Chapter I: Introduction (1)

A hope of immortality and a sense of humor distinguish man from the beasts of the field.

A single exception may be made, perhaps, of the Laughing Hyena, and, on the other hand, not every one of the human race possesses the power of laughter. For those who do, this volume is intended.

And since there can be nothing humorous about an introduction, there can be small need of a lengthy one.

Merely a few explanations of conditions which may be censured by captious critics.

First, the limitations of space had to be recognized. Hence, the book is a compilation, not a collection. It is representative, but not exhaustive. My ambition was toward a volume to which everyone could go, with a surety of finding any one of his favorite humorous poems between these covers. But no covers of one book could insure that, so I reluctantly gave up the dream for a reality which I trust will make it possible for a majority of seekers to find their favorites here.

The compiler's course is a difficult one. The Scylla of Popularity lures him on the one hand, while the Charybdis of the Classical charms him on the other. He has nothing to steer by but his own good taste, and good taste, alack, is greatly a matter of opinion.

And no opinion seemeth good unto an honest compiler, save his own. Wherefore, the choice of these selections, like kissing, went by favor. As to the arrangement of them, every compiler will tell you that Classification is Vexation. And why not? When many a poem may be both Parody and Satire,--both Romance and Cynicism. Wherefore, the compiler sorted with loving care the selections here presented striving to do justice to the verses themselves, and taking a chance on the tolerant good nature of the reader.

For,

"A jest's prosperity lies in the ear
Of him that hears it.
Never in the tongue
Of him that makes it."

Which made me all the more careful to do my authors justice, leaving the prosperity of the jests to the hearers.

|Carolyn Wells.|

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The compiler is indebted to the publisher or author, as noted below, for the use of copyright material included in this volume. Special arrangements have been made with the authorized publishers of those American poets, whose works in whole or in part have lapsed copyright. All rights of these poems have been reserved by the authorized publisher, author or holder of the copyright as indicated in the following:

Little, Brown & Company: For selections from the Poems and Limericks of Edward Lear.

The Macmillan Company: For selections from the Poems of Lewis Carroll and Verses from "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass."

Harr Wagner Publishing Company: For permission to reprint from "The Complete Poems" of Joaquin Miller "That Gentle Man From Boston Town," "That Texan Cattle Man," "William Brown of Oregon."

Frederick A. Stokes Company: "Bessie Brown, M.D." and "A Kiss in the Rain," by Samuel Minturn Peck.

Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Company: For the inclusion of the following Poems by Sam Walter Foss: "The Meeting of the Clabberhuses," "A Philosopher" and "The Prayer of Cyrus Brown" from "Dreams in Homespun," copyright, 1897. "Then Agin--" and "Husband and Heathen," from "Back Country Poems," copyright, 1894. "The Ideal Husband to His Wife," from "Whiffs from Wild Meadows," copyright, 1895.

Forbes & Company: "How Often?" "If I Should Die To-night," and "The Pessimist," by Ben King.

The Century Company: For permission to reprint from _St. Nicholas Magazine_ the following poems by Ruth McEnery Stuart: "The Endless Song" and "The Hen-Roost Man"; and by Tudor Jenks: "An Old Bachelor"; and by Mary Mapes Dodge: "Home and Mother," "Life in Laconics," "Over the Way" and "The Zealless Xylographer."

Thomas L. Masson: For permission to reprint "The Kiss" from "Life."

E. P. Button & Company: "The Converted Cannibals" and "The Retired Pork-Butcher and the Spook," by G. E. Farrow.

Houghton Mifflin Company: With their permission and by special arrangement, as authorized publishers of the following authors' works, are used: Selections from Nora Perry, John Townsend Trowbridge, Charles E. Carryl, Oliver Wendell Holmes, John Greenleaf Whittier, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Bret Harte, James Thomas Fields, John G. Saxe, James Russell Lowell and Bayard Taylor.

A. P. Watt & Son and Doubleday, Page & Company: For their permission to use "Divided Destinies," "Study of an Elevation, in Indian Ink," and "Commonplaces," by Rudyard Kipling.

G. P. Putnam's Sons: Selections from the Poems of Eugene Fitch Ware and "The Wreck of the 'Julie Plante,'" by William Henry Drummond.

Henry Holt & Company: Two Parodies from "----and Other Poets," by Louis Untermeyer.

Dodd, Mead & Company: "The Constant Cannibal Maiden," "Blow Me Eyes" and "A Grain of Salt," by Wallace Irwin.

