Please unbuttonhole us—­O,
      Have the grace to let us go,
          For we know
    How you Summer poets thrive,
      By the recapitulation
      And insistent iteration
  Of the wondrous doings incident to Life Among
          Ourselves! 
    So, I pray you stop the fervor and the fuss. 
      For you, poor human linnet,
      There’s a half a living in it,
    But there’s not a copper cent in it for us!

ARTHUR McEWEN.

  Posterity with all its eyes
  Will come and view him where he lies. 
  Then, turning from the scene away
  With a concerted shrug, will say: 
  “H’m, Scarabaeus Sisyphus—­
  What interest has that to us? 
  We can’t admire at all, at all,
  A tumble-bug without its ball.” 
  And then a sage will rise and say: 
  “Good friends, you err—­turn back, I pray: 
  This freak that you unwisely shun
  Is bug and ball rolled into one.”

CHARLES AND PETER.

  Ere Gabriel’s note to silence died
  All graves of men were gaping wide.

  Then Charles A. Dana, of “The Sun,”
  Rose slowly from the deepest one.

  “The dead in Christ rise first, ’t is writ,”
  Quoth he—­“ick, bick, ban, doe,—­I’m It!”

  (His headstone, footstone, counted slow,
  Were “ick” and “bick,” he “ban” and “doe”: 

  Of beating Nick the subtle art
  Was part of his immortal part.)

  Then straight to Heaven he took his flight,
  Arriving at the Gates of Light.

  There Warden Peter, in the throes
  Of sleep, lay roaring in the nose.

  “Get up, you sluggard!” Dana cried—­
  “I’ve an engagement there inside.”

  The Saint arose and scratched his head. 
  “I recollect your face,” he said.

  “(And, pardon me, ’t is rather hard),
  But——­” Dana handed him a card.

  “Ah, yes, I now remember—­bless
  My soul, how dull I am I—­yes, yes,

  “We’ve nothing better here than bliss. 
  Walk in.  But I must tell you this: 

  “We’ve rest and comfort, though, and peace.” 
  “H’m—­puddles,” Dana said, “for geese.

  “Have you in Heaven no Hell?” “Why, no,”
  Said Peter, “nor, in truth, below.

  “’T is not included in our scheme—­
  ’T is but a preacher’s idle dream.”

  The great man slowly moved away. 
  “I’ll call,” he said, “another day.

  “On earth I played it, o’er and o’er,
  And Heaven without it were a bore.”

  “O, stuff!—­come in.  You’ll make,” said Pete,
  “A hell where’er you set your feet.”

  1885.

CONTEMPLATION.

  I muse upon the distant town
    In many a dreamy mood. 
  Above my head the sunbeams crown
    The graveyard’s giant rood. 
  The lupin blooms among the tombs. 
    The quail recalls her brood.