muley cow; the poor man's club is a cheerful spot, so open a bottle now! From brimming glasses we'll blow the foam till the midnight hour arrives, when we'll gayly journey the long way home and merrily beat our wives. We earn our dimes like the horse or ox, we toil like the fabled steer, and then we journey a dozen blocks to blow in the dimes for beer. While the women work at the washing tub to add to our scanty hoard, we happily meet at the poor man's club, where never a soul is bored. We recklessly squander our minted brawn, and the clubhouse owner thrives; and we'll homeward go at the break of dawn and joyously beat our wives. 

 

 

 WORDS AND DEEDS 

 A fire broke out in Bildad's shack and burned it to the ground; and Bildad, with his roofless pack, sent up a doleful sound. And I, who lived the next door west, hard by the county jail, went over there and beat my breast, and helped poor Bildad wail. Around the ruined home I stepped, and viewed the shaking walls, and people say the way I wept would beat Niagara Falls. Then words of sympathy I dealt to Bildad and his wife; such kindly words, I've always felt, nerve people for the strife. If I can kill with words your fears, or argue grief away, or drown your woe by shedding tears, call on me any day. I have a sympathetic heart that bleeds for others' aches, and I will ease your pain and smart unless the language breaks. And so to Bildad and his mate I made a helpful talk, with vital truths that elevate and break disasters' shock; I pointed out that stricken men should not yield to the worst, but from the wreckage rise again like flame from torch reversed. 

 Then Johnson interrupted me as I was growing hoarse. A rude, offensive person he, a tactless man and coarse. 

 He said to Bildad, "Well, old pard! You are burned out I see! You can't keep house here in your yard, so come and live with me!" 

 The neighbors who had gathered round applauded Johnson then, declaring that at last they'd found the kindliest of men; not one appreciative voice for me, who furnished tears, who made the sad man's heart rejoice, and drove way his fears! 

 

 

 A DAY OF REST 

 Prev. P 6/60 next