John Lane Company: For Poems by Owen Seaman, Anthony C. Deane and G. K. Chesterton.

The Smart Set: "Dighton is Engaged," and "Kitty Wants to Write," by Gelett Burgess.

Small, Maynard & Company: For selections from Holman F. Day, Richard Hovey and Clinton Scollard.

The Bobbs-Merrill Company: For special permission to reprint from the Biographical Edition of the Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley (copyright, 1913) the following Poems: "Little Orphant Annie," "The Lugubrious Whing-Whang," "The Man in the Moon," "The Old Man and Jim," "Prior to Miss Belle's Appearance," "Spirk Throll-Derisive," "When the Frost is on the Punkin."

The Bobbs-Merrill Company: For permission to use the following Poems by Robert J. Burdette, from "Smiles Yoked with Sighs" (copyright, 1900), "Orphan Born," "The Romance of the Carpet," "Soldier, Rest!", "Songs without Words," "What Will We Do?".

Charles Scribner's Sons: For permission to use "The Dinkey-Bird," "Dutch Lullaby," "The Little Peach," "The Truth About Horace," by Eugene Field.

CONTENTS

I: BANTER PAGE The Played-Out Humorist _W. S. Gilbert_ 25 The Practical Joker _W. S. Gilbert_ 26 To Ph[oe]be _W. S. Gilbert_ 28 Malbrouck _Father Prout_ 29 Mark Twain: A Pipe Dream _Oliver Herford_ 30 From a Full Heart _A. A. Milne_ 31 The Ultimate Joy _Unknown_ 32 Old Fashioned Fun _W. M. Thackeray_ 33 When Moonlike Ore the Hazure Seas _W. M. Thackeray_ 34 When the Frost is on the Punkin _James Whitcomb Riley_ 34 Two Men _Edwin Arlington Robinson_ 35 A Familiar Letter to Several Correspondents _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 36 The Height of the Ridiculous _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 38 Shake, Mulleary and Go-ethe _H. C. Bunner_ 40 A Rondelay _Peter A. Motteux_ 41 Winter Dusk _R. K. Munkittrick_ 42 Comic Miseries _John G. Saxe_ 42 Early Rising _John G. Saxe_ 44 To the Pliocene Skull _Bret Harte_ 46 Ode to Work in Springtime _Thomas R. Ybarra_ 47 Old Stuff _Bert Leston Taylor_ 48 To Minerva _Thomas Hood_ 49 The Legend of Heinz Von Stein _Charles Godfrey Leland_ 49 The Truth About Horace _Eugene Field_ 50 Propinquity Needed _Charles Battell Loomis_ 51 In the Catacombs _Harlan Hoge Ballard_ 52 Our Native Birds _Nathan Haskell Dole_ 53 The Prayer of Cyrus Brown _Sam Walter Foss_ 54 Erring in Company _Franklin P. Adams_ 55 Cupid _William Blake_ 56 If We Didn't Have to Eat _Nixon Waterman_ 57 To My Empty Purse _Geoffrey Chaucer_ 58 The Birth of Saint Patrick _Samuel Lover_ 58 Her Little Feet _William Ernest Henley_ 59 School _James Kenneth Stephen_ 60 The Millennium _James Kenneth Stephen_ 60 "Exactly So" _Lady T. Hastings_ 61 Companions _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 63 The Schoolmaster _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 64 A Appeal for Are to the Sextant of the old Brick Meetinouse _Arabella Willson_ 66 Cupid's Darts _Unknown_ 67 A Plea for Trigamy _Owen Seaman_ 68 The Pope _Charles Lever_ 70 All at Sea _Frederick Moxon_ 70 Ballad of the Primitive Jest _Andrew Lang_ 72 Villanelle of Things Amusing _Gelett Burgess_ 73 How to Eat Watermelons _Frank Libby Stanton_ 73 A Vague Story _Walter Parke_ 74 His Mother-in-Law _Walter Parke_ 75 On a Deaf Housekeeper _Unknown_ 76 Hom[oe]opathic Soup _Unknown_ 76 Some Little Bug _Roy Atwell_ 77 On the Downtown Side of an Uptown Street _William Johnston_ 79 Written After Swimming from Sestos to Abydos _Lord Byron_ 80 The Fisherman's Chant _F. C. Burnand_ 81 Report of an Adjudged Case _William Cowper_ 82 Prehistoric Smith _David Law Proudfit_ 83 Song _George Canning_ 84 Lying _Thomas Moore_ 86 Strictly Germ-Proof _Arthur Guiterman_ 87 The Lay of the Lover's Friend _William B. Aytoun_ 88 Man's Place in Nature _Unknown_ 89 The New Version _W. J. Lampton_ 90 Amazing Facts About Food _Unknown_ 91 Transcendentalism _Unknown_ 92 A "Caudal" Lecture _William Sawyer_ 92 Salad _Sydney Smith_ 93 Nemesis _J. W. Foley_ 94 "Mona Lisa" _John Kendrick Bangs_ 95 The Siege of Djklxprwbz _Eugene Fitch Ware_ 96 Rural Bliss _Anthony C. Deane_ 97 An Old Bachelor _Tudor Jenks_ 98 Song _J. R. Planché_ 99 The Quest of the Purple Cow _Hilda Johnson_ 100 St. Patrick of Ireland, My Dear! _William Maginn_ 101 The Irish Schoolmaster _James A. Sidey_ 103 Reflections on Cleopathera's Needle _Cormac O'Leary_ 105 The Origin of Ireland _Unknown_ 106 As to the Weather _Unknown_ 107 The Twins _Henry S. Leigh_ 108

