Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1912-09-12

Blunt thing" he snapped and flung It
from his hand.
And lowering crept away and left the
field.
Then came the Kings son-wounded sore
bestead
And wcaponess-and saw the broken
sword,
Hit buried In the dry and troddcn sand
And ran and snatched 1t, and with bat
tie shout
Lifted afresh, he hewed the enemy down,
And saved a great cause that heroic day.
Now Theodore Roosevelt reads poetry
sometimes and his favorite happens also
to be called Opportunity" John J..
ingalls, wrote II, and during Mr.. Roose-
volts presidential term a copy OF II hung
over the mantel Of the executive office.
Here 1t is.--
Master Of human destinies am I,
Fame, love and fortune on my footsteps
walt;
Cities and fields I walk; penetrate
Deserts and seas remote, and passing by
Howell. the mart, and palace soon or late
II sleeping wake-if feastIng, rise be-
fore
I turn away. 1t is the hour Of fate,
And they who follow me. reach every
state
Mortals desirei and conquer every foe
Save death; but those who doubt or
hesitate,
CONDEMNED to failure, perjury, and woe,
Seek me In vain and needessly implore.
I answer not, and I return no more.
7 submit that the difference In the
moral as we'll az In the artistic eleva-
ton of these two ideas Of Opportunity
Is significant of the contrasting nature
Of the men to whom they respectively
| appeal. But Mr.. Wilson did not read his
| real favorite until the evening was gone
and bedtime had come. Then, his daugh.
| ters conspiring, a volume Of Wordsworth
was produced, and we listened TO 1.-THE
Character Of the Happy Warrior" BEING
we'll past the years of sentiment / yet
admit that have seldom been so moved
| as l was at the noble words as they
were read that night.
That the reader felt any emotion would
have been imperceptible to stranger 50
controlled was his voice and his look I
was the recital, by a great soul. OF
words we'll approved of the great souls
of the generations since they first were
written-a description Of the character
Of the true knight. 1t was impossible moi
| to feel that It was a description, in some
particulars peculiarly apt and intimate
of the character Of the reader-a revela
ton of himself truer than any he could
otherwise possibly ever have given. The
poem is too long TO set down here, Blu,
here is a little Of it,
Who is tho happy WARRIOR Who Is ne
That every man In arms should wish
| to be?
It's he
Whose powers shed round him in the
common strife
Or mild concerns of ordinary life
A constant influence. a peculiar grace;
But who II he be called upon to face
Some awful moment to which HEAVIER
has Joined
Great issues, good or bad for human
kind,
Is happy as a lover. and attired
With sudden brightness, like a man in.
| spired
|
| He who thus endowed with a sense
And faculty for storm and turbulence,
Is yet soul whose master-bias leans
To home-fet pleasures and to gentle
scenes,
Sweet images! which. where so'er he be
Are at his heart.
I think 1t not at all a fanciful concei
to believe that l have seen two presi
dents and one president who Is to be
in twilight self-revelations; one, of hi
ruling passion for contests Of phys!ca
strength: the second. Of his extreme de
votion to peaceful paths; the third of
natural gentleness averse from strife ant
yet of a soul capable of rising exultan
to the storm.