The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1902-07-27
A HoozIER DANTE.
Nav Poet Discovered in the Indian
ana Woods.
From the New York Sun.

winters
title will be placed after the "or."
The whims of genius must be humor-
al. and both on the title page of this
nracious work and in the typewriter
letter wherein the masterpiece is rec
commended to us as 80 unique, orig
nal and so entirely out of the ordin-
arv. as a literary production, that you
will feel justified in giving it proper
attention. the 'Or" is followed by a
comma. We are not the folks to dis
turb the commas OF Hon. George
Washington Sayler lest there should
fall upon us such a curse as protects
Shakespeare dust.
"Skid's" full name was Will Skid
Moore. He and Mr.. Sayler were boys
+ogether in Carroll county on Wild
cat. Where papaws grow and this and
that" Without casting any doubt on
the Internal power of the Elwood
Dante, we must avow our preference
for his idyllic vein. Not Theocritus,
not William Barnes, not even Blood
good Cutter, the Long Island lark, has
lines like these:
1.-THE forest then with trees stood
thick
AS Sammy Jones's walking stick;
And passing through them OH you q
hear
And tinkIing cowbells far and near.
And oft the pheasants' wing would
whir,
And all of nature seemed astir.
The mink, the weasel, and wusket,
And frequently the fierce wildcat,
Were known TO prowl about at night
And rob the henroosts as of right.
And turkeys wild were often found,
With gobble gobble all around.
And when the winter long was gone,
And warmer days began to dawn,
The snow to melt, the ice to thaW,
And crows to sound their cav, cav,
cav,
And cows themselves began to lick,
And horses all looked fat and slick.
Good old times, when the woods were
full of game and the pantries swarmed
with pie. Simple times, when the
bride rode pillion' behind the groom;
when "buckslkin pants were the fash
ioin; when such diseases as catarrh
Or Bright's disease. as now they are"
were almost unknown; when roads
were of corduroy and wagons had no
springs; when the system was trained
to scorn cold and heat,
For underwear was not worm then,
Except by old and feeble men,"
1t is curious to find the Indiana of
forty or fifty years ago agreeing in the
matter abstinence from underwear
the whole or part of the year with
Great harrington, Boston, Chicago and
Sleepy Eye of to-day. People made
and dyed their own clothes. Log-roll-
ings and wrestling matches were COM
mon. On account of the shaken ager'
the bed would "screak,'
And by the quinine bottle sat
A bitters bottle tall and fiat,
l~,I hot ~ ca had
From Uncle John to little Jake
These sounds of the field and farm
are sweet to the ear. But "the music
of his rustice flute kept not for long
it's happy country Tone as Matthew
Arnold said of Clough and Gilmore
might say of Sayler. We must decline
to follow even an Indiana Dante into
hell If the devil is in chains, he seems
to be covering a good deal of territory
as a ticket-of-leave man; and he has
been so befooled and bedrubbed for
centuries that it is strange there is in
this humane age no Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Old Nick. If
the gentleman in question retains his
sense of beauty he must be much i'm
pressed by Mr.. Sayler's mightiest
rhyme:
"Obsta principals Me JUDGE,
AS Caesar fell before his Brutus."
That is even more successful than
the Cockney ballad mans "sine die
and fine day" ("dy'O. Let the Old
Deluder put that in his pipe and smoke
1t, While Mr.. Sayler's emerging from
the shades. breaks into his more hon.
ey-hearted vein:
There's been a great stir on the banks
of White Lick,
r
creek,
hardly know why, but think can
guess,
The creamery folks have got into
mess"
And so on in his Creamery Folks"
poem worthy of the Sicilian strand.
We know no classical amoebean song
SO quaint and interesting as Charley
and Lizzie" of which we grant our
readers this nibble
Said Charley to Lizzie, called for
Said Lizzie to Charley. I'm SO glad
of that
Said Charley to Lizzie, You are?
Said Lizzie to Charley, I am, that
1 swear
said Charley to Lizzie, I feared you'd
say no.
Said Lizzie to Charley, What made
you think so?'
Said Charley to Lizzie, My heart felt
so funny
Said Lizzie to Charley, Tt shouldn't,
my honey
SAID Lizzie to Charley, Where were
You to-day?'
said Charley to Lizzie, I worked by
the way
Said Lizzie to Charley, For whom did
you work.
Said Charley to Lizzie. For Ransom
said Lizzie i, to Charley, What Ransom
said Charley to Lizzie. It's Ransom.
said Charley to Lizzie, I love you
indeed
Said Lizzie to Charley, Then hug me
in speed"
Is there finer cry of love than
BLESS the Lord and hosts of Heaven.
ror l love thee, Sammy Niven?'
MARK how gently reflection frosts JOY
Tor a moment in lice Cream Party"
~ er the mountains eagles fly,
Meath the sod we all must lie;
mat to-day each other greet,
ana the frosty ice cream eat,
Fly Moore and jamie, too,
Nat and Ell to guide us through;
frank and Charley. Dug, and Sol,
george and Matte, that is all.