Page:Poems Trask.djvu/39

Honest and fearless, free and glad,
 A very prince is he!
At peace with God, in love with truth,
 With man in harmony.

His lot is cast in nature's fanes,
 Beneath a lucky star,—
What is't to him that railroad stocks
 Are quoted under par?
The banks may break, canals burst up,
 And mining sections fail;
He's left to him his wide-spread fields,
 His threshing-floors, and flail.

His children throng about his knee
 When gloaming-time creeps on,
And hang around his sturdy neck,
 To kiss him one by one.
The ruddiest cheeks and sweetest lips,
 The brightest eyes, are theirs,—
The rarest smile in all the town
 The farmer's daughter wears.

God bless the farmer! bless him well!
 A royal life he owns!
He reads his lore from mountain heights,
 His sermons from the stones;
His college halls are nature's wilds,
 And gorgeous summer sky,—
The vast cathedral where he prays
 Is heaven's arched canopy.