Thus far without impediment I got, My sleek Pegasus on an easy gallop, Or ambling steady or on cosy trot Smooth-scudding o’er the airy fields of thought, As a Venetian gondola or shallop. To halt with sudden bump my pencil’s brought. “I can not tell a lie!” (Spring poems are “rot.”) Now all my pretty phrases come to naught. It’s just a shame! But then who would have thought-- Wild polar blizzards, snow and blinding sleet Beat my Pegasus and benumbed his feet? And, most unlucky mishap for a poet, The brute has got the studs and will not go it. One solid hour of labor have I lost-- I can’t write summer songs in winter’s frost. O April, sure you did not count the cost Of your confounded jag! I think you’re drunk! Well, bluster if you want to show your spunk. The Weather Bureau’s all turned inside out-- But pray clear up, Miss April, or clear out! ODE ON THE DEATH OF LEO XIII. DEDICATED TO MRS. MARY ANDERSON NAVARRO, LONDON. I see before me the Gladiator lie: He leans upon his hand--his manly brow Consents to death, but conquers agony. --_Childe Harold._ The Eternal City, shrine of many lands, Slow fades; before his dying gaze expands The Golden-streeted City, not made with hands; Hail him with waving palms and loving eyes, Heaven’s solemn choirs and sweet societies, While sobs below him the great church he trod-- “To Cæsar, Cæsar’s; God’s we yield to God.” Life’s duty done, he ends his manly part, Stop the great throbbings of that true, pure heart; Amid a sorrowing people’s prayers and tears, God greets the saint of two-and-ninety years. Not for the lust of luxury and beauty, Not for the miser’s or the conqueror’s booty, But for the still small voice of duty Bravely did all temptation spurn The immortal Lion of Lucerne. The Lion is at rest, With his awe-inspiring crest, In full-maned majesty and strength he has laid him down to rest. Of all earth’s mortal monarchs the bravest, strongest, best, His bright eye kindled with the love of Jesus and the Cross. Who gave mankind the Light Divine To save the world from loss. His grand life work is o’er, And nations now deplore The Lion of the Vatican, the warrior of the cross, From Italy’s bay-indented shore To where Columbia’s eagles soar, Is heard the voice of weeping, For the Lion softly sleeping, The Lion of the Vatican, Who never feared the face of man-- The Lion o’er whose urn The mounting flames of glory burn; Who died in duty’s harness--the Lion of Lucerne.