Bret Harte

Bret Harte was an American author and poet, renowned for his works about pioneering life in California. Born on August 25, 1836, he gained national fame with his short stories and poetry depicting life in the early mining camps. His most famous works include 'The Luck of Roaring Camp' and 'The Outcasts of Poker Flat.' Harte's writings played a crucial role in shaping the Western genre in American literature. He passed away on May 5, 1902.

August 25, 1836

May 5, 1902

English

Bret Harte

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A Geological Madrigal

I have found out a gift for my fair;
I know where the fossils abound,
Where the footprints of Aves declare
The birds that once walked on the ground.
Oh, come, and in technical speech
Well walk this Devonian shore,
Or on some Silurian beach
Well wander, my love, evermore.

I will show thee the sinuous track
By the slow-moving Annelid made,
Or the Trilobite that, farther back,
In the old Potsdam sandstone was laid;
Thou shalt see, in his Jurassic tomb,
The Plesiosaurus embalmed;
In his Oolitic prime and his bloom,
Iguanodon safe and unharmed.

You wished I remember it well,
And I loved you the more for that wish
For a perfect cystedian shell
And a whole holocephalic fish.
And oh, if Earths strata contains
In its lowest Silur...

Bret Harte

A Greyport Legend

They ran through the streets of the seaport town,
They peered from the decks of the ships that lay;
The cold sea-fog that came whitening down
Was never as cold or white as they.
Ho, Starbuck and Pinckney and Tenterden!
Run for your shallops, gather your men,
Scatter your boats on the lower bay.

Good cause for fear! In the thick mid-day
The hulk that lay by the rotting pier,
Filled with the children in happy play,
Parted its moorings and drifted clear,
Drifted clear beyond reach or call,
Thirteen children they were in all,
All adrift in the lower bay!

Said a hard-faced skipper, God help us all!
She will not float till the turning tide!
Said his wife, My darling will hear my call,
Whether in sea or heaven she bide;
And she lifted a qu...

Bret Harte

A Legend of Cologne

Above the bones
St. Ursula owns,
And those of the virgins she chaperons;
Above the boats,
And the bridge that floats,
And the Rhine and the steamers smoky throats;
Above the chimneys and quaint-tiled roofs,
Above the clatter of wheels and hoofs;
Above Newmarkets open space,
Above that consecrated place
Where the genuine bones of the Magi seen are,
And the dozen shops of the real Farina;
Higher than even old Hohestrasse,
Whose houses threaten the timid passer,
Above them all,
Through scaffolds tall,
And spires like delicate limbs in splinters,
The great Colognes
Cathedral stones
Climb through the storms of eight hundred winters.

Unfinished there,
In high mid-air
The towers halt like a broken prayer;
Through years bela...

Bret Harte

A Moral Vindicator

If Mr. Jones, Lycurgus B.,
Had one peculiar quality,
Twas his severe advocacy
Of conjugal fidelity.

His views of heaven were very free;
His views of life were painfully
Ridiculous; but fervently
He dwelt on marriage sanctity.

He frequently went on a spree;
But in his wildest revelry,
On this especial subject he
Betrayed no ambiguity.

And though at times Lycurgus B.
Did lay his hands not lovingly
Upon his wife, the sanctity
Of wedlock was his guaranty.

But Mrs. Jones declined to see
Affairs in the same light as he,
And quietly got a decree
Divorcing her from that L. B.

And what did Jones, Lycurgus B.,
With his known idiosyncrasy?
He smiled, a bitter smile to see,
And drew the weapon of Bowie.

Bret Harte

A Newport Romance

They say that she died of a broken heart
(I tell the tale as twas told to me);
But her spirit lives, and her soul is part
Of this sad old house by the sea.

Her lover was fickle and fine and French:
It was nearly a hundred years ago
When he sailed away from her arms poor wench!
With the Admiral Rochambeau.

I marvel much what periwigged phrase
Won the heart of this sentimental Quaker,
At what gold-laced speech of those modish days
She listened the mischief take her!

But she kept the posies of mignonette
That he gave; and ever as their bloom failed
And faded (though with her tears still wet)
Her youth with their own exhaled.

Till one night, when the sea-fog wrapped a shroud
Round spar and spire and tarn and tree,
Her soul went u...

Bret Harte

A Question of Privilege

It was Andrew Jackson Sutter who, despising Mr. Cutter for remarks he heard him utter in debate upon the floor,
Swung him up into the skylight, in the peaceful, pensive twilight, and then keerlessly proceeded, makin no account what we did To wipe up with his person casual dust upon the floor.

