VIII.

But I from missals, quaintly bound, With cither and with clavichord Will sing her songs of sovran sound: Belike her pity will afford Such faint return as suits a saint So sweetly done in verse and paint.

FROM 'THE TAMING OF THEMISTOCLES.'

(WILLIAM MORRIS)

'He must be holpen; yet how help shall I, Steeped to the lips in ancient misery, And by the newer grief apparellèd? If that I throw these ashes on mine head, Do this thing for thee,--while about my way A shadow gathers, and the piteous day, So wan and bleak for very loneliness, Turneth from sight of such untruthfulness?' Therewith he caught an arrow from the sheaf, And brake the shaft in witlessness of grief; But Chiton's vest, such dismal fear she had, Shook from the heart that sorely was a-drad, And she began, withouten any pause, To say: 'Why break the old Ætolian laws? Send this man forth, that never harm hath done, Between the risen and the setten sun.'

And next, they wandered to a steepy hill, Whence all the land was lying grey and still, And not a living creature there might be From the cold mountains to the salt, cold sea; Only, within a little cove, one sail Shook, as it whimpered at the cruel gale, And the mast moaned from chafing of the rope; So all was pain: they saw not any hope.

ALL OR NOTHING.

(EMERSON)

Whoso answers my questions Knoweth more than me; Hunger is but knowledge In a less degree: Prophet, priest, and poet Oft prevaricate, And the surest sentence Hath the greatest weight.

When upon my gaiters Drops the morning dew, Somewhat of Life's riddle Soaks my spirit through. I am buskined by the goddess Of Monadnock's crest, And my wings extended Touch the East and West.

Or ever coal was hardened In the cells of earth, Or flowed the founts of Bourbon, Lo! I had my birth. I am crowned coeval With the Saurian eggs, And my fancy firmly Stands on its own legs.

Wouldst thou know the secret Of the barberry-bush, Catch the slippery whistle Of the moulting thrush, Dance upon the mushrooms, Dive beneath the sea, Or anything else remarkable, Thou must follow me!

THE BALLAD OF HIRAM HOVER.

(WHITTIER)

Where the Moosatockmaguntic Pours its waters in the Skuntic, Met, along the forest-side, Hiram Hover, Huldah Hyde.

She, a maiden fair and dapper, He, a red-haired, stalwart trapper, Hunting beaver, mink, and skunk, In the woodlands of Squeedunk.

She, Pentucket's pensive daughter, Walked beside the Skuntic water, Gathering, in her apron wet, Snakeroot, mint, and bouncing-bet.

'Why,' he murmured, loath to leave her, 'Gather yarbs for chills and fever, When a lovyer, bold and true, Only waits to gather you?'

'Go,' she answered, 'I'm not hasty; I prefer a man more tasty: Leastways, one to please me well Should not have a beasty smell.'

'Haughty Huldah!' Hiram answered; 'Mind and heart alike are cancered: Jest look here! these peltries give Cash, wherefrom a pair may live.

'I, you think, am but a vagrant, Trapping beasts by no means fragrant: Yet--I'm sure it's worth a thank-- I've a handsome sum in bank.'

Turned and vanished Hiram Hover; And, before the year was over, Huldah, with the yarbs she sold, Bought a cape, against the cold.

Black and thick the furry cape was; Of a stylish cut the shape was, And the girls, in all the town, Envied Huldah up and down.

Then, at last, one winter morning, Hiram came, without a warning: 'Either,' said he, 'you are blind, Huldah, or you've changed your mind.

'Me you snub for trapping varmints, Yet you take the skins for garments: Since you wear the skunk and mink, There's no harm in me, I think.'

'Well,' she said, 'we will not quarrel, Hiram: I accept the moral, Now the fashion's so, I guess I can't hardly do no less.'

Thus the trouble all was over Of the love of Hiram Hover; Thus he made sweet Huldah Hyde Huldah Hover as his bride.

Love employs, with equal favour, Things of good and evil savour; That, which first appeared to part, Warmed, at last, the maiden's heart.

Under one impartial banner, Life, the hunter, Love, the tanner, Draw, from every beast they snare, Comfort for a wedded pair!

THE SEWING-MACHINE.

(LONGFELLOW)

A strange vibration from the cottage window My vagrant steps delayed, And half abstracted, like an ancient Hindoo, I paused beneath the shade.

What is, I said, this unremitted humming, Louder than bees in spring? As unto prayer the murmurous answer coming, Shed from Sandalphon's wing.

Is this the sound of unimpeded labour, That now usurpeth play? Our harsher substitute for pipe and tabor, Ghittern and virelay?

Or, is it yearning for a higher vision, By spiritual hearing heard? Nearer I drew, to listen with precision, Detecting not a word.

Then, peering through the pane, as men of sin do, Myself the while unseen, I marked a maiden seated by the window, Sewing with a machine.

Her gentle foot propelled the tireless treadle, Her gentle hand the seam: My fancy said, it were a bliss to peddle Those shirts, as in a dream!

Her lovely fingers lent to yoke and collar Some imperceptible taste; The rural swain, who buys it for a dollar, By beauty is embraced.

O fairer aspect of the common mission! Only the Poet sees The true significance, the high position Of such small things as these.

Not now doth Toil, a brutal Boanerges, Deform the maiden's hand; Her implement its soft sonata merges In songs of sea and land.

And thus the hum of the unspooling cotton, Blent with her rhythmic tread, Shall still be heard, when virelays are forgotten, And troubadours are dead.

MORTIMER COLLINS.

IF.

(SWINBURNE)

If life were never bitter, And love were always sweet, Then who would care to borrow A moral from to-morrow-- If Thames would always glitter, And joy would ne'er retreat, If life were never bitter, And love were always sweet?

If Care were not the waiter Behind a fellow's chair, When easy-going sinners Sit down to Richmond dinners, And life's swift stream flows straighter-- By Jove, it would be rare If Care were not the waiter Behind a fellow's chair.

If wit were always radiant, And wine were always iced, And bores were kicked out straightway Through a convenient gateway; Then down the years' long gradient 'Twere sad to be enticed; If wit were always radiant, And wine were always iced.

SALAD.

(SWINBURNE)

_Brow._

O cool in the summer is salad, And warm in the winter is love; And a poet shall sing you a ballad Delicious thereon and thereof. A singer am I, if no sinner, My Muse has a marvellous wing, And I willingly worship at dinner The Sirens of Spring.

Take endive... like love it is bitter; Take beet... for like love it is red; Crisp leaf of the lettuce shall glitter, And cress from the rivulet's bed; Anchovies foam-born, like the Lady Whose beauty has maddened this bard; And olives, from groves that are shady; And eggs--boil 'em hard.

(R. BROWNING)

_Beard._

Waitress, with eyes so marvellous black, And the blackest possible lustrous gay tress, This is the month of the Zodiac When I want a pretty deft-handed waitress. Bring a china-bowl, you merry young soul; Bring anything green, from worsted to celery; Bring pure olive-oil, from Italy's soil... Then your china-bowl we'll well array. When the time arrives chip choicest chives, And administer quietly chili and capsicum... (Young girls do not quite know what 's what Till as a Poet into their laps I come). Then a lobster fresh as fresh can be (When it screams in the pot I feel a murderer); After which I fancy we Shall want a few bottles of Heidsieck or Roederer.

