Part 22

"And I have jest laid back and laughed, And rolled and wallered in the grass At fairs, to see some heavy-draft Lead out at FIRST, yit come in LAST!

"Each hoss has his appinted place,-- The heavy hoss should plow the soil;-- The blooded racer, he must race, And win big wages fer his toil.

"I never bet--ner never wrought Upon my feller man to bet-- And yit, at times, I've often thought Of my convictions with regret.

"I bless the hoss from hoof to head-- From head to hoof, and tale to mane!-- I bless the hoss, as I have said, From head to hoof, and back again!

"I love my God the first of all, Then Him that perished on the cross, And next, my wife,--and then I fall Down on my knees and love the hoss."

Again I applauded, handing the old man still another of his poems, and the last received. "Ah!" said he, as his gentle eyes bent on the title; "this-- here's the cheerfullest one of 'em all. This is the one writ, as I wrote you about--on that glorious October morning two weeks ago--I thought your paper would print this-un, shore!"

"Oh, it WILL print it," I said eagerly; "and it will print the other two as well! It will print ANYTHING that you may do us the honor to offer, and we'll reward you beside just as you may see fit to designate.-- But go on--go on! Read me the poem."

The old man's eyes were glistening as he responded with the poem entitled

"WHEN THE FROST IS ON THE PUNKIN"

"When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock, And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock, And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens, And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence O, it's then's the times a feller is a-feelin' at his best, With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest, As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock, When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

"They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here-- Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossums on the trees, And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees; But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock-- When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

"The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn, And the raspin' of the tangled leaves, as golden as the morn; The stubble in the furries--kindo' lonesome-like, but still A-preachin' sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill; The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed; The hosses in theyr stalls below--the clover overhead!-- O, it sets my hart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock, When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock!

"Then your apples all is getherd, and the ones a feller keeps Is poured around the celler-floor in red and yeller heaps; And your cider-makin' 's over, and your wimmern-folks is through With theyr mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and saussage, too! . . . I don't know how to tell it--but ef sich a thing could be As the Angels wantin' boardin', and they'd call around on ME-- I'd want to 'commodate 'em-all the whole-indurin' flock-- When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock!"

That was enough! "Surely," thought I, "here is a diamond in the rough, and a 'gem,' too, 'of purest ray serene'!" I caught the old man's hand and wrung it with positive rapture; and it is needless to go further in explanation of how the readers of our daily came to an acquaintance through its columns with the crude, unpolished, yet most gentle genius of Benj. F. Johnson, of Boone.

THE OLD SOLDIER'S STORY

AS TOLD BEFORE THE NEW ENGLAND SOCIETY IN NEW YORK CITY

Since we have had no stories to-night I will venture, Mr. President, to tell a story that I have heretofore heard at nearly all the banquets I have ever attended. It is a story simply, and you must bear with it kindly. It is a story as told by a friend of us all, who is found in all parts of all countries, who is immoderately fond of a funny story, and who, unfortunately, attempts to tell a funny story himself--one that he has been particularly delighted with. Well, he is not a story-teller, and especially he is not a funny story-teller. His funny stories, indeed, are oftentimes touchingly pathetic. But to such a story as he tells, being a good-natured man and kindly disposed, we have to listen, because we do not want to wound his feelings by telling him that we have heard that story a great number of times, and that we have heard it ably told by a great number of people from the time we were children. But, as I say, we can not hurt his feelings. We can not stop him. We can not kill him; and so the story generally proceeds. He selects a very old story always, and generally tells it in about this fashion:

I heerd an awful funny thing the other day--ha! ha! I don't know whether I kin git it off er not, but, anyhow, I'll tell it to you. Well!--le's see now how the fool-thing goes. Oh, yes!--W'y, there was a feller one time--it was during the army and this feller that I started in to tell you about was in the war and--ha! ha!--there was a big fight a-goin' on, and this feller was in the fight, and it was a big battle and bullets a-flyin' ever' which way, and bomb- shells a-bu'stin', and cannon-balls a-flyin' 'round promiskus; and this feller right in the midst of it, you know, and all excited and het up, and chargin' away; and the fust thing you know along come a cannon-ball and shot his head off--ha! ha! ha! Hold on here a minute!--no, sir; I'm a-gittin' ahead of my story; no, no; it didn't shoot his HEAD off-- I'm gittin' the cart before the horse there--shot his LEG off; that was the way; shot his leg off; and down the poor feller drapped, and, of course, in that condition was perfectly he'pless, you know, but yit with presence o' mind enough to know that he was in a dangerous condition ef somepin' wasn't done fer him right away. So he seen a comrade a-chargin', by that he knowed, and he hollers to him and called him by name--I disremember now what the feller's name was. . . .

