I caught no cold, yet flying pains could find
For weeks in me,—a rheumatism of mind.
One thing alone imprisoned there had power
To hold me in the place that one half-hour,—
A scutcheon this, a helm-surmounted shield,
Three griffins argent on a sable field;
A relic of the shipwrecked past was here,
And Ezra held some old-world lumber dear;
Nay, do not smile, I love this kind of thing,
These cooped traditions with a broken wing,
This real estate in Fancy's pipe-blown ball.
This less than nothing that is more than all!
Have I not seen sweet natures kept alive
Amid the humdrum of your business hive.
Undowered spinsters shielded from all harms,
By force imagined of a coat of arms?"
He paused a moment, and his features took
The flitting sweetness of that inward look
I hinted at before; but, scarcely seen,
It shrank for shelter 'neath his harder mien,
And, rapping his black pipe of ashes clear,
He went on with a self-derisive sneer:—
"No doubt we make a part of God's design,
And break the forest-path for feet divine;
To furnish foothold for this grand prevision
Is good,—and yet to be the mere transition,—
That, you will say, is also good, though I
Scarce like to feed the ogre By-and-by;
My skull has somehow never closed the suture
That seems to bind yours firmly with the future,
So you 'll excuse me if I 'm sometimes fain
To tie the past's warm nightcap o'er my brain;
I 'm quite aware 't is not in fashion here,
But then your northeast winds are so severe!
"But to my story: though 't is truly naught
But a few hints in Memory's sketchbook caught,
And which may claim a value on the score
Of calling back some scenery now no more.
Shall I confess? The tavern's only Lar
Seemed (be not shocked!) its homely-featured bar.
Here snapped a fire of beechen logs, that bred
Strange fancies in its embers golden-red,
And nursed the loggerhead whose hissing dip,
Timed by nice instinct, creamed the mug of flip
Which made from mouth to mouth its genial round,
Nor left one nature wholly winter-bound;
Hence dropt the tinkling coal all mellow-ripe
For Uncle Reuben's talk-extinguished pipe;
Hence rayed the heat, as from an in-door sun,
That wooed forth many a shoot of rustic fun.
