 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Reading by Kristin Hughes. Ballads of a Bohemian. By Robert W. Service. Prelude. Alas, upon some starry height, the gods of excellence to please, this hand of mine will never smite the harp of high serenities, mere minstrel of the street am I, to whom a careless coin you fling, but who, beneath the bitter sky, blue-lipped yet indolent of I, can shrill a song of spring. A song of merry manso-days, the cheery chimney-tops among, of rollicks and of roundelays, when we were young, when we were young. A song of love and lilac nights, of wit, of wisdom and of wine, of farly whirling on the heights of hunger and of hope divine. Of Blanche, Suzette and Celestine, and all that gay and tender band who shared with us the fat, the lean, the hazard of illusion land. When scores of Philistines we slew as mightily with brush and pen we sought to make the world new and scorned the gods of other men. When we were fools divinely wise, who held it rapturous to strive, when art was sacred in our eyes, and it was heaven to be alive. O days of glamour, glory truth, to you to-night I raise my glass. O freehold of immortal youth, bohemia, the lost, alas. O laughing lads who led the romp, respectable you've grown, I'm told. Your heads you bow to power and pomp, you've learned to know the worth of gold. O merry maids who shared our cheer, your eyes are dim, your locks are grey, and as you scrub I sadly fear your daughters speed the dance to-day. O windmill land and crescent moon, O Columbine and Pyrrhet, to you my old guitar I tune ere I forget, ere I forget. So come good men who toil and tire, who smoke and sip the kindly cup, ring round about the tavern fire ere yet you drink your liquor up, and hear my simple songs of earth, of youth and truth and living things. Of poverty and proper mirth, of rags and rich imaginings. Of karkahoop, blue heaven days, of hearts elate and eager breath, of wonder, worship, pity, praise, of sorrow, sacrifice, and death. Of lusting, laughter, passion, pain, of nights that lure and dreams that thrall. And if a golden word I gain, O kindly folks, God save you all. And if you shake your heads in blame, good friends, God love you all the same. Book One. Spring. Part One. Montparnasse. April. 1914. All day the sun has shone into my little attic, a bitter sunshine that brightened, yet did not warm. And so, as I toiled and toiled doggedly enough, many were the looks I cast at the three faggots I had saved to cook my evening meal. Now, however, my supper is over, my pipe alight, and as I stretch my legs before the embers, I have at last a glow of comfort, a glimpse of peace. My Garrett. Here is my Garrett, up five flights of stairs. Here is where I deal in dreams and ply and fancies. Here is the wonder-shop of all my wares, my sounding sonnets and my red romances. Here is where I challenge fate and ring my rhymes and grope at glory, I and starve at times. Here is my stronghold, stout of heart am I, greeting each dawn as songful as a linnet, and when at night on yarn poor bed I lie, blessing the world and every soul that's in it. Here's where I thank the Lord, no shadow bars my skylight's vision of the valiant stars. Here is my palace, tapestry'd with dreams. Ah, though to-night Tensu are all my treasure, while in my gaze immortal beauty gleams. Am I not doward with wealth beyond all measure? Though in my ragged coat my songs I sing, king of my soul I envy not the king. Here is my haven, it's so quiet here. Only the scratch of pen, the candles flutter, shabby and barren small, but oh, how dear! Mark you, my table with my worker clutter, my shelf of tattered books along the wall, my bed, my broken chair. That's nearly all. Only four faded walls, yet mine, all mine. Oh, you fine folks, a popper scorns your pity. Look where above me stars of rapture shine. See where below me gleams the siren city. Am I not rich? A millionaire, no less, if wealth be told in terms of happiness. Tensu. I think one can sing best of poverty when one is holding it at arm's length. I'm sure that when I wrote these lines fortune had for a moment tweaked me by the nose. Tonight, however, I am truly down to Tensu. It is for that I have stayed in my room all day, rolled in my blankets, and clutching my pen with clammy fingers. I must work, work, work. I must finish my book before poverty crushes me. I am not only writing for my living, but for my life. Even today my muse was mutinous. For hours and hours anxiously I stared at a paper that was blank. Nervously I paced up and down my garret. Bitterly I flung myself on my bed. Then suddenly it all came. Line after line I wrote with hardly a halt. So I made another of my ballads of the boulevards. Here it is. Jullo the Apache You've heard of Jullo the Apache and Jigolette, his mom? Momatra was their hunting-ground, but Belleville was their home. A little chap, just like a boy with smudgy black moustache, yet there was nothing juvenile in Jullo the Apache. From head to heel as tough as steel, as nimble as a cat, with every trick of twist and kick, a master of savat. And Jigolette was tall and fair, as stupid as a cow, with three combs in the greasy hair she banged upon her brow. You'd see her on the Place Pigalle on any afternoon, a primitive and strapping wench as brazen as the moon. And yet there is a tale that's told of cliché after dark, and two gendarmes who swung their arms with Jullo for a mark. And, oh, but they'd have got him too, they banged and blazed away, when like a flash a woman leapt between them and the prey. She took the medicine meant for him, she came down with a crash. Quick now, and make your getaway, oh Jullo the Apache. But no, he turned, ran swiftly back, his arms around her met. They nabbed him sobbing like a kid, and kissing Jigolette. Now I'm a reckless painter chap who loves a jamboree, and one night in Cyrano's bar I got upon a spree. And there were trollops all about and crooks of every kind. But though the place was reeling round, I didn't seem to mind. Till down I sank, and all was blank when in the bleary dawn I woke up in my studio to find my money gone. Three hundred francs I'd scraped and squeezed to pay my quarter's rent. Someone has pinched my wad, I wailed. It never has been spent. And as I racked my brains to seek how I could raise some more, before my cruel landlord kicked me cowering from the door. A knock. Come in, I gruffly groaned, and did not raise my head. Then low I heard a husky voice, a swift and silky tread. You got so blind last night, mon vu, I colored all your cash. Three hundred francs. There, nom de deux. C'est Joulo, the apache. And that was how I came to know Joulo and Jigolette, and we would talk and drink a bark and smoke a cigarette. And I would meditate upon the artistry of crime, and he would tell of cracking cribs and cops and doing time. Or else, when he was flush of funds, he'd carelessly explain he'd biffed some bloated bourgeois on the border of the Seine. So gentle and polite he was, just like a man of peace, and not a desperado and the terror of the police. Now, one day, in a bistro, that's behind the Place Vendôme, I came on Joulo the apache, and Jigolette his mom. And as they looked so very grave, says I to them, says I, Come on and have a little glass, it's good to rinse the eye. You both look mighty serious, you've something on the heart. Ah, yes, said Joulo the apache, we've something to impart. When such things come to folks like us it isn't very gay, it's Jigolette. She tells me that a gosse is on the way. Then Jigolette, she looked at me with eyes like stones of gall. If we were honest folks, said she, I wouldn't mind at all. But then you know the life we lead. Well, anyway, I mean, that is providing it's a girl, to call her Angeline. Cheer up, said I, it's all in life, there's gold within the dross. Come on, we'll drink another ver to Angeline the gosse. And so the weary winter passed, and then, one April morn, the worthy Joulo came at last to say the babe was born. I'd like to chuck it in the sen, he sourly snarled. And yet, I guess I'll have to let it live, because of Jigolette. I only laughed, for sure I saw his spite was all a bluff, and he was prouder than a prince behind his manor gruff. Yet every day he'd blast the brat with curses deep in grim, and swear to me that Jigolette no longer thought of him. And then, one night he dropped the mask, his eyes were sick with dread. And when I offered him a smoke he groaned and shook his head. I'm all upset it's Angeline, she's covered with a rash. She'll maybe die my little gosse, cried Joulo the apache. But Angeline, I joy to say, came through the test all right, though Joulo, so they tell me, watched beside her day and night. And when I saw him next, says he, come up and dine with me, we'll buy a beefsteak on the way, a bottle, and some brie. And so I had a merry night within his humble home, and laughed with Angeline the gosse and Jigolette the mum. And every