Newspaper History

Category: Evening Public Ledger

  • The Ultimate Consumer

    From the Evening Public Ledger, July 27, 1915.

    Light, in ballast, a thousand ships
        Come streaming through our harbor gate;
    Then, laden down at busy slips,
        Go out again with stores of freight
        Bound over sea to the buyer great,
    Who always calls for more and more,
        Whose greed not all the world may sate,
    The ultimate consumer—War.

    Ships that come from the Seven Seas,
        Some that move with stately gait;
    Some that loiter in any breeze,
        Lured by Wartime’s double rate.
        Mocking all at the hand of fate,
    Seeking share in the wondrous store,
        They come to serve, let who berate,
    The ultimate consumer—War.

    Battered hulks once forced aside
        By vessels of a later date;
    Proud and scornful of wind and tide
        And foes that under the ocean wait,
        Again they pass, but sans the state
    That marked their going in days of yore;
        Servants now of the king of hate,
    The ultimate consumer—War.

    Captain, the risk of the trip is great
        And none may tell when a gun will roar;
    But you are serving, despite the strait
        The ultimate consumer—War.

  • The Immune

    From the Evening Public Ledger, July 19, 1913. By Grantland Rice.

    They saw him charge from trench to trench,
    Through pools of gore and deadly stench.

    They heard him plunge on with a jeer
    When shrapnel took away an ear.

    And when the famous Forty-twos
    Began to drop, with lighted fuse,

    They saw him in his careless pride
    Rise up and kick them to one side.

    And in some wild charge on the line,
    Where chills assail the human spine,

    They saw him face a bayonet
    And yawning, light a cigarette.

    Where deadly mortars scattered gore
    He gave three cheers—and called for more.

    The captains called in wonderment,
    “Who can this hero be?”

    “I used to umpire,” he replied—
    “This stuff is pie for me.”

  • Ballad of the King’s Triumph

    From the Evening Public Ledger, June 18, 1915. By Dana Burnet.

    “Call me my minstrel,” said the king,
        “And let him sing a glee.
    For I have won this summer day
        A mighty victory.

    “Between the tides of dawn and dusk
        Upon a field I stood
    And saw my gallant swords drink deep
        Of body and of blood.

    “So bid my merry minstrel in
        With lute and silver thong,
    And let him take my stained sword
        And sheathe it in a song!”

    The minstrel came, an ancient man,
        And smote a silver string.
    “Oh, gallant is the victory
        And mighty is the king!

    “At dawn he rode with all his knights
        Into a virgin field.
    At dusk the blood of honest men
        Was stained upon his shield.

    “And in the houses of his foes
        A thousand leagues away,
    The hearts of women bled and broke
        Upon a summer’s day.”

    “What song is this?” the monarch cried,
        “What sorrow dost thou sing?”
    “Why, only of the victory
        That crowned my lord and king.”

    The minstrel smiled a fleeting smile
        And smote a splendid chord.
    “Oh, gallant is the use of arms
        And mighty is the sword!

    “For on this day a greening field
        Was won at crimson cost;
    And what the gods of war have gained
        The loves of men have lost.

    “And many a heart of friend and foe
        Has broken on this day,
    And children starve and women weep
        A thousand leagues away!

    “Then cry the triumph to the stars
        And let the heavens ring!
    For gallant is the victory!
        And mighty is the king!”

  • Madrigal

    From the Evening Public Ledger, June 17, 1915. By Edith Ives Woodworth.

                    I.

    She came across the shining hill
        Adown a golden lea,
    Love lightened in her dewy eyes,
        Love piped a melody.

    Love led her to a silver space
        Beneath a gray-leaved tree;
    Dear Heaven! the wind tossed in her hair,
        The sunlight touched her knee.

    Ah, unforgotten morn of gold,
        O river running free,
    I thrilled to see her foam-white foot
        When my love came to me.

                    II.

    Night broods upon the gray-leaved bough
        Around the shadowed door,
    O dark is yon unlighted hill
        And dull the reedy shore.

    Nor will she pass upon the plain
        As once she passed before,
    Nor evermore her foam-white foot,
        My starry love of yore.

  • The Soul Purger

    From the Evening Public Ledger, May 29, 1915. By Grantland Rice.

    Two out—and the bases full—
        Three runs to win and two to tie;
    And then, amid the boding lull,
        Looms Crawford of the batting eye;
    I watch the pitcher writhe and whirl
        And shoot one from his mounded pen—
    I see the white pill dart and curl
        As Crawford’s bludgeon swings—and then—

    In that one moment through the stands
        There runs—before the groans and cheers—
    The taut grip of ten thousand hands—
        The pulse leap of a thousand years;
    The one great throbbing human call
        Above all science, war or love,
    As crashing bat meets speeding ball
        Or speeding ball meets waiting glove.

    Here end the sorrows of the race—
        All want and wretchedness and crime;
    Where Care must seek another place—
        Where Sin must bide another time;
    Here where the heart’s wiped clean and dry—
        The drudge soul lifted from the pit
    For those who wait for the reply—
        A strike-out—or a two-base hit?

  • The Arrow and the Song

    From the Evening Public Ledger, May 14, 1915. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

    I shot an arrow into the air,
    It fell to earth, I know not where;
    For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
    Could not follow it in its flight.

    I breathed a song into the air,
    It fell to earth, I know not where;
    For who has sight so keen and strong
    That it can follow the flight of song?

    Long, long afterward, in an oak
    I found the arrow, still unbroke;
    And the song, from beginning to end,
    I found again in the heart of a friend.

  • The Night and I

    From the Evening Public Ledger, May 12, 1915. By James Stephens.

    The night was creeping on the ground,
    She crept along without a sound
    Until she reached the tree, and then
    She covered it, and stole again
    Along the grass up to the wall.

    I heard the rustle of her shawl
    Inside the room where I was hid;
    But no matter what she did
    To everything that was without,
    She could not put my candle out.

    So I peeped at the night, and she
    Stared back solemnly at me.