Classic Poem

I Wish you Happy New Year, kind friends and patrons all,
On you may Heaven's blessing, like summer showers fall;
May your joys be great and lasting, your sorrows short and small.

With the New Year at the threshold, and the Old Year laid away
Beneath the shrouds of winter, of the winter hoar and gray,
I come to pray your patience while I sing my simple lay.

Did you hear the bells a-ringing in the middle of the night?
Did you see, athwart the darkness, a radiance clear and bright,
As the strong hands of the New Year folded back the gates of light?

It is come — the joyful morning; let all words be words of cheer;
Let sorrow cease its warning and forget to drop its tear;
Let the croaker cease his croaking, for once in all the year.

There is ample cause for triumph, ample cause for hopeful song,
For the Right has learned to conquer in its conflict with the Wrong,
And Corruption fears and trembles, for the arm of Truth is strong.

You have watched the tides of battle, from your firesides bright and warm;
You have marked the people's banner, the broad banner of Reform;
You have seen it waving proudly above the surging storm.

You have heard the victor's peans floating up from distant shores,
From the beaches of the Bay state, where the wild Atlantic roars,
And from sunny southern gardens, where the Mississippi pours.

Where Ohio rolls its waters, where sweeps the Tennessee,
From the shores of bleak Ontario, from the vales of Genesee,
You have heard the thunderous echoes of the guns of victory.

What means the glad rejoicing? What do we hope to win
When the Old is going out, and the New is coming in?
For a change that betters nothing, is a change not worth a pin.

We hope for better rulers — men who earnestly desire
The good of all the country, and who honestly aspire
To wash away the traces of the days of blood and fire.

The war is long since over, and it is not brave we know,
To keep relentless foot upon the neck of fallen foe;
Let us bridge the " bloody chasm, " o'er the graves let grasses grow;
Across old fields of battle let the breath of kindness blow.

Send out the cleansing besom, sweep away the rot and rust
From the courts our fathers founded! Brush away the gathered dust
Where righteous laws lie burried — should not judgement aye be just?

" Down with the Carpet Baggers, " comes with the glad hurrah;
" Down with the Salary Grabbers, " and " down the Press Gag Law, "
While we snatch the good old Union from destruction's ravening jaw.

Ho, for the good time coming! — even now its on the way.
When the rascals shall be punished, and the patriots win the day;
When only faithful servants shall receive the people's pay.

'Tis true our own Wisconsin fell partly away from grace,
She was seized with sudden panic, and backward turned her face,
But she even now repenteth, and is mourning her disgrace.

She was caught by a wily lawyer, who went out to hunt for votes,
Courting the sturdy farmer, praising his wheat and oats,
And damning the railroad system as the rottenest ship that floats.

He filled his hair with hay seed, as he grasped the farmer's hand,
And he sang this plous anthem, so lofty and so grand,
" I want to be a Granger, and with the noble Grangers stand. "

So the Badgers were bamboozled, for the trap was deftly set,
But now their eyes are opened and they see the silken net;
And from the woods and prairies come the tones of deep regret.

This is the wholesome Gospel, clean work, unspotted hands,
The public mill must take square toll, honest taxes on our lands,
Which The News is ever preaching — the platform where it stands.

It tells the people TRUTH , denounces Regency and Ring,
For its argus eye is watchful, it hates and scorns the thing
Which men miscall republic, where secret gold is king.
While the years swing round their circle, and the seasons come and go
In calm, soft, summer mornings, in dawns still dim with snow,
It lays the world before you, its doings, high and low.

And as the great world changes, keeping step with Time,
It marks the wheels of Progress, as they roll o'er every clime,
And paints you shifting pictures, now grotesque, now sublime.

Now a strain for our fair Cream City — but, you know, with too much to say,
One often stammers, and falters, and utterance dies away;
'Twill be thus if my song goes halting, gets tangled, loses its way.

So fair, so fresh, so stately, the Gem of the wide, wide West.
Do you see how her arms she stretches, and fold to her throbbing breast
The circling farms and woodlands? How she widens her place of rest?

Lapped by the pale blue waters of yonder inland Sea,
Spreading along its margin swiftly and steadily;
Who shall look down her future and tell where her bounds shall be?

There's no end of things she does, with her busy hands and brain;
She makes the finest flour, and the mills that grind the grain;
Organs, books, steam engines, and verses thick as rain.

Under the sun at noonday, under the midnight stars,
With the brawny fist of a Vulcan, she forges her iron bars.
And her pavements throb and tremble under her loaded cars.

So she eats the bread of labor, and lays it up in store,
And she always has a slice for the sick and suffering poor;
In the face of helpless Want, she has never closed her door.

We are proud of our beautiful city, proud of her spreading fame,
Proud of her growing greatness, — and who shall chide or blame?
It rests with us, her children, stainless to keep her name.

The seasons are swiftly flying, and the years — how they slip away!

We are nearing a mighty landmark, — Freedom's Centennial Day.
Her years are almost a hundred, and her locks are not yet gray,
And the stain that was on her garments, thank God, it is washed away.

She was born in the midst of danger, and a King sent forth his slaves
To strangle her in her cradle. They came, and she dug their graves;
But the sod was soaked and watered with the blood of her faithful braves.

She passed through seas of sorrow, through many an evil day,
She has worn her garb of mourning — her sackcloth drear and gray,
Yet she bore aloft her banner, and her foes were swept away.

On the birthday that is coming, may her children, brave and free,
From all her distant borders, come and gather at her knee,
Clasping hands like loving brothers, in peace and harmony,
While the sword, forgot in its scabbard, is rusting silently.

'Tis well the Future's hidden — well we cannot tear away,
The dark and silent curtain 'twixt to-morrow and to-day;
He who borrows future trouble, has a weary debt to pay.

Let us drop our sins and errors in the grave of 'Seventy-four,
Let us roll a stone above them, that they resurrect no more;
Let us not return to take them, though tempted hard and sore.

This is the noblest wisdom ever clasped to mortal breast —
Wheresoever one is working, just to do his level best;
To accept the present duty, and leave to God the rest.

My lay is ended. Kindly think sometimes
Amid your pleasures, of the carrier boy,
Who on this day, in simple, cheerful rhymes,
Sang you a New Year Song, and wished you joy.