time that Joulo used a word the least obscene, how Jigolette would frown at him in point to Angeline. Oh, such a little innocent, with hair of silk and floss, I do not wonder they were proud of Angeline the gosse. And when her arms were round his neck, then Joulo says to me, I must work harder now, mon vu, since I've to work for three. He worked so very hard indeed, the police dropped in one day, and for a year behind the bars they put him safe away. So dark and silent now their home, they'd gone, I'd wondered where, till in a laundry near I saw a child was shining hair, and o'er the tub a strapping wench, her arms in soapy foam, lo, it was Angeline the gosse and Jigolette the mum. And so I kept an eye on them, and saw that all went right, until at last came Joulo home half crazy with delight, and when he'd kissed them both says he, I've had my fill this time, I'm on the honest now, I am, I'm all fed up with crime. You mark my words, the page I turn is going to be clean, I swear it on the head of her, my little Angeline. And so, to finish up my tale, this morning as I strolled along the boulevard, I heard a voice I knew of old. I saw a rosy little man with walrus-like moustache, I stopped, I stared, by all the gods to a Joulo the apache. I'm in the garden way, he said, and doing mighty well, I've half an acre under glass and heaps of truck to sell. Come out and see, oh come my friend, on Sunday wet a shine, say, it's the first communion of that little girl of mine. End of Book One, Part One. Book One, Spring, Part Two. Chais-moi, Montparnasse, the same evening. Today is an anniversary. A year ago to-day I kicked over an office stool and came to Paris thinking to make a living by my pen. I was twenty then, and in my pocket I had twenty pounds. Of that, my ten sous are all that remain, and so to-night I am going to spend them, not prudently on bread, but prodigally on beer. As I stroll down the boule-miche, the lingering light has all the exquisite tenderness of violet. The trees are in their first translucent green. Beneath them, the lamps are lit with purest gold, and from the little Luxembourg comes a silver jangle of tiny voices. Taking the gay side of the street, I enter a café. Although it isn't its true name, I choose to call my café. Les Cagaux d'Or. Oh, tavern of the golden snail, ten sous have I, so I'll regale. Ten sous, your amber brew to sip. Eight for the bark and two the tip. And so I'll sit the evening long and smoke my pipe and watch the throng. The giddy crowd that drains and drinks. I'll watch it quiet as a sphinx. And who among them all shall buy for ten poor sous such joy as I? As I, who snugly tucked away, look on at all as on a play. A frolic scene of love and fun, to please an audience of one. Oh, tavern of the golden snail, you've stuffed indeed for many a tale. All eyes, all ears, I nothing miss. Two lovers lean to clasp and kiss. The merry students sing and shout. The nimble garçon dart about. Lo, here comes Mimi and Musette. With Sylvou play, un cigarette. Mosselle and Rudolph, Sean or two. Behold the old Rapscallion crew, with flowing tie and shaggy head. Who says Bohemia is dead? O shades of merge, prank and clown. And I will watch and write it down. O tavern of the golden snail, what crackling throats have gulped your ale. What sons of fame from far and near have glowed and mellowed in your cheer. Within this corner where I sit, Banville and Coppe clash their wit. And hither, too, to dream and drain, And round despair came poor Verlaine. Here Wilde would talk and sing would muse. Maybe like me, with just Tensu. Ah, one is lucky as one not, With ghosts so rare to drain apart. So may your custom never fail O tavern of the golden snail. There, my pipe is out. Let me light it again and consider. I have no illusions about myself. I am not fool enough to think I am a poet. But I have a knack of rhyme, and I love to make verse. Mine is a tootling, tin whistle music. Humbly and afar I follow in the footsteps of prey in Lampson. A field in Riley. Hoping that in time my muse may bring me bread and butter. So far, however, it has been all kicks and no carpers. And to-night I am at the end of my tether. I wish I knew where tomorrow's breakfast was coming from. Well, since rhyming's been my ruin, Let me rhyme to the bitter end. It is later than you think. Lone amid the cafe's cheer, Sad of heart am I to-night. Dolefully I drink my beer, But no single line I write. There's a wretched rent to pay, Yet I glower at pen and ink. O inspire me, muse, I pray It is later than you think. Hello! There's a pregnant phrase. Bravo! Let me write it down. Hold it with a hopeful gaze, Gauge it with a fretful frown. Tune it to my lyric lyre. Ah, upon starvation's brink, How the words are dark and dire. It is later than you think. Weigh them well. Behold, yon band, Students drinking by the door. Madly merry. Bark in hand. Saucers stacked to mark their score. Get you gone, you jolly scamps. Let your parting glasses clink. Seek your long neglected lamps. It is later than you think. Look again. Yon dainty blonde. All allure and golden grace. Oh, so willing to respond, Should you turn a smiling face. Play your part, poor pretty doll. Feast and frolic pose in prank. There's the morgue to end it all. And it's later than you think. Yon's a playwright. Mark his face. Puffed and purple, tense and tired. Parsha like he holds his place, Hated, envied, and admired. How you gobble life, my friend. Wine and women soft and pink. Well, each tether has its end. Sir, it's later than you think. See Yon living scarecrow pass With a wild and wolfish stare At each empty absinthe glass, As if he saw heaven there. Poor damned wretch, To end your pain, There is still the greater drink. Yonder waits the sanguine sane. It is later than you think. Lastly, you who read, I, you, Who this very line may scan, Think of all you plan to do. Have you done the best you can? See the tavern lights are low, Blacks the night and how you shrink. God, and is it time to go? Ah, the clock is always slow. It is later than you think. Sadly, later than you think. Far, far later than you think. Scarcely do I scribble that line On the back of an old envelope When a voice hails me. It is a fellow freelance, A short story man called McBean. He is having a feast of Marene, And he asks me to join him. McBean is a Scotsman with the soul of an Irishman. He has a keen, lean, spectacled face, And if it were not for his grey hair, He might be taken for a student of theology. However, there is nothing of the Puritan in McBean. He loves wine and women, And money melts in his fingers. He has lived so long in the quarter, He looks at life from the Parisian angle. His knowledge of literature is such that he might be a professor, But he would rather be a vagabond of letters. We talk sharp. We discuss the American short story. But McBean vows they do these things better in France. He says that some of the Kant, printed every day in the journal, Are worthy of Mompasson. After that, he buys more beer, And we roam airily over the fields of literature, Plucking here and there a blossom of quotation, A fine talk, vivid and eager. He puts me into a kind of glow. McBean pays the bill from a handful of big notes, And the thought of my own empty pockets for a moment damps me. However, when we rise to go, It is well after midnight, And I am in a pleasant daze. The rest of the evening may be summed up in the following jingle. Naktambul. Zoot! It is two o'clock. See the lights are jumping? Finish up your bark. Time we all were humping. Waiters stack the chairs, pile them on the tables. Let us to our lairs underneath the gables. Up the old bulmish climb with steps erratic. Steady. How I wish I was in my attic. Full am I with cheer. In my heart the joysters. Couldn't be the beer. Must have been the oysters. In obscene array garbage cans spill over. How I wish that they smelled as sweet as clover. Charring women wait. Cafes drop their shutters. Rats perambulate up and down the gutters. Down the darkened street market carts are creeping. Horse with wary feet. Red-faced driver sleeping. Loads of vivid greens. Carrots, leeks, potatoes, cabbages and beans. Turnips and tomatoes. Pair of dapper chaps. Cigarettes and sashes. Stare at me. Perhaps desperate apaches. Needn't bother me jolly well, you know it. Parce que je suis cotée et latin poète. Give you villanelles, madrigals in lyrics. Ballads and rondelles, odes and panagerics. Poet pinched and poor. Pricked by cold and hunger. Troubles troubadour. Misery's ballad monger. Think how queer it is. Every move I'm making. Cosmic gravity. The center I am shaking. Oh, how droll to feel. As I now am feeling. Even as a real, all the world is reeling. Reeling to the stars. Neptune and Uranus. Jupiter and Mars. Mercury and Venus. Suns and moons with me. As I'm homeward straying. All in sympathy. Swaying, swaying, swaying. Lord, I've got a head. Well, it's not surprising. I must gain my bed ere the sun is rising. When the merry lark in the sky is soaring, I'll refuse to hark. I'll be snoring, snoring. Strike a sulfur match. Ha! At last my garret. Fumble at the latch. Close the door and bar it. Bed you graciously wait, despite my scorning. So, babaciously mad old world, good morning. End of book one, spring, part two. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Reading by Kristen Hughes. Ballads of Bohemian by Robert W. Service. Book one, spring. Part three. My garret, Montpenas, April. Insomnia. I hope to sleep I vainly try. Since twelve I haven't closed an eye. And now it's three. And as I lie, from Notre Dame to Sondanie, the bells of Paris chime to me. You're young, they say, and strong and free. I do not turn with sighs and groans to ease my limbs, to rest my bones, as if my bed was stuffed with stones. No peevish murmur tips my tongue. Ah, no. For every sound-up flung says, Lad, you're free and strong and young. And so beneath the sheets caress my body purrs with happiness. Joy bubbles in my veins. Ah, yes. My very blood that leaps along is chiming in a joyous song, because I'm young and free and strong. Maybe it is the spring tide. I am so happy I am afraid. The sense of living fills me with exultation. I want to sing, to dance. I am ditherambic with delight. I think the moon must be to blame. It fills the room with fairy flame. It paints the walls. It seems to pour a dappled flood upon the floor. I rise in through the window-stare. Ye gods, how marvellously fair. From Mont Rouge to the Martyr's Hill, a silver city wrapped and still. Dim drowsy deeps of opal haze. And spire and dome in diamond blaze. The little lisping leaves of spring like sequins softly glimmering. Each roof a plaque of Argent sheen. A gauzy gulf the space between. Each chimney-top a thing of grace, where merry moonbeams prank and chase. And all that soared it was and mean. Just beauty, deathless and serene. O magic city of a dream, from glory unto glory gleam. And I will gaze and pity those who on their pillows drows and doze. And as I've nothing else to do, of tea I'll make a rousing brew, and coax my pipes until they croon, and chant a ditty to the moon. There, my tea is black and strong. Inspiration comes with every sip. Now for the moon. The moon peeped out behind the hill as yellow as an apricot. Then up and up it climbed until into the sky it fairly got. The sky was vast and violet. The poor moon seemed to faint in fright, and pale it grew and paler yet, like fine old silver rinsed and bright. And yet it climbed so bravely on until it mounted heaven high. Then earthward it serenely shone, a silver sovereign of the sky, a bland sultana of the night, surveying realms of lily-light. Moon Song A child saw in the morning skies the dissipated-looking moon, and opened wide her big blue eyes and cried, Look, look, my lost balloon! And clapped her rosy hands with glee, Quick mother, bring it back to me! A poet in a lily'd pond despised the moon's reflected charms, and ravished by that beauty blonde, leapt out to clasp her in his arms. And as he'd never learnt to swim, poor fool, that was the end of him. A rustic glimpse to mid the trees, the bluff moon caught as in a snare. They say it do be made of cheese, said Giles, and that a chap bides there, that blue bore ale be strong, I vow, the lads are winking at me now. Two lovers watched the new moon hold the old moon in her bright embrace, said she, there's mother pale and old and drawing near her resting place, said he, be mine and with me wed. Moon high she stared and shook her head. A soldier saw with dying eyes the bleared moon like a ball of blood, and thought of how in other skies, so pearly bright, unleafened bud like peace its soft white beams had lain, like peace. He closed his eyes again. Child lover, poet, soldier clown, I, yes, old moon, what things you've seen, I marvel now, as you look down, how can your face be so serene, and tranquil still you'll make your round, old moon, when we are underground. And now blow out your candle, lad, and get to bed. See the dawn is in the sky? Open your window and let its freshness rouse your cheek. You've earned your rest. Sleep. I, but before I do so, let me read again the last of my ballads. The sowing girl, the humble garret where I dwell is in that quarter called the Latin. It isn't spacious, truth to tell, there's hardly room to swing a cat in. But what of that? It's there I fight for food and fame, my muse inviting, and all the day and half the night you'll find me writing, writing, writing. Now, it was in the month of May as wrestling with a rhyme-romatic. I chanced to look across the way, and lo, within a neighbor attic, a hand drew back the window-shade. And there, a picture glad and glowing, I saw a sweet and slender maid, and she was sowing, sowing, sowing. So poor the room, so small, so scant, yet somehow oh so bright an airy. There was a pink teranium plant, likewise a very pert canary. And in the maiden's heart it seemed some fount of gladness must be springing. For as alone I sadly dreamed, I heard her singing, singing, singing. God love her how it cheered me then to see her there so brave and pretty. So she, with needle, I with pen, we slaved and sang above the city. And as across my streams of ink were from a poet's distance, she stitched and sang. I scarcely think she was aware of my existence. And then one day she sang no more. That put me out, there's no denying. I looked, she labored as before. But bless me, she was crying, crying. Her poor canary chirped in vain, her pink teranium drooped in sorrow. Of course, said I, she'll sing again. Maybe, I sighed, she will tomorrow. Poor child, it was finished with her song. Day after day her tears were flowing. And as I wondered what was wrong she pined and peaked above her sewing. And then one day the blind she drew. Ah, though I sought with vain endeavour to pierce the darkness, well I knew my sewing-girl had gone forever. And as I sit alone tonight, my eyes unto her room are turning. I'd give the sum of all I write once more to see her candle burning, once more to glimpse her happy face. And while my rhymes of cheer I'm ringing across the sunny sweep of space to hear her singing, singing, singing. Hi-ho! I realize I am very weary. It's nice to be so tired and to know one can sleep as long as one wants. The morning sunlight floods in at my window, so I draw the blind and throw myself on my bed. End of book one, spring, part three. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Reading by Kristen Hughes. Ballads of a Bohemian by Robert W. Service. Book one, spring, part four. My Garrett, Montpennance, April. Hurrah! As I opened my eyes this morning to a hard, unfeeling world, little did I think what a surprise awaited me. A big blue envelope had been pushed under my door. Another rejection, I thought, and I took it up distastefully. The next moment I was staring at my first check. It was an express order for two hundred francs in payment of a bit of verse. So today I will celebrate. I will lunch at the dark whore. I will dine on the grand boulevard. I will go to the theatre. Well, here's the thing that has turned the tide for me. It is somewhat in the vein of the sourdough service of the Yukon Bard. I don't think much of his stuff, but they say he makes heaps of money. I can well believe it, for he drives a Hispano Sousa in the boire every afternoon. The other night he was with a crowd at the Dom Café, a chubby chap who sits in a corner and seldom speaks. I was disappointed. I thought he was a big hairy man who swore like a trooper and mixed brandy with his beer. He only drank Vichy, poor fellow. Lucille. Of course you've heard of the Nancy Lee and how she sailed away on her famous quest of the Arctic Flea to the wilds of Hudson Bay. For it was a foreign prince's whim to collect this tiny cus and a golden quid was no more to him than a copper to coves like us. So we sailed away and our hearts were gay as we gazed on the gorgeous scene and we laughed with glee as we caught the flea of the wolf and the wolverine. Yea, our hearts were light as the parasite of the ermine rat we slew and the great musk ox and the silver fox and the moose and the caribou and we laughed with zest as the insect pest of the marmot crowned our zeal and the wary mink and the wily link and the walrus and the seal and with eyes aglow on the scornful snow we danced a rigadoon round the lonesome lair of the arctic hare by the light of the silver moon but the time was nigh to homeward high when imagine our despair for the best of the lot we hadn't got the flea of the polar bear oh his face was long and his breath was strong as the skipper he said to me I want you to linger here my lad by the shores of the arctic sea I want you to hunt the polar bear the pershing winter through and if flea you find of its breed and kind there's a hundred quid for you but I shook my head no cap I said it's yourself I'd like to please but I tells you flat I