Now a square fight never frets me, nor unpleasantness upsets me, but the simple thing that gets me now the job is done and gone,
And weve come home free and merry from the peaceful cemetery, leavin Cutter there with Sutter that mebbee just a stutter On the part of Mr. Cutter caused the loss we deeply mourn.

Some bashful hesitation, just like spellin punctooation might have worked an aggravation on to Sutters mournful mind,
For the witnesses all vary ez to wot was said and nary a galoot will toot his horn exce...

Bret Harte

A Sanitary Message

Last night, above the whistling wind,
I heard the welcome rain,
A fusillade upon the roof,
A tattoo on the pane:
The keyhole piped; the chimney-top
A warlike trumpet blew;
Yet, mingling with these sounds of strife,
A softer voice stole through.

Give thanks, O brothers! said the voice,
That He who sent the rains
Hath spared your fields the scarlet dew
That drips from patriot veins:
Ive seen the grass on Eastern graves
In brighter verdure rise;
But, oh! the rain that gave it life
Sprang first from human eyes.

I come to wash away no stain
Upon your wasted lea;
I raise no banners, save the ones
The forest waves to me:
Upon the mountain side, where Spring
Her farthest picket sets,
My reveille awakes a host
Of gras...

Bret Harte

A Second Review of the Grand Army

I read last night of the grand review
In Washingtons chiefest avenue,
Two hundred thousand men in blue,
I think they said was the number,
Till I seemed to hear their trampling feet,
The bugle blast and the drums quick beat,
The clatter of hoofs in the stony street,
The cheers of people who came to greet,
And the thousand details that to repeat
Would only my verse encumber,
Till I fell in a reverie, sad and sweet,
And then to a fitful slumber.

When, lo! in a vision I seemed to stand
In the lonely Capitol.        On each hand
Far stretched the portico, dim and grand
Its columns ranged like a martial band
Of sheeted spectres, whom some command
Had called to a last reviewing.
And the streets of the city were white and bare,
No footfall echoe...

Bret Harte

Address - The Opening of the California Theatre, San Francisco, January 19, 1870

Brief words, when actions wait, are well:
The prompters hand is on his bell;
The coming heroes, lovers, kings,
Are idly lounging at the wings;
Behind the curtains mystic fold
The glowing future lies unrolled;
And yet, one moment for the Past,
One retrospect, the first and last.

The worlds a stage, the Master said.
To-night a mightier truth is read:
Not in the shifting canvas screen,
The flash of gas or tinsel sheen;
Not in the skill whose signal calls
From empty boards baronial halls;
But, fronting sea and curving bay,
Behold the players and the play.

Ah, friends! beneath your real skies
The actors short-lived triumph dies:
On that broad stage of empire won,
Whose footlights were the setting sun,
Whose flats a distant back...

Bret Harte

After the Accident

What I want is my husband, sir,
And if youre a man, sir,
Youll give me an answer,
Where is my Joe?

Penrhyn, sir, Joe,
Caernarvonshire.
Six months ago
Since we came here
Eh? Ah, you know!

Well, I am quiet
And still,
But I must stand here,
And will!
Please, Ill be strong,
If youll just let me wait
Inside o that gate
Till the news comes along.

Negligence!
That was the cause!
Butchery!
Are there no laws,
Laws to protect such as we?

Well, then!
I wont raise my voice.
There, men!
I wont make no noise,
Only you just let me be.

Four, only four did he say
Saved! and the other ones? Eh?
Why do they call?
Why are they all
Looking and coming this way?

Bret Harte

Alnaschar

Heres yer toy balloons! All sizes!
Twenty cents for that. It rises
Jest as quick as that ere, Miss,
Twice as big. Ye see it is
Some more fancy. Make it square
Fifty for em both. Thats fair.

Thats the sixth Ive sold since noon.
Trades reviving. Just as soon
As this lots worked off, Ill take
Wholesale figgers. Make or break,
Thats my motto! Then Ill buy
In some first-class lottery
One half ticket, numbered right
As I dreamed about last night.

Thatll fetch it. Dont tell me!
When a mans in luck, you see,
All things help him. Every chance
Hits him like an avalanche.
Heres your toy balloons, Miss. Eh?
You wont turn your face this way?
Mebbe youll be glad some day.
With that clear ten thousand prize
This yer...

Bret Harte

An Arctic Vision

Where the short-legged Esquimaux
Waddle in the ice and snow,
And the playful Polar bear
Nips the hunter unaware;
Where by day they track the ermine,
And by night another vermin,
Segment of the frigid zone,
Where the temperature alone
Warms on St. Elias cone;
Polar dock, where Nature slips
From the ways her icy ships;
Land of fox and deer and sable,
Shore end of our western cable,
Let the news that flying goes
Thrill through all your Arctic floes,
And reverberate the boast
From the cliffs off Beecheys coast,
Till the tidings, circling round
Every bay of Norton Sound,
Throw the vocal tide-wave back
To the isles of Kodiac.
Let the stately Polar bears
Waltz around the pole in pairs,
And the walrus, in his glee,
Bare his tu...

