YANKS

BY JAMES W. FOLEY

O'LEARY, from Chicago, and a first-class fightin' man,

Born in County Clare or Kerry, where the gentle art

began;

Sergeant Dennis P. O'Leary, from somewhere on Archie

road;

Dodgin' shells and smellin' powder while the battle ebbed and flowed.

And the captain says: "O'Leary, from your fightin'

company

5

Pick a dozen fightin' Yankees and come skirmishin' with 10

me;

Pick a dozen fightin' devils, and I know it's you who can." And O'Leary, he saluted like a first-class fightin' man.

O'Leary's eye was piercin' and O'Leary's voice was clear: "Dimitri Georgenopulos!" and Dimitri answered “Here!” Then "Vladimir Slaminsky! Step three paces to the front,

For we're wantin' you to join us in a little Heinie hunt!" "Garibaldi Ravioli!" Garibaldi was to share;

And "Ole Axel Kettleson !" and "Thomas Scalp-the-Bear!" Who was Choctaw by inheritance, bred in the blood and

bones,

But set down in army records by the name of Thomas

Jones.

15

20

ΙΟ

"Van Winkle Schuyler Stuyvesant!" Van Winkle was a bud

From the ancient tree of Stuyvesant and had it in his

blood;

5 "Don Miguel de Colombo!" Don Miguel's next kin

Were across the Rio Grande when Don Miguel went in.

66

Ulysses Grant O'Sheridan!" Ulysses' sire, you see, Had been at Appomattox near the famous apple tree; And "Patrick Michael Casey!" Patrick Michael, you can

tell,

Was a fightin' man by nature with three fightin' names as well.

"Joe Wheeler Lee!" And Joseph had a pair of fightin'

eyes;

Is And his granddad was a Johnny, as perhaps you might

surmise;

Then "Robert Bruce MacPherson!" And the Yankee

squad was done

With "Isaac Abie Cohen!" once a light-weight champion.

20 Then O'Leary paced 'em forward and, says he, "You Yanks, fall in!"

25

And he marched 'em to the captain; "Let the skirmishin' begin,"

Says he, "the Yanks are comin', and you beat 'em if you can!"

And saluted like a soldier and a first-class fightin' man!

1. This is a ballad of the Great War. It is intended to show that all nationalities are American, and all helped make up our army. How many nationalities are represented? List them.

(Used by permission of James W. Foley and The Saturday Evening Post.) S. H. R. SIXTH- -7

IN SCHOOL DAYS

BY JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

STILL

TILL sits the schoolhouse by the road,
A ragged beggar sleeping;

Around it still the sumacs grow,

And blackberry vines are creeping.

Within, the master's desk is seen,
Deep scarred by raps official;
The warping floor, the battered seats,
The jackknife's carved initial;

The charcoal frescoes on its wall;

Its door's worn sill, betraying
The feet that, creeping slow to school,
Went storming out to playing!

Long years ago a winter sun
Shone over it at setting;
Lit up its western windowpanes,
And low eaves' icy fretting.

It touched the tangled golden curls,
And brown eyes full of grieving,
Of one who still her steps delayed
When all the school were leaving.

For near her stood the little boy
Her childish favor singled,

ΤΟ

15

20

His cap pulled low upon a face

Where pride and shame were mingled.

Pushing with restless feet the snow

To right and left, he lingered;
As restlessly her tiny hands

The blue-checked apron fingered.

He saw her lift her eyes; he felt
The soft hand's light caressing;
And heard the tremble of her voice,
As if a fault confessing.

"I'm sorry that I spelt the word:
I hate to go above you,

Because," - the brown eyes lower fell,
"Because, you see, I love you!"

Still memory to a gray-haired man
That sweet child face is showing.
Dear girl! the grasses on her grave
Have forty years been growing!

He lives to learn, in life's hard school,
How few who pass above him
Lament their triumph and his loss,

Like her - because they love him.

I. What is the story related? How long before the poem was written had the events happened? Prove your answer.

2. Read aloud the stanzas that describe the schoolhouse. Sketch the boy and the girl.