wouldn't do that if you went on your bended knees then the captain spat in the seething brine and he says good luck to you if it can't be did for a hundred quid supposing we call it too so that was why they said goodbye and they sailed and left me there alone alone in the arctic zone to hunt for the polar bear oh the days were slow and packed with woe till I thought they would never end and I used to sit when the fire was lit with my pipe for my only friend and I tried to sing some rollicky thing but my song broke off in a prayer and I drows and dream by the driftwood gleam I dream of a polar bear I dream of a cloud like polar bear that blotted the stars on high with ravenous jaws and flensing claws and the flames of hell in his eye and I'd trap around on the frozen ground as a proper hunter-art and beasts I'd find of every kind but never the one I sought never a track in the white ice pack that humped and heaved and flawed till I came to think why strike me pink if the creature ain't a fraud and then one night in the waning light as I hurried home to supp I hears a roar by the cabin door and a great white hulk heaves up so my rifle flashed and a bullet crashed dead dead as a stone fell he and I gave a cheer for there was in his ear gosh ding me a tiny flea at last at last oh I clutched it fast and I gazed on it with pride and I thrust it into a biscuit tin and I shut it safe inside with a lid of glass for the light to pass and space to leap and play oh it kept alive yay seemed to thrive as I watched it night and day and I used to sit and sing to it and I shielded it from harm and many a hearty feed it had on the heft of my hairy arm for you'll never know in that land of snow how lonesome a man can feel so I made a fuss of the little cuss and I christened it loose seal but the longest winter has its end and the ice went out to sea and I saw one day a ship in the bay and there was the Nancy Lee so a boat was lowered and I went aboard and they opened wide their eyes yes they gave a cheer when the truth was clear and they saw my precious prize and then it was all like a giddy dream but to cut my story short we sailed away on the 5th of May to the foreign princes court to a palmy land and a palace grand and the little prince was there and a fat princess in a satin dress with a crown of gold on her hair and they showed me into a shiny room just him and her and me and the prince he was pleased and friendly like and he calls for drinks for three and I shows them my battered biscuit tin and I makes my modest spiel and they laughed they did when I opened the lid and out their popped loose seal oh the prince was glad I could soon see that and the princess she was too and loose seal waltzed around on the tablecloth as she often used to do and the prince pulled out a purse of gold and he put it in my hand and he says it was worth all that I'm told to stay in that nasty land and then he turned with a sudden cry and he clutched at his royal beard and the princess screamed and well she might for loose seal had disappeared oh she must be here said his noble nibs so we hunted all around oh we searched that place but never a trace of the little beast we found so I shook my head and I glumly said called darn the saucy cuss it's mighty queer but she isn't here so she must be on one of us you'll pardon me if I make so free but there's just one thing to do if you'll kindly go for a half a mow I'll search me garments through then all alone on the shiny throne I stripped from head to heel in vain in vain it was very plain that I hadn't got loose seal so I garbed again and I told the prince and he scratched his august head I suppose if she hasn't selected you it must be me he said so he retired but soon came back and his features showed distress oh it isn't you and it isn't me then we looked at the princess so she retired and we heard a scream and she opened wide the door and her fingers twain were pinched to pain but a radiant smile she wore it's here she cries our precious prize oh I found it right away then I ran to her with a shout of joy but I choked with a wild dismay I clutched the back of the golden throne and the room began to reel what she held to me was a yes a flea but it wasn't my loose seal after all I did not celebrate I sat on the terrace of the café Napolitan on the Grand Boulevard half hypnotized by the passing crowd and as I sat I fell into conversation with a god-like stranger who sipped some golden ambrosia he told me he was an actor and introduced me to his beverage which he called a sous-anis he soon left me but the effect of the golden liquid remained and there came over me a desire to write c'était plus fort que moi so instead of going to the Folli Berger I spent all evening in the Arminium Bar near the Bourse and wrote the following On the Boulevard oh it's pleasant sitting here seeing all the people pass you beside your bark of beer I behind my Demitas chatting of no matter what you the mama I the bard oh it's jolly is it not sitting on the Boulevard more amusing than a book if a chap has eyes to see for no matter where I look stories stories jump at me moving tales my pen might write poems plain on every face monologues you could recite with inimitable grace ah imaginations power see on Demimondane there idly toying with a flower smiling with a pence of air well her smile is but a mask for I saw within her muff such a wicked little flask vitriol erg the beastly stuff now look back beside the bar see yon curled and scented bow puffing at a fine cigar sale espiste macaro well of course it's all surmise it's for him she holds her place when he passes she will rise dash the vitriol in his face quick they'll carry him away pack him in a red cross car her they'll hurry so they say to the cells of sound lasar what will happen then you ask what will all the sequels be ah imaginations task isn't easy let me see she will go to jail no doubt for a year or maybe two as soon as she gets out start her body life anew he will lie with an award harmless as a man can be with his face grotesquely scarred and his eyes that cannot see then amid the city's din he will stand against a wall with around his neck a tin into which the pennies fall she will pass I see it plain like a cinematograph she will halt and turn again look and look and maybe laugh well I'm not so sure of that whether she will laugh or cry he will hold a battered hat to the lady passing by he will smile a cringing smile and into his grimy hold with a laugh or sob the while she will drop a piece of gold bless you lady he will say and get grandly drunk that night she will come and come each day fascinated by the site then somehow he'll get to know maybe by some kindly friend who she is and so bringing my story to an end how his heart will burst with hate he will curse and he will cry wait and wait and wait till again she passes by then like tiger from its lair he will leap out from his place down her clutch her by the hair smear the vitriol on her face ah imagination rare see he takes his hat to go now he's level with her chair now she rises up to throw God and she has done it too screams those hideous screams I imagined and it's true how his face will haunt my dreams what a sight it makes me sick seems I am to blame somehow garçon fetch a brandy quick there I'm feeling better now let's collaborate we two you the mummer I the bard oh what a ripping stuff we'll do sitting on the boulevard it is strange how one works easily at times I wrote this so quickly that I might almost say I had reached the end before I had come to the beginning in such a mood I wonder why everybody does not write poetry get a roger's the source a rhyming dictionary sit before your typewriter with a strong glass of coffee at your elbow and just click the stuff off facility so easy tiz to make a rhyme that did the world but know it your coachman might parnassus climb your butler be a poet then oh how charming it would be if when in haste steric you called the page you learned that he was grappling with a lyric or else what rapture it would yield when cook sent up the salad to find within its depths concealed a touching little ballad or if for tea and toast you yearned what joy to find upon it the chambermaid had coily laid a palpitating sonnet your baker could the fashion set your butcher might respond well with every tart a triolette with every chop a rondelle your tailor's bill well I'll be blowed dear chap I never knowed him he's gone and written me an ode instead of what I owed him so easy tiz to rhyme yet stay oh terrible misgiving please do not give the game away I've got to make my living end of book one spring part four this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org reading by Kristen Hughes Ballads of a Bohemian by Robert W. Service book one spring part five My Garrett May 1914 golden days another day of toil and strife another page so white within that fateful log of life that I and all must write another page without