HOW sweet to rest serenely in the gloaming, the week's work done, your princely wages drawn; to rest and read, the winds your sideboards combing, and watch the children play upon the lawn. I tell you this, my grouchy friend and neighbor, there's naught on earth more soothing to the soul, than rest that follows days of earnest labor, the toil that brings a small but honest roll. The pride of wealth, the pride of birth or beauty, the pride that swells the chests of beau and belle, seems shoddy stuff to him who does his duty, who does his tasks, and strives to do them well. Beneath his vine the workingman is sitting, his bills are paid, some roubles put away; upon the porch his smiling wife is knitting, around his feet the tow-haired kidlets play. For pomp and state he wastes no time in sighing, he knows how oft such longings lives have queered; and past his home the motor cars go flying, by men in debt and divers bankrupts steered. A cottage home that's yours and fully paid for, a happy frau, a sense of duty done; that pleasant lot a millionaire might trade for, and get big value for his heaps of mon. |