Thar's a hundred
an' 'levcn verses into it, an' each one like a bullet outen a
Winchester. It goes like this: "Thar's a word to be uttered to the
rich man in his pride.
(Which a gent is frequent richest when it's jest before he died!)
Thar's a word to be uttered to the hawg a-eatin' truck.
(Which a hawg is frequent fattest when it's jest before he's
stuck!)
"Mighty sperited epick, that! You recalls that English preacher
sharp that comes squanderin' 'round the tavern yere for his health
about a month ago? Shore! I knows you couldn't have overlooked no
bet like that divine. Well, that night in them parlors, when he
reads some rhymes in a book,--whatever is that piece he reads?
Locksley Hall; right you be, son! As I was sayin', when he's through
renderin' said Locksley Hall, he comes buttin' into a talk with me
where I'm camped in a corner all cosy as a toad onder a cabbage
leaf, reecoverin' myse'f with licker from them recitals of his, an'
he says to me, this parson party does:
"'Which it's shorely a set-back America has no poets,' says he.
"'It's evident,' I says, 'that you never hears of Mollie Hines.'
"'No, never once,' he replies; 'is this yere Miss Hines a poet?'
"Is Mollie Hines a poet!' I repeats, for my scorn at the mere idee
kind o' stiffens its knees an' takes to buckin' some.
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