a stain to make of as I may that done I shall not see again until the judgment day ah could I could I backward turn the pages of that book how often would I blanch and burn how often loathe to look what pages would be meanly scrolled what smeared as if with mud a few maybe might gleam like gold some scarlet seem as blood oh record grave God guide my hand and make me worthy be since what I write today shall stand to all eternity I teach me Lord of life I pray as I salute the sun to bear myself that every day may be a golden one I awoke this morning to see the bright sunshine flooding my Garrett no chamber in the palace of a king could have been more fair how I sang as I dressed how I lingered of my coffee savoring every drop how carefully I packed my pipe gazing serenely over the roofs of Paris never is the city so lovely as in this month of May when all the trees are in the fullest of their foliage as I look I feel a freshness of delight in my eyes wonder wakes in me the simplest things move me to delight the joy of little things it's good the great green earth to roam where sights of awe the soul inspire but oh its best the coming home the crackling of one's own hearthfire you've harbobbed with the solemn past you've seen the pageantry of kings yet oh how sweet to gain at last the peace and rest of little things perhaps you're counted with the great you strain and strive with mighty men your hand is on the helm of state colossus like you stride and then there comes a pause a shining hour a dog that leaps a hand that clings oh Titan turn from pomp and power give all your heart to little things go couch you child wise in the grass believing at some jungle strange where mighty monsters peer and pass where beetles roam and spiders range mid-gloom and gleam of leaf and blade what dragons rasp their painted wings oh magic world of shine and shade oh beauty land of little things I sometimes wonder after all amid this tangled web of fate if what is great may not be small and what is small may not be great so wondering I go my way my heart contentment sings oh may I ever see I pray God's grace and love in little things so give to me I only beg a little roof to call my own a little cider in the keg a little meat upon the bone a little garden by the sea a little boat that dips and swings but leave to me oh lord of life just little things yesterday I finished my tenth ballad when I have done about a score I will seek a publisher if I cannot find one I will earn, beg, or steal the money to get them printed then if they do not sell I will hawk them from door to door oh I'll succeed I know I'll succeed and yet I don't want an easy success give me the joy of the fight the thrill of the adventure here's my last ballad the absinthe drinkers he's yonder on the terrace of the cafe de la paix the little wise and Spanish man I see him every day he's sitting with his Pernod on his customary chair he's staring at the passes with his customary stare he never takes his piercing eyes from off that moving throng that current cosmopolitan meandering long dark diplomats from Martinique pale rosters from Peru an Englishman from Bloomsbury a yank from Kalamazoo a poet from Montress Heights a dapper little jab exotic citizens of all the countries on the map a tourist horde from every land that's underneath the sun that little wise and Spanish man he misses never one oh fowl of fair he's always there and many a drink he buys and there's a fire of red desire within his hollow eyes and sipping of my Pernod and knowing what I know sometimes I want to shriek aloud and give away the show I've lost my nerve he's haunting me he's like a beast of prey that Spanish man that's watching at the cafe de la paix say listen and I'll tell you all the day was growing dim and I was with my Pernod at the table next to him and he was sitting soberly as if he were asleep when suddenly he seemed to tense like tiger for a leap and then he swung around to me his hand went to his hip my heart was beating like a gong my arm was in his grip his eyes were glaring into mine I though I shrank with fear his fetid breath was on my face his voice was in my ear excuse my brusquay he hissed but sir do you suppose that portly man who passed us had a wend upon his nose and then at last it dawned on me the fellow must be mad and when I soothingly replied I do not think he had the little wise and Spanish man subsided in his chair and shrouded in his raven cloak resumed his owlish stare but when I tried to slip away he turned and glared at me and oh that fish-like face of his was sinister to see forgive me if I startled you of course you think I'm queer no doubt you wonder who I am so solitary here you question why the passes by I piercingly review well listen my babacious friend I'll tell my tale to you it happened twenty years ago and in another land a maiden young and beautiful two suitors for her hand my rival was the lucky one I vowed I would repay revenge has mellowed in my heart it's rotten ripe today my happy rival skipped away vamoosed he left no trace and so I'm waiting waiting here to meet him face to face for has it not been ever said that all the world one day will pass in pilgrimage before the café de la paix but sir I made remonstrance if it's twenty years ago you'd scarcely recognize him now he must have altered so the little wise and Spanish man he laughed a hideous laugh and from his cloak he quickly drew a faded photograph you're right said he was very fat oh this you must allow that never change Lopez was fat he must be fatter now his paunch is senatorial he cannot see his toes I'm sure of it and then behold that when upon his nose I'm looking for a man like that I'll wait and wait until what will you do I sharply cried why kill he robbed me of my happiness nay stranger do not start I'll firmly and politely put a bullet in his heart and then that little Spanish man with big cigar alight up rose and shook my trembling hand and vanished in the night and I went home and thought of him and had a dreadful dream of portly men with each a when and woke up with a scream and sure enough next morning as I prowled the boulevard a portly man with when he knows roamed into my regard then like a flash I ran to him and clutched him by the arm oh sir said I I do not wish to see you come to harm but if your life you value ought I beg and treat and pray don't pass before the terrace of the cafe de la paix that portly man he looked at me with such a startle there then bolted like a rabbit down the room me show the air ha ha I've saved a life I thought and laughed in my relief and straightway joined the Spanish man over his aperitif and thus each day I dodged about and kept the strictest guard for portly men when upon the boulevard and then I hailed my Spanish pal and sitting in the sun we ordered many Pernodes and we drank them every one and sternly he would stare and stare until my hand would shake and grimly he would glare and glare until my heart would quake and I would say Alfonso lad I must expostulate why keep alive for twenty years the furnace of your hate perhaps his wedded life was hell and you at least are free that's where you've got it wrong he snarled the fool she took was me my rival sneaked threw up the sponge betrayed himself a churl it was he who got the happiness I only got the girl with that he looked so devil-like he made me creep and shrink and there was nothing else to do but buy another drink now yonder like a blot of ink he sits across the way upon the smiling terrace of the cafe de la paix that little wise and Spanish man his face is ghastly white his eyes are staring staring like a tiger's in the night I know within his evil heart the fires of hate are fanned I know his automatic's ready waiting to his hand I know a tragedy is near I dread I have no peace oh don't you think I ought to go and call upon the police look there he's rising up my god he leaps from out his place yon millionaire from Argentine the two are face to face a shot a shriek a heavy fall a huddled heap oh see the little wise and Spanish man is dancing in his glee I'm sick and faint I'm going mad oh please take me away there's blood upon the terrace of the cafe de la paix and now I'll leave my work in Sallyforth the city is on-fet I'll join the crowd and laugh and sing with the best the sunshine seeks my little room to tell me Paris streets are gay the children cry the lily-bloom all up and down the leafy way that half the town is mad with may with flame of flag and boom of bell for Carnival is king today so pen and page a while farewell end of book one spring part five this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org reading by Kristen Hughes Ballads of Bohemian by Robert W. Service book two early summer part one June 1914 the release today within a grog shop near I saw a newly captured linnet who beat against his cage and fear and fell exhausted every minute and when I asked the fellow there if he to sell the bird