A MIDSUMMER IDYL 



As I sit here of a midsummer day, in front of the 

 wide-open doors of a big hay-barn, busy with my 

 pen, and look out upon broad meadows where my 

 farmer neighbor is busy with his haymaking, I 

 idly contrast his harvest with mine. I have to 

 admit that he succeeds with his better than I do 

 with mine, though he can make hay only while the 

 sun shines, while I can reap and cure my light fan- 

 cies nearly as well in the shade as in the sun. Yet his 

 crop is the surer and of more certain value to man- 

 kind. But I have this advantage over him I 

 might make literature out of his haymaking, or 

 might reap his fields after him, and gather a harvest 

 he never dreamed of. What does Emerson say? 



One harvest from the field 

 Homeward bring the oxen strong; 



A second crop thine acres yield, 

 Which I gather in a song. 



But the poet, like the farmer, can reap only 

 where he has sown, and if Emerson had not scat- 

 tered his own heart in the fields his Muse would not 

 reap much there. Song is not one of the instru- 

 ments with which I gather my harvest, but long 

 ago, as a farm boy, in haymaking, and in driving 



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