II: THE ETERNAL FEMININE

He and She _Eugene Fitch Ware_ 109 The Kiss _Tom Masson_ 109 The Courtin' _James Russell Lowell_ 110 Hiram Hover _Bayard Taylor_ 113 Blow Me Eyes! _Wallace Irwin_ 115 First Love _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 116 What Is a Woman Like? _Unknown_ 118 Mis' Smith _Albert Bigelow Paine_ 119 Triolet _Paul T. Gilbert_ 120 Bessie Brown, M.D. _Samuel Minturn Peck_ 120 A Sketch from the Life _Arthur Guiterman_ 121 Minguillo's Kiss _Unknown_ 122 A Kiss in the Rain _Samuel Minturn Peck_ 123 The Love-Knot _Nora Perry_ 124 Over the Way _Mary Mapes Dodge_ 125 Chorus of Women _Aristophanes_ 126 The Widow Malone _Charles Lever_ 126 The Smack in School _William Pitt Palmer_ 128 'Späcially Jim _Bessie Morgan_ 129 Kitty of Coleraine _Edward Lysaght_ 130 Why Don't the Men Propose? _Thomas Haynes Bayly_ 130 A Pin _Ella Wheeler Wilcox_ 132 The Whistler _Unknown_ 133 The Cloud _Oliver Herford_ 134 Constancy _John Boyle O'Reilly_ 137 Ain't it Awful, Mabel? _John Edward Hazzard_ 137 Wing Tee Wee _J. P. Denison_ 139 Phyllis Lee _Oliver Herford_ 139 The Sorrows of Werther _W. M. Thackeray_ 140 The Unattainable _Harry Romaine_ 141 Rory O'More; or, Good Omens _Samuel Lover_ 141 A Dialogue from Plato _Austin Dobson_ 142 Dora Versus Rose _Austin Dobson_ 144 Tu Quoque _Austin Dobson_ 146 Nothing to Wear _William Allen Butler_ 148 My Mistress's Boots _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 153 Mrs. Smith _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 155 A Terrible Infant _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 156 Susan _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 157 "I Didn't Like Him" _Harry B. Smith_ 157 My Angeline _Harry B. Smith_ 158 Nora's Vow _Sir Walter Scott_ 159 Husband and Heathen _Sam Walter Foss_ 160 The Lost Pleiad _Arthur Reed Ropes_ 161 The New Church Organ _Will Carleton_ 162 Larrie O'Dee _William W. Fink_ 165 No Fault in Women _Robert Herrick_ 166 A Cosmopolitan Woman _Unknown_ 167 Courting in Kentucky _Florence E. Pratt_ 168 Any One Will Do _Unknown_ 169 A Bird in the Hand _Frederic E. Weatherly_ 170 The Belle of the Ball _Winthrop Mackworth Praed_ 171 The Retort _George Pope Morris_ 174 Behave Yoursel' Before Folk _Alexander Rodger_ 174 The Chronicle: A Ballad _Abraham Cowley_ 176 Buxom Joan _William Congreve_ 179 Oh, My Geraldine _F. C. Burnand_ 180 The Parterre _E. H. Palmer_ 180 How to Ask and Have _Samuel Lover_ 181 Sally in Our Alley _Henry Carey_ 182 False Love and True Logic _Laman Blanchard_ 183 Pet's Punishment _J. Ashby-Sterry_ 184 Ad Chloen, M.A. _Mortimer Collins_ 184 Chloe, M.A. _Mortimer Collins_ 185 The Fair Millinger _Fred W. Loring_ 186 Two Fishers _Unknown_ 188 Maud _Henry S. Leigh_ 188 Are Women Fair? _Francis Davison_ 189 The Plaidie _Charles Sibley_ 190 Feminine Arithmetic _Charles Graham Halpine_ 191 Lord Guy _George F. Warren_ 191 Sary "Fixes Up" Things _Albert Bigelow Paine_ 192 The Constant Cannibal Maiden _Wallace Irwin_ 194 Widow Bedott to Elder Sniffles _Frances M. Whitcher_ 195 Under the Mistletoe _George Francis Shults_ 196 The Broken Pitcher _William E. Aytoun_ 196 Gifts Returned _Walter Savage Landor_ 198

