37 



Dear friends of the Hampshire Agricultural Society, 

 I trust you will deem it no breach of propriety, 

 If without the usual fuss and ado, 

 I give you the brunt of my lyrical shoe ; 

 And if anything's left that's worth being told, 

 Not forty times written — not forty years old, 

 Not harped by the papers — not beat on the drum, 

 Not prattled by infants still sucking their thumb ; 

 Why, this is the theme — this, this is the thought 

 That ought to be harnessed as soon as it's caught. 

 However, I really and truly suppose 

 These thoughts of mine, if hammered to prose, 

 Instead of the famous old head-dress of laurels, 

 Would honor my brow with cabbage and sorrel ; 

 But clothed in the glitter and tinsel of rhyme, 

 Of course you will dub them exceeding sublime. 



And first, may it not be counted a sin, 



If before my spinster shall fairly begin, 



While gathered around the loaves and the fishes 



I give with this glass my heart's truest wishes. 



To our President-Prof, who bravely insists 



That men may have brains at the ends of their fists,* 



Who has shown himself true in the stiffest of breezes, 



The pleuro-pneumonia and kindred diseases,f 



Which — if I correctly and truly remember — 



Occasionally come in the month of December, 



And which — to the people's amazement and wonder, 



Result in merely rhetorical thunder I 



May he never be troubled by serious crosses — 



Have ever a love for the culture of horses — 



Be owner himself of a beautiful steed 



Of some notorious, popular breed, 



And if clouds hang heavily over his skies, 



Like bread or the moon, be certain to rise, 



Till his name shall be known from the east to the west 



For his wonderful power in expanding the chest! 



To the ladies who honor our tables to-day, 

 From Amherst and Hadley — some farther away 

 Where Belchertown runs its art into thills, 

 Where Sunderland sleeps 'neath the Sugar Loaf hills, 

 A health and a welcome to the brightest of pearls, 

 The wives and the daughters — hurrah for the girls t 

 May they always have plenty of Bridget O'Flinns 



• Referring to Professor Clark"s efforts in the cause of Muscular Christianity, 

 f The battle of the " cow pens," in which nobody was killed. 



