To a Golf-Ball Did "Silvertown" thy merits claim, Whate'er ye were, or whence ye came, Insensate lump of molded gutta! Far be it from me to despise; That's not proportioned to thy size, However small. In fact, I hold ye as a prize, With others of your kin and kith I don't know what he does it with, But yet it's true! 19 The Man with the Hoe Bowed by the weight of centuries, he leans And on his back the burden of the world. Full many a vicious swipe And breathes a prayer that he may 'scape unseen. The Man with the Hoe Haply a Hayseed passes with a hoe. Like as a drowning man the floating straw, Aided thereto by many a clever stroke And as the mellowing spirit works its will, 21 He views the world and all mankind with thoughts The Pessimist Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud! Our much-vaunted skill in this ancient Scotch game Doth vanish until there's naught left but the name. We start quite puffed up from the No. One tee, Ambition that soared at the No. Two tee And what is the use of reviling our fate When we fail to beat "bogey" in playing the "gate." And nothing our skill so completely confounds Our play for the Seventh of course is all wrong; The lies they are cuppy, the grass it is long. The Pessimist We find all the bunkers and trouble galore- 23 The Eighth is "dead easy"—were't not for the brook. The Ninth was a " cinch -but the course we for sook. We're "quite off our game”—we “find we're not fit"; Our patience is gone, and we're ready to quit. No matter how well we think we can play, For we are the same things our fathers have been. "dubs." The shots we are trying for, they too would try. The foozles we're flying from, they too would fly. To the record we're clinging to, they too would cling, But it speeds from our grasp like a bird on the wing. |