No. 2. (letter
smells of bad cigars) must have more jokes; wants me to tell a
"good storey" which he has copied out for me.
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