The Calf Path

-Sam Walter Foss

One day, through the primeval wood,
A calf walked home as good calves should;
But made a trail all bent askew,
A crooked trail as all calves do.

Since then two hundred years have fled,
And I infer the calf is dead.
But still he left behind his trail,
And thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up next day
By a lone dog that passed that way;
And then a wise bell-wether sheep,
Pursued the trail o'er vale and steep,
And drew the flock behind him, too,
As good bell-wethers always do.

And from that day o'er hill and glade,
Through these old wood a path was made;
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged and turned and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath
Because 'twas such a crooked path,
but still they followed-do not laugh-
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way staled.
Because he wobbled when he walked.

This forest path became a lane
That bent, and turned, and turned again;
This crooked lane became a road,
Where many a poor horse with his load
Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
And travelled some three miles in one.

And thus a century and a half
They trod the footsteps of that calf.

The years passed on in swiftness fleet,
The road became a village street;
And this, before men were aware,
A city's crowded thoroughfare;
And soon the central street was this
of a renowned metropolis;
And men two centuries and a half
Trod in the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand rout
Followed the zigzag calf about;
And o'er his crooked journey went
The traffic of a continent.
A hundred thousand men were led
By one calf near three centuries dead;
They followed still his crooked way;
And lost one hundred years a day;
For thus such reverence is lent
To a well-established precedent.

But how the wise old wood-gods laugh
Who saw the first primeval calf!
And many things this tale might teach--
But I am not ordained to preach.