Uncle Walt [Walt Mason] Part 2

_Eagles and Hens_

The eagle ought to have a place among the false alarms; we place its picture on our coins, and on our coat of arms; but what did eagles ever do but frolic in the sun? They'd be in jail for larceny if justice should be done. They are not half so good to eat as mallard duck or grouse; they'd surely cause a panic in a section boarding house; and never in this weary world was farmer seen to go, to trade a pail of eagle eggs for nails or calico. The humble hen, on t'other hand, still helps the world along; she lifts the farmer's mortgage as she trills her morning song; she yields the fragrant omelet, and when reduced to pie, she makes the boarder feel that he at last is fit to die. The eagle does not stir the souls of earnest, thoughtful men; and so let's take him from the s.h.i.+eld and subst.i.tute the hen.

_The Sunday Paper_

I spent five cents for the Sunday "Dart," and hauled it home in a two-wheeled cart; I piled the sections upon the floor, till they reached as high as the kitchen door; I hung the chromos upon the wall, though there wasn't room to hang them all, and the yard was littered some ten feet deep with "comic sections" that made me weep; and there were sections of pink and green, a woman's section and magazine, and sheets of music the which if played would quickly make an audience fade; and there were patterns for women's gowns and also for gentlemen's hand-me-downs; and a false mustache and a rubber doll, and a deck of cards and a parasol. Now men are busy with dray and cart, a-hauling away the Sunday "Dart."

_The Nation's Hope_

The nation's sliding down the path that leads to Ruin's lair, and all of Ruin's dogs of wrath will chew its vitals there; each day we deeper plunge in grief; we'll soon have reached the worst; why don't we turn, then, for relief, to William Randolph Hurst? It seems we haven't any sense, that we these ills endure; he's told us oft, in confidence, that he alone is pure; he is the bulwark of our hope--our last s.h.i.+eld and our first; then let's rely upon the dope of William Randolph Hurst. He offers us the helping hand, he fain would be our guide; and still we wreck this blooming land, and let all virtue slide; of all that is the country's best we're making wienerwurst; O let us lean upon the breast of William Randolph Hurst! He stands and waits, serene, sublime, he beckons and he sings! He wears a halo all the time, and he is growing wings! So let us quit the course that harms, forsake the things accurst, and rest, like children, in the arms of William Randolph Hurst!

_Football_

The game was ended, and the noise, at last had died away, and now they gathered up the boys where they in pieces lay. And one was hammered in the ground by many a jolt and jar; some fragments never have been found, they flew away so far. They found a stack of tawny hair, some fourteen cubits high; it was the half-back, lying there, where he had crawled to die. They placed the pieces on a door, and from the crimson field, that hero then they gently bore, like soldier on his s.h.i.+eld. The surgeon toiled the livelong night above the gory wreck; he got the ribs adjusted right, the wishbone and the neck. He soldered on the ears and toes, and got the spine in place, and fixed a gutta-percha nose upon the mangled face. And then he washed his hands and said: "I'm glad that task is done!" The half-back raised his fractured head, and cried: "I call this fun!"

_Health Food_

The doctor is sure that my health is poor, he says that I waste away; so bring me a can of the shredded bran, and a bale of the toasted hay; O feed me on rice and denatured ice, and the oats that the horses chew, and a peck of slaw and a load of straw and a turnip and squash or two.

The doctor cries that it won't be wise to eat of the things I like; if I make a break at a sirloin steak, my stomach is sure to strike; I dare not reach for the luscious peach, or stab at the lemon pie; if I make a pa.s.s at the stew, alas! I'm sure to curl up and die. If a thing looks good, it must be eschewed, if bad, I may eat it down; so bring me a jar of the rich pine tar from the Health Food works up town; and bring me a bag of your basic slag, and a sack of your bolted prunes, and a bowl of slop from the doctor's shop, and ladle it in with spoons! I will have to feed on the jimson weed, and the gra.s.s that the cows may leave, for the doctor's sure that my health is poor, and I know that he'd not deceive.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "_O, it may be all right for a woman so old, to leap o'er the table and chairs._"]

_Physical Culture_

My grandmother suffered and languished in pain, till she read in a magazine ad, that a woman should put on a sweater and train, and help the Delsartean fad. And now when I go to my midday repast, no meal is made ready for me; my grandmother's climbing a forty-foot mast or s.h.i.+nning up into a tree. The house has a stairway that she will not use she always slides down on the rail; she's spoiled all the floors with her spiked sprinting shoes, and she laughs when I put up a wail. O, it may be all right for a woman so old, to leap o'er the table and chairs, while I try to fill up on the grub that is cold, with the dishes all piled on the stairs. Today I protested with many a tear, made a moan like a maundering dunce; and she kicked all the lights from the bra.s.s chandelier, and turned forty handsprings at once. I told her I never could prosper and thrive, on victuals unfit for a man; she offered to throw me three falls out of five, Graeco-Roman or catch-as-catch-can.