were willing he told me with a careless air that I could have it for a shilling and so I bought it cage and all although I went without my dinner and where some trees were fairly tall and houses shrank and smoke was thinner the tiny door I opened through as down upon the grass I sank me poor little chap how quick he flew he didn't even wait to thank me life's like a cage we beat the bars we bruise our breasts we struggle vainly up to the glory of the stars we strain with flutterings ungainly and then God opens wide the door our wondrous wings are arched for flying we poise we part we sing we soar light freedom love fools call it dying yes that wretched little bird haunted me I had to let it go since I have seized my own liberty I am a fanatic for freedom it is now a year ago I launched on my great adventure I have had hard times been hungry, cold, weary I have worked harder than ever I did and discouragement has slapped me on the face yet the year has been the happiest of my life and all because I am free by reason of filthy money no one can say to me do this or do that master doesn't exist in my vocabulary I can look any man in the face and tell him to go to the devil I belong to myself I am not for sale it's glorious to feel like that it sweetens the dry crust and warms the heart in the icy wind for that I will hunger and go threadbare for that I will live austerely and deny myself all pleasure after health the best thing in life is freedom here is the last of my ballads it is by way of being an experiment it's theme is commonplace it's language that of every day it is a bit of realism in rhyme the wee shop she risked her all they told me bravely sinking the pinched economies of 30 years and there the little shop was meek and shrinking the sum of all her dreams and hopes and fears Eretz was opened I could see them in it the grey haired dame the daughter with her crutch so fond so happy hoarding every minute like artists for the final tender touch the opening day I'm sure that to their seeming was never shop so wonderful as theirs with pyramids of jam jars rubbed to gleaming such vivid cans of peaches, prunes and pears and chocolate and biscuits and glass cases and bonbon bottles many huge and bright yet nothing half so radiant as their faces their eyes of hope, excitement and delight I entered how they waited all flutter how awkwardly they weighed my acid drops and then with all the thanks a tongue could utter they bowed me from the kindliest of shops I'm sure that night their customers they numbered discussed them all in happy breathless speech and though quite worn and weary air they slumbered sent heavenward a little prayer for each and so I watched with interest redoubled that little shop spent in it all I had and when I saw it empty I was troubled and when I saw them busy I was glad and when I dared to ask how things were going they told me with a fine and gallant smile not badly slow at first there's never knowing it will surely pick up in a little while I'd often see them through the winter weather behind the shutters by a light's faint speck pouring or books their faces close together the lame girl's arm around her mother's neck they dressed their windows not one time but twenty each change more pinched more desperately neat alas I wondered if behind that plenty the two who owned it had enough to eat ah who would dare to sing of tea and coffee the sadness of a stock unsold and dead the petty tragedy of melting toffee the sordid pathos of stale gingerbread ignoble themes and yet those haggard faces within that little shop oh here I say one does not need to look in lofty places for tragic themes they round us every day and so I saw their agony their fighting their eyes of fear their heartbreak their despair and there the little shop is black and blighting and all the world goes by and does not care they say she sought her old employer's pity content to take the pittance he would give the lame girl yes she's working in the city she coughs a lot she hasn't long to live last night McBean introduced me to Saxon Dane the poet truly he is more like a blacksmith than a bard a big bearded man whose black eyes brood somberly or flash with sudden fire we talked of Walt Whitman and then of others the trouble with poetry he said is that it is too exalted it has a phraseology of its own it selects themes that are quite outside of ordinary experience as a medium of expression it fails to reach the great mass of the people then he added to hell with the great mass of the people what have they got to do with it write to please yourself as if not a single reader existed the moment a man begins to be conscious of an audience he is artistically damned you're not a poet I hope I meekly assured him I was a mere maker of verse well said he better good verse than middling poetry and maybe even the humblest of rhymes has its uses happiness is happiness whether it be inspired by a rosetti sonnet or a ballad by G.R. Sims let each one who has something to say say it in the best way he can and abide the result after all he went on what does it matter we are living in a pygmy day with Tennyson and Browning the line of great poets passed away perhaps forever the world today is full of little minstrels who echo one another and who pipe away tunefully enough but with one exception they do not matter I dared to ask who was his one exception he answered myself of course here's a bit of light verse which it amused me to write today as I sat in the sun on the terrace of the closerie de Lila the Philistine and the Bohemian she was a Philistine Spickenspan he was a bold Bohemian she had the mode and the last at that he had a cape and a brigand hat she was so riant and chic and trim he was so shaggy unkempt and grim on the rude lapay she was want to shine the rude legate was more his line she doted on Barclay and Dallin Cain he quoted Malarm and Paul Vallane she was a triumph at tango tease at vortices uppers he sought to please she thought that Franz Laer was utterly great of Straus and Stravinsky he'd piously pray she loved elegance he loved art they were as wide as the poles apart yet Cupid and Caprice are hand in glove they met her to dinner they fell in love home he went to his garage bare thrilling with rapture hope despair swift he gazed in his looking glass made a grimace and murmured ass seized his scissors and fiercely sheared severed his buccaneering beard grabbed his hair and clip clip clip off came a bunch with every snip ran to a tailor's and startled state suits a dozen commanded straight coats and overcoats pants and pairs everything that a dandy wears socks and collars and shoes and ties everything that a dandy buys Chums looked at him with wondering stare fancied they'd seen him before somewhere a brummel a dorset a bow so fine a shining immaculate Philistine home she went in a rapture days looked in a mirror with startled gaze didn't seem to be pleased at all savagely muttered in Cupid doll clutched her hair and a pair of shears cropped and bobbed it behind the ears aimed at a wan and willowy necked sort of a home and hunt effect robed in subtle and sage green tones like the dames of Rosetti in E. Byrne Jones girdled her garments billowing wide moved with an undulating glide all her frivolous friends for sook cultivated a soulful look gushed in a voice with a creamy throb over some weirdly futurist dob did all in short that a woman can to be a consummate bohemian a year went past with its hopes and fears a year that seemed like a dozen years they met once more oh at last, at last they rushed together they stopped aghast they looked at each other with blank dismay they simply hadn't a word to say he thought with a shiver can this be she she thought with a shudder can this be he this simpering dandy so sleek and spruce this languorous lily in garments loose they sought to brace from the awful shark taking a seat they tried to talk she spoke of Bergson and Patras prose he prattled of dances and ragtime shows she purred of pictures Matisse Cezanne his tastes to the girls of the Kirshner ran she raved of Tchaikovsky and Caesar Frank he owned that he was a jazz band crank they made no headway alas, alas he thought her a bore she thought him an ass and so they arose and hurriedly fled perish illusion romance, you're dead he loved elegance she loved art better at once to part to part and what is the moral of all this rot don't try to be what you know you're not and if you're made on a muttonish plan don't seek to seem a bohemian and if to the goats your feet incline don't try to pass for a Philistine end of book 2 early summer part 1 this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org reading by Kristen Hughes Ballads of a Bohemian by Robert W. Service book 2 early summer part 2 a small cafe in a side street June 1914 Bohemian dreams because my overcoats in porn I choose to take my glass within a little bistro on the rue de Montparnasse the dusty little bins with