Poems by John Hay Part 1

Poems.

by John Hay.

Note to Revised Edition

The Publishers of this volume, desiring to print it in an improved form, have asked me to write something by way of preface or supplement to the new edition. After some deliberation I have found myself unable to comply with this request. These pages were written in the first half of the year 1870, a time of intense interest and importance, to Spain. I left Madrid in the memorable August of that year, pa.s.sing through Paris when that beautiful city was lying in the torpor which followed the wild excitement of the declaration of war, and preceded the fury of despair that came with the catastrophe of Sedan. I then intended to return to Spain before long; and, in fact, few years have pa.s.sed since that time in which I have not nourished the dream of revisiting the Peninsula and its scenes of magic and romance. But many cares and duties have intervened; I have never gone back to Spain, and I have arrived at an age when I begin to doubt if I have any castles there requiring my attention.

I have therefore nothing to add to this little book. Reading it again after the lapse of many years, I find much that might be advantageously modified or omitted. But as its merits, if it have any, are merely those of youth, so also are its faults, and they are immanent and structural; they cannot be amended without tearing the book to pieces. For this reason I have confined myself to the correction of the most obvious and flagrant errors, and can only hope the kindly reader will pa.s.s over with an indulgent smile the rapid judgments, the hot prejudices, the pitiless condemnations, the lyric eulogies, born of an honest enthusiasm and unchecked by the reserve which comes of age and experience. I venture to hope, though with some anxiety and uncertainty, that the honest enthusiasm may itself be recognized, as well as the candor which the writer tried to preserve in speaking of things which powerfully appealed to his loves and his hates.

I therefore commit this book to the public once more with its imperfections on its head; with its prophecies unfulfilled, its hopes baffled, its observations in many instances rendered obsolete by the swift progress of events. A changed Europe--far different from that which I traversed twenty years ago--suffers in a new fever-dream of war and revolution north of the Pyrenees; and beyond those picturesque mountains the Spanish monarchy enjoys a new lease of life by favor of circ.u.mstances which demand a chronicler of more leisure than myself. I must leave what I wrote in the midst of the stirring scenes of the interregnum between the secular monarchy and the short-lived Republic--whose advent I foresaw, but whose sudden fall was veiled from my sanguine vision--without defense or apology, claiming only that it was written in good faith, from a heart filled with pa.s.sionate convictions and an ardent love and devotion to what is best in Spain. I recorded what I saw, and my eyes were better then than now. I trust I have not too often spoken amiss of a people whose art, whose literature, whose language, and whose character compelled my highest admiration, and with whom I enjoyed friendships which are among the dearest recollections of my life.

John Hay.

Lafayette Square, Washington, _April_, 1890.

The Pike County Ballads.

Jim Bludso, of the Prairie Belle.

Wall, no! I can't tell whar he lives, Becase he don't live, you see; Leastways, he's got out of the habit Of livin' like you and me.

Whar have you been for the last three year That you haven't heard folks tell How Jimmy Bludso pa.s.sed in his checks The night of the Prairie Belle?

He weren't no saint,--them engineers Is all pretty much alike, One wife in Natchez-under-the-Hill And another one here, in Pike; A keerless man in his talk was Jim, And an awkward hand in a row, But he never flunked, and he never lied,-- I reckon he never knowed how.

And this was all the religion he had,-- To treat his engine well; Never be pa.s.sed on the river To mind the pilot's bell; And if ever the Prairie Belle took fire,-- A thousand times he swore, He'd hold her nozzle agin the bank Till the last soul got ash.o.r.e.

All boats has their day on the Mississip, And her day come at last, The Movastar was a better boat, But the Belle she _would n't_ be pa.s.sed.

And so she come tearin' along that night-- The oldest craft on the line-- With a n.i.g.g.e.r squat on her safety-valve, And her furnace crammed, rosin and pine.

The fire bust out as she clared the bar, And burnt a hole in the night, And quick as a flash she turned, and made For that willer-bank on the right.

There was runnin' and cursin', but Jim yelled out, Over all the infernal roar, "I'll hold her nozzle agin the bank Till the last galoot's ash.o.r.e."

