Category: Rock Island Argus

From the Rock Island Argus, February 10, 1914. By Henry Howland.

A king who long had worn his crown,
    Whom lesser kings beheld with awe,
Who from his high throne handed down
    What served his people as their law
Stepped forth in simple garb one day,
    And in the fields and crowded marts
Beheld his subjects toil away
    And learned what hopes were in their hearts.

He stroked the curls of many a child,
    And many a sad complaint he heard,
And here and there benignly smiled
    Or paused to speak a cheering word;
Gray-bearded, bent old men he hailed
    As fellows of his brotherhood,
And where the stricken widow wailed
    He left such solace as he could.

The king, all powerful and great
    To whom the haughtiest princes bowed,
Before a petty magistrate
    Was elbowed by the motley crowd;
Among the humble ones he gazed,
    Each moment wondering more and more
Upon the man whom he had raised
    To office but the day before.

He saw the puny tyrant swell,
    And heard him threaten and advise;
Before him timid people fell,
    Stunned by the proud look in his eyes;
He had the manner of a god,
    And, stepping down, he gravely passed
As if the ground whereon he trod
    Had been made hallowed ground, at last.

Deserting those whose heads were bared,
    The king whom lesser kings obeyed
Back to his castle humbly fared
    And knelt beside his throne and prayed:
“Oh, let me be as great,” he cried,
    “As he believes himself to be
Who holds with childish, foolish pride
    A little brief authority.”

From the Rock Island Argus, February 9, 1914. By Henry Howland.

He trained a goose to multiply and add up and subtract;
He taught a spotted pig to waltz—it was a funny act;
He coaxed a billy goat to jump through hoops which were aflame,
He taught a chipmunk how to choose the letters of its name.
But he could never learn to cease to use his toothpick where
And when such action gave offense—or else he did not care.

He trained a dog to walk a rope and taught a cat to pray,
He said himself this took hard work which lasted many a day;
He hitched an alligator up and made it pull a cart.
His perseverance was immense, his teaching was an art.
But he could never train himself, somehow, to save his life,
To quit endeavoring to scoop his food up with his knife.

He trained a mouse to dance a jig, he educated fleas;
He had a carriage which was drawn by harnessed bumble bees;
He taught a turkey gobbler how to balance on his head,
And trained a duck to flatten out pretending to be dead.
But he could never train himself—or else he never tried—
To speak good English and to put vulgarity aside.

From the Rock Island Argus, February 3, 1914. By Henry Howland.

“Master of my own destiny am I,”
    The poet in his attic bravely wrote;
“I ask no master when I wish to lie
    Upon the sward and watch the clouds that float
Across the sky that is my very own;
    My knee is bent to neither lord nor king.
I proudly serve my own sweet will alone,
    As free as is the bird upon the wing.

“I scoff at him who bows to king or wife,
    Afraid to let his fancy e’en have play.
Who, in his groove must live a narrow life,
    A slave receiving orders day by day;
I, being free to do as I may please,
    Permit my soul to soar, and laugh at care;
To me there come a thousand ecstasies
    That those who chafe in bonds may never share.

“I am a law unto myself; I fill
    The place that I elect; I choose my sphere,
I serve no master but my own sweet will,
    I am a stranger to the thing called fear.”
But as he sang his lank landlady came.
    Her air was positive, her look was grim;
She called him many a disrespectful name,
    And flung his satchel downstairs after him.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 26, 1914. By Henry Howland.

My little boy has learned a lot since first he started off to school;
Much that I long ago forgot he has but lately learned by rule.
I once knew how to parse, but now the knack has somehow gone from me;
He fairly chews the grammar up; he knows the whole thing to a T.
Sometimes he is inclined, I fear, to look upon me with disdain,
But I still come in handy here—I earn the pleasures that we gain.

I cannot name the boundaries of Burma or Beloochistan;
He does it with the greatest ease, and proudly shows me that he can;
He works out problems that I shun, although I could have solved them once,
Sometimes I more than half suspect that he regards me as a dunce.
Perhaps I might go back and learn if I had fewer daily cares,
But, after all, ’tis I that earns the food he eats, the clothes he wears.

My little boy is learning fast, while I forget, year after year.
The records of the misty past, to me so vague, to him are clear.
He writes a better hand than I, his letters are more plainly made;
He spells words that I cannot spell without the dictionary’s aid.
He is inclined, sometimes I fear, to think my boyhood was misspent;
But I still come in handy here; I foot the bills and pay the rent.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 21, 1914. By Henry Howland.

“Woman is nearer the savage state than man. Her only function is to bear children.” —Professor Sargent of Harvard.

She is nothing but a woman with a voice that’s soft and sweet,
Making sacred all she touches, e’en the dust beneath her feet,
With a laugh that’s sweetest music and a sigh that’s sweeter yet,
With a look that makes you wonder and remember and forget—
    Just a woman who is pure,
    With a faith serene and sure—
Who has made you somewhat better since the moment when you met.

She is nothing but a woman, of a lower type than man,
Her development restricted, fashioned on a poorer plan;
Learning little as the ages and the aeons roll away,
Made to serve a single purpose and remain unthinking clay;
    Just a woman in whose eyes
    All that’s true and tender lies,
Just a woman claiming graces as angels only may.

She is nothing but a woman who when days of trouble come—
When the friends of fairer moments turn their faces and are dumb—
Hovers near with tender glances and with words that soothe and cheer
Just a woman, hoping bravely when you weakly yield to fear;
    Just a woman clinging fast
    To the love that, at the last,
Shall become your sweet salvation, as the farther shores appear.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 16, 1914. By Henry Howland.

