The fearless soldier, who has faced The serried bayonets' gleam appalling, For nothing save a pin misplaced The peaceful nursery has disgraced With hours of unheroic bawling. The mighty monarch, whose renown Fills up the stately page historic, Has howled to waken half the town, And finished off by gulping down His castor oil or paregoric. The justice, who, in gown and cap, Condemns a wretch to strangulation, Has scratched his nurse and spilled his pap, And sprawled across his mother's lap For wholesome law's administration. Ah, life has many a reef to shun Before in port we drop our anchor, But when its course is nobly run Look aft! for there the work was done. Life owes its headway to the spanker! Yon seat of justice well might awe The fairest manhood's half-blown summer; There Parsons scourged the laggard law, There reigned and ruled majestic Shaw,-- What ghosts to hail the last new-comer! One cause of fear I faintly name,-- The dread lest duty's dereliction Shall give so rarely cause for blame Our guileless voters will exclaim, "No need of human jurisdiction!" What keeps the doctor's trade alive? Bad air, bad water; more's the pity! But lawyers walk where doctors drive, And starve in streets where surgeons thrive, Our Boston is so pure a city. What call for judge or court, indeed, When righteousness prevails so through it Our virtuous car-conductors need Only a card whereon they read "Do right; it's naughty not to do it!" The whirligig of time goes round, And changes all things but affection; One blessed comfort may be found In heaven's broad statute which has bound Each household to its head's protection. If e'er aggrieved, attacked, accused, A sire may claim a son's devotion To shield his innocence abused, As old Anchises freely used His offspring's legs for locomotion. You smile. You did not come to weep, Nor I my weakness to be showing; And these gay stanzas, slight and cheap, Have served their simple use,--to keep A father's eyes from overflowing.