Life — February 8, 1883 — page 10: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

BALLADE OF BLAME, M ITRED and sainted and sung; Posthumous martyrdom thine; Is there a change yet unrung, Is there unwritten a line, Aught to restore or refine, Aught to refurbish and brush, On this, thy day, Valentine, Sanctus of sandals and slush ? Saint, if the muse had a tongue True in its audible sign Unto her troublesome lung, Unto her asthma—and mine, Would you, immortal recline, Drunk with a nectar of gush? Say, would you canonized shine, Sanctus of sandals and slush? Cupidon’s bow is unstrung, Sopped with rain-water—divine Venus, her votaries ‘mong, Shivers and shakes at her shrine. Chill is each Paphian spine, Tipped is each nose with a flush; For thee a snow-wreath we twine, Sanctus of sandals and slush. L'ENvor. Bishops, your bench is benign, Cleric abuses ye crush, Straightway unfrock this malign Sanctus of sandals and slush, - LIFE - ‘Tue London Quarterly Review asserts that * Mr. Henry James has done scant justice to his countrywomen,”” That ‘there are Americans proud of their own descent from the old stock, who would be inclined to receive with much more coldness the credentials of Mr. James's ‘ race. That “‘ every situation in * The American’ is impossible,” and * the plot is simply chaotic.” That ‘‘ From beginning to end there is not a single incident in * The Portrait of a Lady,’ and ‘‘If an earthquake swallowed up all the characters in the middle of the second volume, the reader would only be tempted to thank the fates for a good deliverance.” That “ Imaginative literature in America had passed through a long and respectable life before the Boston Mutual Admiration Society was even heard of,” and that “Tf the American novel has reached its highest perfection in the works proceeding from that band of brothers, Americans will turn with joy from the pro hets of realism to the old-fashioned novelists; and even in the last resort to Thackeray and Dickens, Is the London Quarterly right in its surmises? YES, 1T 1S Bubp Ricut! SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS. J T was the ranchman to himself regret- fully that said, The while he took his pensive way to lodg- ing and to bed: “ Alas, that not to me severe necessity allows To linger here, but makes me punch far Colorado's cows ! There was a time when sanguine youth, with urban pleasures cloyed, Peopled the West with vague delights, that still might be enjoyed ; And bade me for a hut forsake my dinner and my club, And for a cowboy’s slang exchange the culture of the stub. Ah me! I hate those long-haired kine ; I'd like to linger here And with the boys consume my wine, and gossip oer my beer. If men knew how ¢heir members ache who fiery mustangs straddle, They'd think, with me, that muttons make the most alluring saddle. Yet, should I stay, old age that creeps with expedi- tious zeal On men whose greatest joy is in their thrice-receiving meal, Would find me with lack lustre eye and ruby-tinted nose, Condemned to bear the weight of years in alder- manic clothes. Ah! why is gruesome all that’s good, and noxious aJl that’s gay ? Why must to-morrow track so close the heels of poor to-day ? 7 Oh! Why did Eve the apple eat, and Adam, stupid oaf— Partaking too, condemn Re sons, at best, to half a loaf? comicbooks.com