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166 That in this vale of tears not even
 * A Riker is complete perfection,

A most romantic detestation Of power and place, of pay and ration; A strange unwillingness to carry
 * The weight of honor on your shoulders,

For which you have been named, the very
 * Sensitive-plant of office-holders,

A shrinking bashfulness, whose grace Gives beauty to your manly face. Thus shades the green and glowing vine The rough bark of the mountain-pine, Thus round her freedom’s waking steel
 * Harmodius wreathed his country’s myrtle:

And thus the golden lemon’s peel
 * Gives fragrance to a bowl of turtle.

True, “many a flower,” the poet sings,
 * “Is born to blush unseen;”

But you, although you blush, are not
 * The flower the poets mean.

In vain you wooed a lowlier lot;
 * In vain you clipped your eagle-wings—

Talents like yours are not forgot
 * And buried with earth’s common things.

No! my dear Riker, I would give My laurels, living and to live, Or as much cash as you could raise on Their value, by hypothecation,