The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 01Brann, William Cowper
General
The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 01
Brann, William Cowper
Brann, William Cowper, 1855-1898; Essays; Reformers
corners, will yield enormously if the crop be properly
cultivated. I did not discover whether the blonde or
brunette variety is entitled to precedence in medical
science, but incline to the opinion that a judicious admixture
is most advisable from a therapeutical standpoint. Great
care should be taken when collecting the germs not to
crush them by violent collision or blow them away with a
loud explosion that sounds like hitting an empty sugar
hogshead with a green hide. The practice still prevailing in
many parts of this country of chasing a young woman ever
the furniture and around the barn like an amateur cowboy
trying to rope a maverick, rounding her up in the presence
of a dozen people, unscrewing her neck and planting
almost any place a kiss that sounds like a muley cow
pulling her hind foot out of a black-waxy mud hole, and
which jars the putty off the window panes, possesses no
more curative powers than hitting a flitch of bacon with the
back of your hand. I prithee, avoid it; when a girl runs from
a kiss you may take it for granted either that the germ crop
is not ripe or you are poaching on somebody else's
preserves. The best results can be obtained about the
midnight hour, when the dew is on the rose, the
jasmine bud drunken with its own perfume and the mock-
bird trilling a last good night to his drowsy mate. You
entice your best girl into the garden to watch Venus' flaming
orb hanging like the Kohinoor pendant from the crescent
moon. You pause beneath the great gnarled live oak, its
myriad leaves rustling softly as the wings of seraphs. Don't
be in a hurry, and for God's sake, don't gab--in such a night
silence is the acme of eloquence. "In such a night Troilus
mounted the Trojan walls and sighed his soul toward the
Grecian tents where Cressid lay." She watches the fireflies
respiring in phosphorescent flame amid the clover blooms,
while you watch her and twine a spray of honeysuckle in
her hair. Your clumsy fingers unloose the guards and her
fragrant tresses, caught up by the cool night wind, float
about your face. Somehow her hand gets tangled up with
yours, and after a spasmodic flutter there remains a willing
prisoner. The fireflies have failed to interest her and she is
studying the stars. You move your shoulder forward to give
her head a rest and get hold of her other hand. Be patient;
when she wants you to kiss her she'll find means to make it
manifest, and a maid worth kissing despises a forward
man. She looks very beautiful with her face upturned in the
moonlight; but don't say a word about it, for there's a little
of the poseur about all the daughters of Eve. She
withdraws her eyes from the stars, slowly turns them
dreamily upon yours, and you note that they are filled with
astral fire. They roam idly over the shadowy garden, then
close as beneath a weight of weariness. Her head rests
more heavily against your shoulder and her bosom
trembles with a half-audible sigh. There is now really no
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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