Brown makes at such an hour of night! He's celebrating something strange. I wonder if he's sold his farm, Or been made Master of the Grange." He reeled, he lurched, he bobbed, he checked; He fell and made the lantern rattle (But saved the light from going out.) So half-way down he fought the battle Incredulous of his own bad luck. And then becoming reconciled To everything, he gave it up And came down like a coasting child. "Well--I--be--" that was all he said, As standing in the river road, He looked back up the slippery slope (Two miles it was) to his abode. Sometimes as an authority On motor-cars, I'm asked if I Should say our stock was petered out, And this is my sincere reply: Yankees are what they always were. Don't think Brown ever gave up hope Of getting home again because He couldn't climb that slippery slope; Or even thought of standing there Until the January thaw Should take the polish off the crust. He bowed with grace to natural law, And then went round it on his feet, After the manner of our stock; Not much concerned for those to whom, At that particular time o'clock, It must have looked as if the course He steered was really straight away From that which he was headed for-- Not much concerned for them, I say; No more so than became a man-- _And_ politician at odd seasons. I've kept Brown standing in the cold While I invested him with reasons; But now he snapped his eyes three times; Then shook his lantern, saying, "Ile's 'Bout out!" and took the long way home By road, a matter of several miles. THE GUM-GATHERER There overtook me and drew me in To his down-hill, early-morning stride, And set me five miles on my road Better than if he had had me ride, A man with a swinging bag for load And half the bag wound round his hand. We talked like barking above the din Of water we walked along beside. And for my telling him where I'd been And where I lived in mountain land To be coming home the way I was, He told me a little about himself. He came from higher up in the pass Where the grist of the new-beginning brooks Is blocks split off the mountain mass-- And hopeless grist enough it looks Ever to grind to soil for grass. (The way it is will do for moss.) There he had built his stolen shack. It had to be a stolen shack Because of the fears of fire and loss That trouble the sleep of lumber folk: Visions of half the world burned black And the sun shrunken yellow in smoke. We know who when they come to town Bring berries under the wagon seat, Or a basket of eggs between their feet; What this man brought in a cotton sack Was gum, the gum of the mountain spruce. He showed me lumps of the scented stuff Like uncut jewels, dull and rough. It comes to market golden brown; But turns to pink between the teeth.