Chapter XII: Letter VIII: The Rejected “national Hymns.” (6)

Hear the losers at the Hells――
Homburg Hells!
What an end of dread despondency their mien foretells!
When fortune turns her back,
And the promised Red looks Black,
And the Black grows Red with shame,
As it hears its worshipped name;
All is lost
In a timorous appealing to the mercy of Leblanc:
In a sad expostulation with the croupiers of Leblanc:
Playing higher, higher, higher,
With a maddening desire
And a desperate endeavour
Now――now to win or never,
Though it love and honour cost.
Oh the Hells, Hells, Hells!
What tale their echo tells
Of despair!
How they cling to Black and Red!
What a tremor they outspread
On the loving hearts that wait in hope at home.
Yet the year it fully knows
By the curses
Or the purses
How the fortune ebbs and flows!
How the scandal stinks and smells
By the sinking or the swelling in the budget of the Hells!

Hear the groaning in the Hells――
German Hells!
Ev’ry coin in hope thrown down,
Be it florin, thaler, crown,
Is a groan.
And the croupiers dressed in sable,
Sitting down before the table,
And who dealing, dealing, dealing,
In that well-known monotone
Coldly glory in the feeling
That their human heart is stone!
Green cloth their only scenery,
They go by some machinery
Without souls;
And their master takes the tolls,
While the ball it rolls and rolls,
Rolls
And rattles in the Hells.
But his heart no longer swells
At the Pæan of the Hells;
For he hears above the echo of the Hells
The knells, knells, knells,
Of the Hells.
In the fast approaching time,
When ruin, lust, and crime
Will be driven from the wells,
In the downfall of the Hells――
Of the Hells, Hells, Hells,
To the moaning and the groaning of the Hells!

_The Tomahawk_, October 19, 1867.

――――:o:――――

CHRISTMAS FANCIES.

Here is Christmas with its bills――Little Bills!
’Mid a world of merriment intruding with their ills.
What a tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
At the area bell all day,
They’re enough the brow to wrinkle
Of a placid periwinkle,
With their constant “Please to pay.”
Coming time after time,
Without reason, without rhyme,
Holding long confabulations on the lowness of their tills;
With their bills, bills, bills, bills!
Bills, bills, bills,
Oh, the worry and the scurry of the bills!

And the Host of other ills――Christmas ills!
Eatables in baronies and drinkables in rills,
All the day and all the night
Spent in over-eating quite,
And in pouring down your throat
Inopportune――
Floods of liquor that would float――
If not a merchant vessel――a big boat,
Pretty soon!
Oh, the gorges and the swills,
With no thought about the morrow, and the call for DR. SQUILLS,
And your wills,
Codocils,
That you write with shaky quills,
For ’tis indigestion kills!
Oh, the languish and the anguish
Of your ills, ills, ills, ills,
Ills, ills, ills,
Oh, the bother and the pother of your ills!
Then to-morrow and its pills――bitter pills!
Fever-heats succeeding on the heels of horrid chills,
All the livelong restless night――
What a cheerful Christmas plight!
Too much agonized to speak,
You can only squeak――squeak
Like a coon,
In a clamorous appealing from your indigestion’s pangs――
In a mad expostulation with the gnawing of its fangs,
And a sense of utter loathing for the pills,
For the pills, pills, pills, pills,
Pills, pills, pills――
And the comrades of the pills,
The pills, bills, ills!
Oh, the very name of Christmas all my soul with terror fills.

_Fun_, December 28, 1867.

――――:o:――――

THE BELLS.

Oh, those bells――oh, those bells!
Oh, those bells, bells, bells!
Oh, the weary, weary, worry that their ringing always tells!
How they jangle and they jangle
Through the troubled day and night!
How they clash, and clang, and mangle,
As if calling out in spite――
You must run, run, run!
Your work’s never done,
From the rising to the setting of the sun, sun, sun.

Oh, those never-ceasing bells――
Chamber-bells――
What a climbing and a fetching their music ever tells!
Now it’s number seven hundred――
Now it’s number twenty-five――
Now it’s forty more in chorus
Calling――Waiter, look alive!
Ting-a-ling, ling, ling,
Don’t you hear me ring, ring?
You, had better come a-running, or I’ll break a string, string!

Oh, those silver-sounding bells――
Parlour-bells――
What a coming and a running their melody compels!
How they jingle, jingle, jingle,
Till the horrid jingling seems
To multiply and mingle
Into harsh and mocking screams,
Crying――Fly, fly, fly!
We are paying very high,
We’ll get our money’s value, or we’ll know the reason why.

Oh, those cruel, clanging bells――
Front-door bells――
Oh, what cozy dreams of comfort their sounding forth dispels!
How their clanging and their banging
Keeps one trotting to and fro,
Till you seem a sort of nightmare,
Kept forever on the go
By the clang, clang, clang,
And the bang, bang, bang!
Till the ringers of those door-bells you could hang, hang, hang!

Oh, that best and blessed bell――
Dinner bell――
With what harmony and melody its brazen accents swell!
How its full and unctuous greeting
Seems to reach your inner man,
And you answer as a waiter,
And a hungry waiter, can
To its ding, dong, dong!
Come along, long, long!
So the blessed bell for dinner ends my song, song, song!
_Anonymous._

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.

See the members with their bills.
Private bills,
What a world of promises their bringing-in fulfils;
How they jostle one another,
And compete for vacant nights,
How they pant, and gasp, and smother,
Pushed aside by party fights,
While their movers, standing by,
Emit a doleful cry,
Apprehensive of the destiny that ultimately kills
Their bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
The dismal fate in keeping for their bills.

See the silly annual bills,
Foolish bills,
With what-deluded hopefulness their introduction fills
All their friends throughout the land,
Who can never understand,
That the House will throw them out
One by one;
That though the movers shout
At a speaker who is dozing while they spout,
When they’ve done,
With patience sorely tried,
But with a gush of thankfulness the members will divide,
And decide,
To deride
The foolish annual bills;
And the lesson each instils
Is, that clearly these are merely
Futile bills, bills, bills.
Bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
Never to be anything but bills.

