spring or thill,
In panel, or crossbar, or floor, or sill,
In screw, bolt, thorough brace--lurking still,
Find it somewhere you must and will--
Above or below, or within or without--
And that's the reason, beyond a doubt,
A chaise _breaks down_, but doesn't _wear out_.

But the Deacon swore (as Deacons do,
With an "I dew vam" or an "I tell _yeou_"),
He would build one shay to beat the taown
'n' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun';
It should be so built that it _couldna'_ break daown;
--"Fur," said the Deacon, "'t's mighty plain
That the weakes' place mus' stan' the strain;
'n' the way t' fix it, uz I maintain,
Is only jest
T' make that place uz strong uz the rest."

So the deacon inquired of the village folk
Where he could find the strongest oak,
That couldn't be split nor bent nor broke--
That was for spokes and floor and sills;
He sent for lancewood to make the thills;
The cross-bars were ash, from the straightest trees;
The panels of white-wood, that cuts like cheese,
But lasts like iron for things like these;
The hubs of logs from the "Settler's ellum"--
Last of its timber--they couldn't sell 'em,

Never an axe had seen their chips,
And the wedges flew from between their lips;
Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips;
Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw,
Spring, tire, axle, and linch-pin too,
Steel of the finest, bright and blue;
Thorough-broke bison-skin, thick and wide;
Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide
Found in the pit when the tanner died.
That was the way he "put her through"--
"There!" said the deacon, "naow she'll dew!"

Do! I tell you, I rather guess
She was a wonder, and nothing less.
Colts grew horses, beards turned gray,
Deacon and deaconess dropped away,
Children and grandchildren--where were they!
But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay
As fresh as on Lisbon earthquake-day!

|Eighteen hundred|;--it came and found
The deacon's masterpiece strong and sound.
Eighteen hundred increased by ten;--
"Hahnsum kerridge" they called it then.
Eighteen hundred and twenty came;--
Running as usual; much the same.
Thirty and forty at last arrive,
And then came fifty and |fifty-five|.

Little of all we value here
Wakes on the morn of its hundredth year
Without both feeling and looking queer.
In fact, there's nothing that keeps its youth,
So far as I know but a tree and truth.
(That is a moral that runs at large;
Take it--you're welcome.--No extra charge.)

|First of Nov