“Once in awhile some
    Would come a drivin’ past;
      And he’d hear my cry,
      And stop and sigh—­
    Till I jest laid back, at last,
      And I hollered rain till I thought my th’oat
      Would bust right open at ever’ note!

  “But I fetched her!  O I fetched her!—­
    ’Cause a little while ago,
      As I kindo’ set,
      With one eye shet,
    And a-singin’ soft and low,
      A voice drapped down on my fevered brain,
      Sayin’,—­’ Ef you’ll jest hush I’ll rain!’”

A WORN-OUT PENCIL.

  Welladay! 
  Here I lay
  You at rest—­all worn away,
      O my pencil, to the tip
      Of our old companionship!

  Memory
  Sighs to see
  What you are, and used to be,
      Looking backward to the time
      When you wrote your earliest rhyme!—­

  When I sat
  Filing at
  Your first point, and dreaming that
      Your initial song should be
      Worthy of posterity.

  With regret
  I forget
  If the song be living yet,
      Yet remember, vaguely now,
      It was honest, anyhow.

  You have brought
  Me a thought—­
  Truer yet was never taught,—­
      That the silent song is best,
      And the unsung worthiest.

  So if I,
  When I die,
  May as uncomplainingly
      Drop aside as now you do,
      Write of me, as I of you:—­

  Here lies one
  Who begun
  Life a-singing, heard of none;
      And he died, satisfied,
      With his dead songs by his side.

THE STEPMOTHER.

  First she come to our house,
    Tommy run and hid;
  And Emily and Bob and me
    We cried jus’ like we did
  When Mother died,—­and we all said
  ’At we all wisht ’at we was dead!

  And Nurse she couldn’t stop us,
    And Pa he tried and tried,—­
  We sobbed and shook and wouldn’t look,
    But only cried and cried;
  And nen someone—­we couldn’t jus’
  Tell who—­was cryin’ same as us!

  Our Stepmother!  Yes, it was her,
    Her arms around us all—­
  ’Cause Tom slid down the bannister
    And peeked in from the hall.—­
  And we all love her, too, because
  She’s purt nigh good as Mother was!

THE RAIN.

I.

  The rain! the rain! the rain! 
    It gushed from the skies and streamed
  Like awful tears; and the sick man thought
    How pitiful it seemed! 
  And he turned his face away,
    And stared at the wall again,
  His hopes nigh dead and his heart worn out. 
    O the rain! the rain! the rain!

II.