Eugene Field, b. 1850. My favorite Eugene Field poem is Jest ‘Fore Christmas, probably because my mother used to quote it to me at Christmas-time. However, ’tis not the season, so I’ll give you another poem by Mr. Field:
Seein’ Things
I ain’t afeard uv snakes, or toads, or bugs, or worms, or mice,
An’ things ‘at girls are skeered uv I think are awful nice!
I’m pretty brave, I guess; an’ yet I hate to go to bed,
For, when I’m tucked up warm an’ snug an’ when my prayers are said,
Mother tells me “Happy dreams!” and takes away the light,
An’ leaves me lyin’ all alone an’ seein’ things at night!
Sometimes they’re in the corner, sometimes they’re by the door,
Sometimes they’re all a-standin’ in the middle uv the floor;
Sometimes they are a-sittin’ down, sometimes they’re walkin’ round
So softly an’ so creepylike they never make a sound!
Sometimes they are as black as ink, an’ other times they’re white –
But the color ain’t no difference when you see things at night!
Once, when I licked a feller ‘at had just moved on our street,
An’ father sent me up to bed without a bite to eat,
I woke up in the dark an’ saw things standin’ in a row,
A-lookin’ at me cross-eyed an’ p’intin’ at me – so!
Oh, my! I wuz so skeered that time I never slep’ a mite –
It’s almost alluz when I’m bad I see things at night!
Lucky thing I ain’t a girl, or I’d be skeered to death!
Bein’ I’m a boy, I duck my head an’ hold my breath;
An’ I am, oh! so sorry I’m a naughty boy, an’ then
I promise to be better an’ I say my prayers again!
Gran’ma tells me that’s the only way to make it right
When a feller has been wicked an’ sees things at night!
An’ so, when other naughty boys would coax me into sin,
I try to skwush the Tempter’s voice ‘at urges me within;
An’ when they’s pie for supper, or cakes ‘at ‘s big an’ nice,
I want to – but I do not pass my plate f’r them things twice!
No, ruther let Starvation wipe me slowly out o’ sight
Than I should keep a-livin’ on an’ seein’ things at night!
Eugene Field also wrote a memoir, The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac. I began reading it here at Project Gutenberg, but I must get my hands on the book itself. I don’t like reading books via computer. Anyway, I’ll leave you with a quote from the first few pages:
I thank God continually that it hath been my lot in life to found an empire in my heart–no cramped and wizened borough wherein one jealous mistress hath exercised her petty tyranny, but an expansive and ever-widening continent divided and subdivided into dominions, jurisdictions, caliphates, chiefdoms, seneschalships, and prefectures, wherein tetrarchs, burgraves, maharajahs, palatines, seigniors, caziques, nabobs, emirs, nizams, and nawabs hold sway, each over his special and particular realm, and all bound together in harmonious cooperation by the conciliating spirit of polybibliophily!
And another poem by Eugene Field:
Keep me, I pray, in wisdom’s way
That I may truths eternal seek;
I need protecting care to-day,–
My purse is light, my flesh is weak.
So banish from my erring heart
All baleful appetites and hints
Of Satan’s fascinating art,
Of first editions, and of prints.
Direct me in some godly walk
Which leads away from bookish strife,
That I with pious deed and talk
May extra-illustrate my life.
But if, O Lord, it pleaseth Thee
To keep me in temptation’s way,
I humbly ask that I may be
Most notably beset to-day;
Let my temptation be a book,
Which I shall purchase, hold, and keep,
Whereon when other men shall look,
They ‘ll wail to know I got it cheap.
Oh, let it such a volume be
As in rare copperplates abounds,
Large paper, clean, and fair to see,
Uncut, unique, unknown to Lowndes.
