The Poetical Works of Walter C. Smith :: :: University of Virginia Library

Coal, nor wood, nor peat,
Nothing to put in the grate!
And the east wind hurtling along the street,
Dashing the windows with rain and sleet,
And sifting through roofing and slate.

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What are the bairns to do,
With their duds so worn and thin,
For all the day long, all the night through,
Shaking the soot from the smokeless flue,
The gusts come roaring in?

Oh I miss their noisy din,
That once had made me scold,
For now they are sitting so pinched and thin,
With a shiver without, and a gnawing within,
Silent, and dreary and cold.

For there's little to boil or bake,
Little to roast or fry,
Little of daylight when we wake,
Little to do but shiver and shake
As the chill, dark hours go by.

The great lord's iron heel,
The rich man's selfish pride
They were hard to bear; but it's worse to feel
The poor man turning a heart of steel
To the poor man at his side.

Milly.
—So Darrel sings his song;
Some will have it he is wrong,
Who are also wise and good,
Yet the poet's eye sees more
Than is often understood
By the Reason we adore.
Listen to the cry bewildering
Of the women at the doors,
And the wail of the small children
Lying hungry on the floors,
While the lads draw in their breath
With their lips as white as death.
Great their patience to endure,
And if strikes will bring a cure
To their ills, why, fight it out:
But for aught that's come about
Hitherto, to me they seem
The lean kine in Pharaoh's dream,
Eating up the bigger wage
By their idleness and debt,
Hurrying down another stage
To a sorrow deeper yet.
Oh I do not understand—
We women never do—
But I somehow think the land
Was kindlier to the hand
Of the workman long ago,
When the furnace ne'er was quenched.
And the work was never flinched,
Nor the bellows ceased to blow
On the cinders all aglow.

Paul.

—Why, of course, it was, Milly: for master and man
Were brothers, and stood by each other then;
They ate at the same board, and drank the same can,
And the Master was master, and true artizan,
And knew all the craft of his men:
He was not a fellow that handled quills
With a head for nothing but “doing bills.”

And his men were men to him, not mere hands,
And their only quarrel was who should smite
The deftest blows where the anvil stands;
And they were not driven by rough commands
Off to the left and right.—
Ah! a little more human brotherhood
Would go far to sweeten the workman's mood.

That's what is wrong, dear. The wealth of the land
Comes from the forge and the smithy and mine,

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From hammer and chisel, and wheel and band,
And the thinking brain, and the skilful hand,
And yet we must toil and pine,
That one may be rich by driving quills,
And a floating credit of Banker's bills.

They call that capital! it is a lie;
The capital force of the country still
Is the power of work, the nice-judging eye,
The brain to perfect machinery,
And the knack of well-trained skill;
These are the source of all our gains;
Much your credit will do without hands and brains.