She was so gentle and so fair
    That just to see her made me glad;
She spoke in accents sweet and rare,
    And praised the talent that I had;
The admiration in her look
    Awoke my pride and made me strut;
I gave to her my latest book,
    Its precious pages still uncut.

She took it with such pure delight
    That pleasure lingered in my breast;
I thanked the gods that I could write
    And that the book contained my best;
She held it as a precious thing—
    Indeed, she pressed it to her heart,
And set my own heart fluttering
    By sweetly dwelling on my art.

She was so graceful, so sublime
    That I was filled with sudden joy;
My cares took flight and for a time
    I was again a blushing boy;
She sweetly spoke about the glee
    That presently should be her own
In conning my brave lines when she
    Could be unhindered and alone.

Ah! That was three long years ago!
    I called upon her yesterday;
My book was on the stand, and so
    I picked it up from where it lay;
I felt the old joy in my heart,
    The sweet old thrill of boyhood—but
’Twas doomed to suddenly depart;
    The pages all remained uncut.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 10, 1914. By Henry Howland.

The world will give applause to him who rules in great affairs,
To him who in a lofty place assumes a nation’s cares;
His name is passed from lip to lip, his fame is spread abroad,
And they are envied whom he deigns to please with smile or nod;
But there’s another, poor perhaps, unhonored and unknown,
To whom I raise my hat, because of worth that is his own—
The honest man who daily does the best that he may do
And makes the world his debtor for a worthy son or two.

The crowds will gladly shout his name who guides a splendid fleet
And makes his country’s foemen feel the sorrow of defeat;
For him the waiting bands will play, for him the flags will fly,
For him the people will applaud and raise the arches high;
But while they crown him and are glad to stand and watch him pass
I lift my hat to one for whom there is no sounding brass—
The honest man whose sons are taught so they may understand
The worth of honor and the debt they owe their native land.

The world will give sweet praise to him who has enriched its art,
And learn to prize the poet’s song if it shall touch the heart.
There will be high rewards for them who govern and direct,
The warrior and the statesman will be named with the elect;
But there is one whom few will deign to gladden with applause,
Though all his efforts, all his hopes, involve a worthy cause—
The honest man whose sons are taught that honor still is good,
Who, all unnoticed, triumphs in his right of parenthood.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 8, 1914. By Henry Howland.

Joe Brigham was our “white man’s hope,” Joe measures six foot four;
He tips the beam around about two fifty, mebbe more;
His muscles are as hard as rocks; he has a bulldog jaw
And fists that are about as big as I have ever saw.

He’s workin’ in our shingle mill, and till a week ago
We all felt confident that he could lay Jack Johnson low;
He beat up nearly every man around this neighborhood—
At least the ones who couldn’t run as fast as big Joe could.

We brought an expert up from town to learn him how to box;
Joe nearly killed him the first night with one or two swift knocks;
A feller from Chicago come to look him over then;
He told us that the white race soon would be on top agen.

He said that John L., even when he had been at his best,
Would not have made a match for Joe—that made him throw some chest!
He give up workin’ in the mill and trained a week or so
And then knocked out a giant that they’d brought from Buffalo.

Although he’d licked us nearly all, we put our hate aside;
You see he’d got us fairly filled with what’s called local pride;
We watched his trainin’ right along, and cheered him when he passed;
It seemed as though the white man’s sun had rose agen at last.

But all our hopes are blasted now; Joe beat his wife one night,
And when her daddy found it out he went to set things right;
When he’d got through the neighbors found Joe bleedin’ on the floor,
And he is meekly workin’ in the shingle mill once more.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 5, 1914. By Henry Howland.

                HE.
We two may never meet again;
    The world is wide, seas may divide us;
Why should we squander or disdain
    This chance with which Fate has supplied us?
Why should we dream of future bliss,
    A present gladness blindly losing?
Tomorrow you may crave the kiss
    That you are stubbornly refusing.

Tomorrow, when it is too late,
    When leagues between us may be lying,
You may bemoan your lonely fate
    And waste the hours in futile sighing;
Perhaps within a mile or two
    The ways we go may be diverging;
Why scorn the kiss I offer you?
    Tomorrow I may not be urging.

              SHE.
We two may never meet, I know,
    And splashing seas may lie between us;
Hereafter there may never grow
    A potted palm or vine to screen us;
I may, as you have said, give way
    To useless sighing and to sorrow,
And mourn the chance I have today,
    When I sit down to think, tomorrow.

But, even if our ways shall part
    And if our hopes must bloom asunder,
Shall happiness avoid my heart,
    And no fond lips press mine, I wonder?
Nay, though through No Man’s Land I fare,
    I’ll meet some brave one—never doubt it—
Who will gladly embrace me there,
    Without first lecturing about it.

From the Rock Island Argus, January 1, 1914. By Henry Howland.

If you treat the world right, if you give it its due,
It is likely to try to deal fairly with you;
If you give it a smile when you have one to spare,
You will find that the days will more often be fair.

If you ask for no more than you honestly earn,
If you look for no more than a proper return
On investments you make and on risks that you take,
You will seldom sit nursing a foolish heart-ache.

If you pick out your friends just for friendship, instead
Of favoring those who push you ahead,
Disappointments will soon get to passing you by,
And the clouds will be fewer that darken your sky.

If you cheer where you may and give aid where you can,
If you learn that greed never has strengthened a man,
That selfishness is but a loathsome disease,
You will find less to grieve you and much more to please.

If you learn that the weak are the ones who complain,
You will find good in much you have viewed with disdain;
If you treat the world right, if you give it its due
It is likely to deal pretty fairly with you.