Through the hot, black breath of the burnin' boat Jim Bludso's voice was heard, And they all had trust in his cussedness, And knowed he would keep his word.

And, sure's you're born, they all got off Afore the smokestacks fell,-- And Bludso's ghost went up alone In the smoke of the Prairie Belle.

He weren't no saint,--but at jedgment I'd run my chance with Jim, 'Longside of some pious gentlemen That wouldn't shook hands with him.

He seen his duty, a dead-sure thing,-- And went for it thar and then; And Christ ain't a going to be too hard On a man that died for men.

Little Breeches

I don't go much on religion, I never ain't had no show; But I've got a middlin' tight grip, sir, On the handful o' things I know.

I don't pan out on the prophets And free-will, and that sort of thing,-- But I b'lieve in G.o.d and the angels, Ever sence one night last spring.

I come into town with some turnips, And my little Gabe come along,-- No four-year-old in the county Could beat him for pretty and strong, Peart and chipper and sa.s.sy, Always ready to swear and fight,-- And I'd larnt him to chaw terbacker Jest to keep his milk-teeth white.

The snow come down like a blanket As I pa.s.sed by Taggart's store; I went in for a jug of mola.s.ses And left the team at the door.

They scared at something and started,-- I heard one little squall, And h.e.l.l-to-split over the prairie Went team, Little Breeches and all.

h.e.l.l-to-split over the prairie!

I was almost froze with skeer; But we rousted up some torches, And sarched for 'em far and near.

At last we struck hosses and wagon, Snowed under a soft white mound, Upsot, dead beat,--but of little Gabe No hide nor hair was found.

And here all hope soured on me, Of my fellow-critter's aid,-- I jest flopped down on my marrow-bones, Crotch-deep in the snow, and prayed.

By this, the torches was played out, And me and Isrul Parr Went off for some wood to a sheepfold That he said was somewhar thar.

We found it at last, and a little shed Where they shut up the lambs at night.

We looked in and seen them huddled thar, So warm and sleepy and white; And thar sot Little Breeches and chirped, As peart as ever you see, "I want a chaw of terbacker, And that's what's the matter of me."

How did he git thar? Angels.

He could never have walked in that storm They jest scooped down and toted him To whar it was safe and warm.

And I think that saving a little child, And fotching him to his own, Is a derned sight better business Than loafing around The Throne.

Banty Tim

(Remarks of Sergeant Tilmon Joy to The White Man's Committee of s.p.u.n.ky Point, Illinois.)

I reckon I git your drift, gents,-- You 'low the boy sha'n't stay; This is a white man's country; You're Dimocrats, you say; And whereas, and seein', and wherefore, The times bein' all out o' j'int, The n.i.g.g.e.r has got to mosey From the limits o' s.p.u.n.ky P'int!

Le's reason the thing a minute: I'm an old-fashioned Dimocrat too, Though I laid my politics out o' the way For to keep till the war was through.

But I come back here, allowin'

To vote as I used to do, Though it gravels me like the devil to train Along o' sich fools as you.

Now dog my cats ef I kin see, In all the light of the day, What you've got to do with the question Ef Tim shill go or stay.

And furder than that I give notice, Ef one of you tetches the boy, He kin check his trunks to a warmer clime Than he'll find in Illanoy,

Why, blame your hearts, jest hear me!

You know that unG.o.dly day When our left struck Vicksburg Heights, how ripped And torn and tattered we lay.

When the rest retreated I stayed behind, Fur reasons sufficient to me,-- With a rib caved in, and a leg on a strike, I sprawled on that cursed glacee.

Lord! how the hot sun went for us, And br'iled and blistered and burned!

How the Rebel bullets whizzed round us When a cuss in his death-grip turned!

Till along toward dusk I seen a thing I couldn't believe for a spell: That n.i.g.g.e.r--that Tim--was a crawlin' to me Through that fire-proof, gilt-edged h.e.l.l!

The Rebels seen him as quick as me, And the bullets buzzed like bees; But he jumped for me, and shouldered me, Though a shot brought him once to his knees; But he staggered up, and packed me off, With a dozen stumbles and falls, Till safe in our lines he drapped us both, His black hide riddled with b.a.l.l.s.