See the Ministerial bills,
Burly bills,
With what prolonged expectancy their introduction thrills!
Through the country far and wide,
Their friends exult with pride;
Too much horrified to speak,
Their opponents only shriek
In affright,
In a clamourous appealing to the wisdom of the House――
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic House.
They declare the bills a chouse,
And affirm they will, by _nous_,
Rouse the country now or never,
By a resolute endeavour,
To resist the pale-faced premier,
With his bills, bills, bills,
While each party-leader drills
For the fight
His forces great or small
To enfranchise or enthral
The country on the great division night;
And the public hardly knows,
Mid the wrangling
And the jangling,
How the danger ebbs and flows,
But each newspaper instils
Into readers,
By its leaders,
All its own views of the bills,――
Its own views of the pestilent or patriotic bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
The stupendous and tremendous public bills.

See the sickly autumn bills,
Dying bills,
What a flood of penitence each moralist distils
From their slow but sure decay,
As the session wears away,
From the melancholy lesson that they teach;
For every dying scheme
Is in its turn the theme
Of a speech,
And is tediously debated
Until hopelessly belated,
Overthrown,
And its mover prosing, prosing,
In a muffled monotone,
Feels a glory in disclosing
All its merits little known.
In the spring he moves the bills,
And clears his voice and swills
From a tumbler set beside him,
While his enemies deride him,
And his friends cry out, “Hear, hear,”
And he wins a feeble cheer,
Now and then
Only, when
With brows knit in a frown,
His arm sways up and down,
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the moving of the bills:
Of the bills,
To the solemn exposition of the bills,
Till at last the daylight lengthens,
And the summer sunshine strengthens,
And finally it grills
The members in their places,
So sadly, with long faces,
They consent to slay their bills,
To abandon all their bills;
All their bills, bills, bills,
To massacre their bills,
Though sorely ’gainst their wills.
And each bereaved one fills
The house with lamentations o’er his bills,
With sorrow at the slaughter of his bills:
Of his bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
With sorrow at the slaughter of his bills.

_Fun_, August 13, 1870.

――――:o:――――

THE FLUTE.

Lo, the fluter, with his flute――
Grecian flute!
How long the world has waited
For its tantalising toot!
“Unheard melodies are sweetest,
Said the charming poet Keats;
But our pleasure is completest
When we hear them on the streets;
Or sounding loud and shrill
Through the homes of Murray-Hill――
On the heights of Murray-Hill
Loud and shrill,
Hear the flute, flute, flute, flute,
Flute, flute, flute.

That wicked _Broadway Journal_,
Whose Editor infernal,
Lets no trumpet but his own
Through the market place be blown――
Had the chief not been carousing,
Had the “Raven” not been drowsing,
The world had not been waiting,
Been waiting, all in vain,
For that melancholy strain
Of the flute flute――
In anxious expectation for the tintinnabulation
Of the flute.

_American Paper._

――――:o:――――

THE CHIMES DONE IN RHYMES.
AFTER POE AND NEWMAN

Harken to the chimes
That in these Sunday times,
Ring out upon the air.
From the lofty spire,
Rising higher, higher,
In great waves of sound
Vibrating round and round,
Calling out to prayer,
And dropping iron blessings down,
In sweetest music on this wicked town.

We hear professor Pratt,
Keen and clear G flat,
And in each ring there seems to be,
A “horse” cry of agony――
The tortured tones
Of groans and moans――
A poor creature’s speechless agony,
They rise and swell,
Like cries from hell,
Calling the faithful forth to solemn prayer
Then came Schuyler――
Schuyler smiler, Schuyler smiler,
How it rings and sings and swings,
Vibrating on the ear,
As if the hollow smile were set to music here.
“Come ye Christians,” cryeth Schuyler,
The soft political beguiler,
“Come ye Christians, join with me
In praises of the powers that be,
For have we not a neat majority?”
Just such praise in troubled days
Of Our Savior; he would have cried,
“The law should take its course, let him be crucified.”

Schuyler smiler, Schuyler smiler,
From the spire, rising higher,
Rings and swings and sings
The bell,
That of a politician’s heaven seems to tell.
Of a deeper, coarser tone
Chimes the bass a lengthened groan,
For it tells alone,
Alone,
Of the punishment that’s sent
In the person of our President.
Dull and hollow, how it moans
In its heavy undertones!
As if it sought to tell――
That bell――
Of a burdened people doomed to toil
That rogues may fatten off a wasted soil;
Of want and degradation dire,
War, pestilence and fire;
Where rules no ballot but the bayonet,
And Liberty that was and is not yet;
Of Peace, sweet Peace and great content,
Ere the coarse soldier came to be our President
Of office sold for gifts;
Of a low greed that lifts
Mean men to power,
When cowards rule while good men cower.
How it rolls and roars,
And on us pours
Its flood of heavy sound
The vibrating air around,
As the iron tongue upon the iron rim
Clangs out its cry of sin:
Fasting and prayer for a people curs’d
Of all ills the evil far the worst――
A stupid tyranny that brings
No compensation on its blackened wings.

These are the Newman chimes,
And these our modern times.
Were Our Saviour, with weary feet,
Again to walk the dusty street,
And see that lofty steeple;
Hear its clangor calling in the people
See the saints with saintly faces;
In diamonds, silks, and costly laces
Thronging to their downy places――
Hear his apostle state
From marble stall to velvet-cushioned seats,
Not the words of peace, but those of deadly hate
While Mammon the scene completes――
Much would He marvel, and we fear,
Seizing the rod
Would drive old Newman out, and clear
Our goodly people from the house of God.
Ding, dong, bell,
Hear them swell――
Pratt, G flat, scat!
Schuyler smiler, Schuyler smiler;
While groans
And moans
In heavy undertones
The Presidential bell.
D. P.
_The Capital_, (_U.S.A._) November 26, 1871.

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.
BY THE LATE EDGAR ALLAN TOE.

I.

Hear the duns with lots of bills――
Unpaid bills!
What a world of merriment their misery distils!
How they rattle, rattle, rattle,
On your sported outer door!
While within you drink and prattle.
For an oak is half the battle
With a dun――unchristian bore,
Keeping knock, knock, knock,
Like a sort of ticking clock,
To the bitter tribulation of your gyp whose hand he fills
With his bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
With a lumping and a thumping lot of bills,

II.

