Explore "The Hired Man and Floretty" by James Whitcomb Riley on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The Hired Man's supper, which he sat before, / In near reach of the wood-box, the stove-door / And one leaf of the kitchen-table, was / Somewhat belated, and in lifted pause / His dextrous knife was balancing a bit / Of fried mush near the port awaiting it.
At the glad children's advent -- gladder still / To find _him_ there -- "Jest tickled fit to kill / To see ye all! " he said, with unctious cheer. -- / "I'm tryin'-like to he'p Floretty here / To git things cleared away and give ye room / Accordin' to yer stren'th. But I p'sume / It's a pore boarder, as the poet says, / That quarrels with his victuals, so I guess / I'll take another wedge o' that-air cake, / Florett', that you're a-_learnin_' how to bake."