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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
DE SAUTY; AN ELCTRO-CHEMICAL ECLOGUE, by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: Tell me, o provincial! Speak, ceruleo-nasal! Last Line: "cry, ""all right! De sauty." Subject(s): Atlantic Cable | |||
Professor Blue-Nose PROFESSOR TELL me, O Provincial! speak, Ceruleo-Nasal! Lives there one De Sauty extant now among you, Whispering Boanerges, son of silent thunder, Holding talk with nations? Is there a De Sauty ambulant on Tellus, Bifid-cleft like mortals, dormient in night-cap, Having sight, smell, hearing, food-receiving feature Three times daily patent? Breathes there such a being, O Ceruleo-Nasal? Or is he a mythus, -- ancient word for "humbug," -- Such as Livy told about the wolf that wetnursed Romulus and Remus? Was he born of woman, this alleged De Sauty? Or a living product of galvanic action, Like the acarus bred in Crosse's flint-solution? Speak, thou Cyano-Rhinal! BLUE-NOSE Many things thou askest, jackknife-bearing stranger, Much-conjecturing mortal, pork-and-treacle-waster! Pretermit thy whittling, wheel thine earflap toward me, Thou shalt hear them answered. When the charge galvanic tingled through the cable, At the polar focus of the wire electric Suddenly appeared a white-faced man among us: Called himself "DE SAUTY." As the small opossum held in pouch maternal Grasps the nutrient organ whence the term mammalia, So the unknown stranger held the wire electric, Sucking in the current. When the current strengthened, bloomed the pale-faced stranger, -- Took no drink nor victual, yet grew fat and rosy, -- And from time to time, in sharp articulation, Said, "All right! DE SAUTY." From the lonely station passed the utterance, spreading Through the pines and hemlocks to the groves of steeples, Till the land was filled with loud reverberations Of "All right! DE SAUTY." When the current slackened, drooped the mystic stranger, -- Faded, faded, faded, as the stream grew weaker, -- Wasted to a shadow, with a hartshorn odor Of disintegration. Drops of deliquescence glistened on his forehead, Whitened round his feet the dust of efflo-rescence, Till one Monday morning, when the flow suspended, There was no De Sauty. Nothing but a cloud of elements organic, C. O. H. N. Ferrum, Chlor. Flu. Sil. Potassa, Calc. Sod. Phosph. Mag. Sulphur, Mang. (?) Alumin. (?) Cuprum, (?) Such as man is made of. Born of stream galvanic, with it he had perished! There is no DE SAUTY now there is no current! Give us a new cable, then again we'll hear him Cry, "All right! DE SAUTY." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE TENT ON THE BEACH: 8. THE CABLE HYMN by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER COTTON by HARRY EDMUND MARTINSON COTTON by HARRY EDMUND MARTINSON CABLE SHIP by HARRY EDMUND MARTINSON HOW CYRUS LAID THE CABLE by UNKNOWN A BALLAD OF THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY [DECEMBER 16, 1773] by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES A SEA DIALOGUE by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES A SUN-DAY HYMN [OR LAMENT] by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES AFTER A LECTURE ON KEATS by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES BILL AND JOE by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES |
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