bottle shine the counters lined with zinc and there I sit and drink my wine and think and think and think I think of Hori old Stamble of Muslim and of Greek of Persian in coat of wool of curd and Arab chic of all the types of wheel and woe and as I raise my glass across Galata Bridge I know they pass and pass and pass I think of citron trees glow of fan-palms shading down of sailors dancing heel and toe with wenches black and brown and though it's all an ocean far from Yucatán to France I'll bet beside the old bazaar they dance and dance and dance I think of Monte Carlo where the pallid croupiers call and in the gorgeous guilty air the gamblers watch the ball and as I flick away the foam with which my beer is crowned the wheels beneath the gilded dome go round and round and round I think of Vast Niagara those gulfs of foam are shine whose mighty roar would stagger a more prosy bean than mine and as the hours I idly spend against a greasy wall I know that green the waters bend and fall and fall and fall I think of Nizhny Novgorod Jews who never rest and women folk with spade and hard who slave in Budapest of squat and sturdy Japanese who pound the paddy soil and as I loaf and smoke at ease they toil and toil and toil I think of shrines in Hindustan of cloisteral glooms in Spain of minarets in Ispahan of Saint Sophia's Fane of convent towers in Palestine of temples in Cathay and as I stretch and sip my wine they pray and pray and pray and so my dreams I dwell within and visions come and go and life is passing like a cinematographic show till just as surely as my pipe is underneath my nose amid my visions rich and ripe I doze and doze and doze alas it is too true once more I am counting the carpers living on the ragged edge my manuscripts come back to me like boomerangs and I have not the postage far less the heart to send them out again McBean seems to take an interest in my struggles I sit in his room in the rue Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre smoking and sipping whiskey into the small hours he is an old hand who knows the market and frankly manufactures for it give me short pieces he says things of three verses that will fill a blank half page of a magazine let them be sprightly and if possible have a snapper at the end give me that sort of article I'll place it for you then he looked through a lot of my verse this is the kind of stuff I might be able to sell he said a domestic tragedy Clarinda met me on the way as I came from the train her face was anything but gay in fact suggested pain oh hubby hubby dear she cried I've awful news to tell what is it darling she cried your mother is she well oh no oh no it is not that it's something else she wailed my heart was beating pit-a-pat my ruddy visage paled like lightning flash in heaven's dome the fear within me woke don't say I cried a little home has all gone up in smoke she shook her head oh swift I clasped I gasped believe me it is best then then she spoke mid-sabs I caught these words of woe divine it's cook cook cook has gone and bought a new hat just like mine at present I am living on bread and milk by doing this I can rub along for another ten days the thought pleases me as long as I have a crust I am master of my destiny some day when I am rich and famous I shall look back on all this with regret yet I think I shall always remain a bohemian I hate regularity the clock was never made for me I want to eat when I am hungry sleep when I am weary drink well any old time I prefer to be alone company is a constraint on my spirit I never make an engagement if I can avoid it to do so is to put a mortgage on my future I like to be able to rise in the morning with the thoughts that the hours before me are all mine to spend in my own way to work, to dream to watch the unfolding drama of life here is another of my ballads it is longer than most and gave me more trouble though none the better for that the pencil seller a pencil sir a penny won't you buy I am cold and wet and tired a sorry plight don't turn your back sir take one just to try I haven't made a single sale tonight oh thank you sir but take the pencil too I am not a beggar I am a businessman pencils I deal in red and black and blue it's hard to do the best I can most days I make enough to pay for bread a cup of coffee stretching room at night one needs so little to be warm and fed a hole to kennel in oh one's all right excuse me you're a painter are you not I saw you looking at that dealer's show the croots he has for sale a shabby lot what do I know of art what do I know well look that David's strong so well displayed white sorcery it's called all gossamer and pale moon magic and a dancing maid you like the little elf in face of her that's good but still the picture is a whole the values he never painted worse perhaps because his fire was lacking coal his cupboard bear no money in his purse perhaps they say he labored hard and long and see now in the harvest of his fame when round his pictures people gape and throng a scurvy dealer sells this on his name a wretched rag wrung out of wanton woe a soulless dab not David's strong a bit unworthy of his art how should I know how should I know I'm strong I painted it there now I didn't mean to let that out it came in spite of me I stare and stare you think I'm lying crazy drunk no doubt think what you like it's neither here nor there it's hard to tell so terrible a truth to gain to glory yet be such as I it's true that pictures mine done in my youth up in a garret near the Paris sky the child's my daughter eyes she posed for me that's why I come and sit here every night painting's bad but still oh still I see her little face all laughing in the light so now you understand I live in fear lest one like you should carry it away a poor pot boiling thing but oh how dear don't let them buy it pity God I pray and haki sir sometimes my brain's a whirl some night I'll crash into that window pane and snatch my picture back my little girl and run and run I'm talking wild again a crab can't run I'm crippled I'm pulsed as good as dead all down one side no warning had I when the evil came it struck me down all in my strength and pride triumph was mine I thrilled with perfect power honor was mine fame's laurel touched my brow glory was mine within a little hour I was a garden what you find me now my child that little laughing girl you see she was my nurse for all ten weary years her joy her hope her youth she gave for me her very smiles were masks to hide her tears and I my precious art so rich so rare lost lost to me what could my heart but break oh as I lay and wrestled with despair I could have killed myself but for her sake by luck I had some pictures I could sell and so we fought the wolf back from the door she painted too I wonderfully well we often dreamed of brighter days in store and then quite suddenly she seemed to fail I saw the shadows darken round her eyes so tired she was so sorrowful so pale and oh there came a day she could not rise the doctor looked at her he shook his head and spoke of wine and grapes and southern air if you can get her out of this he said she'll have a fighting chance with proper care with proper care he had gone away I sat there trembling twitching dazed with grief under my old and ragged coat she lay our room was bare and cold beyond belief maybe I thought I still can paint a bit some lilies, landscape anything at all alas my brush I could not steady it down from my fumbling hand I let it fall with proper care how could I give her that half of me dead I crawled down to the street cowering beside the wall I held my hat and begged of everyone I chance to meet I got some pennies bought her milk and bread and so I fought to keep the doom away and yet I saw with agony of dread my dear one sinking sinking day by day and then I was awakened in the night please take my hands I'm cold I heard her sigh and soft she whispered as she held me tight oh daddy we've been happy you and I I do not think she suffered any pain she breathed so quietly but though I tried I could not warm her little hands again and so there in the icy dark she died the dawn came groping in with fingers gray and touched me sitting silent as a stone I kissed those piteous lips as cold as clay I did not cry I did not even moan at last I rose groped down the narrow stair an evil fog was oozing from the sky half crazed I stumbled on I knew not where like phantoms were the folks that passed me by how long I wandered thus I do not know but suddenly I halted stood stuck still beside a door that spilled a golden glow I saw a name my name upon a bill a sale of famous pictures so it read a notable collection each a gem distinguished works of art by painters dead the folks were going in I followed them I stood upon the outskirts of the crowd I only hoped that none might notice me soon I heard them call my name aloud a David Strong his Fettin' Brittany a brave big picture that the best I've done it glowed it kindled