Classic Poem

When I was very young indeed, —
Ages ago, my dear, —
I had, to stand by me at need,
A little cavalier;
The prettiest lad I ever met,
Black-eyed, red-cheeked, and fat:
His face I never can forget;
His name? Well — it was Nat.

I saw him first one pleasant day,
Beside his mother's door;
His third year had not slipped away,
And I was scarcely four.
Upon his arm a wooden gun
He bore right soldierly;
I know not which it was first won
My heart, that gun or he.

There never was a clumsier trap
By child of mortal seen.
A button at its side went — snap!
The gun was painted green.
But, shouldering it with martial tread,
Proudest of girls was I;
While like a flag above his head
Would my pink bonnet fly.

For Nat I gathered currants fine,
And flowers that bloomed around;
Though only yellow celandine
And blue gill-over-the-ground
Grew underneath the gray stone-wall,
Still they retain their charm —
Those homely blossoms which recall
That early sunshine warm.

I never tasted gingerbread,
Or doughnuts crisp and new,
But in my mother's ear I said,
" For little Nat some, too."
The days were dull and dark when him
To school I could not lead.
That love like ours at last grew dim
A pity seems, indeed.

To me he brought no cake or toy;
But then you know, my dear,
That he was nothing but a boy,
And boys have ways so queer!
They do not stop to think of things
That give us girls delight;
But take the best that fortune brings
As if it were their right.

'T was no such trifle made us part:
He loved my gifts to take,
And it was comfort to my heart
To see him eat my cake.
It happened thus: One afternoon,
As from the school we came, —
The day was sultry, late in June,
Our faces both aflame, —

Beneath the blooming locust-trees
We loitered, I and Nat;
His hair was lifted by the breeze;
I firmly held his hat
By its long bridle-string of green,
And lightly held his hand:
No happier tiny twain were seen
Than we, in all the land.

A freckled girl was passing by,
And down she gazed at me,
As if we children, Nat and I,
Were something strange to see.
I looked at him and looked at her;
Why did she scan us so?
The cruel words she uttered were,
" I guess you've got a beau!"

" A beau! What! he?" At once I dropped
The little hand and hat,
And home I ran, and never stopped
Till I lost sight of Nat.
A beau! Some monstrous thing, no doubt,
All tusks and fangs and claws;
The one they read to me about
A boa-constrictor was.

None did I with my grief annoy,
None should my terror know;
But, oh, I wondered if a boy
Must always be a beau!
And so my happy days were done!
That innocent-looking Nat,
The owner of that darling gun,
How came he to be that?

Nat's doorstep nevermore I sought;
No sign of woe gave he;
Much more of him I doubtless thought
Than ever he of me.
Forgetting is not hard, for men
As young as he, my dear,
And so I lost him there and then, —
My little cavalier.