The Gauley mail was overdue When Jed who was to drive it through Cheat Mountain Pass to Staunton Run Got special word from Washington– In which a postal clerk inquired Why Mr. Kane who had been hired To drive the course at post haste rate Was not in yet, though three months late. And now on a high-glazed marble wall In the postal building Jed Kane’s scrawl Hangs framed in silver: “Respected Sir, You ask the reason and this be her– If the gable end blowed out of hell Straight into the drifts of a snow that fell Last fall on the ram’s horn point of Cheat It would take till Easter for brimstone heat To melt a horsepath. So I remain. Your obdt. svt., Jedson Kane.”
Source: Louise McNeill, Gauley Mountain (1939).