owe so much to Mr. Bok that language fails me when I try about his kindnesses to talk, and briny tears bedim my eye. I owe it to that gifted man that I can take ten yards of string, and decorate a frying pan until it is a beauteous thing. He taught me how to paint a brick and hang it on the parlor wall, which made the blamed room look so slick that callers cry: "It does beat all!" 'Twas Mr. Bok who taught me how to tie pink ribbons on my corns, and when I bought a muley cow, he showed me how to gild her horns. I made a cupboard from a trunk, directed by his kindly charts; a cart-load of hand-painted junk to my poor home a charm imparts. When Arctic stories stirred the soul, his enterprise was just immense; he showed me how to make a pole complete for ninety-seven cents. And when B. Tumbo sailed away, among the roaring beasts to rush, Bok pictured, in his L. H. J., a jungle made of yellow plush. And when I face the tyrant Death, may Bok be with me in the gloom, to decorate my final breath, with tassels and an ostrich plume. [Pg 65] [Pg 65] Beryl's Boudoir She is a vain and foolish lass; she stands before her looking-glass, and fusses with her pins and rats, and tries on half a dozen hats, and fixes doodads in her hair, and tints her cheeks, already fair. And when she's fooled three hours away, and she appears, in glad array, she isn't half as nice and neat, she isn't half as slick and sweet as she appeared, four hours ago, when she was wearing calico. If she would take the time she fools away with paints and curling tools, and read some books, of prose or rhyme, she'd get some value for her time. She pads her head outside with rats, machine made hair and monster hats; and gladness might with her abide, if she would pad her head inside. For beauty is a transient thing; the hurried years are on the wing; the dazzling maiden of today will soon be haggard, worn and gray; and in life's winter, when she sits beside her lonely hearth and knits, it will not lessen her despair, to think of rats she used to wear. But if her mind is stored with gold from books the sages wrote of old, with ancient lore or modern song, the days will not seem drear and long; life's twilight will be calm and fair, and loneliness will not be there. [Pg 66] [Pg 66] “Honors do not count for much with people underground” [Pg 67]
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