The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1875-06-16
The sock that Baby Wore.

--~~-rS
Read before the Mississippi Press
Convention at Kosciusko, June I'd, 1875,
by Emmett L. Ross, Editor of the Can
ton Mail.
Had the gift that Homer had-could tune
my harp at will.
I'd bid my sluggish muse awake to charm
you with its trill.
Had the power your speaker has, our loved
States gifted son,
I'd nse them all in lavish store to tune harp
unstrung-
Could | command the beauteous words your
Welcome has employed,
So kind. SO tittingly expressed by 10 vely
Annie Boyd,
I'd bid my muses. spirit write upon your
memory's scroll
The gratitude that penetrates and stirs the
printers soul.
But have not such gifts as these tho wish
ing all the while
For Inspirations mystic aid, these moments
to beguile.
SO shall be content in this, to sing in sim
pie lines,
And asking indulgence for my lack of num-
beers, figures, rhymes.
Before cracking fires blaze a matron drew
her chair,
sangits evening air,
Responsive to the good DANES will who
waited all alone
The sound OF distant rolling wheels that
brought her husband home.
moment more, the great yard gate swung
wide to John and team,
And soon his face popped in the door, with
happy smile agleam.
He drew his old wife to his heart his bride
OF long ago,
And kissed her cheeks of cherry red, her
brow so. like the snow.
Forgetting Time had left its trace and made
its burrows there.
Nor knew that raven locks and curls had
turned to silver hair.
To him it was enough to know her heart
beat just as true .a
AS it had done back forty years when first
thew gan to WOO.
AZ III drew h1S ia Der llow-backed chair, and
And told her all the news in town-the latest
death and bride.
How Squire Dyke, from ''rheumatiz," had
taken to his bed;
How Dolly Dill. had caught beau, and very
soon would wed.
How Sary Smith and Polly Green, aud lots
of other s'wimin,h
Wore flaming feathers in their hats and piled
on ribbon "trimmin."
In fact, how all the girls put on their hi-fa-
lu-tin ways,
And wore their dresses all hitched up with
patent straps ana stays.
And how their precious little cheeks were
smeared with paints and dyes,
And how they wore their hair all crimped,
or pulled down DER their eyes,
And how they sang their opera tunes, and
banged piano keys
AS if they owed the thing grudge, and
wanted to appease
Their wrath by pulling off its hair or scratch
ing out its eyes,
Until the sscritter" fairly groaned beneath a
weight of signs.
And how the boys put on the swell and wore
their nobby clothes,
But where they got their money from Old
Harry only knows;
And how they stand upon the street and twirl
their little canes.
And twist the down upon their lips with
most exquisite pains.
And how they talk of blooded stock, horses
and dogs in turn,
And how they mix their talk with drinks
and all took sugar in their'n;
How times were tight and money scarce,
and growing worse each day.
How many merchants had sbust up cause
people would not pay.
How meat had ''riz" and cotton ''fell," how
taxes had grown bigger;
How black the white folks all had got, how
white had grown the Niger;
And how the state was i'll meSs-its little
credit gone
| And how its bonds were scarcely worth the
paper printed on
| How Congressman and Senators had all
learned how to steal
| How Grant had stocked the cards on US and
claimed the right TO deal
/ To us such hands as he could beat, no matter
how we played,
! Because he held for winning card knave
who want afraid
In all this time the good old wife kept busy
as bee
/ In getting for her dear old man his meal OF
toast and tea;
And as he chatted, laughed and ate, she drew
beside her chair
/ A basket full of half-worn socks, and with
the tenderest care
Began the work ofdarning up each worn ouI
toe and heel,
Till John should finish out his talk and cal
his evening meal.
This done, she set the things Alright and
gave the fire poke.
While he filed up his corn-cob pipe and
fixed himself to smoke. sit-sassss-
| Again she took the work ia hand and
/ searched the basket DER.
| While he had fallen of to sleep aud now be-
gan to snore. -
Among the pile of socks that lay about her
here and there,
She spied tiny little one her baby used u
wear.
Long years had passed since last she saw
this precious little thing;
| It had not been on baby's foot for tliirty
years last spring. t ssa 14@
But oh. the memories that it brought Of sad
ness and Of joy;
Oh, how it called up in her mind her blue
eyed baby boy nes y
The tolls, the pains, the anxious cares tina
she had round him thrown.
How watched him through bis boyhood'
years until mau he'd grown.
How her fond heart. his tatner's, too, hal
centered all in him
How kind. how gentle, in return that boy Z
them had been -
| How proud he looked that April morn i
Eighteen sixty-one;
They saw him with is gray suit on, wit
knapsack and with gum @ 81
They never say him after thxt; the day
went away, -
As long a. country needs an arm, he said,
mean 20 stage
One dag they got "a letter from his GaptaiE
m the iiehE before a;' Atlanta he was numbsFe