_The Nine Kings_

Nine monarchs followed in the gloom when Edward journeyed to the tomb; nine monarchs walked, as in a dream--enough to make a baseball team--and cast upon King Edward's bier the futile tribute of a tear. And at his task the s.e.xton sings (the man who digs the graves for kings): "Nine monarchs, in their brave array, are bending over Edward's clay; and does the silent sovereign care, or does he know that they are there? And can the tears of monarchs nine make those dim eyes of Edward's s.h.i.+ne? And if they give their nine commands, can they bring life to those cold hands?

Can all their armies and their s.h.i.+ps bring laughter to those dead white lips? Can their nine crowns and sceptres nine, bring to the dead the life divine? Nine paupers at a pauper's grave, who claw their rags and weep and rave, can do as much to help the dead, as those nine kings at Edward's bed."

_The Eyes of Lincoln_

Sad eyes, that were patient and tender, sad eyes, that were steadfast and true, and warm with the unchanging splendor of courage no ills could subdue! Eyes dark with the dread of the morrow, and woe for the day that was gone, the sleepless companions of sorrow, the watchers that witnessed the dawn. Eyes tired from the clamor and goading, and dim from the stress of the years, and hollowed by pain and foreboding, and strained by repression of tears. Sad eyes that were wearied and blighted, by visions of sieges and wars, now watch o'er a country united from the luminous slopes of the stars!

_The Better Land_

There is a better world, they say, where tears and woe are done away; there s.h.i.+ning hosts in fields sublime are playing baseball all the time, and there (where no one ever sins) the home team nearly always wins.

Upon that bright and sunny sh.o.r.e, we'll never need to sorrow more; no umpires on the field are slain, no games are called because of rain. So let us live that we may fly, on snowy pinions, when we die, to where the pitcher never falls, or gives a man first base on b.a.l.l.s; where goose-eggs don't adorn the score, and shortstops fumble never more.

_Knowledge is Power_

One day a farmer found a bone; he thought at first it was a stone, and threw it at a pa.s.sing snake ere he discovered his mistake. But when he knew it was a bone, and not a diamond or a stone, he took it to an ancient sage, who said: "In prehistoric age, this was the s.h.i.+n-bone of a Thor-dineriomegantosaur-megopium-permastodon-letheriumsohelpmejohn." The farmer cried: "Dad bing my eyes! Was ever man so wondrous wise? He gazes on a piece of bone, that I supposed to be a stone, and, with a confidence sublime, he looks across the void of time, and gives this fossil bone a name, the fragment of some creature's frame! To have such knowledge, sir, as thine, I'd give those fertile farms of mine." "Don't envy me," the sage replied, and shook his weary head, and sighed, "Your life to me seems full and sweet--you always have enough to eat!"

_The Pie Eaters_

A sport in New Jersey, whose name is mislaid, has issued a challenge, serene, undismayed. He claims he can shovel more pies in his hold than any man living, and puts up the gold to back up his challenge, so here is a chance for pie eating experts their fame to advance. Now here is a sport that I like to indorse; a man can eat pies and not work like a horse; no heart-breaking training for wearisome weeks; no sparring or wrestling with subsidized freaks; no rubbing or grooming or skipping the rope, no toning your nerves with some horse doctor's dope; no bones dislocated, or face pounded sore, no wearing gum boots in a whirlpool of gore. The pie eater's training no anguish implies; he starves till his stomach is howling for pies; he loosens his belt to the uttermost hole, and says to the umpire: "All right! Let her roll!" There's gold for the winner, and honor and fame, and even the loser's ahead of the game.

_The s.e.xton's Inn_

Only a little longer, and the journey is done, my friend! Only a little further, and the road will have an end! The shadows begin to lengthen, the evening soon will close, and it's ho for the Inn of the s.e.xton, the inn where we'll all repose. The inn has no Bridal Chamber, no suites for the famed or great; the guests, when they go to slumber, are all of the same estate; the chambers are small and narrow, the couches are hard and cold, and the grinning, fleshless landlord is not to be bribed with gold. A sheet for the proud and haughty, a sheet for the beggar guest; a sheet for the blooming maiden--a sheet for us all, and rest! No bells at the dawn of morning, no rap at the chamber door, but silence is there, and slumber, for ever and ever more. Then ho for the Inn of the s.e.xton, the inn where we all must sleep, when our hands are done with their toiling, and our eyes have ceased to weep!