But on the train I thought Of Cato Braden, brought back all the days Through which I knew him, from the very first When he returned to Winston Prairie from De Pauw, or was it Valparaiso? Yet ’Twas called a university I remember. And when I knew him first he kept at hand De Senectute, also Anthon’s Homer, And lexicons in Latin and in Greek, Both unabridged. Sometimes he let me read The orations he had won the prizes with. And sometimes he would tell me what it meant To study at a university. And what they did and what the boys were like. This Cato Braden was a happy soul At twenty-four, of a full noble brow, A gentle smiling mouth, an honest eye, A tall and handsome figure, altogether A man conspicuous for form, a bearing Of grace and courtliness, engaging ways; He might be called most lovable, he had The gift of friendship, was not envious, Could scarcely be enraged, was not offended By little things and often not by great. He had in short a nature fit to work With great capacity; had he combined An intellect but half his nature’s worth He might have won the race. But many thought He promised much, his father most of all Because he had these virtues, and in truth Before his leaves unfolded with the spring His mind seemed apt, perhaps seemed measured full Of quality, the prizes he had won At Valparaiso pointed to the fruit He would produce at last. So on the train I thought of Cato Braden. Then I thought Of when he came from school with his degree, And for that summer when he walked the square, Was whispered of as “Cato Braden, look.” The first thing Winston Prairie knew it saw His name conjoined with that of Jerry Ott’s-- It was Ott and Braden, editors and owners, The Winston Prairie Eagle. Jerry Ott Was sixty-nine and wheezy from the fight For Jefferson Democracy, free trade. Besides the capital that Cato Braden Brought through his father to the enterprise Meant bitter war on enemies of truth. And Cato Braden’s father had some wealth Made from the making of a vermifuge And a preposterous compound which he called Pesodorne; and I have always thought That Cato Braden’s father garrisoned His factory for making patent nostrums By buying for his son this interest, And place of power in journalism; for The father’s strong devotion to the church Did not protect him ’gainst the casual sneers Of Winston Prairie’s paper called the Lance, Which used to print such things as this, to instance: “There’s Braden’s Vermifuge, well, Doctor Braden, Try your own vermifuge, let’s see it work.”