The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Stroudsburg, Pa.) 1853-1911, 1871-06-08

hrst class poetry, and strlks out boldly lor
good common sense. To use a common ex-
preston, "he comes right down to dots" in
stead of going beating about the bushes, and,
in the very first verse, lets the reader into the
gist of the story. He tells you that the town
of Stroudsburg was "sad and gloomy the day
that Charles Orme was ordered out to die"
And just here we would call the attention Of
the public to the plain forward way the
'Poick" has of getting at "facts." Here was
fact, solemn fact, and the "Poick' tells it
without any circumlocution or meandering at
all. He does not dodge the question, nor per-
ambulate one iota about it, but marches right
up in front of it, and takes it by the hors, as
we imagine he seized the rope that pulled the
prop from under the platform on which stood
his unfortunate hero. 1t is a practical way
the ''Poick' has of getting at things, and we
know the readers of his poem cannot help but
admire it.
Although a practical man, yet our "Poick"
the "P. NJ. Sheriff" does wander off into the
sentimental, occasionally. We have a speci-
men of his sentimental style in the I'd stanza,
where he speaks of the 'breast not dead to
pity" &c. 1t has been suggested that this
verse is unfinished that it
would be better if it had been writer thus:
o where's the breast not
Dead to pity but for him
Did many in this town
Heave a sigh,
While he was swinging on the gallows:
GLOW is that for high Y'
But the suggestions are men of ordinary
ideas while the "P M. Sheriff" is a man ol
extraordinary genius. That he should write
is one thing, and not a marvel by any means
That-common minds should fail to compre-
hend the immensity of his genius, is just as
natural as that water should run down hill.
The third stranza is short, and to the point
1t shows that the author, although compelled
by the necessity Of the case, of course, to hang
his helo, was yet capable of entertaining the
highest admiration for bravery in others; and
we opine, this is his distinguishing character,
istic
The fourth, and last, verse is much longer
than any Of the others, and we must say con-
tains more of eloquence and beauty than all
the others combined. 1t proves conclusively,
that though the "Poicks" self allotted talk was
ended, like the razor strop mans wares, and
the yarn-spinning and song-singing peddlers
"soap," there was still, for some future, like
Solemn occasion, "a few more of the same sort
left"
We are painfully conscious of our inability
to do justice to the merits of this remarkable
poem of the worthy "P. NJ. Sheriff but we
could not neglect to call the attention of our
readers to some of its more powerful points,
and brilliant scintilations of poetic fire espe-
cially as it bids fair to take its place in the
pages of poesy, side by side with the efforts OF
Milton, Shakespeare, and others of great re-
nown. We are satisfied that no man could
have composed it, except the one who hung
the Hero of it; and we have no donbt that
when he catches Brooks and hangs and Poetises
him, he will have so graduated in both the
sublime arts rs to be entitled to become Chief
Executioner and Poet Laureate to ''the King
Of the Cannibal Islands" O.