Bret Harte

An Idyl of the Road

Dramatis Personæ

First Tourist
Second Tourist
Yuba Bill, Driver
A Stranger



First Tourist

Look how the upland plunges into cover,
Green where the pines fade sullenly away.
Wonderful those olive depths! and wonderful, moreover

Second Tourist

The red dust that rises in a suffocating way.

First Tourist

Small is the soul that cannot soar above it,
Cannot but cling to its ever-kindred clay:
Better be yon bird, that seems to breathe and love it

Second Tourist

Doubtless a hawk or some other bird of prey.
Were we, like him, as sure of a dinner
That on our stomachs would comfortably stay;
Or were the fried ham a shade or two just thinner,
That must confront us at closing of the day:

Bret Harte

Artemis in Sierra

Dramatis Personæ

Poet. Philosopher. Jones of Mariposa.



Poet
Halt! Here we are. Now wheel your mare a trifle
Just where you stand; then doff your hat and swear
Never yet was scene you might cover with your rifle
Half as complete or as marvelously fair.

Philosopher
Dropped from Olympus or lifted out of Tempe,
Swung like a censer betwixt the earth and sky!
He who in Greece sang of flocks and flax and hemp, he
Here might recall them six thousand feet on high!

Poet
Well you may say so. The clamor of the river,
Hum of base toil, and mans ignoble strife,
Halt far below, where the stifling sunbeams quiver,
But never climb to this purer, higher life!

Not to this glade, where Jones of Mariposa,
Simple and meek as his ...

Bret Harte

Aspiring Miss De Laine

Certain facts which serve to explain
The physical charms of Miss Addie De Laine,
Who, as the common reports obtain,
Surpassed in complexion the lily and rose;
With a very sweet mouth and a retrousse nose;
A figure like Hebes, or that which revolves
In a milliners window, and partially solves
That question which mentor and moralist pains,
If grace may exist minus feeling or brains.

Of course the young lady had beaux by the score,
All that she wanted, what girl could ask more?
Lovers that sighed and lovers that swore,
Lovers that danced and lovers that played,
Men of profession, of leisure, and trade;
But one, who was destined to take the high part
Of holding that mythical treasure, her heart,
This lover, the wonder and envy of town,
Was a practicin...

Bret Harte

At the Hacienda

Know I not whom thou mayst be
Carved upon this olive-tree,
Manuela of La Torre,
For around on broken walls
Summer sun and spring rain falls,
And in vain the low wind calls
Manuela of La Torre.

Of that song no words remain
But the musical refrain,
Manuela of La Torre.
Yet at night, when winds are still,
Tinkles on the distant hill
A guitar, and words that thrill
Tell to me the old, old story,
Old when first thy charms were sung,
Old when these old walls were young,
Manuela of La Torre.

Bret Harte

Avitor

What was it filled my youthful dreams,
In place of Greek or Latin themes,
Or beautys wild, bewildering beams?
Avitor!

What visions and celestial scenes
I filled with aerial machines,
Montgolfiers and Mr. Greens!
Avitor!

What fairy tales seemed things of course!
The roc that brought Sindbad across,
The Calendars own winged horse!
Avitor!

How many things I took for facts,
Icarus and his conduct lax,
And how he sealed his fate with wax!
Avitor!

The first balloons I sought to sail,
Soap-bubbles fair, but all too frail,
Or kites, but thereby hangs a tail.
Avitor!

What made me launch from attic tall
A kitten and a parasol,
And watch their bitter, frightful fall?
Avitor!

What youthful dre...

Bret Harte

Battle Bunny

(Malvern Hill, 1864)


After the men were ordered to lie down, a white rabbit, which had been hopping hither and thither over the field swept by grape and musketry, took refuge among the skirmishers, in the breast of a corporal.
- Report of the Battle of Malvern Hill.

Bunny, lying in the grass,
Saw the shining column pass;
Saw the starry banner fly,
Saw the chargers fret and fume,
Saw the flapping hat and plume,
Saw them with his moist and shy
Most unspeculative eye,
Thinking only, in the dew,
That it was a fine review.

Till a flash, not all of steel,
Where the rolling caissons wheel,
Brought a rumble and a roar
Rolling down that velvet floor,
And like blows of autumn flail
Sharply threshed the iron hail.

Bunny, thril...

Bret Harte

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