(TENNYSON)

_Hair._

King Arthur, growing very tired indeed Of wild Tintagel, now that Lancelot Had gone to Jersey or to Jericho, And there was nobody to make a rhyme, And Cornish girls were christened Jennifer, And the Round Table had grown rickety, Said unto Merlin (who had been asleep For a few centuries in Broceliande, But woke, and had a bath, and felt refreshed): 'What shall I do to pull myself together?' Quoth Merlin, 'Salad is the very thing, And you can get it at the "Cheshire Cheese."' King Arthur went there: _verily_, I believe That he has dined there every day since then. Have you not marked the portly gentleman In his cool corner, with his plate of greens? The great knight Lancelot prefers the 'Cock,' Where port is excellent (in pints), and waiters Are portlier than kings, and steaks are tender, And poets have been known to meditate... Ox-fed orating ominous octastichs.

ROBERT BARNABAS BROUGH.

I'M A SHRIMP.

('I'M AFLOAT, I'M AFLOAT')

I'm a shrimp! I'm a shrimp, of diminutive size: Inspect my antennæ, and look at my eyes; I'm a natural syphon, when dipped in a cup, For I drain the contents to the latest drop up. I care not for craw-fish, I heed not the prawn, From a flavour especial my fame has been drawn; Nor e'en to the crab or the lobster do yield, When I'm properly cook'd and efficiently peeled. Quick! quick! pile the coals--let your saucepan be deep, For the weather is warm, and I'm sure not to keep; Off, off with my head--split my shell into three-- I'm a shrimp! I'm a shrimp--to be eaten with tea.

DANTE, GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

MACCRACKEN.

(TENNYSON)

Getting his pictures, like his supper, cheap, Far, far away in Belfast by the sea, His watchful one-eyed uninvaded sleep MacCracken sleepeth. While the P.R.B. Must keep the shady side, he walks a swell Through spungings of perennial growth and height: And far away in Belfast out of sight, By many an open do and secret sell, Fresh daubers he makes shift to scarify, And fleece with pliant shears the slumbering 'green.' There he has lied, though aged, and will lie, Fattening on ill-got pictures in his sleep, Till some Preraphael prove for him too deep. Then, once by Hunt and Ruskin to be seen, Insolvent he will turn, and in the Queen's Bench die.

THE BROTHERS.

_By a Scotch Bard and English Reviewer._

(TENNYSON)

I am two brothers with one face, So which is the real man who can trace? (My wrongs are raging inside of me.) Here are some poets and they sell, Therefore revenge becomes me well. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

Of course you know it's a burning shame, But of my last books the press makes game! (My wrongs are boiling inside of me.) So at least all other bards I'll slate Till no one sells but the Laureate. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

I took a beast of a poet's tome And nailed a cheque, and brought them home; (My wrongs were howling inside of me.) And after supper, in lieu of bed, I wound wet towels round my head. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

Of eyelids kissed and all the rest, And rosy cheeks that lie on one's breast, (My wrongs were yelling inside of me.) I told the worst that pen can tell,-- And Strahan and Company loved me well. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

I crowed out loud in the silent night, I made my digs so sharp and bright: (My wrongs were gnashing inside of me.) In our Contemptible Review I struck the beggar through and through. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

I tanned his hide and combed his head, And that bard, for one, I left for dead. (My wrongs are hooting inside of me.) And now he's wrapped in a printer's sheet, Let's fling him at our Public's feet. (Oh Robert-Thomas is dread to see.)

CHARLES STUART CALVERLEY.

ODE TO TOBACCO.

(LONGFELLOW)

Thou who, when fears attack, Bid'st them avaunt, and Black Care, at the horseman's back Perching, unseatest; Sweet when the morn is grey; Sweet, when they've cleared away Lunch; and at close of day Possibly sweetest:

I have a liking old For thee, though manifold Stories, I know, are told, Not to thy credit; How one (or two at most) Drops make a cat a ghost-- Useless, except to roast-- Doctors have said it:

How they who use fusees All grow by slow degrees Brainless as chimpanzees, Meagre as lizards; Go mad, and beat their wives; Plunge (after shocking lives) Razors and carving knives Into their gizzards.

Confound such knavish tricks! Yet know I five or six Smokers who freely mix Still with their neighbours; Jones--who, I'm glad to say, Asked leave of Mrs. J.-- Daily absorbs a clay After his labours.

Cats may have had their goose Cooked by tobacco-juice; Still why deny its use Thoughtfully taken? We're not as tabbies are: Smith, take a fresh cigar! Jones, the tobacco-jar! Here's to thee, Bacon!

BEER.

(BYRON)

In those old days which poets say were golden-- (Perhaps they laid the gilding on themselves: And, if they did, I'm all the more beholden To those brown dwellers in my dusty shelves, Who talk to me 'in language quaint and olden' Of gods and demigods and fauns and elves, Pan with his pipes, and Bacchus with his leopards, And staid young goddesses who flirt with shepherds:)

In those old days, the Nymph called Etiquette (Appalling thought to dwell on) was not born. They had their May, but no Mayfair as yet, No fashions varying as the hues of morn. Just as they pleased they dressed and drank and ate, Sang hymns to Ceres (their John Barleycorn) And danced unchaperoned, and laughed unchecked, And were no doubt extremely incorrect.

Yet do I think their theory was pleasant: And oft, I own, my 'wayward fancy roams' Back to those times, so different from the present; When no one smoked cigars, nor gave At-homes, Nor smote a billiard-ball, nor winged a pheasant, Nor 'did' their hair by means of long-tailed combs, Nor migrated to Brighton once a year, Nor--most astonishing of all--drank Beer.

No, they did not drink Beer, 'which brings me to' (As Gilpin said) 'the middle of my song.' Not that 'the middle' is precisely true, Or else I should not tax your patience long: If I had said 'beginning' it might do; But I have a dislike to quoting wrong: I was unlucky--sinned against, not sinning-- When Cowper wrote down 'middle' for 'beginning.'

So to proceed. That abstinence from Malt Has always struck me as extremely curious. The Greek mind must have had some vital fault, That they should stick to liquors so injurious-- (Wine, water, tempered p'raps with Attic salt)-- And not at once invent that mild, luxurious, And artful beverage, Beer. How the digestion Got on without it, is a startling question.

Had they digestions? and an actual body Such as dyspepsia might make attacks on? Were they abstract ideas--(like Tom Noddy And Mr. Briggs)--or men, like Jones and Jackson? Then Nectar--was that beer, or whisky-toddy? Some say the Gaelic mixture, _I_ the Saxon: I think a strict adherence to the latter Might make some Scots less pigheaded, and fatter.

Besides, Bon Gaultier definitely shows That the real beverage for feasting gods on Is a soft compound, grateful to the nose And also to the palate, known as 'Hodgson.' I know a man--a tailor's son--who rose To be a peer: and this I would lay odds on, (Though in his Memoirs it may not appear,) That that man owed his rise to copious Beer.

