A SONG OF SUNRISE (On the Morning of the Russian Revolution) To those who drink the golden mist The terrors of the human breast:- Of liberty doth blaze and shine; H. C. Bunner Henry Cuyler Bunner, one of our most delightful writers of light verse, was born at Oswego, New York, in 1855. At twenty-two he was appointed editor of Puck (then the most prominent of comic weeklies), a position which he held until his death. For more than ten years he wrote almost all the rhymed contributions to that journal-to say nothing of quantities of short stories (his Short Sixes, first published in 1890, are still well-known), prose paragraphs, topical parodies, edi torials, etc. Like Field, the artist was finally buried in the journalist; but, unlike him, Buǹner kept the work of the serious poet separate from that of the manufacturer of satiric trifles. Yet, in spite of certain exquisite fragments in Airs from Arcady (1884) and Rowen: Second Crop Songs (1892), Bunner is likely to be remembered chiefly for his flippant vers de société, his skilful and grave absurdities. "Behold the Deeds!" is a splendid example of Bunner's wit and technical ingenuity. It is a burlesque of the old ballads in the guise of a Chant-Royal, one of the strictest and most difficult of the French forms. Another of his uncollected comic pieces ("Shake, Mulleary and Go-ethe") owes its origin to the fact that a certain Western poet (Joaquin Miller) had composed a poem in which the name of the author of "Faust" was made to rhyme with "teeth." Bunner not only adopted this rhyme, but carried the broad satire further by mispronouncing Molière, achieving one of his happiest compositions. Bunner's was, at best, an artificial world, a world of graceful compliments, polite evasions, rhymed billets doux, with light sighs and lighter laughter tinkling among the tea-cups. Bunner died, in New Jersey, in 1896. SHAKE, MULLEARY AND GO-ETHE I have a bookcase, which is what I could not put them underneath— Shake was a dramatist of note; Mulleary's line was quite the same; Go-ethe wrote in the German tongue: He did quite nicely for the Dutch; They sit there, on their chests, as bland But why from smiling they refrain I think I clearly can explain: They none of them could show much teeth- BEHOLD THE DEEDS! (Being the Plaint of Adolphe Culpepper Ferguson, Salesman of Fancy Notions, held in durance of his Landlady for a “failure to connect" on Saturday night.) I would that all men my hard case would know, For being short on this sad Saturday, Nor having shekels of silver wherewith to pay: I sing, (as prisoners to their dungeon-stones Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones! One night and one day have I wept my woe; To pray them to advance the requisite tin Led by the daughter of my landlady Miss Amabel Jones is musical, and so The heart of the young he-boarder doth win, Playing "The Maiden's Prayer" adagio That fetcheth him, as fetcheth the "bunko skin" The innocent rustic. For my part, I pray That Badarjewska maid may wait for aye Ere sits she with a lover, as did we Once sit together, Amabel! Can it be That all that arduous wooing not atones For Saturday's shortness of trade dollars three? Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones! Yea! She forgets the arm that was wont to go Around her waist. She wears a buckle whose pin Galleth the crook of her young man's elbow. I forget not, for I that youth have been! Smith was aforetime the Lothario gay. Yet once, I mind me, Smith was forced to stay Close in his room. Not calm as I was he; But his noise brought no pleasaunce, verily. Small ease he got of playing on the bones Or hammering on the stove-pipe, that I see. Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones! |