But the cold-blooded snake, in the edge of the brake,
Lies amid the rank grass, half asleep, half awake;
And the ashen-white snail, with the slime in, its trail,
Moves wearily on like a life's tedious tale,
Yet disturbs not the toad in his spacious abode,
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone,
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.

Down deep in a hollow some wiseacres sit,
Like a toad in his cell in the stone;
Around them in daylight the blind owlets flit,
And their creeds are with ivy o'ergrown;--
Their stream may go dry, and the wheels cease to ply,
And their glimpses be few of the sun and the sky,
Still they hug to their breast every time-honored guest.
And slumber and doze in inglorious rest;
For no progress they find in the wide sphere of mind,
And the world's standing still with all of their kind;
Contented to dwell deep down in the well,
Or move like a snail in the crust of his shell,
Or live like the toad in his narrow abode,
With their souls closely wedged in a thick wall of stone,
By the gray weeds of prejudice rankly o'ergrown.

REBECCA S. NICHOLS.


* * * * *

HER CREED.