O Beer! O Hodgson, Guinness, Allsopp, Bass! Names that should be on every infant's tongue! Shall days and months and years and centuries pass, And still your merits be unrecked, unsung? Oh! I have gazed into my foaming glass, And wished that lyre could yet again be strung Which once rang prophet-like through Greece, and taught her Misguided sons that 'the best drink was water.'

How would he now recant that wild opinion, And sing--as would that I could sing--of you! I was not born (alas!) the 'Muses' minion,' I'm not poetical, not even blue: And he (we know) but strives with waxen pinion, Whoe'er he is that entertains the view Of emulating Pindar, and will be Sponsor at last to some now nameless sea.

Oh! when the green slopes of Arcadia burned With all the lustre of the dying day, And on Cithaeron's brow the reaper turned, (Humming, of course, in his delightful way, How Lycidas was dead, and how concerned The Nymphs were when they saw his lifeless clay; And how rock told to rock the dreadful story That poor young Lycidas was gone to glory:)

What would that lone and labouring soul have given, At that soft moment, for a pewter pot! How had the mists that dimmed his eye been riven, And Lycidas and sorrow all forgot! If his own grandmother had died unshriven, In two short seconds he'd have recked it not; Such power hath Beer. The heart which Grief hath canker'd Hath one unfailing remedy--the Tankard.

Coffee is good, and so no doubt is cocoa; Tea did for Johnson and the Chinamen: When 'Dulce est desipere in loco' Was written, real Falernian winged the pen. When a rapt audience has encored 'Fra Poco' Or 'Casta Diva,' I have heard that then The Prima Donna, smiling herself out, Recruits her flagging powers with bottled stout.

But what is coffee, but a noxious berry, Born to keep used-up Londoners awake? What is Falernian, what is Port or Sherry, But vile concoctions to make dull heads ache? Nay stout itself--(though good with oysters, very)-- Is not a thing your reading man should take. He that would shine, and petrify his tutor, Should drink draught Allsopp in its 'native pewter.'

But hark! a sound is stealing on my ear-- A soft and silvery sound--I know it well. Its tinkling tells me that a time is near Precious to me--it is the Dinner Bell. O blessed Bell! Thou bringest beef and beer, Thou bringest good things more than tongue may tell: Seared is (of course) my heart--but unsubdued Is, and shall be, my appetite for food.

I go. Untaught and feeble is my pen: But on one statement I may safely venture: That few of our most highly gifted men Have more appreciation of the trencher. I go. One pound of British beef, and then What Mr. Swiveller called 'a modest quencher'; That, home-returning, I may 'soothly say,' 'Fate cannot touch me: I have dined to-day.'

WANDERERS.

(TENNYSON)

As o'er the hill we roam'd at will, My dog and I together, We mark'd a chaise, by two bright bays Slow-moved along the heather:

Two bays arch-neck'd, with tails erect And gold upon their blinkers; And by their side an ass I spied; It was a travelling tinker's.

The chaise went by, nor aught cared I; Such things are not in my way; I turn'd me to the tinker, who Was loafing down a by-way:

I ask'd him where he lived--a stare Was all I got in answer, As on he trudged: I rightly judged The stare said, 'Where I can, sir.'

I ask'd him if he'd take a whiff Of 'bacco; he acceded; He grew communicative too, (A pipe was all he needed,) Till of the tinker's life, I think, I knew as much as he did.

'I loiter down by thorp and town, For any job I'm willing; Take here and there a dusty brown, And here and there a shilling.

'I deal in every ware in turn, I've rings for buddin' Sally That sparkle like those eyes of her'n; I've liquor for the valet.

'I steal from th' parson's strawberry-plots, I hide by th' squire's covers; I teach the sweet young housemaids what's The art of trapping lovers.

'The things I've done 'neath moon and stars Have got me into messes: I've seen the sky through prison bars, I've torn up prison dresses:

'I've sat, I've sigh'd, I've gloom'd, I've glanced With envy at the swallows That through the window slid, and danced (Quite happy) round the gallows;

'But out again I come, and show My face nor care a stiver, For trades are brisk and trades are slow, But mine goes on for ever.'

Thus on he prattled like a babbling brook. Then I, 'The sun hath slipped behind the hill, And my aunt Vivian dines at half-past six.' So in all love we parted; I to the Hall, They to the village. It was noised next noon That chickens had been miss'd at Syllabub Farm.

PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY.

(TUPPER)

INTRODUCTORY.

Art thou beautiful, O my daughter, as the budding rose of April? Are all thy motions music, and is poetry throned in thine eye? Then hearken unto me; and I will make the bud a fair flower, I will plant it upon the bank of Elegance, and water it with the water of Cologne; And in the season it shall 'come out,' yea bloom, the pride of the parterre; Ladies shall marvel at its beauty, and a Lord shall pluck it at the last.

OF PROPRIETY.

Study first Propriety: for she is indeed the Polestar Which shall guide the artless maiden through the mazes of Vanity Fair; Nay, she is the golden chain which holdeth together Society; The lamp by whose light young Psyche shall approach unblamed her Eros. Verily Truth is as Eve, which was ashamed being naked; Wherefore doth Propriety dress her with the fair foliage of artifice: And when she is drest, behold! she knoweth not herself again.-- I walked in the Forest; and above me stood the yew, Stood like a slumbering giants shrouded in impenetrable shade; Then I pass'd into the citizen's garden, and marked a tree clipt into shape, (The giant's locks had been shorn by the Dalilah-shears of Decorum;) And I said, 'Surely nature is goodly; but how much goodlier is Art!' I heard the wild notes of the lark floating far over the blue sky, And my foolish heart went after him, and, lo! I blessed him as he rose; Foolish! for far better is the trained boudoir bullfinch, Which pipeth the semblance of a tune, and mechanically draweth up water: And the reinless steed of the desert, though his neck be clothed with thunder, Must yield to him that danceth and 'moveth in the circles' at Astley's. For verily, O my daughter, the world is a masquerade, And God made thee one thing, that thou mightest make thyself another: A maiden's heart is as champagne, ever aspiring and struggling upwards, And it needed that its motions be checked by the silvered cork of Propriety: He that can afford the price, his be the precious treasure, Let him drink deeply of its sweetness, nor grumble if it tasteth of the cork.

OF FRIENDSHIP.

Choose judiciously thy friends; for to discard them is undesirable, Yet it is better to drop thy friends, O my daughter, than to drop thy 'H's.' Dost thou know a wise woman? yea, wiser than the children of light? Hath she a position? and a title? and are her parties in the _Morning Post_? If thou dost, cleave unto her, and give up unto her thy body and mind; Think with her ideas, and distribute thy smiles at her bidding: So shalt thou become like unto her; and thy manners shall be 'formed,' And thy name shall be a Sesame, at which the doors of the great shall fly open: Thou shalt know every Peer, his arms, and the date of his creation, His pedigree and their intermarriages, and cousins to the sixth remove: Thou shalt kiss the hand of Royalty, and lo! in next morning's papers, Side by side with rumours of wars, and stories of shipwrecks and sieges, Shall appear thy name, and the minutiæ of thy head-dress and petticoat, For an enraptured public to muse upon over their matutinal muffin.

OF READING.

