Mexico weekly ledger. (Mexico, Mo.) 1855-1956, 1879-07-31
A MODEST POET.
And the Young Editor who
Had His Little Joke.
From the Burlington Hawkeye.

From the Burlington Hawkeye
Anybody could tell what he had.
Every man in the sanctum knew in a
minute. The timid knock at the
door gave him clear away at the verv
start. No man or woman ever knocks
at the sanctum door unless he comes
on that fatal errand. Then he came
inside and took off his hat and bowed
all round the room, when every man
on the staff roared out, in a terrible
chorus, "Come in." Then he asked
for the editor, and when the UNDER
lings, with fine mingling of truth
and grammar, pointed to the young
est and newest man in the office and
yelled, "That's him!" he walked up
to the young gentleman designated,
and before he could unroll his manu-
script we knew the subject of it, and
a deep groan echoed round the room.
Poetry, young MANI" asked the
editor.
eyes, sir" said the poet; "a cou-
pie of trlolets and sonnet on the
marriage of my sister with an old
college friend"
sold college friend, male or fe-
male, young MANI" asked the editor,
severely.
'tMale, sir,' said the young man.
He said ''sir'' every time, and eve-
ry time he said it all the young gen.
tlemen of the staff, save the young
gentleman who personated the gov
ernor, snickered. He looked severe.
"Anything more, young man?" he
asked.
Eyes, SIR" replied the infant Ten
nyson; "a kind of idyl and ode in
scribed "To My Lost Love-"
''Love been lost very long, young
MANI asked the journalist, very crit
ically.
"Well, its immaterial, that ls,''
stammered the young man, Sits in
definite-it's-"
''Ever advertised for it?'' asked
the reporter, who was writing puff
for Slabs tombstones, but he was in
stantly frowned down.
Anything more?" asked the prir-
cipal interlocutor; ''anything more,
young man?'
''Ies, sir" was the hopeful re-
sponse. "a threnody in memory ola
departed brother"
Brother dead, young man, or
only gone to SagetownE'
dead, sir.'
''Your own brother?"
''No, Sir, never had real broth
er; it's only imaginary"
Cant take this, then, young
man." was the chilling reply. 'Poe-
try, to find acceptance with the Hawk
eye, must be true. Have to reject
this threnody, not because it is not
very beautiful, but because is not
true. Now, how much do you want
for these others!" And he fingered
them over like man buying mink
skins.
xuS PvU. IUe.,ry uiuu-O n..v".
had never published before; he had
barely dared hope to have his verses
published it all. A few copies of
the paper containing them, were quite
enough.
"Oh, no. the editor broke in, "oh
no no, sir; can't do that; we don't
do business that way; if a poem or
sketch is worth publishing, it is worth
paying for. Would $l5 pay you for
these!''
The poet blushed to the floor with
gratitude, and the young journalist
grandly wrote out an order and hand
cd it to the poet.
''Take that to the court house," he
said, ''and the auditors clerk will
give you the money ="
The poet bowed and withdrew, and
with great merriment the journalists
burned his poems and resumed their
work.
That wasn't tle funny part OF it,
however. The next day the simple
minded poet presented his order to
the clerk designated. And it was so
that the clerk owed the paper $18 for
subscription and advertising, and he
promptly cashed the order and turned
it in when his bill was presented, and
the manager just charged it to the
salary account of the smart young
journalist who signed the order, and
the happiest man and the maddest
man In America are living at Burling-
ton. One of them is happy, green,
unsophisticated young machine poet,
and the other is a wide-awake, up-to-
snuff, know-the-world, get up and
dust young journalist, who is already
a rival of Horace Greeley in some of