Hear the loud alarm of bills――
Tailors’ bills――
What a tale of trousers and of coats whose volume fills
Some dozen drawers. They might
Make one scream out with affright――
Too hard up to pay this week;
You can only speak, speak
Through the door,
In a pitiful appealing to the mercy of the dun,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and dirty dun.
Bills get higher, higher, higher,
And the parent’s wrath is dire;
His son’s resolute endeavour
Not now to pay nor ever,
Making him scold and swear and roar.
Oh the bills, bills, bills,
Hardest far of human ills
To remove!
How they cram and crowd each drawer,
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating gov!
Yet the ear it fully knows
When one’s thinking,
Or a drinking,
When a dun comes up or goes;
Yet the hand it fully fills
Up a beaker,
Getting weaker,
And the beggar drinks and swills.
But that drinking and that swilling gets one off some of the bills;
Of the bills――
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――
In the paying or delaying of the bills.

_The Light Green_, Cambridge, 1872.

――――:o:――――

THE BELLS.
BY AN OVERWORKED WAITER

Hear the strangers pull the bells――
Tinkling bells!
What voracious appetites their clattering foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
From morning until night,
And the dishes seem to twinkle,
As the gravies oversprinkle,
With a crystalline delight;
And they chime, chime, chime,
As a shout from time to time,
From “pottle-bodied” gourmands or animated swells,
Is mingled with the ever-ringing bells――
Bells, bells, bells――
The tintinnabulation of the bells.

Hear the early breakfast bells――
Tiresome bells!
Perhaps a Continental trip their harmony foretells,
With a guest awake all night,
And ringing, ere ’tis light,
For change of gold or note,
Hours too soon.
While the ship he wants to sail by does not float
Out of harbour until noon;
And in accents most unmusical he yells
For coffee to be taken,
With toast and eggs and bacon,
Up many flights of stairs, while he tells
Of twenty other wishes
Respecting drinks and dishes,
Which I strive to hear in vain,
For a train
A thousand country visitors propels
From Bath or Tunbridge Wells,
Who come ringing, ringing, ringing at the bells――
Bells, bells, bells――
And I march away to answer fifty bells.

Hear the hasty dinner-bells――
Frantic bells!
What a tale of hunger now their turbulency tells!
The fires are blazing bright,
The cooking is all right,
But I scarce can breathe or speak,
I’m so bothered all the week――
Don’t have a bit of rest――
Through the clamourous appealing of some gormandising guest,
And in mild expostulation to his deaf and frantic ire,
I say, “Yessir, yessir, yessir,”
To my hard-hearted oppressor,
’Mid the clatter
Of the platter,
And of dish and glass and spoon,
Or an organ,
With the owner like a Gorgon,
Grinding in the street some doleful tune;
Yet the ear it fully knows
By the twanging
And the clanging,
How the dining ebbs and flows,
To the jangling of the bells――
Bells, bells, bells――
To the clamour and the clangour of the bells.

Later still the supper bells――
Busy bells!
What a world of cheerful thought their melody compels,
Of pleasant airs that float
From operatic throat,
Of farce and pantomime;
But the bells begin to chime,
And, alas! unlucky wight,
Not for me is such delight,
The pleasure-seekers claim me as their own;
Be it man or be it woman,
They are all alike inhuman――
They are ghouls
Wanting soles,
Sausages and rolls,
Flowing bowls,
Pie or tart,
_Souper a-la-carte_,
Lobster salad, oyster,
Peppered grill, or something moister;
And they chat and laugh and joke,
Heedless of the yoke
Of the bells――
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells,
Which my presence through the weary night compels,
Till morning comes again with the bells――
The merciless and everlasting bells.

_Funny Folks_, April 3, 1875.

――――:o:――――

THE GIRLS.

Hear the laughter of the girls――
Pretty girls.
What a fund of merriment each ruby lip unfurls!
How they chatter, chatter, chatter,
In the balmy air of night!
While the stars that over-spatter
All the heavens hear their clatter
In a soft and wild delight;
To the tintinnabulation that, increasing, ever purls
From the girls, girls, girls, girls.
Girls, girls, girls,
From the wild, capricious, saucy, jaunty girls.

See the flirting of the girls,
Radiant girls!
How the lover’s softened brain wildly whirls
Through the mazes of the ball,
Up and down the stately hall!
How he skips to and fro
And perspires!
Would that we could tell the idiot all we know
Of the fires
Into which the false ones hurl.

Each new whim――see the flame――how it swirls!
How it curls!
How it curls!
Better far that they were churls,
Than fall victims to the girls;
To the prattle and the rattle
Of the girls, girls, girls,
Of the girls, girls, girls, girls,
Girls, girls, girls――
To the sacking and heart racking of the girls!

_Merry Folks._

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.
_After Poe, by a Mercantile Poet._

See the traders with their bills
Showy bills;
What a joyous feeling every speculator fills,
As his bills go crinkle, crinkle,
On the counters smooth and bright;
And the eyes of bankers twinkle
At their shareholders delight,
Who are dreaming all the time,
Of dividends sublime――
Of a very high percentage made from cashing doubtful bills,
Bills, bills, bills, bills,
Of gratifying profits from accommodation bills.

See the foreign merchants’ bills,
Flimsy bills!
For railways, ships and waterworks and tunnels through the hills,
Oh, we take them with delight,
And for “3 months, after sight”
Give them sovereigns and notes;
And very soon
The merry gambler floats
Far away from British shores, while he gloats
On the boon;
An operatic melody he trills,
And his mellow meerschaum fills,
And he swills
A bumper as he chuckles at the state of bankers’ tills;
When his bills
Falling due,
Not a Jew
Will give twopence for the batch of foreign bills.

Then the failure of the bills,
Brazen bills!
What a tale of terror now the crazy city fills!
Managers, directors, how it thrills!
When they see from morn till night,
Houses crashing left and right,
Fearing, ere a week,
A crowd may shriek, shriek,
With a clamorous appealing at the counters of the bank
Saying, gentlemen, we’ll thank
You very much without delay to empty all your tills;
Things are looking very black,
And we want our money back;
And the banker fully knows
By the banging
And the clanging
How the danger ebbs and flows.
But we trust these passing ills
Will clear the city air,
By inducing greater care
How good money is exchanged for worthless bills,
Bills, bills, bills, bills,
In discounting such accommodation bills.

_Funny Folks_, 14 August, 1875.

――――:o:――――

THE BELLES.

I.

