eye, dear
Libertas, unless it is the smallest glint from the carrot-tips. The
gleam in your eye is golden, oh Columbia!

Nevertheless, and in spite of all this, up trots this here little ass
and makes you a nice present of this pretty book. You needn't sniff,
and glance at your carrot-sceptre, lady Liberty. You needn't throw
down the thinnest carrot-paring you can pare off, and then say: "Why
should I pay for this tripe, this wordy mass of rather revolting
nonsense!" You can't pay for it, darling. If I didn't make you a
present of it you could never buy it. So don't shake your
carrot-sceptre and feel supercilious. Here's a gift for you, Missis.
You can look in its mouth, too. Mind it doesn't bite you.--No, you
needn't bother to put your carrot behind your back, nobody wants to
snatch it.

How do you do, Columbia! Look, I brought you a posy: this nice little
posy of words and wisdom which I made for you in the woods of
Ebersteinburg, on the borders of the Black Forest, near Baden Baden,
in Germany, in this summer of scanty grace but nice weather. I made it
specially for you--Whitman, for whom I have an immense regard, says
"These States." I suppose I ought to say: "Those States." If the
publisher would let me, I'd dedicate this book to you, to "Those
States." Because I wrote this book entirely for you, Columbia. You may
not take it as a compliment. You may even smell a tiny bit of
Schwarzwald sap in it, and be finally disgusted. I admit that trees
ought to think twice before they flourish in such a disgraced place as
the Fatherland. "_Chi va coi zoppi, all' anno zoppica._" But you've
not only to gather ye rosebuds while ye may, but _where_ ye may. And
so, as I said before, the Black Forest, etc.

I know, Columbia, dear Libertas, you'll take my posy and put your
carrot aside for a minute, and smile, and say: "I'm sure, Mr.
Lawrence, it is a _long_ time since I had such a perfectly beautiful
bunch of ideas brought me." And I shall blush and look sheepish and
say: "So glad you think so. I believe you'll find they'll keep fresh
quite a long time, if you put them in water." Whereupon you, Columbia,
with real American gallantry: "Oh, they'll keep for _ever_, Mr.
Lawrence. They _couldn't_ be so cruel as to go and die, such perfectly
lovely-colored ideas. Lovely! Thank you ever, ever so much."

Just think of it, Columbia, how pleased we shall be with one another:
and how much nicer it will be than if you snorted "High-falut