half the hall away with all its memories of sea and sun of pipe and bowl of joyous work and play I saw the sardine nets blue as the sky I saw the nut-brown fissure boats put out five hundred pounds wrapped out a voice nearby six hundred seven eight and then a shout a thousand pounds oh how I thrilled to hear oh how the bids went up by leaps by bounds and then a silence then the auctioneer it's going going gone three thousand pounds three thousand pounds a frenzy leapt in me that picture's mine I cried I'm David Strong I painted it this famished wretch you see I did it I and sold it for a song and in a garret three small hours ago my daughter died for want of Christian care look look at me is it to mark my woe you pay three thousand for my picture there oh god I stumbled blindly from the hall the city crashed on me the fiendish sounds of cruelty and strife but over all three thousand pounds I heard three thousand pounds there that's my story sir tisn't very gay tales of the poor are never very bright you look for me next time you pass this way I hope you'll find me sir good night good night end of book two early summer part two this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org reading by Kristen Hughes ballads of a Bohemian by Robert W. Service book two early summer part three the Luxembourg, June 1914 on a late afternoon when the sunlight is mellow on the leaves I often sit near the Fontaine de Medici and watch the children at their play sometimes I make bits of verse about them such as dead up into the sky I stare all the little stars I see and I know that God is there oh how lonely he must be me I laugh and leap all day till my head begins to nod he's so great he cannot play I am glad I am not God poor kind God upon his throne up there in the sky so blue always always all alone please dear God I pity you or else sitting on the terrace of a cafe on the Bourmiche I sip slowly a Dubinet or a Bur and the charm of the quarter possesses me I think of men who have lived and loved there who have groveled and gloried who have drunk deep and died and then I scribble things like this God's in the gutter I dreamed I saw three Demigods who in a cafe sat and one was small and crapless and one was large and fat and one was eaten up with vice and verminous at that the first he spoke of secret sins and gems and perfumes rare and velvet cats and cordisans voluptuously fair who is this Sibirite I asked they answered Baudelaire the second talked in tapestries by fantasy beguiled as frail as bubbles hard as gems his pageantries he piled this lord of language who is he they whispered ask a wild the third was staring at his glass from out abysmal pain with tears his eyes were bitten in beneath his bulbous brain who is the sodden wretch I said they told me Paul Volaine oh wild Volaine and Baudelaire their lips were wet with wine oh poser pimp and libertine oh cynic sart and swine oh votaries of velvet vice oh gods of light divine oh Baudelaire Volaine and wild they knew the sinks of shame their sun aspiring wings they scorched at passions alterflame yet low and throned and skyed they stand immortal sons of fame I dreamed I saw three demigods who walked with feet of clay with cruel crosses on their backs along a miry way who climbed and climbed the bitter steep to which men turn and pray and while I'm on the subject of the quarter let me repeat this which is included in my ballads of the boulevards the death of Marie Toro we're taking Marie Toro to her home in Pelliches we're taking Marie Toro to her last resting place behold her hearse has hung with wreaths till everything is hid except the blossoms heaping high upon her coffin lid a week ago she roamed the street a draggle and a slut a byword of the boulevard and everybody's butt a week ago she haunted us we heard her whining cry we brushed aside the broken blooms she pestered us to buy a week ago she had not where to rest her weary head but now oh follow follow on for Marie Toro's dead oh Marie she was once a queen ah yes a queen of queens high throned above the carnival she held her splendid sway for four and twenty crashing hours she knew what glory means the cheers of half a million throats the delir of a day yet she was only one of us a little sewing girl though far the loveliest and best of all our laughing band then fortune beckoned off she danced amid the dizzy whirl and we who once might kiss her cheek were proud to kiss her hand for swiftly as a star she soared she had her every wish we saw her roped with pearls of price with princes at her call and yet and yet I think her dreams were of the old boulemiche and yet I'm sure within her heart she loved us best of all for one night in the purple pig upon the rue Saint-Jacques we laughed and coiffed a limousine came swishing to the door then Raymond Joliqueur cried out its Queen Marie come back in satin clad to make us glad and witch our hearts once more but no her face was strangely sad and at the evening's end dear lads she said I love you all and when I'm far away remember oh remember little Marie is your friend and though the world may lie between I'm coming back some day and so she went and many a boy who's fought his way to fame can look back on the struggle of his garret days and bless the loyal heart the tender hand the providence that came to him and all in hour of need in sickness and distress time passed away she won their hearts in London, Moscow, Rome they worshiped her in Argentine adored her in Brazil we smoked our pipes and wondered when she might be coming home and then we learned the luck had turned the things were going ill her health had failed her beauty paled her lovers fled away and someone saw her in Peru a common drab at last so years went by and faces changed our beards were sadly gray and Marie Torreau's name became an echo of the past you know that old and withered man that derelict of art who for a paltry frank will make a crown sketch of you in slouching hat and shabby cloak he looks and is the part a sod and old bohemian without a single sue a boon companion of the days of rimbaud and valaine he broods and broods and choose the cut of bitter souvenirs beneath his mop of grizzled hair his cheeks are gouged with pain the saffron sockets of his eyes are hollowed out with tears well one night in the dark court's din I saw him in his place when suddenly the door was swung a woman halted there a woman cowering like a dog with white and haggard face a broken creature bent of spine a daughter of despair she looked and looked as to a breast she held some withered bloom too late too late they all are dead and gone I heard her say and once again her weary eyes went round and round the room not a one of all I used to know she turned to go away but quick I saw the old man start ah no he cried not all oh marie toro queen of queens don't you remember paul oh marie marie toro in my garret next to the sky where many a day and night I've crouched with not a crust to eat a picture hangs upon the wall a fortune couldn't buy a portrait of a girl whose face is pure and angel sweet sadly the woman looked at him alas it's true she said that little maid I knew her once it's long ago she's dead he went to her he laid his hand upon her wasted arm oh marie toro come with me though poor and sick am I for old time's sake I cannot bear to see you come to harm ah there are memories God knows that never never die too late she sighed I've lived my life of splendor and of shame I've been adored by men of power I've touched the highest height I've squandered gold like heaps of dirt oh I have played the game I've had my place within the sun and now I face the night look look you and see I'm lost to hope I live no matter how to drink and drink and so forget that's all I care for now and so she went her heedless way and all our help was vain she trailed along with tattered shawl and mud corroded skirt she nodded a crust and slept beneath the bridges of the Sain a garbage thing a composite of alcohol and dirt the students learned her story and the cafes knew her well the Pascal and the Pantheon the Souffleaux and Vachette she shuffled round the tables with the flowers she tried to sell a living mask of misery that no one will forget and then last week I missed her and found her in the street one morning early huddled down for it was freezing cold and when they raised her ragged shawl her face was still and sweet some bits of broken bloom were clutched within her icy hold that's all ah yes they say that saw her blue wide open eyes were beautiful with joy again a radiant surprise a week ago she begged for bread we've bought for her stone and a peaceful place in Père Lachaise where she'll be well alone she cost a king his crown they say oh wouldn't she be proud if she could see the wreaths today the coaches and the crowd so follow, follow follow on with slow and sober tread for Marie Torreau got a waif and queen of queens is dead end of book two early summer part three