Oh, the dancing of the belles,
Silver belles!
What a world of merriment that glancing group foretells.
How they dance, dance, dance,
In the white and heated light,
Till the berries that o’ersprinkle
Every picture seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight.
Keeping time, time, time,
To the valse-exciting rhyme
Of Der Schönen Blauen Donau that so musically wells;
Oh, the belles, belles, belles, belles,
Belles, belles, belles,
Oh, the dancing and the glancing of the belles.

II.

Oh, the court-invited belles,
Golden belles!
What a world of plush and paint their dazzling grandeur tells.
Through the balmy air of night,
Through a vision of delight,
From the jarring city notes
Out of tune,
What a splendid vision floats
To the eyes of Miss Fitz-Neotes
Of Aroon!
Oh the crushing and the rout,
And the gathers that come out!
How the agony voluminously wells,
How it swells!
How it dwells!
On the temper how it tells!
To what anger it impels.
Oh, the rushing and the crushing of the belles!
Of the belles, belles, belles, belles,
Belles, belles, belles,
Oh, the tearing and despairing of the belles!

III.

Oh, the belles of the Mabille,
Brazen belles!
What a world of lying love their honied accent tells.
In the glare and in the light
How they dance out their delight,
Thinking of the future never,
Dancing on and dancing ever,
With a weary simulation of a love they cannot feel,
In the glare and in the glitter and the hell of the Mabille.
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavour
Now――now to win or never,
Golden youth!
Oh, the belles, belles, belles,
What a tale their laughing tells
Of despair.
How they dance, dance, dance,
With a weary smile and glance,
In the glare and in the glitter that are there!
Yet the eye it fully knows
By the sighing
Lips and dying
How the hoping ebbs and flows.
Yet the eye distinctly tells
How the hoping sinks and swells,
By the dancing, and the glancing, and the prancing of the belles,
Of the belles――
Of the belles, belles, belles, belles,
Belles, belles, belles,
By the sighing lips and dying of the belles.

BENJAMIN D――――. _His Little Dinner_, 1876.

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.

Hear the doctor with his bills,
Horrid bills!
What a world of medicine, of powders and of pills,
How you sicken, sicken, sicken,
When they burst upon your sight,
While your very pulse will quicken,
And your blood will seem to thicken,
And throb in fearful fright,
Keeping time, time, time,
In an allopathic rhyme,
To the merry little “guinea” that so very neatly fills
Up the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
That adds a portly total to the bills.

Hear the tailor with his bills,
Heavy bills!
What a vast extravagance their money column fills,
In the merry summer’s light,
How they pall upon the sight,
From the hard up debtors’ throats,
In dismal tune,
What a grumbling ditty floats,
To the sanguine “Master Stitchem” as he gloats,
Grasping loon.
Oh, from out his sounding tills
What a rush of chinking satirically trills,
How it trills,
How it spills.
Hopes of Future! How it fills
Up the cranium to “dils.”
Oh, the adding and the padding,
Of the bills, bills, bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
Till we’re bilious at the summary of bills.

Hear the butcher with his bills,
Meaty bills!
What a hearty appetite their money column fills,
On the thoughtful mind at night,
How they grin with blue delight,
We’re too much annoyed to speak,
But we shriek a dismal shriek,
And out of tune,
In a senseless, vain appealing to the mercy of the man,
In a vain expostulation with the deaf and grasping man.
Screaming man, man, man,
Make them smaller if you can,
And our sensible endeavour
Shall be never, never, never,
To pay the greasy, red-faced loon.
Oh, the bills, bills, bills,
What a cup their total fills,
Of despair!
How they come in more and more,
Till the eye is nearly sore
As it contemplates the culminating store.
Yet the mind it fully knows
By the ringing,
They are bringing,
A further lot which we must add to those,
Yet the bosom quickly fills,
By the ringing,
By the ringing,
With a dark foreboding fills,
For it knows of many long outstanding unreceipted bills,
Heavy bills!
Oh, the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
Oh, the torture we are put to by the bills!

Hear the matron with her bills!
Many bills,
What a pleasant breakfast time their large addition kills.
From our happy dreams by night,
How we start with ghastly fright,
And quick relapse with melancholy groan,
Again to hear their notes
From their grim fantastic throats
In threatening tone.
And the devils! Ah! the devils,
And minutely he that revels
All alone
In the padding, padding, padding,
In that dismal monotone,
Feels delight as thus he’s adding
Round the debtor’s neck a stone.
He is neither man nor woman,
But a junior clerk inhuman,
Worst of lads.
And his chief it is who pads,
And he adds, adds, adds,
Adds
More figures to the bills,
And his demon mind it fills
With delight to view the bills,
And he capers and he trills,
Keeping time, time, time,
In a Basinghall street rhyme,
To the rustle of the bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills,
To the total of the bills,
Keeping time, time, time,
As he trills, trills, trills,
In a Basinghall street rhyme,
To the padding of the bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills,
To the adding of the bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
Oh, the trying care, undying, of the bills!

_The Corkscrew Papers._ London: W. H. GUEST, 1876.

――――:o:――――

THE SWELLS.

Listen to the lisping of the swells――
Awful swells
_Ennui_ in intensity each drawling accent tells,
As they saunter in the “Row,”
With _entourage comme il faut_,
Far too _blasé_ e’en to speak,
Save in childish pipings weak,
Out of tune,――
In a mild expostulation at the want of something new,
In a clamorous appealing at the dearth of aught to do,――
Looking cool, cool, cool,
At all “get-ups” not by POOLE,
As club scandal they retail
Of the last connubial sale
Of the day!
How they leer,
And peer, and sneer,
At Saint John’s Wood broughams queer,
In a charmingly debilitated way!

Next, we have another kind of swells――
Seedy swells!
Impecuniosity within their aspect dwells,
And their boots, and hats, and clothes,
Sadly foreign are to those
Which our former friends disclose
Every day!
And they dismally recur unto the days ere tick expired,
When they dined and wined _ad lib._, and were both fêted and admired――
Ere the Hebrew would refuse
To transmute their I O U’s,
And they only knew the blues
As a bore;
When the features of their creeds
Were feeds, and weeds,
And steeds,
And the thought of being poor
In the future they ne’er saw,
But would greet it with a roar,
To be sure!