III: LOVE AND COURTSHIP

Noureddin, the Son of the Shah _Clinton Scollard_ 199 The Usual Way _Frederic E. Weatherly_ 200 The Way to Arcady _H. C. Bunner_ 201 My Love and My Heart _Henry S. Leigh_ 204 Quite by Chance _Frederick Langbridge_ 205 The Nun _Leigh Hunt_ 206 The Chemist to His Love _Unknown_ 206 Categorical Courtship _Unknown_ 207 Lanty Leary _Samuel Lover_ 208 The Secret Combination _Ellis Parker Butler_ 209 Forty Years After _H. H. Porter_ 210 Cupid _Ben Jonson_ 211 Paring-Time Anticipated _William Cowper_ 212 Why _H. P. Stevens_ 214 The Sabine Farmer's Serenade _Father Prout_ 214 I Hae Laid a Herring in Saut _James Tytler_ 216 The Clown's Courtship _Unknown_ 217 Out Upon It _Sir John Suckling_ 218 Love is Like a Dizziness _James Hogg_ 218 The Kitchen Clock _John Vance Cheney_ 220 Lady Mine _H. E. Clarke_ 221 Ballade of the Golfer in Love _Clinton Scollard_ 222 Ballade of Forgotten Loves _Arthur Grissom_ 223

