Along the highway--paused and, turning, cast
A lingering, last look--as though to take
A vivid print of it, for memory's sake,
To lighten all the empty, aching miles
Beyond with brighter fancies, hopes and smiles.
The cynic put aside his biting wit
And tacitly declared in praise of it;
And even the apprentice-poet of the town
Rose to impassioned heights, and then sat down
And penned a panegyric scroll of rhyme
That made the Snow-Man famous for all time.

And though, as now, the ever warmer sun
Of summer had so melted and undone
The perishable figure that--alas!--
Not even in dwindled white against the grass--
Was left its latest and minutest ghost,
The children yet--_materially_, almost--
Beheld it--circled 'round it hand-in-hand--
(Or rather 'round the place it used to stand)--
With "Ring-a-round-a-rosy! Bottle full
O' posey!" and, with shriek and laugh, would pull
From seeming contact with it--just as when
It was the _real-est_ of old Snow-Men.




"A NOTED TRAVELER"