CXV Fate
Francis Bret Harte (b. 1839,—) was born in Albany, N.Y. When seventeen years old he went to California, where he engaged in various employments. He was a teacher, was employed in government offices, worked in the gold mines, and learned to be a compositor in a printing office. In 1868 he started the “Overland Monthly,” and his original and characteristic poems and sketches soon made it a popular magazine. Mr. Harte has been a contributor to some of the leading periodicals of the country, but principally to the “Atlantic Monthly.”
1. “The sky is clouded, the rocks are bare; The spray of the tempest is white in air; The winds are out with the waves at play, And I shall not tempt the sea to-day.
2. “The trail is narrow, the wood is dim, The panther clings to the arching limb; And the lion’s whelps are abroad at play, And I shall not join in the chase to-day.”
3. But the ship sailed safely over the sea, And the hunters came from the chase in glee; And the town that was builded upon a rock Was swallowed up in the earthquake shock.