IV: SATIRE

A Ballade of Suicide _G. K. Chesterton_ 224 Finnigan to Flannigan _S. W. Gillinan_ 225 Study of an Elevation in Indian Ink _Rudyard Kipling_ 226 The V-a-s-e _James Jeffrey Roche_ 227 Miniver Cheevy _Edwin Arlington Robinson_ 229 The Recruit _Robert W. Chambers_ 230 Officer Brady _Robert W. Chambers_ 232 Post-Impressionism _Bert Leston Taylor_ 235 To the Portrait of "A Gentleman" _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 236 Cacoethes Scribendi _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 238 Contentment _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 238 A Boston Lullaby _James Jeffrey Roche_ 240 A Grain of Salt _Wallace Irwin_ 241 Song _Richard Lovelace_ 241 A Philosopher _Sam Walter Foss_ 242 The Meeting of the Clabberhuses _Sam Walter Foss_ 244 The Ideal Husband to His Wife _Sam Walter Foss_ 246 Distichs _John Hay_ 247 The Hen-roost Man _Ruth McEnery Stuart_ 247 If They Meant All They Say _Alice Duer Miller_ 247 The Man _Stephen Crane_ 248 A Thought _James Kenneth Stephen_ 248 The Musical Ass _Tomaso de Yriarte_ 249 The Knife-Grinder _George Canning_ 249 St. Anthony's Sermon to the Fishes _Abraham á Sancta-Clara_ 251 The Battle of Blenheim _Robert Southey_ 252 The Three Black Crows _John Byrom_ 254 To the Terrestrial Globe _W. S. Gilbert_ 256 Etiquette _W. S. Gilbert_ 256 A Modest Wit _Selleck Osborn_ 260 The Latest Decalogue _Arthur Hugh Clough_ 261 A Simile _Matthew Prior_ 262 By Parcels Post _George R. Sims_ 262 All's Well That Ends Well _Unknown_ 264 The Contrast _Captain C. Morris_ 265 The Devonshire Lane _John Marriott_ 266 A Splendid Fellow _H. C. Dodge_ 267 If _H. C. Dodge_ 268 Accepted and Will Appear _Parmenas Mix_ 268 The Little Vagabond _William Blake_ 269 Sympathy _Reginald Heber_ 270 The Religion of Hudibras _Samuel Butler_ 271 Holy Willie's Prayer _Robert Burns_ 272 The Learned Negro _Unknown_ 274 True to Poll _F. C. Burnand_ 275 Trust in Women _Unknown_ 276 The Literary Lady _Richard Brinsley Sheridan_ 278 Twelve Articles _Dean Swift_ 279 All-Saints _Edmund Yates_ 280 How to Make a Man of Consequence _Mark Lemon_ 280 On a Magazine Sonnet _Russell Hilliard Loines_ 281 Paradise _George Birdseye_ 281 The Friar of Orders Gray _John O'Keefe_ 282 Of a Certain Man _Sir John Harrington_ 282 Clean Clara _W. B. Rands_ 283 Christmas Chimes _Unknown_ 284 The Ruling Passion _Alexander Pope_ 285 The Pope and the Net _Robert Browning_ 286 The Actor _John Wolcot_ 287 The Lost Spectacles _Unknown_ 287 That Texan Cattle Man _Joaquin Miller_ 288 Fable _Ralph Waldo Emerson_ 290 Hoch! Der Kaiser _Rodney Blake_ 291 What Mr. Robinson Thinks _James Russell Lowell_ 292 The Candidate's Creed _James Russell Lowell_ 294 The Razor Seller _John Wolcot_ 297 The Devil's Walk on Earth _Robert Southey_ 298 Father Molloy _Samuel Lover_ 307 The Owl-Critic _James Thomas Fields_ 309 What Will We Do? _Robert J. Burdette_ 311 Life in Laconics _Mary Mapes Dodge_ 311 On Knowing When to Stop _L. J. Bridgman_ 312 Rev. Gabe Tucker's Remarks _Unknown_ 312 Thursday _Frederic E. Weatherly_ 313 Sky-Making _Mortimer Collins_ 314 The Positivists _Mortimer Collins_ 315 Martial in London _Mortimer Collins_ 316 The Splendid Shilling _John Philips_ 316 After Horace _A. D. Godley_ 320 Of a Precise Tailor _Sir John Harrington_ 322 Money _Jehan du Pontalais_ 323 Boston Nursery Rhymes _Rev. Joseph Cook_ 324 Kentucky Philosophy _Harrison Robertson_ 325 John Grumlie _Allan Cunningham_ 326 A Song of Impossibilities _Winthrop Mackworth Praed_ 327 Song _John Donne_ 330 The Oubit _Charles Kingsley_ 330 Double Ballade of Primitive Man _Andrew Lang_ 331 Phillis's Age _Matthew Prior_ 332

V: CYNICISM

Good and Bad Luck _John Hay_ 334 Bangkolidye _Barry Pain_ 334 Pensées De Noël _A. D. Godley_ 336 A Ballade of an Anti-Puritan _G. K. Chesterton_ 337 Pessimism _Newton Mackintosh_ 338 Cynical Ode to an Ultra-Cynical Public _Charles Mackay_ 339 Youth and Art _Robert Browning_ 339 The Bachelor's Dream _Thomas Hood_ 342 All Things Except Myself I Know _Francois Villon_ 343 The Joys of Marriage _Charles Cotton_ 344 The Third Proposition _Madeline Bridges_ 345 The Ballad of Cassandra Brown _Helen Gray Cone_ 345 What's in a Name? _R. K. Munkittrick_ 347 Too Late _Fits Hugh Ludlow_ 348 The Annuity _George Outram_ 350 K. K.--Can't Calculate _Frances M. Whitcher_ 353 Northern Farmer _Lord Tennyson_ 354 Fin de Siècle _Unknown_ 357 Then Ag'in _Sam Walter Foss_ 357 The Pessimist _Ben King_ 358 Without and Within _James Russell Lowell_ 359 Same Old Story _Harry B. Smith_ 360

