This gave the drunken dandies quite a sweat;
For though from head to heels they now were wet
With mingled gutter-wash, a falling shower,
Which on their crazy heads did constant pour,
Yet there they stood, and stamped, and counted still,
As on their ears each stroke successive fell.

They reached, at length, fourteen; and quite amazed,

One thus exclaimed, while wildly round he gazed,

Through all my —(hic) — life, some twenty years or more, I never knew it. ·(hic) — quite so late before.”

APOSTROPHE TO THE MERRIMACK,

RECITED AT THE CONCLUSION OF A TEMPERANCE DISCOURSE, IN LOWELL.

COLD WATER, hail! sure cure for countless ills,
Better than patent drugs or Parr's Life Pills;
True panacea of the human kind,

Sovereign alike for body and for mind ;
Potent to quench the kindling sparks of strife,
To heal the sorrows of the weeping wife;
Spell that alike is able to unclasp

The felon's stealthy clutch and ruffian's grasp.
How great the debt which every son and daughter
Of Adam's race doth owe to thee, Cold Water.

Say, what were Lowell, were it not for thee,
Child of the mountains, journeying to the sea ?*
Pausing a moment in thy glorious course,
Thou lendest here to man thy boundless force;
Which, joined with skill to his, at once creates
The second city of the first of states.

But change thy course a little, turn thy head,

And Lowell would be, Where? Why, here—but dead!
Its wheels would stop, its spindles cease their hum;
The cheerful voice of industry be dumb;

The Merrimack takes its rise in a very mountainous region.

Its streets, deserted, desolate, and lone,
Would be with rank, unseemly weeds o'ergrown;
Decay would through these homes her besom sweep,
And reptiles crawl where now your infants sleep;
Where through yon snow-white warp the shuttles fling
The embracing woof, and cheerful maidens sing,
The industrious spider rear her loom on high,
And weave her web to catch the incautious fly;
Then, like rum-sellers, with a fatal skill,
Retire behind her screen, entrap and kill.

Its busy merchants, now a very host,

Would be in earnest "SELLING OFF AT COST!"
Its barbers and its lawyers cease to shave,
And scores of doctors, impotent to save
Their fees or patients, fly the common grave.
The dentist who can scarce believe it sin
To bag your gold and fill your teeth with tin,
Would take a journey west, in hopes to find
Substantial food for his own teeth to grind.

Those mighty cotton kings, whose slightest word
Is now obeyed almost as soon as heard;

Who speak the word, and lofty walls ascend,

Who stretch the hand, and lengthening streets extend
Who stamp the foot, and like an ebbing tide,
The very pavement settles by your side, —
Lords of both men and money, where were they,
Shouldst thou but turn thy water power away?
Their might and salaries gone, alas! what then
Were corporation agents? Merely men.

Such were the fate of Lowell, shouldst thou lack
Thy wealth of waters, bounteous Merrimack!
The pulse of life, that beats so full and free
Through all her mighty frame, is given by thee!
Then let her own thy power, yield to thy sway,
And in Cold Water wash her stains away.

A COTTON SPECULATION.

IN Bristol county, in a certain town,

Not fifty miles from one they call Fall River,

A trader lived, a man of some renown;

And though he peddled grog, men called him clever. He chanced to have a very worthy wife,

Possessed of real nobleness of mind,
Benevolent and kind;

And swayed by her he lived a decent life.
Upright in some respects, yet still, for gold,
The devil's own elixir, Rum, he sold ;
And while promoting thus "the public good,"
Took in exchange the cash, or - - what he could.

His house stood distant from the store
Some twenty rods or more;

And toward the close of a fair summer's day
A wretched beggar thither bent his way.

His eye was sunken, and his look was sad;

His beard, unshaven, o'er his bosom hung;

While tattered rags, with which the wre.ch was clad, Stirred by the evening breeze, around him swung.

An old, crushed hat protected his gray head,

While his thin locks were streaming in the wind; He moved along with tottering, feeble tread, Bending beneath a pack,

Which rested on his back,

While his lean dog was trotting close behind.

He mounts the steps, and gently rings the bell:
The wife invites him in, and sets a chair,
And while the wretch his tale of woe doth tell,

There glistens in her eye the sympathetic tear.
She offers food; but that he does not want;

And seeing what a scarecrow dress he's got on, Concludes of clothing he must sure be scant,

Especially of that part made of cotton.

For through his tattered rags, all glazed with dirt,
(Although she has a most observant eye,)
Collar or wristbands she cannot espy,

Or e'en the smallest vestige of a shirt.

Then quick as thought she to her chamber flew, And, from her husband's ample store,

Selected one he oft had wore,

And in the beggar's lap the needed garment threw.

He stammered out his thanks, and in his pack
He stowed the gift, and swung it on his back;
Then took his leave, and toward a neighboring wood
He bent his steps, and made what speed he could.

There, seated on a log, he viewed his prize,
As any tippler would, with gin-inflamed eyes;
And thus communed he with himself: "Shall I,
To please the eyes of other people, die?

True, I am shirtless; but then, what's the harm?
We need more than our clothes to keep us warm.
To clothe the outward man is sure a sin,

If we neglect the better part within.

'Tis true, 'man wants but little here below,'

Yet wants that little often that we know.

Rags will buy gin, and gin I sure must have;
Without, though c. ad in silks, I could not live.

1

So here it goes!" The garment then he tore,
And with the rags he hasted to the store,
And had his empty bottle filled once more.

As out the wretch was passing with his gin,
By chance the merchant's lady happened in,
And to her husband thus: "What had he there

Within that bottle ?"- "What? Some gin, my dear."
"And could that wretched beggar thus deceive?
Can tears tell lies? What shall we then believe?
Stooping and sad, he tottered to our door,
And begged I would have pity on the poor.'
While like a child he wept, I could but heed

His prayer, and gave him what he seemed to need:
He'd not a rag of cotton on his skin;

And had he still the cash to purchase gin?"

"He did not pay in cash," the man replied.

“Not cash! — and what had he to pay beside?”

"Why, rags." "He barter rags! What sort? Speak quick;

I fear the wretch has played us both a trick."
"Here is the bundle," said he, "if you doubt
What it contains, just pull the fragments out.”
She drew them forth, and made the fellow stare,
By loud exclaiming, "Sir, see there! see there!!
There is your name I wrought it there myself→
And that old ragged, dirty, lying elf,
As great a hypocrite as e'er was born,
Has sold you your own shirt, in pieces torn."

Then, staring in the face of her liege lord,
And suiting well her action to the word,
With bitter irony, she thus exclaimed:

"Dear sir, don't look confounded or ashamed;

For one of moderate means, and humble station,
You've made a splendid cotton speculation."