Read not Milton, for he is dry; nor Shakespeare, for he wrote of common life: Nor Scott, for his romances, though fascinating, are yet intelligible: Nor Thackeray, for he is a Hogarth, a photographer who flattereth not: Nor Kingsley, for he shall teach thee that thou shouldest not dream, but do. Read incessantly thy Burke; that Burke who, nobler than he of old, Treateth of the Peer and Peeress, the truly Sublime and Beautiful: Likewise study the 'creations' of 'the Prince of modern Romance'; Sigh over Leonard the Martyr, and smile on Pelham the puppy: Learn how 'love is the dram-drinking of existence'; And how we 'invoke, in the Gadara of our still closets, The beautiful ghost of the Ideal, with the simple wand of the pen.' Listen how Maltravers and the orphan 'forgot all but love,' And how Devereux's family chaplain 'made and unmade kings': How Eugene Aram, though a thief, a liar, and a murderer, Yet, being intellectual, was amongst the noblest of mankind. So shalt thou live in a world peopled with heroes and master-spirits; And if thou canst not realize the Ideal, thou shalt at least idealize the Real.

THE COCK AND THE BULL.

(BROWNING)

You see this pebble-stone? It's a thing I bought Of a bit of a chit of a boy i' the mid o' the day-- I like to dock the smaller parts-o'-speech, As we curtail the already cur-tail'd cur (You catch the paronomasia, play 'po' words?), Did, rather, i' the pre-Landseerian days. Well, to my muttons. I purchased the concern, And clapt it i' my poke, having given for same By way o' chop, swop, barter or exchange-- 'Chop' was my snickering dandiprat's own term-- One shilling and fourpence, current coin o' the realm. O-n-e one and f-o-u-r four Pence, one and fourpence--you are with me, sir?-- What hour it skills not: ten or eleven o' the clock, One day (and what a roaring day it was Go shop or sight-see--bar a spit o' rain!) In February, eighteen sixty nine, Alexandrina Victoria, Fidei Hm--hm--how runs the jargon? being on throne.

Such, sir, are all the facts, succinctly put, The basis or substratum--what you will-- Of the impending eighty thousand lines. 'Not much in 'em either,' quoth perhaps simple Hodge. But there's a superstructure. Wait a bit. Mark first the rationale of the thing: Hear logic rivel and levigate the deed. That shilling--and for matter o' that, the pence-- I had o' course upo' me--wi' me say-- (_Mecum's_ the Latin, make a note o' that) When I popp'd pen i' stand, scratch'd ear, wip'd snout, (Let everybody wipe his own himself) Sniff'd--tch!--at snuffbox; tumbled up, he-heed, Haw-haw'd (not hee-haw'd, that's another guess thing:) Then fumbled at, and stumbled out of, door, I shoved the timber ope wi' my omoplat; And _in vestibulo_, i' the lobby to-wit, (Iacobi Facciolati's rendering, sir,) Donn'd galligaskins, antigropeloes, And so forth; and, complete with hat and gloves, One on and one a-dangle i' my hand, And ombrifuge (Lord love you!), case o' rain, I flopp'd forth, 'sbuddikins! on my own ten toes, (I do assure you there be ten of them,) And went clump-clumping up hill and down dale To find myself o' the sudden i' front o' the boy. Put case I hadn't 'em on me, could I ha' bought This sort-o'-kind-o'-what-you-might-call toy, This pebble-thing, o' the boy-thing? Q.E.D. That's proven without aid from mumping Pope, Sleek porporate or bloated Cardinal. (Isn't it, old Fatchaps? You're in Euclid now.) So, having the shilling--having i' fact a lot-- And pence and halfpence, ever so many o' them, I purchased, as I think I said before, The pebble (_lapis, lapidis, -di, -dem, -de_-- What nouns 'crease short i' the genitive, Fatchaps, eh?) O' the boy, a bare-legg'd beggarly son of a gun, For one-and-fourpence. Here we are again.

Now Law steps in, bigwigg'd, voluminous-jaw'd; Investigates and re-investigates. Was the transaction illegal? Law shakes head. Perpend, sir, all the bearings of the case.

At first the coin was mine, the chattel his. But now (by virtue of the said exchange And barter) _vice versa_ all the coin, _Per juris operationem_, vests I' the boy and his assigns till ding o' doom; (_In sæcula sæculo-o-o-orum_; I think I hear the Abate mouth out that.) To have and hold the same to him and them.... _Confer_ some idiot on Conveyancing. Whereas the pebble and every part thereof, And all that appertained thereunto, _Quodcunque pertinet ad eam rem_, (I fancy, sir, my Latin's rather pat) Or shall, will, may, might, can, could, would or should, (_Subaudi cætera_--clap we to the close-- For what's the good of law in a case o' the kind) Is mine to all intents and purposes. This settled, I resume the thread o' the tale.

Now for a touch o' the vendor's quality. He says a gen'lman bought a pebble of him, (This pebble i' sooth, sir, which I hold i' my hand)-- And paid for't, _like_ a gen'lman, on the nail. 'Did I o'ercharge him a ha'penny? Devil a bit. Fiddlepin's end! Get out, you blazing ass! Gabble o' the goose. Don't bugaboo-baby _me_! Go double or quits? Yah! tittup! what's the odds?' --There's the transaction view'd i' the vendor's light.

Next ask that dumpled hag, stood snuffling by, With her three frowsy blowsy brats o' babes, The scum o' the kennel, cream o' the filth-heap--Faugh! Aie, aie, aie, aie! ὀτοτοτοτοτοῖ, ('Stead which we blurt out Hoighty toighty now)-- And the baker and candlestickmaker, and Jack and Gill, Blear'd Goody this and queasy Gaffer that. Ask the schoolmaster. Take schoolmaster first.

He saw a gentleman purchase of a lad A stone, and pay for it _rite_, on the square, And carry it off _per saltum_, jauntily, _Propria quæ maribus_, gentleman's property now (Agreeably to the law explain'd above), _In proprium usum_, for his private ends. The boy he chuck'd a brown i' the air, and bit I' the face the shilling: heaved a thumping stone At a lean hen that ran cluck clucking by, (And hit her, dead as nail i' post o' door,) Then _abiit_--what's the Ciceronian phrase?-- _Excessit, evasit, erupit_--off slogs boy; Off like bird, _avi similis_--(you observed The dative? Pretty i' the Mantuan!)--Anglice, Off in three flea skips. _Hactenus_, so far, So good, _tam bene. Bene, satis, male_--, Where was I with my trope 'bout one in a quag? I did once hitch the syntax into verse: _Verbum personale_, a verb personal, _Concordat_--ay, 'agrees,' old Fatchaps--_cum_ _Nominativo_, with its nominative, _Genere_, i' point o' gender, _numero_; O' number, _et persona_, and person. _Ut_, Instance: _Sol ruit_, down flops sun, _et_ and, _Montes umbrantur_, out flounce mountains. Pah! Excuse me, sir, I think I'm going mad. You see the trick on't though, and can yourself Continue the discourse _ad libitum_. It takes up about eighty thousand lines, A thing imagination boggles at; And might, odds-bobs, sir! in judicious hands, Extend from here to Mesopotamy.