VI: EPIGRAMS

Woman's Will _John G. Saxe_ 362 Cynicus to W. Shakespeare _James Kenneth Stephen_ 362 Senex to Matt. Prior _James Kenneth Stephen_ 362 To a Blockhead _Alexander Pope_ 362 The Fool and the Poet _Alexander Pope_ 363 A Rhymester _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 363 Giles's Hope _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 363 Cologne _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 363 An Eternal Poem _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 364 On a Bad Singer _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 364 Job _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 364 Reasons for Drinking _Dr. Henry Aldrich_ 364 Smatterers _Samuel Butler_ 365 Hypocrisy _Samuel Butler_ 365 To Doctor Empiric _Ben Jonson_ 365 A Remedy Worse than the Disease _Matthew Prior_ 365 A Wife _Richard Brinsley Sheridan_ 366 The Honey-Moon _Walter Savage Landor_ 366 Dido _Richard Porson_ 366 An Epitaph _George John Cayley_ 366 On Taking a Wife _Thomas Moore_ 367 Upon Being Obliged to Leave a Pleasant Party _Thomas Moore_ 367 Some Ladies _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 367 On a Sense of Humor _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 367 On Hearing a Lady Praise a Certain Rev. Doctor's Eyes _George Outram_ 368 Epitaph Intended for His Wife _John Dryden_ 368 To a Capricious Friend _Joseph Addison_ 368 Which is Which _John Byrom_ 368 On a Full-Length Portrait of Beau Marsh _Lord Chesterfield_ 369 On Scotland _Cleveland_ 369 Mendax _Lessing_ 369 To a Slow Walker and Quick Eater _Lessing_ 369 What's My Thought Like? _Thomas Moore_ 370 Of All the Men _Thomas Moore_ 370 On Butler's Monument _Rev. Samuel Wesley_ 370 A Conjugal Conundrum _Unknown_ 371

VII: BURLESQUE

Lovers and a Reflection _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 372 Our Hymn _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 374 "Soldier, Rest!" _Robert J. Burdette_ 374 Imitation _Anthony C. Deane_ 375 The Mighty Must _W. S. Gilbert_ 376 Midsummer Madness _Unknown_ 377 Mavrone _Arthur Guiterman_ 378 Lilies _Don Marquis_ 379 For I am Sad _Don Marquis_ 379 A Little Swirl of Vers Libre _Thomas R. Ybarra_ 380 Young Lochinvar _Unknown_ 381 Imagiste Love Lines _Unknown_ 383 Bygones _Bert Lesion Taylor_ 383 Justice to Scotland _Unknown_ 384 Lament of the Scotch-Irish Exile _James Jeffrey Roche_ 385 A Song of Sorrow _Charles Battell Loomis_ 386 The Rejected "National Hymns" _Robert H. Newell_ 387 The Editor's Wooing _Robert H. Newell_ 389 The Baby's Debut _James Smith_ 390 The Cantelope _Bayard Taylor_ 393 Never Forget Your Parents _Franklin P. Adams_ 394 A Girl was Too Reckless of Grammar _Guy Wetmore Carryl_ 395 Behold the Deeds! _H. C. Bunner_ 397 Villon's Straight Tip to All Cross Coves _William Ernest Henley_ 399 Culture in the Slums _William Ernest Henley_ 400 The Lawyer's Invocation to Spring _Henry Howard Brownell_ 402 North, East, South, and West _Unknown_ 403 Martin Luther at Potsdam _Barry Pain_ 404 An Idyll of Phatte and Leene _Unknown_ 406 The House that Jack Built _Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ 407 Palabras Grandiosas _Bayard Taylor_ 407 A Love Playnt _Godfrey Turner_ 408 Darwinity _Herman C. Merivale_ 409 Select Passages from a Coming Poet _F. Anstey_ 410 The Romaunt of Humpty Dumpty _Henry S. Leigh_ 411 The Wedding _Thomas Hood, Jr._ 412 In Memoriam Technicam _Thomas Hood, Jr._ 413 "Songs Without Words" _Robert J. Burdette_ 413 At the Sign of the Cock _Owen Seaman_ 414 Presto Furioso _Owen Seaman_ 417 To Julia in Shooting Togs _Owen Seaman_ 418 Farewell _Bert Leston Taylor_ 419 Here is the Tale _Anthony C. Deane_ 421 The Willows _Bret Harte_ 423 A Ballad _Guy Wetmore Carryl_ 426 The Translated Way _Franklin P. Adams_ 427 Commonplaces _Rudyard Kipling_ 427 Angelo Orders His Dinner _Bayard Taylor_ 428 The Promissory Note _Bayard Taylor_ 429 Camerados _Bayard Taylor_ 430 The Last Ride Together _James Kenneth Stephen_ 431 Imitation of Walt Whitman _Unknown_ 434 Salad _Mortimer Collins_ 436 If _Mortimer Collins_ 436 The Jabberwocky of Authors _Harry Persons Taber_ 437 The Town of Nice _Herman C. Merivale_ 438 The Willow-Tree _W. M. Thackeray_ 439 A Ballade of Ballade-Mongers _Augustus M. Moore_ 441

