of the Captains, the rotund babble of
prosperity,
(Prosperity for whom? Nay, ask not troublesome questions!)
The Captains' vaunting I heard, their boasts of glory and victory,
While red, red, red their hands dripped red with the blood of the
butchered workers.
I heard the Judges' self-glorification, Quixotic fighting of
windmills,
Heard also the unclean jests that those respected Leaders told.
And as I looked and listened, I still observed the Socialist,
Unmoved and patient and serious, calm, full of sober reflections.

Then there spake (among many others) an honored and full-paunched
Bishop.
Rubicund he was, and of portly habit of body,
Shepherd of a well-pastured flock, mightily content with God,
Out of whose omnipotent Hand (no doubt) the blessings of his life
descended.
I heard this exponent of Christ the Crucified, Christ the Carpenter,
Christ the Leader of Workingmen, the Agitator, the Disturber,
Christ the Labor-organizer, Christ the Archetypal Socialist,
Friend of the dwellers in the pits of Life, Consoler of earth's
exploited,
Who once with the lash scourged from the Temple the unclean
graft-brood of usurers.
And the rotund Bishop's words were as the crackling of dry thorns
Under a pot, bubbling without use in the desert of dreary
platitudes.
The story he told was spiced and garnished with profane words,
Whereat the Leaders laughed in their cups, making great show of
merriment,
So that the banquet-hall rang, and wine was spilt on the linen.
Wine as red as blood--the blood of the shattered miner,
Blood of the boy in the rifle-pits, blood of the coughing
child-slave,
Blood of the mangled trainman, blood that the Carpenter shed.

And still I watched the Socialist. Sober, judicial, observant
And full of greater wisdom he was than to laugh with the tipsy
Leaders.
His eyes were fixed on the Bishop, vice-regent of God upon earth.
And as I watched the Socialist, the unmoved, the contemplative one,
He thoughtfully took his pencil, he took the fine and large card
Whereon the names of the rich foods and all the costly wines were
printed,
And made a few notes of the feast, notes of the Bishop's speech,
Notes to remind him to search the slums for the great, God-given
prosperity,
W