LOVERS, AND A REFLECTION.

(JEAN INGELOW)

In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter (And heaven it knoweth what that may mean; Meaning, however, is no great matter) Where woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween;

Through God's own heather we wonned together, I and my Willie (O love my love): I need hardly remark it was glorious weather, And flitterbats wavered alow, above:

Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing (Boats in that climate are so polite), And sands were a ribbon of green endowing, And O the sundazzle on bark and bight!

Through the rare red heather we danced together, (O love my Willie!) and smelt for flowers: I must mention again it was gorgeous weather, Rhymes are so scarce in this world of ours:--

By rises that flushed with their purple favours, Through becks that brattled o'er grasses sheen, We walked and waded, we two young shavers, Thanking our stars we were both so green.

We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie, In fortunate parallels! Butterflies, Hid in weltering shadows of daffodilly Or marjoram, kept making peacock eyes:

Songbirds darted about, some inky As coal, some snowy (I ween) as curds; Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky-- They reck of no eerie To-come, those birds!

But they skim over bents which the millstream washes, Or hang in the lift 'neath a white cloud's hem; They need no parasols, no goloshes; And good Mrs. Trimmer she feedeth them.

Then we thrid God's cowslips (as erst His heather) That endowed the wan grass with their golden blooms And snapped--(it was perfectly charming weather)-- Our fingers at Fate and her goddess-glooms:

And Willie 'gan sing (O, his notes were fluty; Wafts fluttered them out to the white-winged' sea)-- Something made up of rhymes that have done much duty Rhymes (better to put it) of 'ancientry':

Bowers of flowers encountered showers In William's carol--(O love my Willie!) Then he bade sorrow borrow from blithe to-morrow I quite forget what--say a daffodilly:

A nest in a hollow, 'with buds to follow,' I think occurred next in his nimble strain; And clay that was 'kneaden' of course in Eden-- A rhyme most novel, I do maintain:

Mists, bones, the singer himself, love-stories, And all least furlable things got 'furled'; Not with any design to conceal their 'glories,' But simply and solely to rhyme with 'world.'

* * * * *

O if billows and pillows and hours and flowers, And all the brave rhymes of an elder day, Could be furled together, this genial weather, And carted, or carried on 'wafts' away, Nor ever again trotted out--ah me! How much fewer volumes of verse there'd be!

BALLAD.

(JEAN INGELOW)

The auld wife sat at her ivied door, (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) A thing she had frequently done before; And her spectacles lay on her aproned knees.

The piper he piped on the hill-top high, (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) Till the cow said 'I die,' and the goose asked 'Why?' And the dog said nothing, but searched for fleas.

The farmer he strove through the square farmyard; (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) His last brew of ale was a trifle hard-- The connexion of which with the plot one sees.

The farmer's daughter hath frank blue eyes; (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) She hears the rooks caw in the windy skies, As she sits at her lattice and shells her peas.

The farmer's daughter hath ripe red lips; (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) If you try to approach her, away she skips Over tables and chairs with apparent ease.

The farmer's daughter hath soft brown hair; (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) And I met with a ballad, I can't say where, Which wholly consisted of lines like these.

PART II.

She sat, with her hands 'neath her dimpled cheeks, (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) And spake not a word. While a lady speaks There is hope, but she didn't even sneeze.

She sat, with her hands 'neath her crimson cheeks, (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) She gave up mending her father's breeks, And let the cat roll in her new chemise.

She sat, with her hands 'neath her burning cheeks, (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) And gazed at the piper for thirteen weeks; Then she followed him out o'er the misty leas.

Her sheep followed her, as their tails did them. (_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_) And this song is considered a perfect gem, And as to the meaning, it's what you please.

CHARLES LUTWIDGE DODGSON ('LEWIS CARROLL')

HOW DOTH THE LITTLE CROCODILE

(ISAAC WATTS)

How doth the little crocodile Improve his shining tail, And pour the waters of the Nile On every golden scale!

How cheerfully he seems to grin, How neatly spreads his claws, And welcomes little fishes in, With gently smiling jaws!

'TIS THE VOICE OF THE LOBSTER.

(ISAAC WATTS)

'Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare, 'You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair.' As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.

TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE BAT.

(JANE TAYLOR)

Twinkle, twinkle, little bat! How I wonder what you're at! Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky.

YOU ARE OLD, FATHER WILLIAM.

(SOUTHEY)

'You are old, Father William,' the young man said, 'And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head-- Do you think, at your age, it is right?'

'In my youth,' Father William replied to his son, 'I feared it might injure the brain; But now that I'm perfectly sure I have none, Why, I do it again and again.'

'You are old,' said the youth, 'as I mentioned before, And have grown most uncommonly fat; Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door-- Pray, what is the reason of that?'

'In my youth,' said the sage, as he shook his grey locks, 'I kept all my limbs very supple By the use of this ointment--one shilling the box-- Allow me to sell you a couple.'

'You are old,' said the youth, 'and your jaws are too weak For anything tougher than suet; Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak-- Pray how did you manage to do it?'

'In my youth,' said his father, 'I took to the law, And argued each case with my wife; And the muscular strength, which it gave to my jaw, Has lasted the rest of my life.'

'You are old,' said the youth, 'one would hardly suppose That your eye was as steady as ever; Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose-- What made you so awfully clever?'

'I have answered three questions, and that is enough,' Said his father; 'don't give yourself airs! Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff? Be off, or I'll kick you downstairs!'

HIAWATHA'S PHOTOGRAPHING.

(LONGFELLOW)

In an age of imitation, I can claim no sort of merit for this slight attempt at doing what is known to be so easy. Anyone who knows what verse is, with the slightest ear for rhythm, can throw off a composition in the easy running metre of 'The Song of Hiawatha.' Having, then, distinctly stated that I challenge no attention, in the following little poem, to its merely verbal jingle, I must beg the candid reader, to confine his criticism to its treatment of the subject.

