The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1911-11-23
Tampa Tribune


Right merrily does c. H. B. Floyd
the prose-poet of Florida, the gifted
wizard of the fiowery pen, resume his
meditations and rhapsodies on things
F'loridian. And the latest from this
genius, whom the Tribune has unhes-
itatingly declared the best word paint
er in the state today, is one of the best
that has yet flowed from his agile
brain. He talks of the governor of
Florida, in his capacity as a more or
less lonely bachelor, and urges him
with all the power of his rhetoric and
imagery, to quit the dreary single
state and take unto himself a wife
But hear it in Floyd's own matchless
language:
Listen-God made the beauty Of the
puff balls we call stars; and the end
less ocean of space; and the shining
rivers; and the solemn trees that do
them homage on their banks; and the
trembling lily on the river brim and
the long delicious Cry of the cardinal
in the cottonwood; and the unspeak-
able loneliness of the everlasting dawn
and dusk; and the white glory of mar
ble~cities; and the ocean at Palm
Beach--a waving sea of Violets singing
forever on the edges of the plot of
purple flowers. He thought of the
utter joy of a yellow rose and gave
his thought to the world, insuring the
perpetuity of that thought -and the
never failing fragrance Of our star on
which we live; and he stood the
mountains with their white boards
over the tender valleys. and set the
united Niagara that we might, on our
honeymoon, take Mary there to keep
her from believing all we were telling
her after the twilight. He put the
thunder in the cloud to waken us to
our immortal detsiny, and the light
lY1H al c-I, L \
the starlit all-enclosing waves of
death. He flung into His palace sons
and daughters-and the daughters
each was the thought Of all made into
one symbol, Eve-the stars brought
near-the rivers domesticated-the
rapture of the nightingale repeated in
kiss-the trembling lily becomes .
white caress-the dawn and the twi-
light approaching Adam in two prom
Using eyes-the beauty of the lightning
became her tongue-and the thunder
her Jealousy-and the ocean her affec-
tion-and the days and nights and
years her eager slaves-the MONDAY
sun her passion and the milky way
her Sunderland having drawn into
one form all the beauty and romance
and we of all of His glory and secret
being He created you, governor, and
you live like a dimes worth of ice in
a lonely room of the Leon hotel. No
lived with dignity and dignity is this
"a wife. Why, you are a ship with
out charter party webbing around
on the Indian ocean. You are a lamp
unlt; you are magnolia tree withou,
blossom; a hawk without wings; a
painter without eyes,, "a tongueless
nightingale heart stif1ed in it's dell";
Omar without his jar of violet wine:
mother whose children are buried;
hotel without a guest; a lawyer
without a fee; lungs without an at
mosphere; Napoleon without a battle
field; Edison born an idiot; Caruso
dumb; Plato without a brain; Romeo
divorced from Juliet become a miser;
gold-barred bee hunting iron flow
ers; body without g. head; an arm
without a hand; o ship without a
pilot; ST. Paul without q Savior; the
play of Hamlet without either Ophelia
or the moody prince; Florida without
an orange grove; the earth without
the sun; a universe without even the
memory of God!
My Godi governor, what's the mat
ter with you, anyway?
Florida is and should be proud of a
son so eloquent-and If this superb ap-
peal of F1oyd's doesn't set the gov
ernor thinking of orange blossoms and
golden circlets and strains of 'Lohen-
grim" we miss our guess!