Last, we have the naughtiest of swells――
Howling swells!
Each, in larks nocturnal, both our other friends excels,
Thinking nought of getting “tight,”
Screeching out in wild delight
In the “startled eve of night”
Tavern melodies, despite
The warning of the much-disgusted “p’lice,”
Making rows, rows, rows,
Imitating small bow-wows,
While the cats on all the tiles,
Whom this mad defiance riles,
Add their quota to the torment of the Peace!
Yes, these swells, swells, swells,
Bibulation deep impels
To wake the peaceful midnight with their yells, yells, yells,
With their yells, yells, yells, yells, yells, yells, yells,
Their sleep-destroying, horrifying yells!

_Worthy a Crown?_――1876.

――――:o:――――

THE BELLS.

Hear the tramcars with their bells,
Merry bells,
What a good threepennyworth their melody foretels,
As they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
Through the day and through the night,
All the cars that oversprinkle
The lines fly in a twinkle,
From the red, or blue and white;
And from eight p.m. they chime,
Through the Corporation slime
(The proper term is mud, but then you see it wouldn’t rhyme――
It’s sometimes very difficult to hit upon a rhyme.)
Until the licensed-victualler his customers expels,
And their bacchanalian yells,
Join in chorus with the bells;
With the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells――
The racing and the chasing of the bells.

Hear the yellow dinner bells,
In hotels――
How pleasant to the tympanum of all the hungry swells,
How it conjures to the eye
Happy dreams of pigeon pie,
And gorgeous _table d’hotes_,
Coming soon;
And swimming butter boats,
And turtle soup that glistens as it floats
In the spoon:
Now rising from the dish
Comes the odour of the fish,
How it smells, and it tells
Why the eye so brightly glistens, and the ear so fondly listens
For the bells,
For the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells,
The rousing to carousing by the bells.

Hear those clanging iron bells,
Railway bells.
What a page of accidents their dissonance foretels,
As we thunder o’er the river
How the nervous ladies shiver,
How they groan.
And the stoker, ah, the stoker,
He who wields the mighty poker,
All alone.
And who, like a thing of evil,
Sits undaunted on his throne,
As if he knew the devil
Would be careful of his own
(It has often been remarked that he is careful of his own.)
The engine is a pyre,
The poker is his lyre,
And he joins in ghastly cadence with the demons of the fire
(Perhaps you’re not aware that there are demons in the fire)
They rush across the fells
Through the forests and the dells,
And echo goblin choruses in answer to the bells,
Ringing knells for the swells,
With the bells,
With the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells,
The rasping, and the grasping of the bells.

_Zoz_, October 26, 1878.

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.
E. A. POE-TICS FOR THE SEASON.

Hear the postmen with the bills――
Christmas bills!
What a world of merriment their frequency instils!
How they gather, gather, gather,
On the file to such a height,
That one wishes――don’t one, _rather_!――
Them considerably farther――
Altogether out of sight;
With their “Time, time, time,
With the proceeds of your rhyme――
Time to meet the invitation which so chronically fills
All the bills, bills, bills, bills,”
Prompts our glaring and our swearing at the bills.
Dash that fellow with the bills!
Olden bills!
What a world of happiness their cursed coming kills!
And from morning until night
How they check a man’s delight
With demands for gold and notes:
Payment for shoon,
Meat and drink and coal and coats;
While they nearly all desire their pounds and groats
Very soon!

Oh, the girls’ astounding frills!
Oh, the rare old sherry which papa at moments swills!
And the pills for the ills.
Thence resulting! it all fills
Up the avalanche which chills
Us, the starters and the martyrs
Of the bills, bills, bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――
Of the pining and the whining of the bills!

Hear the checking of the bills,
Bothering bills!
What a lot of bitter spite their tedious tale distils!
In the silence of the night
How we plot to “fly a kite,”
To avoid the moody menace of their tone!
For their only antidote
To the check in every note
Is a loan.

And the people――hang the people!――
They would call from every steeple
How your payments you postpone.
And in calling, calling, calling
Oft enough to make them blown,
Proves they glory in appalling
Men whose debts are all they own
Be they man or be they woman,
They are certainly less human
Than like ghouls;
And their king is he who rolls
Most people into holes,
Bowls
Men over with his bills!
And his merry bosom fills
With delight at leaving bills;
And he dances and he trills,
Saying, “Time, time, time,
To pay up your pound and dime――
Pay the figure of the bills,
Of the bills.”

Saying, “Time, time, time!
Owing money is a crime;
It is robbing to have bills,
To have bills, bills, bills;
It is shocking to have bills!”
Saying, “Time, time, time!”
As he trills, trills, trills,
To the growing of the bills――
Of the bills, bills, bills,
To the growing of the bills――
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――

To our groaning and our moaning o’er the bills.

_Funny Folks_, January 25, 1879.

――――:o:――――

THE HOSE.

Hear the ballad of the hose――
Stripèd hose.
What a blissful wealth of plumpness they tenderly enclose!
Naught you’ll find in ancient story
Like those shapely symmetries.
Solomon, in all his glory,
Was not arrayed in one of these
Dainty hose, hose, hose.
Nothing can compare with those
Striped with the crimson color of the fragrant-scented rose.
Oh! those hose, hose, hose, hose,
Hose, hose, hose――
Those softly rounded, garter-bounded hose.

There’s a charm about those hose――
Silken hose――
Which, from an æsthetic standpoint, admiration will impose!
And whene’er we chance to spy them,
Then they seem our sole “Utopias,”
And we feel we’d like to buy them――
Buy them filled, like Cornucopias――
Saucy hose, hose, hose.
And the beauty they disclose――
How the eye of the beholder in entranced rapture glows
On those hose, hose, hose, hose,
Hose, hose, hose――
Those grace-enveloped, full-developed hose.

You, by chance, may see those hose――
Well-filled hose――
Peeping from the mystic meshes of a labyrinth of clothes.
Damsels dark and damsels fair,
Each, mayhaps, displays a pair
Of deftly-woven, parti-colored stockings, which more winsomely allure
By the floral garniture
Of their clockings.
But the people-ah! the people――
They that dwell up in the steeple,
Far from those:
’Mid the clanging and the rumble
Of the bells――they never “tumble”
To the hose.
At that lofty elevation,
They maintain their equipose,
Suffering not the excitation
Consequent on seeing those
Shapely hose, hose, hose――
White as winter’s snows,
Save the stripes, so richly tinted with the blushes of the rose,
Are the hose, hose, hose, hose――
Those hose, hose――
Are the fascinating, aggravating hose.
LUTIN.
_Puck_, (New York), May 21, 1879.

