Explore "Then and Now" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
A little time agone, a few brief years, / And there was peace within our beauteous borders; / Peace, and a prosperous people, and no fears / Of war and its disorders. / Pleasure was ruling goddess of our land; with her attendant Mirth / She led a jubilant, joy-seeking band about the riant earth.
Do you recall those laughing days, my Brothers, / And those long nights that trespassed on the dawn? / Those throngs of idle dancing maids and mothers / Who lilted on and on- / Card mad, wine flushed, bejewelled and half stripped, / Yet women whose sweet mouth had never sipped / From sin's black chalice-women good at heart / Who, in the winding maze of pleasure's mart, / Had lost the sun-kissed way to wholesome pleasures of an earlier day.