the aidge like they'd rolled their britches! Old turkle on the root kindo-sorto drappin'   Intoo th' worter like he don't know how it happen! Worter, shade and all so mixed, don't know which you'd orter Say, th' worter in the shadder—shadder in the worter! Somebody hollerin'—'way around the bend in Upper Fork—where yer eye kin jes' ketch the endin'   Of the shiney wedge o' wake some muss-rat's a-makin'   With that pesky nose o' his! Then a sniff o' bacon, Corn-bread and 'dock-greens—and little Dave a-shinnin'   'Crost the rocks and mussel-shells, a-limpin' and a-grinnin', With yer dinner far ye, and a blessin' from the giver. Noon-time and June-time down around the river! 

  

  

       KNEELING WITH HERRICK.     

   Dear Lord, to Thee my knee is bent.—     Give me content—   Full-pleasured with what comes to me, What e'er it be:   An humble roof—a frugal board, And simple hoard; The wintry fagot piled beside The chimney wide, While the enwreathing flames up-sprout And twine about The brazen dogs that guard my hearth And household worth:   Tinge with the ember's ruddy glow The rafters low; And let the sparks snap with delight, As ringers might That mark deft measures of some tune     The children croon:   Then, with good friends, the rarest few Thou holdest true, Ranged round about the blaze, to share My comfort there,—   Give me to claim the service meet That makes each seat A place of honor, and each guest Loved as the rest. 

  

  

       ROMANCIN'.     

   I' b'en a-kindo musin', as the feller says, and I'm About o' the conclusion that they ain't no better time, When you come to cipher on it, than the times we used to know When we swore our first "dog-gone-it" sorto solem'-like and low! You git my idy, do you?—Little tads, you understand—   Jes' a wishin' thue and thue you that you on'y was a man.—   Yit here I am, this minute, even forty, to a day, And fergittin' all that's in it, wishin' jes' the other way! I hain't no hand to lectur' on the times, er dimonstrate Whur the trouble is, er hector and domineer with Fate,—   But when I git so flurried, and so pestered-like and blue, And so rail owdacious worried, let me tell you what I do!—    I jes' gee-haw the hosses, and unhook the swingle-tree, Whur the hazel-bushes tosses down their shadders over me, And I draw my plug o' navy, and I climb the fence, and set Jes' 

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