January, 1885.

These winter days are passing fair!         As if a breath of spring     Had permeated all the air,         And touched each living thing     With thankfulness for such a boon -         Discounting with a scoff     The almanac's report that "June         Is yet a long way off!"     We quarrel with the calendar -         For May has been misplaced -     And doubt the tale oracular         Of "Janus, double-faced;"     For this "ethereal mildness" looks         Toward shadowy delights     Of roseate bowers, of cosy nooks,         Of coming thermal nights.     Let robes diaphanous succeed         Dense garments made of fur,     And overcoats maintain the lead -         Among the things that were!     The wisely-rented sealskin sacque,         By many a dame possessed,     Be quickly relegated back         To its moth-haunted chest!     While every portly alderman,         In linen suit arrayed,     Manipulates the palm-leaf fan         And seeks the cooling shade;     And he perspires who not in vain         Suggests his funny squibs,     By poking his unwelcome cane         In other people's ribs.     Who dares to fling opprobrium         On January now?     As to a potentate we come         With reverential bow,     Because it doth not yet appear         That Time hath ever seen     The ruler of th' inverted year         In more benignant mien.     O Boreas! do not lie low -         That is, if "lie" thou must -     Upon our planet; do not blow         With fierce and sudden gust,     But come so gently, tenderly -         As come thou surely wilt -     That we may have sweet dreams of thee,         Beneath "our crazy quilt!"