home

His wit invites you by his looks to come, But when you knock, it never is at home.

How much a dunce that has been sent to roam Excels a dunce that has been kept at home!

Friends, books, a garden, and perhaps his pen, Delightful industry enjoy'd at home, And Nature, in her cultivated trim Dress'd to his taste, inviting him abroad - Can he want occupation who has these?

Strength may wield the ponderous spade, May turn the clod, and wheel the compost home; But elegance, chief grace the garden shows, And most attractive, is the fair result Of thought, the creature of a polished mind.

The Dead-Beat He dropped, - more sullenly than wearily, Lay stupid like a cod, heavy like meat, And none of us could kick him to his feet; -Just blinked at my revolver, blearily; -Didn't appear to know a war was on, Or see the blasted trench at which he stared. 'I'll do 'em in,' he whined, 'if this hand's spared, I'll murder them, I will.' A low voice said, 'It's Blighty, p'raps, he sees; his pluck's all gone, Dreaming of all the valiant, that aren't dead: Bold uncles, smiling ministerially; Maybe his brave young wife, getting her fun In some new home, improved materially. It's not these stiffs have crazed him; nor the Hun.' We sent him down at last, out of the way. Unwounded; - stout lad, too, before that strafe. Malingering? Stretcher-bearers winked, 'Not half!' Next day I heard the Doc.'s well-whiskied laugh: 'That scum you sent last night soon died. Hooray!'

Futility Move him into the sun - Gently its touch awoke him once, At home, whispering of fields unsown. Always it woke him, even in France, Until this morning and this snow. If anything might rouse him now The kind old sun will know. Think how it wakes the seeds, - Woke, once, the clays of a cold star. Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides, Full-nerved -still warm -too hard to stir? Was it for this the clay grew tall? -O what made fatuous sunbeams toil To break earth's sleep at all?

Success. Four flights Thursday morning. All against twenty-one-mile wind. Started from level with engine power alone. Average speed through air thirty-one miles. Longest fifty-nine seconds. Inform press. Home Christmas.

There are times when minds need to turn to simple things. Perhaps for a few of these nights all of us might do well to leave the briefcases at the office and to read again the pages of the Bible, and to re-read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. We might do well to stay home a few days and walk over the fields, or to stand in the shelter of the barn door and reflect upon the relentless and yet benevolent forces of Mother Nature. The laws of nature are relentless. They can never be disobeyed without exacting a penalty. Yet they are benevolent, for when they are understood and obeyed, nature yields up the abundance that blesses those who understand and obey.

A person who undertakes to grow a garden at home, by practices that will preserve rather than exploit the economy of the soil, has his mind precisely against what is wrong with us. . . . What I am saying is that if we apply our minds directly and competently to the needs of the earth, then we will have begun to make fundamental and necessary changes in our minds. We will begin to understand and to mistrust and to change our wasteful economy, which markets not just the produce of the earth, but also the earth's ability to produce.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers borrowed one from another. The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbor's, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.