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.
(_An apology for which Punch is proud to owe to Edgar Poe._)

I.

See the ever-swelling bills――
Heavy bills!
What a world of botherment SIR STAFFORD’S bosom fills!
How they tumble, tumble, tumble
In, to his extreme affright!
While the nation ’gins to grumble
At the wild financial jumble,
To the Liberals’ delight.
E’en the _Times_, _Times_, _Times_,
Hints at economic crimes
In the quick accumulation that the world with wonder fills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills,――
The growing and o’erflowing of the bills.

II.

See the Military bills――
Bouncing bills!
How their growth the CHANCELLOR’S optimism chills!
For each little local fight,
Afghan, Zulu, what a sight
Of cash, in gold or notes,
Must come soon!
What triumphant mockery floats
From the Radical, who capers while he gloats
O’er the tune,
The pretty tune to which
The Nation, racked though rich,
Will have to pay the piper from its coffers and its tills,
For the bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills,
The ne’er ceasing increasing of the bills!

III.

See the long Imperial bills――
Bloated bills!
How their swoln proportions hint of choking bolus pills
For JOHN BULL, who, at the sight,
Stares and stammers with affright!
Too much horrified to reckon
All the burdens piled his neck on
By the lune,
The mad hallucination which his fancy did inspire,
The wild and weak ambition, which his foolish brain did fire,
To soar higher, higher, higher,
With a lunatic desire,
And an imbecile endeavour
Now, now to swell, or never,
To Imperial plenilune!
Oh the bills, bills, bills!
What a tale their tottle fills!
Hard to bear!
How they mount to more and more!
What a cold, cold _douche_ they pour
On the folly of the frantic Jingo scare!
Yet our pockets fully know,
By the waxing
Of the taxing,
How they flow, and flow, and flow;
Yet the ear that daily fills
With the wrangling,
And the jangling
Of the rival Party quills,
Knows how the Country chills,
At the swelling beyond telling in the number of the bills――
Of the bills――
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills,
The mounting past all counting of the bills!

_Punch_, Oct. 25, 1879.
――――――――

BILLS.

(SCENE.――Paterfamilias discovered in the act of looking through his morning’s letters.)

I.

Here’s the postman with his bills――
Christmas bills!
What a world of coming trouble their very sight instils!
How they worry, worry, worry,
In their envelopes of blue!
Whilst though I conceal my flurry,
I am really in a hurry,
To break open and review
The long lines, lines, lines,
Of fours and noughts, and nines,
And the terrifying total――which, as it is, my heart so thrills――
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――
Oh, the flurry and the worry of the bills!

II.

Here are two most lengthy bills――
Bonnet bills!
What a world of foolish details, to be sure, their columns fills!
Here are bonnets for all weathers,
Trimm’d with birds, and flowers, and feathers’
Tulle diaphanous that floats――
Each new device!
Gold-tipp’d grasses, silver oats,
Birds have yielded up their plumage, beasts their coats,――
At a price,
Which is down in Madame’s bills.
(Three guineas! only fancy for a wreath of daffodils!)
Why it chills,
And it thrills,
And a lesson new instils,
Does the wicked waste that fills,
And makes bigger every figure
Of those shameful bonnet bills!
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――
These increasing and ne’er ceasing
Bonnet bills!

III.

Here are more alarming bills――
Butcher’s bills!
What a tale their total tells of the worst of household ills!
How the figures seem to glare,
And to tell one everywhere
Of bones weighed out as meat,
Of triumphant plans to cheat
In their bills.
In their bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills――
Change the prices and devices of their bills.

IV.

Here are countless other bills――
Sundry bills!
Of which the reckoning up is like climbing up high hills!
Now I tremble with affright
On my lawyer’s to alight,
With its endless six and eightpences
All shown;
And the doctors, though one line,
To bad language doth incline,
Or a groan;
Whilst the tailor――oh, the tailor!
Was he ever found to fail, or
Ever known
Not to pile up useless details
In the manner to him prone;
“Fancy twill’d,” and “double mill’d,”
“Blue Elysian,” “braided,” “drill’d,”
Till each garment that he retails
Is described in terms high flown.
Then there are bills, of course,
Sent by tradesmen, who, perforce,――
(Without doubt);
Of American sirloins sold as Scotch beef superfine,
Of suet charged but never sent, of fat skewer’d on the chine;
Of rump steak at one-and-nine,
And of “rounds” so steep’d in brine,
That, spite resolute endeavour,
One could eat it never, never!
Nor anyhow the salt boil out.
Oh these bills, bills, bills,
Writ with skewers ’stead of quills――
They recall
Prices always going higher,
Though at Newgate ’twould transpire
Often meat had had a most decided fall.

Yes, there’s scarce a line that shows
Joints overweighted,
Price o’erstated,
As one by experience knows.
Yet the whole with hope one fills,
Co-operation
Through the nation
Soon will empty butchers’ tills;
Or at least bring down the prices they are charging in their bills――
With under-dash――
_Must_ make up by _Tuesday week_
Such a sum; so from you seek
Cash!
To assist them with _their_ bills,
And here, too, like bitter pills,
Come the long-forgotten bills――

Accounts one fancied settled,
Till by them, newly nettled,
All the air with cries one fills,
Making moan, moan, moan,
In a muffled monotone,
At the checking of the bills――
Of the bills!
Making moan, moan, moan,
In the same old monotone,
At the reckoning of the bills!

Of the bills, bills, bills,
At the checking, the reck’ning of the bills.
With a deep and final groan,
At the bother of the bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills,
At the pother of the bills,
Of the bills, bills, bills, bills,
Bills, bills, bills,
At the bother, and the pother of the bills.

