TO GERALD STANLEY LEE “Let him sing to me Who sees the watching of the stars above the day, Who hears the singing of the sunrise On its way Through all the night.
Let him sing to me Who is the sky-voice, the thunder-lover, Who hears above the winds’ fast flying shrouds The drifted darkness, the heavenly strife, The singing on the sunny sides of all the clouds Of his own life.”
“Yes, I’m shif’less. I’m gen’ally considered shif’less,” said William Benslow. He spoke in a tone of satisfaction, and hitched his trousers skilfully into place by their one suspender.
His companion shifted his easel a little, squinting across the harbor at the changing light. There was a mysterious green in the water that he failed to find in his color-box.
William Benslow watched him patiently. “Kind o’ ticklish business, ain’t it?” he said.
The artist admitted that it was.
“I reckon I wouldn’t ever ’a’ done for a painter,” said the old man, readjusting his legs. “It’s settin’-work, and that’s good; but you have to keep at it steady-lik