39 



And now, in good, ministerial fashion, 

 Before my muse shall recklessly dash on, 

 Let me pass in brief, superficial review 

 The plan of the work I purpose to do. 



I shall not aspire to be wonderfully witty, 

 Nor aim at anything shockingly pretty ; 

 Nor carry you up on an eagle's wings 

 Where the Yankee poet commonly sings; 

 But wish you to know before I commence, 

 That I make not the slightest claim or pretense 

 To anything grand or etherial in learning, 

 But merely have kept my hopper a turning, 

 And poured unassorted into a cup 

 Whatever my muse or miller turned up. 



The theme of these very grandiloquent rhymes 



Is generally known as the " Good Old Times; " 



But before I take my hand from the crank 



I hope to give one terrible yank, 



Which, if I'm not deceived in my drumming, 



Will open your eyes to the " Good Time Coming." 



The " Good Old Times," I mean not when Moses 



And Abram. and Eli, and Samson, and Joses, 



And all the old prophets worshipped a bull, 



And Absalom hung in a tree by his wool, 



Nor do I refer to those barbarous years 



When mortals were prized at the length of their ears. 



But coming down to sensible dates, 



To our own puritanic, ancestral estates, 



We find the identical " Good Old Times " 



Which your humble bard is fitting to rhymes. 



Ah, can it be as we look around 



On the busy world with its ceaseless sound. 



Of revolving wheels, and the heavy tread 



Of the molten feet through the mazes led 



By the magic might of the monarch steam 



In its creaking chains of band and seam ; 



As we hear the throbs of the netted wire 



That thrills and burns with the electric fire 



All over the length and breadth of the dry lands, 



And far away to most desolate islands ; 



As we cast our eyes o'er the teeming throng 



That forever raise this clamorous song; 



" A life, a life for the golden crown 



Of the flowery ways of grand renown ! " 