_Truth_, January 8, 1880.
――――:o:――――

THE BELLS.[8]

Hear a voice announcing IRVING in _The Bells_――sledge’s bells!
What a scene of wild excitement the advertisement foretells!
See the rush upon the pay-hole――
People stand a night and day whole
To secure a little corner for _The Bells_!
To look ghastly pale and shudder, every man and every “brudder”
Feels that nothing can be equal to _The Bells_!
_Bells! Bells! Bells! Bells!_
Too horrified to cheer,
Folk will testify by fear
How appalled they are by IRVING in _The Bells_;
While great beads of perspiration will appear,
For in conscience-stricken terrors he excels!
Gloomy _Bells_!
Pit and gallery will glory in the weird and frightful story,
Which may even thrill the bosom of the swells,
For every Yankee “dude”
Unquestionably should
Have nightmare after witnessing _The Bells_!
Will our cousins all go frantic from Pacific to Atlantic, or condemn
as childish antic
IRVING’S dancing, and his gasping, and his yells!
There’s a certain admiration which the strange impersonation
Still compels,
E’en from those who can’t see beauty in _The Bells_――
In the play that Mr. LEWIS calls _The Bells_!
Wondrous _Bells_!
You first made HENRY famous, so the stage historian tells,
Will the scene be now repeated which in London always greeted
His performance of Mathias in _The Bells_?
Or will every sneering Yankee,
In his nasal tones, say “Thankee,
I guess this is just another of your mighty British ‘sells?’”
Let the thought for ever perish, that the actor whom we cherish
Could fail to lick creation in _The Bells_!
But if there are detractors
Of this foremost of our actors,
Of the gentlemanly IRVING――friend of TOOLE’S――
“They are neither man nor woman, they are neither brute nor human,”
They are fools!

_Judy_, October 24, 1883.

――――:o:――――

The following verses, in imitation of POE, are quoted from a little work entitled “Original Readings and Recitations,” by W. A. Eaton, published by H. Vickers, Strand. Mr. Eaton is a well-known Temperance Advocate, and the author of many pathetic poems admirably adapted for public Recitations:――

THE VOICE OF THE BELLS.

I love the sound of bells
At evening, when the sun
To the tired labourer tells
His hard day’s work is done.
I love to hear,
So soft and clear,
Their notes go sailing o’er mount and mere.
Bells, softly chime
Your sweet, low rhyme,
Ring on, still ring.
While softly the shadows creep,
Over the folded sheep.
The day is done;
Down goes the sun,
And Silence opens the gates of Sleep.

I love the sound of bells
On a glorious summer morn,
When ev’ry note that swells
Tells of a joy new born.
The wedding note
Doth lightly float,
Gaily o’er hill and dale,
Merrily, cherrily,
Madly, gladly,
Telling of joys that will never fail.
Bells, bells, bells!
Hark how their music swells!
How it floats along,
Like a glorious song!
Bells, bells, bells, bells!
Oh, teach me the joy that your glad music tells.

I love to hear the bell
That is rung for a passing soul,
As, solemnly over the dell,
Its mournful boomings roll.
Toll, toll, toll,
For a passing soul;
While the mourners tramp
Through the graveyard damp.
Toll, toll, toll!
Boom, boom, boom!
Over an open tomb.
With a voice of terrible gloom,
(Toll, toll, toll,)
As long as the ages roll,
Thou wilt tell men of their doom.
But yet I love thee well,
Thou mournful, chiming bell;
For who shall say,
While thou dost toll,
What glorious chimes
And echoing rhymes
Will welcome to heaven the new born soul?

* * * * *

――――:o:――――

THE BILLS.
RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO THE GENTLE READER.

Hark! the postman! he brings Bills!
Christmas Bills!!
What a world of torment now my bosom fills!
How they trouble, trouble, trouble,
All the merry Christmas time,
While a woe unfathomable
Seems to bubble, bubble, bubble
In my mind and mars the merry Christmas chime.
For they come, come, come,
In a multiplying sum,
Admitting no evasion of their ills;
Oh the Bills! Bills!! Bills!!! Bills!!!!
Bills!!!!! Bills!!!!!! Bills!!!!!!!
Oh, the torment and the torture of the Bills!
Hang those Bills!
Christmas Bills!!
For their presence all our Christmas joy dispels;
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
And every note that floats
From our dry and dusty throats
Is a groan;
And we wish we were the people
Who dwell up in a steeple――
Happy people!
All alone!
And who, toiling, toiling, toiling
For their creditors’ despoiling,
Find it easy all cash payments to postpone,
And find pleasure in the spoiling,
In the spoiling and the moiling,
In the spoiling of a bailiff with a stone.
They are scarcely man and woman,
They are almost superhuman――
They are kings,
And like kings can sit and sing,
While they fling, fling, fling,
Fling rocks upon their duns;
While each dun gets up and runs
For his pistols and his guns,
And he dances and he groans,
Keeping time, time, time,
In a strange spasmodic rhyme,
To the volley of big stones,
Of big stones;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a ghastly sort of rhyme,
To the volleying of the stones,
Of the stones, stones, stones,
To the volley of the jolly big stones.
Keeping time, time, time,
While he yells, yells, yells,
In a wild galvanic rhyme,
For the payment of his bills,
Of his Bills! Bills!! Bills!!! Bills!!!!
Bills!!!!! Bills!!!!!! Bills!!!!!!!
For the instant liquidation of his Bills!

_Free Press Flashes_, 1883.

――――:o:――――

O! THE HAMMERS.

O! the hammers, hammers, hammers,
Clanging hammers;
How they beat, how they chime,
With a joyous music time,
Soul-inspiring, never tiring
To the ear;
O’er the waters of the Tyne
Rolls the melody divine
Loud and clear;
And the toilers, strong and grim,
Glory in the sounding hymn,
For they know that each blow
Keeps the homely hearth aglow;
So they hammer, hammer, hammer,
And the far-resounding clamour
Gives them cheer.

O! the hammers, hammers, hammers,
Throbbing hammers,
How they leap, how they skip,
O’er the bosom of the ship,
Ever beating and repeating
Labour’s lay;
Hark! they tell of human might,
With an echoing delight,
All the day;
O! the battle must be won,
And the toiling must be done,
For the strife of each life
Is for children and for wife;
So they hammer, hammer, hammer,
And the wild, sonorous clamour
Is their stay.

From “Poems and Songs,” by WILLIAM ALLAN.――Simpkin Marshall & Co., London, 1883.

――――:o:――――

REMINISCENCES OF SUMMER.

See the frog, the slimy, green frog,
Dozing away on that old rotten log;
Seriously wondering
What caused the sundering
Of the tail that he wore when a wee pollywog.

See the boy, the freckled schoolboy,
Famed for cussedness, free from alloy;
Watching the frog
Perched on the log,
With feelings akin to tumultuous joy.

See the rock, the hard, flinty rock,
Which the freckled-faced boy at the frog doth sock;
Conscious he’s sinning,
Yet gleefully grinning
At the likely result of its terrific shock.

