"I don't hope--I know. But enough of that. It is a philosopher who can say, 'Ha! old Socrates, pass your cup this way.' They have hushed their song. Even the poor and the ignorant grow weary of singing; then who can expect music from the wise? What have you there? Old Whittier? He died, and they gave him a stingy column in the newspapers, squeezed by the report of the prize fight at New Orleans. If a poet would look to his fame, let him die when there is no other news. But some have died in a spread of newspaper glory--Eugene Field, the sweetest lisper of a boy's mischief, the tuner of tenderest lyrics, but with a laugh for man that cut like a scythe. And some of the rich whom he had laughed at, scrambled for a place at his coffin to bear it to the grave--tuneless clay, scuffling over tuneful dust! Oh, hypocrisy, stamp thy countenance with a dollar!" "It's raining now," said Milford, seeking to draw his mind from the darkness of its wandering. "Yes, the falling of water, rhythmic, poetry--all poets have been as water. I will class them for you. Keats, the rivulet; Shelley, the brook; Byron, the creek; Tennyson, the river; Wordsworth, the lake; Milton, the bay; and Shakespeare, the waters of all the world, the sea. But I will not keep you up. You are a working-man, and must rest." "Don't go; I'm not tired; I haven't done a thing to-day. Shall I fill the jug?" "No, enough. Let me take up my gilded trash," he said, reaching for his bundle. "I wish you'd stay longer. Let me go home with you." "No, I prefer to walk alone. You remember in the old reader, the dog went out to walk alone." "It was the cat that walked alone," said Milford. "The dog sat down to gnaw his bone. Don't you recollect?" The old man touched his forehead, and shook his head. "So it was the cat that walked alone. But we will reverse it. The dog will walk alone to-night." "I wish you'd let me go with you." "Plead not your friendship, or I shall yield. But I want to be alone." "Then you shall be." "I thank you, and good-night." He strode off, with his bundle and stick; and out in the darkness he cried: "Don't forget my classification of the poets. Wordsworth! Wordsworth! And so, good-night." The hired man came into the kitchen. "Wan't that the Professor shoutin' out there?" he asked. "Yes, the poor old man has just come home, crushed." "Didn't find no market, then, for his book?" "No. He brought it back with him. And, by the way, his life insurance will soon be due, and I must pay it for him." "Don't he owe you for one?" "That makes no difference. I must help him. The world ought to help him, but he is laughed at by you clods." "Bill, don't call me a clod. I don't own enough dirt to be called a clod." "That's all right, Bob. I don't mean you. What day of the month is this?" "Second, ain't it?" "I asked you." "Then I guess it's the second."