Explore "The Pathos of Applause" by James Whitcomb Riley on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The greeting of the company throughout / Was like a jubilee, -- the children's shout / And fusillading hand-claps, with great guns / And detonations of the older ones, / Raged to such tumult of tempestuous joy, / It even more alarmed than pleased the boy; / Till, with a sudden twitching lip, he slid / Down to the floor and dodged across and hid / His face against his mother as she raised / Him to the shelter of her heart, and praised / His story in low whisperings, and smoothed / The "amber-colored hair," and kissed, and soothed / And lulled him back to sweet tranquillity -- / "And 'ats a sign 'at you're the Ma fer me!"
He lisped, with gurgling ecstasy, and drew / Her closer, with shut eyes; and feeling, too, / If he could only _purr_ now like a cat, / He would undoubtedly be doing that!