VIII: BATHOS

The Confession _Richard Harris Barham_ 443 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] If You Have Seen _Thomas Moore_ 444 Circumstance _Frederick Locker-Lampson_ 444 Elegy _Arthur Guiterman_ 445 Our Traveler _H. Cholmondeley-Pennell_ 445 Optimism _Newton Mackintosh_ 445 The Declaration _N. P. Willis_ 446 He Came to Pay _Parmenas Mix_ 447 The Forlorn One _Richard Harris Barham_ 449 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] Rural Raptures _Unknown_ 450 A Fragment _Unknown_ 450 The Bitter Bit _William E. Aytoun_ 451 Comfort in Affliction _William E. Aytoun_ 453 The Husband's Petition _William E. Aytoun_ 454 Lines Written After a Battle _Unknown_ 456 Lines _Unknown_ 456 The Imaginative Crisis _Unknown_ 457

IX: PARODY

The Higher Pantheism in a Nut-Shell _Algernon Charles Swinburne_ 458 Nephelidia _Algernon Charles Swinburne_ 459 Up the Spout _Algernon Charles Swinburne_ 460 In Memoriam _Cuthbert Bede_ 463 Lucy Lake _Newton Mackintosh_ 463 The Cock and the Bull _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 464 Ballad _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 467 Disaster _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 469 Wordsworthian Reminiscence _Unknown_ 470 Inspect Us _Edith Daniell_ 471 The Messed Damozel _Charles Hanson Towne_ 471 A Melton Mowbray Pork-Pie _Richard le Gallienne_ 472 Israfiddlestrings _Unknown_ 472 After Dilettante Concetti _H. D. Traill_ 474 Whenceness of the Which _Unknown_ 476 The Little Star _Unknown_ 476 The Original Lamb _Unknown_ 477 Sainte Margérie _Unknown_ 477 Robert Frost _Louis Untermeyer_ 479 Owen Seaman _Louis Untermeyer_ 480 The Modern Hiawatha _Unknown_ 482 Somewhere-in-Europe-Wocky _F. G. Hartswick_ 482 Rigid Body Sings _J. C. Maxwell_ 483 A Ballad of High Endeavor _Unknown_ 484 Father William _Lewis Carroll_ 485 The Poets at Tea _Barry Pain_ 486 How Often _Ben King_ 489 If I Should Die To-Night _Ben King_ 489 "The Day is Done" _Phoebe Cary_ 490 Jacob _Phoebe Cary_ 491 Ballad of the Canal _Phoebe Cary_ 492 "There's a Bower of Beanvines" _Phoebe Cary_ 493 Reuben _Phoebe Cary_ 493 The Wife _Phoebe Cary_ 494 When Lovely Woman _Phoebe Cary_ 494 John Thomson's Daughter _Phoebe Cary_ 494 A Portrait _John Keats_ 496 Annabel Lee _Stanley Huntley_ 497 Home Sweet Home with Variations _H. C. Bunner_ 498 An Old Song by New Singers _A. C. Wilkie_ 506 More Impressions _Oscuro Wildgoose_ 509 Nursery Rhymes á la Mode _Unknown_ 509 A Maudle-In Ballad _Unknown_ 510 Gillian _Unknown_ 511 Extracts from the Rubaiyat of Omar Cayenne _Gelett Burgess_ 512 Diversions of the Re-Echo Club _Carolyn Wells_ 515 Styx River Anthology _Carolyn Wells_ 521 Answer to Master Wither's Song, "Shall I, Wasting in Despair?" _Ben Jonson_ 526 Song of the Springtide _Unknown_ 527 The Village Choir _Unknown_ 528 My Foe _Unknown_ 529 Nursery Song in Pidgin English _Unknown_ 530 Father William _Unknown_ 531 A Poe-'em of Passion _C. F. Lummis_ 532 How the Daughters Come Down at Dunoon _H. Cholmondeley-Pennell_ 533 To an Importunate Host _Unknown_ 534 Cremation _William Sawyer_ 534 An Imitation of Wordsworth _Catharine M. Fanshawe_ 535 The Lay of the Love-Lorn _Aytoun and Martin_ 537 Only Seven _Henry S. Leigh_ 543 'Twas Ever Thus _Henry S. Leigh_ 544 Foam and Fangs _Walter Parke_ 544