From his shoulder Hiawatha Took the camera of rosewood, Made of sliding, folding rosewood; Neatly put it all together. In its case it lay compactly, Folded into nearly nothing; But he opened out the hinges, Pushed and pulled the joints and hinges, Till it looked all squares and oblongs, Like a complicated figure In the second book of Euclid. This he perched upon a tripod, And the family in order Sat before him for their pictures. Mystic, awful was the process. First a piece of glass he coated With Collodion, and plunged it In a bath of Lunar Caustic Carefully dissolved in water: There he left it certain minutes. Secondly, my Hiawatha Made with cunning hand a mixture Of the acid Pyro-gallic, And of Glacial Acetic, And of Alcohol and water: This developed all the picture. Finally, he fixed each picture With a saturate solution Of a certain salt of Soda-- Chemists call it Hyposulphite. (Very difficult the name is For a metre like the present, But periphrasis has done it.) All the family in order Sat before him for their pictures. Each in turn, as he was taken, Volunteered his own suggestions, His invaluable suggestions. First the Governor, the Father: He suggested velvet curtains Looped about a massy pillar; And the corner of a table, Of a rosewood dining-table. He would hold a scroll of something, Hold it firmly in his left-hand; He would keep his right-hand buried (Like Napoleon) in his waistcoat; He would contemplate the distance With a look of pensive meaning, As of ducks that die in tempests. Grand, heroic was the notion: Yet the picture failed entirely: Failed, because he moved a little, Moved, because he couldn't help it. Next, his better half took courage; _She_ would have her picture taken: She came dressed beyond description, Dressed in jewels and in satin Far too gorgeous for an empress. Gracefully she sat down sideways, With a simper scarcely human, Holding in her hand a nosegay Rather larger than a cabbage. All the while that she was taking, Still the lady chattered, chattered, Like a monkey in the forest. 'Am I sitting still?' she asked him. 'Is my face enough in profile? Shall I hold the nosegay higher? Will it come into the picture?' And the picture failed completely. Next the Son, the Stunning-Cantab: He suggested curves of beauty, Curves pervading all his figure, Which the eye might follow onward, Till they centred in the breast-pin, Centred in the golden breast-pin. He had learnt it all from Ruskin (Author of 'The Stones of Venice,' 'Seven Lamps of Architecture,' 'Modern Painters,' and some others); And perhaps he had not fully Understood his author's meaning; But, whatever was the reason, All was fruitless, as the picture Ended in an utter failure. Next to him the eldest daughter: She suggested very little; Only asked if he would take her With her look of 'passive beauty.' Her idea of passive beauty Was a squinting of the left-eye, Was a drooping of the right-eye, Was a smile that went up sideways To the corner of the nostrils. Hiawatha, when she asked him, Took no notice of the question, Looked as if he hadn't heard it; But, when pointedly appealed to, Smiled in his peculiar manner, Coughed and said it 'didn't matter,' Bit his lip and changed the subject. Nor in this was he mistaken, As the picture failed completely. So in turn the other sisters. Last, the youngest son was taken: Very rough and thick his hair was, Very round and red his face was, Very dusty was his jacket, Very fidgetty his manner. And his overbearing sisters Called him names he disapproved of: Called him Johnny, 'Daddy's Darling,' Called him Jacky, 'Scrubby School-boy,' And, so awful was the picture, In comparison the others Might be thought to have succeeded, To have partially succeeded. Finally my Hiawatha Tumbled all the tribe together, 'Grouped' is not the right expression,) And, as happy chance would have it, Did at last obtain a picture Where the faces all succeeded: Each came out a perfect likeness. Then they joined and all abused it, Unrestrainedly abused it, As 'the worst and ugliest picture They could possibly have dreamed of. Giving one such strange expressions! Sulkiness, conceit, and meanness! Really any one would take us (Any one that did not know us) For the most unpleasant people!' (Hiawatha seemed to think so, Seemed to think it not unlikely.) All together rang their voices, Angry, loud, discordant voices, As of dogs that howl in concert, As of cats that wail in chorus. But my Hiawatha's patience, His politeness and his patience, Unaccountably had vanished, And he left that happy party. Neither did he leave them slowly, With that calm deliberation, That intense deliberation Which photographers aspire to: But he left them in a hurry, Left them in a mighty hurry, Vowing that he would not stand it. Hurriedly he packed his boxes, Hurriedly the porter trundled On a barrow all his boxes; Hurriedly he took his ticket, Hurriedly the train received him: Thus departed Hiawatha.

THE THREE VOICES.

(TENNYSON)

_The First Voice._

With hands tight clenched through matted hair, He crouched in trance of dumb despair: There came a breeze from out the air.

It passed athwart the glooming flat-- It fanned his forehead as he sat-- It lightly bore away his hat,

All to the feet of one who stood Like maid enchanted in a wood, Frowning as darkly as she could.

With huge umbrella, lank and brown, Unerringly she pinned it down, Right through the centre of the crown.

Then, with an aspect cold and grim, Regardless of its battered rim, She took it up and gave it him.

Awhile like one in dreams he stood, Then faltered forth his gratitude, In words just short of being rude:

For it had lost its shape and shine, And it had cost him four-and-nine, And he was going out to dine.

With grave indifference to his speech, Fixing her eyes upon the beach, She said 'Each gives to more than each.'

He could not answer yea or nay: He faltered 'Gifts may pass away.' Yet knew not what he meant to say.

'If that be so,' she straight replied, 'Each heart with each doth coincide. What boots it? For the world is wide.'

And he, not wishing to appear Less wise, said 'This Material Sphere Is but Attributive Idea.'

But when she asked him 'Wherefore so?' He felt his very whiskers glow, And frankly owned 'I do not know.'

While, like broad waves of golden grain. Or sunlit hues on cloistered pane, His colour came and went again.

Pitying his obvious distress, Yet with a tinge of bitterness, She said 'The More exceeds the Less.'

'A truth of such undoubted weight, He urged, 'and so extreme in date, It were superfluous to state.'

Roused into sudden passion, she In tone of cold malignity: 'To others, yes: but not to thee.'

But when she saw him quail and quake, And when he urged 'For pity's sake!' Once more in gentle tone she spake.

'Thought in the mind doth still abide; That is by Intellect supplied, And within that Idea doth hide.

'And he, that yearns the truth to know, Still further inwardly may go, And find Idea from Notion flow.

'And thus the chain, that sages sought, Is to a glorious circle wrought, For Notion hath its source in Thought.'

When he, with racked and whirling brain, Feebly implored her to explain, She simply said it all again.

Wrenched with an agony intense, He spake, neglecting Sound and Sense, And careless of all consequence:

'Mind--I believe--is Essence--Ent-- Abstract--that is--an Accident-- Which we--that is to say--I meant--'

When, with quick breath and cheeks all flushed, At length his speech was somewhat hushed, She looked at him, and he was crushed.

It needed not her calm reply: She fixed him with a stony eye, And he could neither fight nor fly,

While she dissected, word by word, His speech, half guessed at and half heard, As might a cat a little bird.

Then, having wholly overthrown His views, and stripped them to the bone, Proceeded to unfold her own.

So passed they on with even pace, Yet gradually one might trace A shadow growing on his face.

_The Second Voice._

They walked beside the wave-worn beach, Her tongue was very apt to teach, And now and then he did beseech

She would abate her dulcet tone, Because the talk was all her own, And he was dull as any drone.

She urged 'No cheese is made of chalk': And ceaseless flowed her dreary talk, Tuned to the footfall of a walk.

Her voice was very full and rich, And, when at length she asked him 'Which?' It mounted to its highest pitch.

He a bewildered answer gave, Drowned in the sullen moaning wave, Lost in the echoes of the cave.

He answered her he knew not what: Like shaft from bow at random shot: He spoke, but she regarded not.

She waited not for his reply, But with a downward leaden eye Went on as if he were not by.

Sound argument and grave defence, Strange questions raised on 'Why?' and 'Whence?' And weighted down with common sense.

'Shall Man be Man? And shall he miss Of other thoughts no thought but this, Harmonious dews of sober bliss?

'What boots it? Shall his fevered eye Through towering nothingness descry The grisly phantom hurry by?

'And hear dumb shrieks that fill the air; See mouths that gape, and eyes that stare And redden in the dusky glare?

'The meadows breathing amber light, The darkness toppling from the height, The feathery train of granite Night?

