"Forget it not till the crowns are crumbled And the swords of the kings are rent with rust; Forget it not till the hills lie humbled, And the springs of the seas run dust." The Shoes of Happiness. Prophetic? Yes! But ah, the music of it! Here rings and here sings David the shepherd; the sweet lute, the harp, the wind in the trees, the surge of the ocean-reef. It is music of a high and holy kind. Which reminds me that I am to treat in this chapter on Markham only of what he has written since 1906, the preceding period, best known through his "Man with the Hoe," having been discussed by Dr. Downey in the book heretofore mentioned. I have the joy-task in these brief lines to bring to you Markham's "The Shoes of Happiness," which seems to me the strongest book he has written, not forgetting, either, "The Hoe" book, as he himself calls it. If you have the privilege of personal friendship with this "Father Poet," he will write for you somewhere, some time, some place, these four favorite lines, with a twinkle in his eyes that is half boy and half sage, but all love, which quatrain he calls "Outwitted": "He drew a circle that shut me out-- Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But Love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle that took him in!" The Shoes of Happiness. And with these four lines he introduces the new book of poems, "The Shoes of Happiness." THE HAPPINESS OF POVERTY One wonders where "The Shoes of Happiness" may be found, and the answer is forthcoming in the first of "Six Stories," when he finds that the Sultan Mahmoud is near unto death, and that there is just one thing that will make him well, and that is that he may wear the shoes of a perfectly happy man: "For only by this can you break the ban: You must wear the shoes of a happy man." The Shoes of Happiness. The Vizier was sent to find these shoes or lose his own head: "Go forth, Vizier, when the dawn is red, And bring me the shoes, or send instead, By the hand of this trusted slave, your head!" The Shoes of Happiness. He first found a crowd of idle rich going forth for a day's outing among the fields and flowers, a "swarm of the folk of high degree," and thought to find the shoes here, but, alas! he found that "In each glad heart was a wistful cry; Behind each joy was a secret sigh." The Shoes of Happiness. He turned from the rich and sought the homes of the poor, and the Father in the home of the poor said unto him: "Ah, Vizier, I have seven sweet joys, but I have one fear: The dread of to-morrow ever is here!" The Shoes of Happiness. A Poet was found weaving a song of happiness, and the Vizier thought that surely here would he find the man with the "happy shoes," but the Poet cried: