Bred to fear nothing but reproach and blame, Ascetic dandies o'er whom vestals rave, Clean-limbed young Spartans, disciplined young elves, Taught to destroy, that they may live to save, Students embattled, soldiers at their shelves, Heroes whose conquests are at first themselves.
VI
Within the camp they lie, in dreams are freed From the grim discipline they learn to love;
In dreams no more the sentry's challenge heed, In dreams afar beyond their pickets rove;
One treads once more the piny paths that lead To his green mountain home, and pausing hears The cattle call; one treads the tangled weed Of slippery rocks beside Atlantic piers;
One smiles in sleep, one wakens wet with tears.
VII
One scents the breath of jasmine flowers that twine The pillared porches of his Southern home;
One hears the coo of pigeons in the pine Of Western woods where he was wont to roam;
One sees the sunset fire the distant line Where the long prairie sweeps its levels down;
One treads the snow-peaks; one by lamps that shine Down the broad highways of the sea-girt town;
And two are missing,--Cadets Grey and Brown!
VIII
Much as I grieve to chronicle the fact, That selfsame truant known as "Cadet Grey" Was the young hero of our moral tract, Shorn of his twofold names on entrance-day.
"Winthrop" and "Adams" dropped in that one act Of martial curtness, and the roll-call thinned Of his ancestors, he with youthful tact Indulgence claimed, since Winthrop no more sinned, Nor sainted Adams winced when he, plain Grey, was "skinned."
IX
He had known trials since we saw him last, By sheer good luck had just escaped rejection, Not for his learning, but that it was cast In a spare frame scarce fit for drill inspection;
But when he ope'd his lips a stream so vast Of information flooded each professor, They quite forgot his eyeglass,--something past All precedent,--accepting the transgressor, Weak eyes and all of which he was possessor.
X
E'en the first day he touched a blackboard's space--So the tradition of his glory lingers--Two wise professors fainted, each with face White as the chalk within his rapid fingers:
All day he ciphered, at such frantic pace, His form was hid in chalk precipitation Of every problem, till they said his case Could meet from them no fair examination Till Congress made a new appropriation.
XI
Famous in molecules, he demonstrated From the mess hash to many a listening classful;
Great as a botanist, he separated Three kinds of "Mentha" in one julep's glassful;
High in astronomy, it has been stated He was the first at West Point to discover Mars' missing satellites, and calculated Their true positions, not the heavens over, But 'neath the window of Miss Kitty Rover.
XII
Indeed, I fear this novelty celestial That very night was visible and clear;
At least two youths of aspect most terrestrial, And clad in uniform, were loitering near A villa's casement, where a gentle vestal Took their impatience somewhat patiently, Knowing the youths were somewhat green and "bestial"--(A certain slang of the Academy, I beg the reader won't refer to me).
XIII
For when they ceased their ardent strain, Miss Kitty Glowed not with anger nor a kindred flame, But rather flushed with an odd sort of pity, Half matron's kindness, and half coquette's shame;
Proud yet quite blameful, when she heard their ditty She gave her soul poetical expression, And being clever too, as she was pretty, From her high casement warbled this confession,--Half provocation and one half repression:--
NOT YET
Not yet, O friend, not yet! the patient stars Lean from their lattices, content to wait.
All is illusion till the morning bars Slip from the levels of the Eastern gate.
Night is too young, O friend! day is too near;
Wait for the day that maketh all things clear.
Not yet, O friend, not yet!
Not yet, O love, not yet! all is not true, All is not ever as it seemeth now.
Soon shall the river take another blue, Soon dies yon light upon the mountain brow.
What lieth dark, O love, bright day will fill;
Wait for thy morning, be it good or ill.
Not yet, O love, not yet!
XIV
The strain was finished; softly as the night Her voice died from the window, yet e'en then Fluttered and fell likewise a kerchief white;
But that no doubt was accident, for when She sought her couch she deemed her conduct quite Beyond the reach of scandalous commenter,--Washing her hands of either gallant wight, Knowing the moralist might compliment her,--Thus voicing Siren with the words of Mentor.
XV
She little knew the youths below, who straight Dived for her kerchief, and quite overlooked The pregnant moral she would inculcate;
Nor dreamed the less how little Winthrop brooked Her right to doubt his soul's maturer state.
Brown--who was Western, amiable, and new--Might take the moral and accept his fate;
The which he did, but, being stronger too, Took the white kerchief, also, as his due.
XVI
They did not quarrel, which no doubt seemed queer To those who knew not how their friendship blended;
Each was opposed, and each the other's peer, Yet each the other in some things transcended.
Where Brown lacked culture, brains,--and oft, I fear, Cash in his pocket,--Grey of course supplied him;
Where Grey lacked frankness, force, and faith sincere, Brown of his manhood suffered none to chide him, But in his faults stood manfully beside him.
XVII
In academic walks and studies grave, In the camp drill and martial occupation, They helped each other: but just here I crave Space for the reader's full imagination,--The fact is patent, Grey became a slave!
A tool, a fag, a "pleb"! To state it plainer, All that blue blood and ancestry e'er gave Cleaned guns, brought water!--was, in fact, retainer To Jones, whose uncle was a paper-stainer!
XVIII
How they bore this at home I cannot say:
I only know so runs the gossip's tale.