'Shall he, grown gray among his peers, Through the thick curtain of his tears Catch glimpses of his earlier years,

'And hear the sounds he knew of yore, Old shufflings on the sanded floor, Old knuckles tapping at the door?

'Yet still before him as he flies One pallid form shall ever rise, And, bodying forth in glassy eyes

'The vision of a vanished good, Low peering through the tangled wood, Shall freeze the current of his blood.'

Still from each fact, with skill uncouth And savage rapture, like a tooth She wrenched a slow reluctant truth.

Till, like some silent water-mill, When summer suns have dried the rill, She reached a full stop, and was still.

Dead calm succeeded to the fuss, As when the loaded omnibus Has reached the railway terminus:

When, for the tumult of the street, Is heard the engine's stifled beat, The velvet tread of porters' feet.

With glance that ever sought the ground, She moved her lips without a sound, And every now and then she frowned.

He gazed upon the sleeping sea, And joyed in its tranquillity, And in that silence dead, but she

To muse a little space did seem, Then, like the echo of a dream, Harped back upon her threadbare theme.

Still an attentive ear he lent, But could not fathom what she meant: She was not deep, nor eloquent.

He marked the ripple on the sand: The even swaying of her hand Was all that he could understand.

He left her, and he turned aside: He sat and watched the coming tide Across the shores so newly dried.

He wondered at the waters clear, The breeze that whispered in his ear, The billows heaving far and near;

And why he had so long preferred To hang upon her every word; 'In truth,' he said, 'it was absurd.'

_The Third Voice._

Not long this transport held its place: Within a little moment's space Quick tears were raining down his face.

His heart stood still, aghast with fear; A wordless voice, nor far nor near, He seemed to hear and not to hear.

'Tears kindle not the doubtful spark: If so, why not? Of this remark The bearings are profoundly dark.'

'Her speech,' he said, 'hath caused this pain; Easier I count it to explain The jargon of the howling main,

'Or, stretched beside some sedgy brook, To con, with inexpressive look, An unintelligible book.'

Low spake the voice within his head, In words imagined more than said, Soundless as ghost's intended tread:

'If thou art duller than before, Why quittedst thou the voice of lore? Why not endure, expecting more?'

'Rather than that,' he groaned aghast, 'I'd writhe in depths of cavern vast, Some loathly vampire's rich repast.'

''Twere hard,' it answered, 'themes immense To coop within the narrow fence That rings _thy_ scant intelligence.'

'Not so,' he urged, 'nor once alone: But there was that within her tone Which chilled me to the very bone.

'Her style was anything but clear, And most unpleasantly severe; Her epithets were very queer.

'And yet, so grand were her replies, I could not choose but deem her wise; I did not dare to criticise;

'Nor did I leave her, till she went So deep in tangled argument That all my powers of thought were spent,'

A little whisper inly slid; 'Yet truth is truth: you know you did--' A little wink beneath the lid.

And, sickened with excess of dread, Prone to the dust he bent his head, And lay like one three-quarters dead.

Forth went the whisper like a breeze; Left him amid the wondering trees, Left him by no means at his ease.

Once more he weltered in despair, With hands, through denser-matted hair, More tightly clenched than then they were.

When, bathed in dawn of living red, Majestic frowned the mountain head, 'Tell me my fault,' was all he said.

When, at high noon, the blazing sky Scorched in his head each haggard eye, Then keenest rose his weary cry.

And when at eve the unpitying sun Smiled grimly on the solemn fun, 'Alack,' he sighed, 'what _have_ I done?'

But saddest, darkest was the sight, When the cold grasp of leaden Night Dashed him to earth, and held him tight.

Tortured, unaided, and alone, Thunders were silence to his groan, Bagpipes sweet music to its tone:

'What? Ever thus, in dismal round, Shall Pain and Misery profound Pursue me like a sleepless hound,

'With crimson-dashed and eager jaws, Me, still in ignorance of the cause, Unknowing what I brake of laws?'

The whisper to his ear did seem Like echoed flow of silent stream, Or shadow of forgotten dream;

The whisper trembling in the wind: 'Her fate with thine was intertwined,' So spake it in his inner mind:

'Each orbed on each a baleful star, Each proved the other's blight and bar, Each unto each were best, most far:

'Yea, each to each was worse than foe, Thou, a scared dullard, gibbering low, And she, an avalanche of woe.'

BEAUTIFUL SOUP.

(UNCERTAIN)

Beautiful Soup, so rich and green, Waiting in a hot tureen! Who for such dainties would not stoop? Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Soo--oop of the e--e--evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup!

Beautiful Soup! who cares for fish, Game, or any other dish? Who would not give all else for two Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Soo--oop of the e--e--evening Beautiful, beauti--FUL SOUP!

THOMAS HOOD THE YOUNGER.

RAVINGS.

(BY E., A POE-T)

The autumn upon us was rushing, The Parks were deserted and lone-- The streets were unpeopled and lone; My foot through the sere leaves was brushing, That over the pathway were strown-- By the wind in its wanderings strown. I sighed--for my feelings were gushing Round Mnemosyne's porphyry throne, Like lava liquescent lay gushing, And rose to the porphyry throne-- To the filigree footstool were gushing, That stands on the steps of that throne-- On the stolid stone steps of that throne!

I cried--'Shall the winter-leaves fret us?' Oh, turn--we must turn to the fruit, To the freshness and force of the fruit! To the gifts wherewith Autumn has met us-- Her music that never grows mute (That maunders but never grows mute), The tendrils the vine branches net us, The lily, the lettuce, the lute-- The esculent, succulent lettuce, And the languishing lily, and lute;-- Yes;--the lotos-like leaves of the lettuce; Late lily and lingering lute.

Then come--let us fly from the city! Let us travel in orient isles-- In the purple of orient isles-- Oh, bear me--yes, bear me in pity To climes where a sun ever smiles-- Ever smoothly and speciously smiles! Where the swarth-browed Arabian's wild ditty Enhances pyramidal piles: Where his wild, weird, and wonderful ditty Awakens pyramidal piles-- Yes:--his pointless perpetual ditty Perplexes pyramidal piles!

IN MEMORIAM TECHNICAM.

(TENNYSON)

I count it true which sages teach-- That passion sways not with repose, That love, confounding these with those, Is ever welding each with each.

And so when time has ebbed away, Like childish wreaths too lightly held, The song of immemorial eld Shall moan about the belted bay,

Where slant Orion slopes his star To swelter in the rolling seas, Till slowly widening by degrees, The grey climbs upward from afar,

And golden youth and passion stray Along the ridges of the strand-- Not far apart, but hand in hand-- With all the darkness danced away!

THE WEDDING.

('OWEN MEREDITH')

Lady Clara Vere de Vere! I hardly know what I must say, But I'm to be Queen of the May, mother I'm to be Queen of the May! I am half-crazed; I don't feel grave, Let me rave! Whole weeks and months, early and late, To win his love I lay in wait. Oh, the Earl was fair to see, As fair as any man could be:-- The wind is howling in turret and tree!

We two shall be wed to-morrow morn, And I shall be the Lady Clare, And when my marriage morn shall fall I hardly know what I shall wear. But I shan't say 'my life is dreary,' And sadly hang my head, With the remark, 'I'm very weary, And wish that I were dead.'

