I met a King this afternoon!

I met a King this afternoon!

He had not on a Crown indeed,

A little Palm leaf Hat was all,

And he was barefoot, I'm afraid!

But sure I am he Ermine wore

Beneath his faded Jacket's blue –

And sure I am, the crest he bore

Within that Jacket's pocket too!

For 'twas too stately for an Earl –

A Marquis would not go so grand!

'Twas possibly a Czar petite –

A Pope, or something of that kind!

If I must tell you, of a Horse

My freckled Monarch held the rein –

Doubtless an estimable Beast,

But not at all disposed to run!

And such a wagon! While I live

Dare I presume to see

Another such a vehicle

As then transported me!

Two other ragged Princes

His royal state partook!

Doubtless the first excursion

These sovereigns ever took!

I question if the Royal Coach

Round which the Footmen wait

Has the significance, on high,

Of this Barefoot Estate!

                                                            - F 183 (1860) 

The poet seems to have met a raggedy and tattered man with his two boys traveling in an old wagon pulled by an old horse. But something about the pride or dignity in the man’s bearing must have struck her for he was “too stately for an Earl” and “A Marquis would not go so grand.”  Consider, though, the difference in the way Whitman describes a rustic man in  a lovely passage of “I Sing the Body Electric”:

I knew a man, a common farmer, the father of five sons,

And in them the fathers of sons, and in them the fathers of sons.

This man was a wonderful vigor, calmness, beauty of person,

The shape of his head, the pale yellow and white of his hair and

     beard, the immeasurable meaning of his black eyes, the richness

     and breadth of his manners,

             […]

When he went with his five sons and many grand-sons to hunt or fish,

     you would pick him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of

     the gang,

You would wish long and long to be with him, you would wish to sit

     by him in the boat that you and he might touch each other.

While Whitman is writing a tribute (and writing at about the same time as Dicknson), Dickinson seems to be making light of a poor man’s proud demeanor as she tosses out that he was “possibly a Czar petite – / A Pope, or something of that kind!” King, Czar, Pope – whatever. One pictures the poet smiling behind her hand and then running home to write a description down.

Modern Amherst citizens
might laugh at this man, too

            Here’s the picture: a barefoot freckled man with a rustic palm-leaf hat, a faded blue jacket, two ragged young sons who had seemingly never ventured far from home before, a dilapidated wagon, and an old horse “not at all disposed to run.” When she claims she was “transported” by the “vehicle” she is making a play on the double meanings of “conveyed” and “delighted.”

            I leave it to other readers to each determine whether or not she was writing in admiration of something she saw in the traveler or in mockery (as the raggedy group were probably out of place in the byways of tidy, prosperous Amherst). Nonetheless, she ends by saying that in Heaven this man and his family will have probably even more significance that a real king. And that is a very democratic thing to say so we will forgive Dickinson the giggles here.