C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

James Whitcomb Riley

An’ all us other children, when the supper things is done,

We set around the kitchen fire an’ has the mostest fun

A-list’nin’ to the witch tales ’at Annie tells about,

An’ the gobble-uns ’at gits you

Ef you

Don’t

Watch

Out!

And the South Wind—he was dressed

With a ribbon round his breast

That floated, flapped, and fluttered

In it riotous unrest

And a drapery of mist

From the shoulder to the wrist

Floating backward with the motion

Of the waving hand he kissed.

And the sun had on a crown

Wrought of gilded thistledown,

And a scarf of velvet vapor

And a raveled rainbow gown;

And his tinsel-tangled hair

Tossed and lost upon the air

Was glossier and flossier

Than any anywhere.

Just the wee cot—the cricket’s chirr—

Love and the smiling face of her.

One naked star has waded through

The purple shallows of the night,

And faltering as falls the dew

It drips its misty light.

The ripest peach is highest on the tree.