Life of John Boyle O'Reilly — Chapter 14

"'Let sleek statesmen temporize;Palsied are their shifts and liesWhen they meet your blood-shot eyesGrim and bold;Policy you set at naught,In their traps you'll not be caught,You're too honest to be bought,Hunger and cold.'"

Where are the lessons your kinglings teach?And what is the text of your proud commanders?Out of the centuries heroes reachWith the scroll of a deed, with the word of a storyOf one man's truth and of all men's glory.Like Ensign Epps at the Battle of Flanders.

When men possess one secret or one creed,Or love one land, or struggle for one need,They draw together brotherly and human—(Those only fly apart who love one woman).So we, with one dear picture in our heartDraw closer still with years, and grieve to part.

******And now, old Glasgow totters to its fall,And Underwood is called to prop the wall.We smile to him—and we congratulateThe Nation that has stolen a march on Fate.We say to him: O Brother, go ye forth,And bear good tidings to the misty North:Show them to write a book or taste a dish,To sell a cargo or to cook a fish:Teach them that scholars can be guides of trade,When men of letters are our consuls made;That those who write what all acknowledge trueCan act as well when duty calls to do.And when they cry with wonder: "What a man!"Answer: "Go to! I am no other thanA simple citizen from out the Hub,A member of the quaint Papyrus Club!",

******Some dreamer called the earth an apple—well,The Celt dares all the cycles have to tell:

To call the globe a fruit is rash and risky;But if it be, its juice is Irish whisky!

Stick well to this, old friend, and you will takeWith graceful ease the Consul's largest cake.Good-by! God speed you! On the other sideWe know that you will take no bastard prideIn aping foreign manners, but will showThat Democrats are Gentlemen, who knowTheir due to others and what others oweTo them and to their country—that you will.When years bring out our Mugwumps, turn your faceToward home and friends to fill your old-time placeThe same old-time Papyrus-Yankee still.