Even there I heard a strange wild strain The kerbstone war, the auction's hammer, -And swift, on Music's misty ways, It led, from all this strife for millions, To ancient, sweet-do-nothing days Among the kirtle-robed Sicilians. And as it stilled the multitude, And yet more joyous rose and shriller, The reeds give out that strain impassioned. The prelude of some pastoral ditty! The demigod had crossed the seas,- From haunts of shepherd, nymph, and satyr, And Syracusan times, -to these Far shores and twenty centuries later. A ragged cap was on his head : But-hidden thus-there was no doubting That, all with crispy locks o'erspread, His gnarlèd horns were somewhere sprouting; His club-feet, cased in rusty shoes, Were crossed, as on some frieze you see them, And trousers, patched of divers hues, Concealed his crooked shanks beneath them. He filled the quivering reeds with sound, The nymphs and herdsmen ran to hear him, Even now the tradesmen from their tills, With clerks and porters, crowded near him. The bulls and bears together drew From Jauncey Court and New Street Alley, As erst, if pastorals be true, Came beasts from every wooded valley; A one-eyed Cyclops halted long A blowsy, apple-vending slattern; From some new-fangled lunch-house handy, To strike up Yankee Doodle Dandy! A newsboy and a peanut-girl Like little Fauns began to caper: Her tawny legs were bare and taper; His pipe, and struck the gamut higher. O heart of Nature, beating still With throbs her vernal passion taught her Or by the Arethusan water! New forms may fold the speech, new lands So thought I,-but among us trod "Great Pan is dead!"-and all the people F. BRET HARTE. [Born about 1835. A name now universally known, by the authorship of The Luck of Roaring Camp, and especially of the verses on That Heathen Chinee]. THE SOCIETY UPON THE STANISLAUS. I RESIDE at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful James; And I'll tell in simple language what I know about the row But first I would remark that it is not a proper plan For any scientific gent to whale his fellow-man, To lay for that same member for to "put a head" on him. Now nothing could be finer or more beautiful to see Then Brown he read a paper, and he reconstructed there, Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said he was at fault: Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of order-when And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and curled up on the floor, For, in less time than I write it, every member did engage And the way they heaved those fossils in their anger was a sin, And this is all I have to say of these improper games, PENELOPE. SIMPSON'S BAR, 1858. So you've kem 'yer agen, That I've struck, it is you. O Sal! 'yer's that derned fool from Simpson's, cavortin' round 'yer in the dew. Kem in, ef you will. Thar,-quit! Take a cheer. Not that; you can't fill Them theer cushings this year, For that cheer was my old man's, Joe Simpson, and they don't make such men about 'yer. He was tall, was my Jack, And you come a courtin' his widder. Lord! where You'd fill my Jack's place? And a man of your size,- And nary-Sho! thar! I was foolin',--I was, Joe, for sartain,—don't rise. Sit down. Law! why, sho! I'm as weak as a gal. Sal! Don't you go, Joe, Or I'll faint,-sure I shall. Sit down, -anywheer where you like, Joe,-in that cheer, if you choose,-Lord, where's Sal? TO THE PLIOCENE SKULL. A GEOLOGICAL ADDRESS. "SPEAK, O man less recent! Fragmentary fossil! Hid in lowest drifts below the earliest stratum "Older than the beasts, the oldest Palæotherium; "Eo-Mio-Plio-whatsoe'er the '-cene' was Tell us thy strange story! "Or has the professor slightly antedated By some thousand years thy advent on this planet, "Wert thou true spectator of that mighty forest Reared its columned trunks in that remote and distant "Tell us of that scene,-the dim and watery woodland Songless, silent, hushed, with never bird or insect Veiled with spreading fronds and screened with tall club-mosses, "When beside thee walked the solemn Plesiosaurus, "Tell us of thy food,-those half-marine refections, "Speak, thou awful vestige of the Earth's creation,- Tell the wondrous secret of thy past existence,- Even as I gazed, a thrill of the maxilla, And a lateral movement of the condyloid process, And, from that imperfect dental exhibition, "Which my name is Bowers, and my crust was busted But I'd take it kindly if you'd send the pieces Home to old Missouri !” ROBERT H. NEWELL. [This popular writer is author of the Orpheus C. Kerr (i.e. Office-seeker) Papers; from which book the following piece is taken). THE AMERICAN TRAVELLER. To Lake Aghmoogenegamook, A man from Wittequergaugaum came "I am a traveller," said he, |