See the grass, the treacherous grass,
Slip from beneath his feet! Alas,
Into the mud
With a dull thud
He falls, and rises a slimy mass.

Now, see the frog, the hilarious frog,
Dancing a jig on his old rotten log;
Applying his toes
To his broad, blunt nose
As he laughs at the boy stuck fast in the bog.

* * * * *

Look at the switch, the hickory switch,
Waiting to make that schoolboy twitch;
When his mother knows
The state of his clothes
Won’t he raise his voice to its highest pitch.

_Free Press Flashes_, 1883.

――――:o:――――

THAT AMATEUR FLUTE.

Hear the fluter with his flute――
Silver flute!
Oh, what a world of wailing is awakened by its toot!
How it demi-semi quavers
On the maddened air of night!
And defieth all endeavours
To escape the sound or sight
Of the flute, flute, flute,
With its tootle, tootle, toot――
With reiterated tooteling of exasperating toots,
The long protracted tootelings of agonising toots,
Of the flute, flute, flute, flute,
Flute, flute, flute,
And the wheezings and the spittings of its toots.
Should he get that other flute――
Golden flute――
Oh, what a deeper anguish will its presence institoot!
How his eyes to heaven he’ll raise,
As he plays,
All the days!
How he’ll stop us on our ways
With its praise!
And the people――oh, the people,
That don’t live up in the steeple,
But inhabit Christian parlours
Where he visiteth and plays――
Where he plays, plays, plays――
In the cruellest of ways,
And thinks we ought to listen,
And expects us to be mute,
Who would rather have the earache
Than the music of his flute,
Of his flute, flute, flute,
And the tootings of his toot,
Of the toots wherewith he tooteleth its agonising toot,
Of the flute, flewt, fluit, floot,
Phlute, phlewt, phlewght,
And the tootle, tootle, tooting of its toot.

_American Paper._

――――:o:――――

THE OFFICE BOY’S MOTHER IN AMERICA.

“Bells, bells, bells, bells, bells!”
How their clashing, and their clanging, all thought of peace dispels!
Oh, well might EDGAR ALLAN POE――or any other poet, born in American
clime――
Adopt the bells, the ceaseless bells, as subject for his rhyme.
From early morn, till dewy eve, their clamour resounds loud and long,
The railway train as it puffs and clatters through the streets,
proclaims its passage with “ding, dong! ding, dong!”
The matutinal milkman tinkle tinkles on his way,
And the vegetable vendor tintinabulates “ting-a-ring! ting-a-ring!”
――enough to drive one mad, as a body may say.
The steamboat bell resounds, as if summoning the nation to its doom,
And from chapel, church, and schoolhouse――at all hours――echoes forth
the solemn “boom, boom, boom!”
And at any time――day or night――just as it were――to fill up the blank,
The fire-engine rushes through the streets, with its quick, sharp,
metallic, warning voice, “Clank――clank――clank――clank!”
It ain’t till you’ve lived in an American city that you learn how it
was they came to dub
The oh-no-we-never-mention-him with the name of _Bells_-ebub!

* * * * *

_Judy_, January 14, 1885.

BISAKEL.
“ISRAFEL,” BY POE, RECAST FOR A NEW ROLL.

The angel Bisakel, whose wings are wheels, has the
fleetest pace of all God’s creatures.――_Koran._

In heaven a spirit doth dwell
Whose great wing is a wheel.
None fly so wildly well
As the angel Bisakel,
And the giddy stars, so legends say,
Slowing their course, attend the play
Of his wondrous heel.

Maturing her age
In her highest noon,
The enamelled moon
Reddens with rage,
And to witness, with misgivin’,
(With the nautic Pleiads even,
More than seven.)
Pauses in heaven.

And they say (the starry choir
And the other gossiping things)
That Bisakeli’s fire
Is owing to that tire
O’er which he sits and slings
The trembling living wire
Of those unusual wings.

But surely that angel trod
Treadles amazing flighty;
And, for a grown-up god,
Their bicycling Houris’ are
His rivals――Aphrodite
Transports faster than a star!

The ecstasies he took
With such company to deal――
His leg and style, his pure caoutchouc,
With the fervour of his wheel――
Well may the stars go reel!

We say thou art not wrong,
Bisakeli, who despisest
Feathers and psalming song;
Bloom thou the laurels among,
Best angel and the wisest,――
_Merrily live, and long!_

Ah, heaven is his’n, indeed――
This world is sweets _and_ sours;
Our powers are puny powers,
And the slowest of his perfect speed
Is the swiftest of ours.

If I could dwell
Where Bisakel
Hath dwelt, and he where I,
He might not spin so wildly well
Our mortal wheelery,
While a better song than now might swell
From my lyre within the sky――
But――how is this “for _high_”?

_Lyra Bicyclica_, By J. G. Dalton, Boston, 1880.

――――:o:――――

THE STEED OF FIRE.
From Poe’s “Eldorado”――Fabled Golden
made true steel.

Soberly dight,
A modern knight,
Upon a hack of hire
Had journeyed long
Singing a song
In search of a steed of fire.

But he grew old,
This knight, tho’ bold,
With o’er his heart a dire
Dump as he found
Nothing around
That looked like a steed of fire

And as his strength
Waned, he at length
Met a bicycling flyer:
“Flyer,” said he,
“What! can it be――
Can this be the steed of fire?”

“Upon this mount
We surely count,
’Tis all you can desire;
Ride, boldly ride,”
Cycler replied,
“If you seek for a steed of fire!”

He dried his tears,――
And shed his years,
All on the windy wire,
And sweeps along
Singing much song
In praise of the steed of fire.

_Lyra Bicyclica_, By J. G. DALTON, Boston, Hodges & Co., 1880.

――――:o:――――

THE RAVEN.

_Scene_――Study in Chief Secretary’s Lodge, Phœnix Park. [9]_G.O.T. loquitor_――

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary
Over two delightful volumes rich in biographic lore.
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping
As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis the footman with the tumblers, tapping at my chamber door――
Only that and nothing more.”

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak November;
Wrought each separate dying ember, Gladstone’s nose upon the floor,
Terror-struck I feared the morrow; vainly had I sought to borrow
From those books surcease of sorrow; agony perhaps in store!
If those students, sons of Gladstone, failed to top Sir Stafford’s
score!
Name it not for evermore.