The Candidate's Creed

I du believe in special ways

O' prayin' an' convartin';
The bread comes back in many days,
An' buttered, tu, fer sartin;-
I mean in preyin' till one busts
On wut the party chooses,
An' in convartin' public trusts
To very privit uses.

I do believe hard coin the stuff
Fer 'lectioneers to spout on;
The people's ollers soft enough

To make hard money out on;
Dear Uncle Sam pervides fer his,
An' gives a good-sized junk to all-
I don't care how hard money is,
Ez long ez mine's paid punctooal.

I du believe with all my soul
In the gret Press's freedom,
To pint the people to the goal

An' in the traces lead 'em:
Palsied the arm thet forges yokes
At my fat contracts squintin',
An' withered be the nose thet pokes
Inter the gov'ment printin'!

I du believe thet I should give
Wut's his'n unto Cæsar,

Fer it's by him I move an' live,

From him my bread an' cheese air.

I du believe thet all o' me

Doth bear his souperscription,Will, conscience, honor, honesty, An' things o' thet description.

I du believe in prayer an' praise
To him thet hez the grantin'
O' jobs-in every thin' thet pays,
But most of all in CANTIN';

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This doth my cup with marcies fill,
This lays all thought o' sin to rest-
I don't believe in princerple,

But, O, I du in interest.

I du believe in bein' this

Or thet, ez it may happen
One way, or t' other hendiest is
To ketch the people nappin';
It ain't by princerples nor men
My preudent course is steadied-
I scent wich pays the best, an' then
Go into it baldheaded.

I du believe thet holdin' slaves
Comes nat'ral tu a President,
Let 'lone the rowdedow it saves
To have a wal-broke precedunt;
Fer any office, small or gret,

I couldn't ax with no face,
Without I'd been, thru dry an' wet,
The unrizziest kind o' doughface.

I du believe wutever trash

'll keep the people in blindness,— Thet we the Mexicans can thrash

Right inter brotherly kindness-
Thet bombshells, grape, an' powder 'n' ball
Air good-will's strongest magnets-

Thet peace, to make it stick at all,
Must be druv in with bagnets.

In short, I firmly du believe
In Humbug generally,

Fer it's a thing thet I perceive

To hev a solid vally;

This heth my faithful shepherd ben,

In pastures sweet heth led me, An' this'll keep the people green To feed ez they have fed me.

James Russell Lowell.

The Razor Seller

297

THE RAZOR SELLER

A FELLOW in a market town,
Most musical, cried razors up and down,
And offered twelve for eighteen-pence;
Which certainly seemed wondrous cheap,
And for the money quite a heap,

As every man would buy, with cash and sense.

A country bumpkin the great offer heard:
Poor Hodge, who suffered by a broad black beard,
That seemed a shoe-brush stuck beneath his nose
With cheerfulness the eighteen-pence he paid,
And proudly to himself, in whispers, said,
"This rascal stole the razors, I suppose.

"No matter if the fellow be a knave,
Provided that the razors shave;

It certainly will be a monstrous prize."
So home the clown, with his good fortune, went,
Smiling in heart and soul, content,

And quickly soaped himself to ears and eyes.

Being well lathered from a dish or tub,
Hodge now began with grinning pain to grub,
Just like a hedger cutting furze:

'Twas a vile razor!-then the rest he tried-
All were imposters-" Ah," Hodge sighed!

"I wish my eighteen-pence within my purse."

In vain to chase his beard, and bring the graces,
He cut, and dug, and winced, and stamped, and swore,
Brought blood, and danced, blasphemed, and made wry
faces,

And cursed each razor's body o'er and o'er:

His muzzle, formed of opposition stuff,
Firm as a Foxite, would not lose its ruff!

So kept it-laughing at the steel and suds:
Hodge, in a passion, stretched his angry jaws,

Vowing the direst vengeance, with clenched claws,
On the vile cheat that sold the goods.
"Razors; a damned, confounded dog,
Not fit to scrape a hog!"

Hodge sought the fellow-found him-and begun:
"P'rhaps, Master Razor rogue, to you 'tis fun,

That people flay themselves out of their lives:
You rascal! for an hour have I been grubbing,
Giving my crying whiskers here a scrubbing,
With razors just like oyster knives.
Sirrah! I tell you, you're a knave,

To cry up razors that can't shave."

"Friend," quoth the razor-man, "I'm not a knave.

As for the razors you have bought,

Upon my soul I never thought

That they would shave."

"Not think they'd shave!" quoth Hodge, with wond'ring eyes,

And voice not much unlike an Indian yell;

"What were they made for then, you dog?" he cries: "Made!" quoth the fellow, with a smile-" to sell."

John Wolcot.

THE DEVIL'S WALK ON EARTH

FROM his brimstone bed at break of day

A walking the Devil is gone,

To look at his snug little farm of the World,
And see how his stock went on.

Over the hill and over the dale,

And he went over the plain;

And backward and forward he swish'd his tail
As a gentleman swishes a cane.

How then was the Devil drest?

Oh, he was in his Sunday's best

His coat was red and his breeches were blue,
And there was a hole where his tail came through.

The Devil's Walk on Earth

A lady drove by in her pride,
In whose face an expression he spied

For which he could have kiss'd her;
Such a flourishing, fine, clever woman was she,
With an eye as wicked as wicked can be,
I should take her for my Aunt, thought he,
If my dam had had a sister.

He met a lord of high degree,

No matter what was his name;

Whose face with his own when he came to compare
The expression, the look, and the air,

And the character, too, as it seem'd to a hair-
Such a twin-likeness there was in the pair
That it made the Devil start and stare

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For he thought there was surely a looking-glass there, But he could not see the frame.

He saw a Lawyer killing a viper,
On a dung-hill beside his stable;
Ha! quoth he, thou put'st me in mind
Of the story of Cain and Abel.

An Apothecary on a white horse

Rode by on his vocation;

And the Devil thought of his old friend
Death in the Revelation.

He pass'd a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility,

And he own'd with a grin

That his favorite sin,

Is pride that apes humility.

He saw a pig rapidly

Down a river float;

The pig swam well, but every stroke

Was cutting his own throat;