Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 May 1878 — “Little Classics.” [ARTICLE]

“Little Classics.”

It was along about the kalends of May when Coriolanus went into the hall closet at the head of the stairs and brought forth a pair of his last-summer trousers. The mailed hand, that, “like an eagle in a dove-cote, fluttered the Voices in Corioli,” dropped with a gesture of despair when he beheld a yawning postern gate in the raiment, wkere breack or fissure there should have been none. To him, his true and honorable wife; the fair Virgilia, said: “Now the gods crown thee, Coriolanus, what appears to be the trouble with you?” “ Now the gods mend these trousers, oh my gracious silence,” replied Coriblanus. “See what a rent tho envious tooth of time has made.” Virgilia dropped her tender, beaming eyes and drew a heavy sigh as she turned and dived mournfully into the rag-bag to hunt for a patch. “My lord and husband,” she said, wearily dragging up bits of red flannel, tufts of raw cotton, scraps of calico, tags of carpet-rags, and finding nothing that would match the lavender trousers any nearer than a slab of seal-browu empress cloth, “ I’ve patched those trousers till my eyes and fingers ache at the sight of them. I would the immortal gods would send on Rome and to our house the one unending blessing of eternal piece. ” Coriolanus looked at her steadily for a moment, but couldn’t tell from her unrippled face whether she meant it or not. “And I, too, thou noble sister of Publicola,” he said, “I, too, thou moon of Rome, for my great soul, to tear invulnerable, is weary of the restless god of wore. ” Virgilia dropped the rag bag and looked up at him quickly, but he never smiled. “ Keno,” she said. “ Put it there,” he said, and then they both promised they would never bebave so like mouthing paragraphers again.— Burlington Hawk Eye.