So Much The Worse For Boston

I read the aspens like a book, and every leaf was signed, And I climbed above the aspen-grove to read what I could find On Mount Clinton, Colorado, I met a mountain-cat. I will call him “Andrew Jackson,” and I mean no harm by that. He was growling, and devouring a terrific mountain-rat. But when the feast was ended, the mountain-cat was kind, And showed a pretty smile, and spoke his mind. “I am dreaming of old Boston,” he said, and wiped his jaws.

“I have often HEARD of Boston,” and he folded in his paws, “Boston, Massachusetts, a mountain bold and great. I will tell you all about it, if you care to curl and wait.

“In the Boston of my beauty-sleep, when storm-flowers are in bloom, When storm-lilies and storm-thistles and storm-roses are in bloom, The faithful cats go creeping through the catnip-ferns, And rainbows, and sunshine, and gloom, And pounce upon the Boston Mice, that tremble underneath the flowers, And pounce upon the big-eared rats, and drag them to the tomb. For we are Tom-policemen, vigilant and sure. We keep the Back Bay ditches and potato cellars pure. Apples are not bitten into, cheese is let alone.

THE BOSTON MOUSE WAITS IN TERROR OF THE MOUNTAIN-CAT, UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE STORM-ROSE]

Sweet corn is left upon the cob, and the beef left on the bone. Every Sunday morning, the Pilgrims give us codfish balls, Because we keep the poisonous rats from the Boston halls.” And then I contradicted him, in a manner firm and flat. “I have never seen, in the famous Hub, suppression of the rat.” “So much the worse for Boston,” said the whiskery mountain-cat.

And the cat continued his great dream, closing one shrewd eye: “The Tower-of-Babel Cactus blazes above the sky. Fangs and sabers guard the buds and crimson fruits on high. Yet cactus-eating eagles and black hawks hum through the air. When the pigeons weep in Copley Square, look up, those wings are there,