But on my husband's arm I'll lean, And roundly waste his plenteous gold, Passing the honeymoon serene In that new world which is the old. For down we'll go and take the boat Beside St. Katherine's Docks afloat, Which round about its prow has wrote-- 'The Lady of Shalotter' (Mondays and Thursdays--Captain Foat), Bound for the Dam of Rotter.

(From _Ten Hours, or the Warbling Wag'ner_. BY OWING MERRYTHIEF.)

POETS AND LINNETS.

(BROWNING)

Where'er there's a thistle to feed a linnet And linnets are plenty, thistles rife-- Or an acorn-cup to catch dew-drops in it There's ample promise of further life. Now, mark how we begin it.

For linnets will follow, if linnets are minded, As blows the white-feather parachute; And ships will reel by the tempest blinded-- Aye, ships and shiploads of men to boot! How deep whole fleets you'll find hid.

And we blow the thistle-down hither and thither Forgetful of linnets, and men, and God. The dew! for its want an oak will wither-- By the dull hoof into the dust is trod, And then who strikes the cither?

But thistles were only for donkeys intended, And that donkeys are common enough is clear, And that drop! what a vessel it might have befriended, Does it add any flavour to Glugabib's beer? Well, there's my musing ended.

WALTER WILLIAM SKEAT.

A CLERK THER WAS OF CAUNTEBRIGGE ALSO.

(CHAUCER)

A Clerk ther was of Cauntebrigge also, That unto rowing haddè long y-go. Of thinnè shidès[112] wolde he shippès makè, And he was nat right fat, I undertakè. And whan his ship he wrought had attè fullè, Right gladly by the river wolde he pullè, And eek returne as blythly as he wentè. Him rekkèd nevere that the sonne him brentè,[113] Ne stinted he his cours for reyn ne snowè; It was a joyè for to seen him rowè! Yit was him lever, in his shelves newè, Six oldè textès,[114] clad in greenish hewè, Of Chaucer and his oldè poesyè Than ale, or wyn of Lepe,[115] or Malvoisyè. And therwithal he wex a philosofre; And peyned him to gadren gold in cofre Of sundry folk; and al that he mighte hentè[116] On textès and emprinting he it spentè; And busily gan bokès to purveyè For hem that yeve him wherwith to scoleyè.[117] Of glossaryès took he hede and curè[118]; And when he spyèd had, by aventurè, A word that semèd him or strange or rarè, To henten[119] it anon he noldè sparè,[120] But wolde it on a shrede[121] of paper wrytè, And in a cheste he dide his shredès whytè, And preyèd every man to doon the samè; Swich maner study was to him but gamè. And on this wysè many a yeer he wroughté, Ay storing every shreed that men him broughtè, Til, attè lastè, from the noble pressè Of Clarendoun, at Oxenforde, I gessè, Cam stalking forth the Gretè Dictionárie That no man wel may pinche at[122] ne contrárie. But for to tellen alle his queintè gerès,[123] They wolden occupye wel seven yerès; Therefore I passe as lightly as I may; Ne speke I of his hatte or his array, Ne how his berd by every wind was shakè When as, for hete, his hat he wolde of takè. Souning in[124] Erly English was his spechè, 'And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly techè.'

HENRY SAMBROOKE LEIGH.

ONLY SEVEN.

(A PASTORAL STORY, AFTER WORDSWORTH)

I marvelled why a simple child That lightly draws its breath Should utter groans so very wild, And look as pale as Death.

Adopting a parental tone, I asked her why she cried; The damsel answered, with a groan, 'I've got a pain inside.

'I thought it would have sent me mad Last night about eleven;' Said I, 'What is it makes you bad? How many apples have you had?' She answered, 'Only seven!'

'And are you sure you took no more, My little maid?' quoth I. 'Oh! please, sir, mother gave me four, But _they_ were in a pie!'

'If that's the case,' I stammered out, 'Of course you've had eleven;' The maiden answered, with a pout, 'I ain't had more nor seven!'

I wondered hugely what she meant, And said, 'I'm bad at riddles, But I know where little girls are sent For telling tarradiddles.

'Now, if you don't reform,' said I, 'You'll never go to heaven.' But all in vain; each time I try, That little idiot makes reply, 'I ain't had more nor seven!'

POSTSCRIPT.

To borrow Wordsworth's name was wrong, Or slightly misapplied; And so I'd better call my song, 'Lines after _Ache-inside_.'

CHATEAUX D'ESPAGNE.

(A REMINISCENCE OF 'DAVID GARRICK' AND 'THE BATTLE OF ANDALUSIA.')

(E. A. POE)

Once upon an evening weary, shortly after Lord Dundreary With his quaint and curious humour set the town in such a roar, With my shilling I stood rapping--only very gently tapping--

For the man in charge was napping--at the money-taker's door. It was Mr. Buckstone's playhouse, where I lingered at the door; Paid half price and nothing more.

Most distinctly I remember, it was just about September-- Though it might have been in August, or it might have been before-- Dreadfully I fear'd the morrow. Vainly had I sought to borrow; For (I own it to my sorrow) I was miserably poor, And the heart is heavy laden when one's miserably poor; (I have been so once before.)

I was doubtful and uncertain, at the rising of the curtain, If the piece would prove a novelty, or one I'd seen before; For a band of robbers drinking in a gloomy cave, and clinking With their glasses on the table, I had witness'd o'er and o'er; Since the half-forgotten period of my innocence was o'er; Twenty years ago or more.

Presently my doubt grew stronger. I could stand the thing no longer; 'Miss,' said I, 'or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore. Pardon my apparent rudeness. Would you kindly have the goodness To inform me if this drama is from Gaul's enlightened shore?' For I know that plays are often brought us from the Gallic shore; Adaptations--nothing more!

So I put the question lowly: and my neighbour answer'd slowly, 'It's a British drama wholly, written quite in days of yore. 'Tis an Andalusian story of a castle old and hoary, And the music is delicious, though the dialogue be poor!' (And I could not help agreeing that the dialogue _was_ poor; Very flat, and nothing more.)

But at last a lady entered, and my interest grew centred In her figure, and her features, and the costume that she wore. And the slightest sound she utter'd was like music; so I mutter'd To my neighbour, 'Glance a minute at your play-bill, I implore. Who's that rare and radiant maiden? Tell, oh, tell me! I implore!' Quoth my neighbour, 'Nelly Moore!'

Then I ask'd in quite a tremble--it was useless to dissemble-- 'Miss, or Madam, do not trifle with my feelings any more; Tell me who, then, was the maiden, that appear'd so sorrow laden In the room of David Garrick, with a bust above the door?' Quoth my neighbour, 'Nelly Moore.'

* * * * *

I've her photograph from Lacy's; that delicious little face is Smiling on me as I'm sitting (in a draught from yonder door), And often in the nightfalls, when a precious little light falls From the wretched tallow candles on my gloomy second-floor, (For I have not got the gaslight on my gloomy second-floor) Comes an echo, 'Nelly Moore!'

ROBERT HENRY NEWELL.

('ORPHEUS C. KERR')

REJECTED NATIONAL ANTHEMS.