Well, that's got nothin' to do with the story, anyway; he hollers to him, he did, and says, "Hello, there," he says to him; "here, I want you to come here and give me a lift; I got my leg shot off, and I want you to pack me back to the rear of the battle" --where the doctors always is, you know, during a fight--and he says, "I want you to pack me back there where I can get med-dy-cinal attention er I'm a dead man, fer I got my leg shot off," he says, "and I want you to pack me back there so's the surgeons kin take keer of me." Well-- the feller, as luck would have it, ricko'nized him and run to him and throwed down his own musket, so's he could pick him up; and he stooped down and picked him up and kindo' half-way shouldered him and half-way helt him betwixt his arms like, and then he turned and started back with him--ha! ha! ha! Now, mind, the fight was still a-goin' on--and right at the hot of the fight, and the feller, all excited, you know, like he was, and the soldier that had his leg shot off gittin' kindo' fainty like, and his head kindo' stuck back over the feller's shoulder that was carryin' him. And he hadn't got more'n a couple o' rods with him when another cannon-ball come along and tuk his head off, shore enough!-- and the curioust thing about it was--ha! ha!--that the feller was a-packin' him didn't know that he had been hit ag'in at all, and back he went--still carryin' the deceased back--ha! ha! ha!--to where the doctors could take keer of him--as he thought. Well, his cap'n happened to see him, and he thought it was a ruther cur'ous p'ceedin's--a soldier carryin' a dead body out o' the fight--don't you see? And so he hollers at him, and he says to the soldier, the cap'n did, he says, "Hullo, there; where you goin' with that thing?" the cap'n said to the soldier who was a-carryin' away the feller that had his leg shot off. Well, his head, too, by that time. So he says, "Where you going with that thing?" the cap'n said to the soldier who was a-carryin' away the feller that had his leg shot off. Well, the soldier he stopped-- kinder halted, you know, like a private soldier will when his presidin' officer speaks to him--and he says to him, "W'y," he says, "Cap, it's a comrade o' mine and the pore feller has got his leg shot off, and I'm a-packin' him back to where the doctors is; and there was nobody to he'p him, and the feller would 'a' died in his tracks--er track ruther--if it hadn't a-been fer me, and I'm a-packin' him back where the surgeons can take keer of him; where he can get medical attendance--er his wife's a widder!" he says, " 'cause he's got his leg shot off!" Then CAP'N says, "You blame fool you, he's got his HEAD shot off." So then the feller slacked his grip on the body and let it slide down to the ground, and looked at it a minute, all puzzled, you know, and says, "W'y, he told me it was his leg!" Ha! ha! ha!

DIALECT IN LITERATURE

'And the common people heard him gladly'

Of what shall be said herein of dialect, let it be understood the term dialect referred to is of that general breadth of meaning given it to-day, namely, any speech or vernacular outside of the prescribed form of good English in its present state. The present state of the English is, of course, not any one of its prior states. So first let it be remarked that it is highly probable that what may have been the best of English once may now by some be counted as a weak, inconsequent patois, or dialect.

To be direct, it is the object of this article to show that dialect is not a thing to be despised in any event --that its origin is oftentimes of as royal caste as that of any speech. Listening back, from the stand- point of to-day, even to the divine singing of that old classic master to whom England's late laureate refers as

". . . the first warbler, whose sweet breath Preluded those melodious bursts that fill The spacious times of great Elizabeth With sounds that echo still";

or to whom Longfellow alludes, in his matchless sonnet, as

". . . the poet of the dawn, who wrote The Canterbury Tales, and his old age Made beautiful with song"--

Chaucer's verse to us is NOW as veritably dialect as to that old time it was the chastest English; and even then his materials were essentially dialect when his song was at best pitch. Again, our present dialect, of most plebeian ancestry, may none the less prove worthy. Mark the recognition of its own personal merit in the great new dictionary, where what was, in our own remembrance, the most outlandish dialect, is now good, sound, official English.

Since Literature must embrace all naturally existing materials--physical, mental and spiritual--we have no occasion to urge its acceptance of so-called dialect, for dialect IS in Literature, and HAS been there since the beginning of all written thought and utterance. Strictly speaking, as well as paradoxically, all verbal expression is more or less dialectic, however grammatical. While usage establishes grammar, it no less establishes so-called dialect. Therefore we may as rightfully refer to "so-called grammar."