One curious circumstance happened lately which I mention without drawing an absolute inference.Being at the studio of a sculptor with whom I am acquainted, the other day, I saw a remarkable cast of a left arm.On my asking where the model came from, he said it was taken direct from the arm of a deformed person, who had employed one of the Italian moulders to make the cast.It was a curious case, it should seem, of one beautiful limb upon a frame otherwise singularly imperfect--I have repeatedly noticed this little gentleman's use of his left arm.Can he have furnished the model I saw at the sculptor's?
--So we are to have a new boarder to-morrow.I hope there will be something pretty and pleasing about her.A woman with a creamy voice, and finished in alto rilievo, would be a variety in the boarding-house,--a little more marrow and a little less sinew than our landlady and her daughter and the bombazine-clad female, all of whom are of the turkey-drumstick style of organization.I don't mean that these are our only female companions; but the rest being conversational non-combatants, mostly still, sad feeders, who take in their food as locomotives take in wood and water, and then wither away from the table like blossoms that never came to fruit, I have not yet referred to them as individuals.
I wonder what kind of young person we shall see in that empty chair to-morrow!
--I read this song to the boarders after breakfast the other morning.
It was written for our fellows;--you know who they are, of course.
THE BOYS.
Has there any old fellow got mixed with the boys?
If there has, take him out, without making a noise!
Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite!
Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night!
We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more?
He's tipsy,--young jackanapes!--show him the door!--"Gray temples at twenty?"--Yes! white, if we please;Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there's nothing can freeze!
Was it snowing I spoke of? Excuse the mistake!
Look close,--you will see not a sign of a flake;We want some new garlands for those we have shed, And these are white roses in place of the red!
We've a trick, we young fellows, you may have been told.
Of talking (in public) as if we were old;That boy we call Doctor," (1) and this we call Judge (2)--It's a neat little fiction,--of course it's all fudge.
That fellow's the Speaker,"(3)--the one on the right;Mr.Mayor,"(4) my young one, how are you to-night?
That's our "Member of Congress,"(5) we say when we chaff;There's the "Reverend"(6) What's his name?--don't make me laugh!
That boy with the grave mathematical look(7)Made believe he had written a wonderful book, And the ROYAL SOCIETY thought it was true!
So they chose him right in; a good joke it was, too.
There's a boy,--we pretend,--with a three-decker-brain That could harness a team with a logical chain:
When he spoke for our manhood in syllabled fire, We called him "The Justice,"--but now he's "The Squire."(1)And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,(2)Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith, But he shouted a song for the brave and the free, --Just read on his medal,--My country,--of thee! "You hear that boy laughing?--you think he's all fun, But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done;The children laugh loud as they troop to his call, And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all!(3)Yes, we're boys,--always playing with tongue or with pen,--And I sometimes have asked,--Shall we ever be men?
Shall we always be youthful and laughing and gay, Till the last dear companion drops smiling away?
Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its gray!
The stars of its Winter, the dews of its May!
And when we have done with our life-lasting toys, Dear Father, take care of thy children, the Boys!
1 Francis Thomas.
2 George Tyler Bigelow.
3 Francis Boardman Crowninshield.
4 G.W.Richardson.
5 George Thomas Davis.
6 James Freeman Clarke.
7 Benjamin Peirce.
