From Rude Rural Rhymes by Bob Adams, New York: The Macmillan Company; 1925; pp. 76-77.
JOHNNY APPLESEED
I’ll write, that he who runs may read,
A rhyme of Johnny Appleseed.
Men called him cracked, his ways were quaint,
He was a hero and a saint.
His praise the heavenly chorus sings
While all the angles flap their wings.
He left the town, the beaten track,
With apple seeds upon his back,
And where he saw a likely site
He planted them to left and right;
Then lying on the ground at night
He thought of more unselfish schemes
And planted apples in his dreams.
May heaven send for modern need
More men like Johnny Appleseed.
He ate each day one fruit or more
But never threw away the core.
The seeds he rescued from his jaw
Blessed later gents he never saw,
And not a tree he ever stuck
Bore fruit that he would ever pluck,
But when our fathers emigranted
They found the young orchards ready planted.
[77]
What though your work men never know
And credit it to me or Joe,
Let’s do our darndest here below.
I too will twang the lyre again
To benefit my fellow-men.
I too will rise and write some rhymes
That folks may grin in these hard times.
And when discouraged, stumped and treed,
I’ll think of Johnny Appleseed.