To My Friends And Critics
Come all you friends and critics,
And listen to my song,
A word I will say to you,
It will not take me long,
The people talks about me,
They've nothing else to do
But to criticise their neighbors,
And they have me now in view.
Perhaps they talk for meanness,
And perhaps it is in jest,
If they leave out their freeness
It would suit me now the best,
To keep the good old maxim
I find it hard to do,
That is to do to others
As you wish them do to you.
Perhaps you've read the papers
Containing my interview;
I hope you kind good people
Will not believe it true.
Some Editors of the papers
They thought it would be wise
To write a column about me,
So they filled it up with lies.
The papers have ridiculed me
A year and a half or more.
Such slander as the interview
I never read before.
Some reporters and editors
Are versed in telling lies.
Others it seems are willing
To let industry rise.
The people of good judgment
Will read the papers through,
And not rely on its truth
Without a candid view.
My first attempt at literature
Is the "Sweet Singer" by name,
I wrote that book without a thought
Of the future, or of fame.
Dear Friends, I write for money,
With a kind heart and hand,
I wish to make no Enemies
Throughout my native land.
Kind friends, now I close my rhyme,
And lay my pen aside,
Between me and my critics
I leave you to decide.
The Author's Early Life
I will write a sketch of my early life,
It will be of childhood day,
And all who chance to read it,
No criticism, pray.
My childhood days were happy,
And it fills my heart with woe,
To muse o'er the days that have passed by
And the scenes of long ago.
In the days of my early childhood,
Kent county was quite wild,
Especially the towns I lived in
When I was a little child.
I will not speak of my birthplace,
For if you will only look
O'er the little poem, My Childhood Days,
That is in this little book.
I am not ashamed of my birthright,
Though it was of poor estate,
Many a poor person in our land
Has risen to be great.
My parents were poor, I know, kind friends,
But that is no disgrace;
They were honorable and respected
Throughout my native place.
My mother was an invalid,
And was for many a year,
And I being the eldest daughter
Her life I had to cheer.
I had two little sisters,
And a brother which made three,
And dear mother being sickly,
Their care it fell on me.
My parents moved to Algoma
Near twenty-three years ago,
And bought one hundred acres of land,
That's a good sized farm you know.
It was then a wilderness,
With tall forest trees abound,
And it was four miles from a village,
Or any other town.
And it was two miles from a schoolhouse,
That's the distance I had to go,
And how many times I traveled
Through summer suns and winter snow.
How well do I remember
Going to school many a morn,
Both in summer and in winter,
Through many a heavy storm.
My heart was gay and happy,
This was ever in my mind,
There is better times a coming,
And I hope some day to find
Myself capable of composing.
It was by heart's delight,
To compose on a sentimental subject
If it came in my mind just right.
If I went to school half the time,
It was all that I could do;
It seems very strange to me sometimes,
And it may seem strange to you.
It was natural for me to compose,
And put words into rhyme,
And the success of my first work
Is this little song book of mine.
My childhood days have passed and gone,
And it fills my heart with pain
To think that youth will nevermore
Return to me again.
And now kind friends, what I have wrote,
I hope you will pass o'er,
And not criticise as some have done,
Hitherto herebefore.