X: NARRATIVE

Little Billee _W. M. Thackeray_ 546 The Crystal Palace _W. M. Thackeray_ 547 The Wofle New Ballad of Jane Roney and Mary Brown _W. M. Thackeray_ 552 King John and the Abbot _Unknown_ 554 On the Death of a Favorite Cat _Thomas Gray_ 557 Misadventures at Margate _Richard Harris Barham_ 558 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] The Gouty Merchant and the Stranger _Horace Smith_ 563 The Diverting History of John Gilpin _William Cowper_ 564 Paddy O'Rafther _Samuel Lover_ 571 Here She Goes and There She Goes _James Nack_ 572 The Quaker's Meeting _Samuel Lover_ 576 The Jester Condemned to Death _Horace Smith_ 578 The Deacon's Masterpiece _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 580 The Ballad of the Oysterman _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 583 The Well of St. Keyne _Robert Southey_ 584 The Jackdaw of Rheims _Richard Harris Barham_ 586 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] The Knight and the Lady _Richard Harris Barham_ 590 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] An Eastern Question _H. M. Paull_ 598 My Aunt's Spectre _Mortimer Collins_ 600 Casey at the Bat _Ernest Lawrence Thayer_ 601 The Pied Piper of Hamelin _Robert Browning_ 603 The Goose _Lord Tennyson_ 611 The Ballad of Charity _Charles Godfrey Leland_ 613 The Post Captain _Charles E. Carryl_ 615 Robinson Crusoe's Story _Charles E. Carryl_ 617 Ben Bluff _Thomas Hood_ 619 The Pilgrims and the Peas _John Wolcot_ 621 Tam O'Shanter _Robert Burns_ 623 That Gentleman from Boston Town _Joaquin Miller_ 629 The Yarn of the "Nancy Bell" _W. S. Gilbert_ 632 Ferdinando and Elvira _W. S. Gilbert_ 635 Gentle Alice Brown _W. S. Gilbert_ 639 The Story of Prince Agib _W. S. Gilbert_ 641 Sir Guy the Crusader _W. S. Gilbert_ 644 Kitty Wants to Write _Gelett Burgess_ 646 Dighton is Engaged _Gelett Burgess_ 647 Plain Language from Truthful James _Bret Harte_ 648 The Society Upon the Stanisalaus _Bret Harte_ 650 "Jim" _Bret Harte_ 652 William Brown of Oregon _Joaquin Miller_ 653 Little Breeches _John Hay_ 657 The Enchanted Shirt _John Hay_ 658 Jim Bludso _John Hay_ 661 Wreck of the "Julie Plante" _William Henry Drummond_ 662 The Alarmed Skipper _James T. Fields_ 664 The Elderly Gentleman _George Canning_ 665 Saying Not Meaning _William Basil Wake_ 666 Hans Breitmann's Party _Charles Godfrey Leland_ 668 Ballad by Hans Breitmann _Charles Godfrey Leland_ 669 Grampy Sings a Song _Holman F. Day_ 670 The First Banjo _Irwin Russell_ 672 The Romance of the Carpet _Robert J. Burdette_ 674 Hunting of the Snark, The _Lewis Carroll_ 676 The Old Man and Jim _James Whitcomb Riley_ 678 A Sailor's Yarn _James Jeffrey Roche_ 680 The Converted Cannibals _G. E. Farrow_ 683 The Retired Pork-Butcher and the spook _G. E. Farrow_ 685 Skipper Ireson's Ride _John Greenleaf Whittier_ 688 Darius Green and His Flying-Machine _John Townsend Trowbridge_ 690 A Great Fight _Robert H. Newell_ 697 The Donnybrook Jig _Viscount Dillon_ 700 Unfortunate Miss Bailey _Unknown_ 702 The Laird o' Cockpen _Lady Nairne_ 703 A Wedding _Sir John Suckling_ 704

XI: TRIBUTE

The Ahkond of Swat _Edward Lear_ 708 The Ahkoond of Swat _George Thomas Lanigan_ 710 Dirge of the Moolla of Kotal _George Thomas Lanigan_ 712 The Ballad of Bouillabaisse _W. M. Thackeray_ 714 Ould Doctor Mack _Alfred Perceval Graves_ 717 Father O'Flynn _Alfred Perceval Graves_ 719 The Bald-headed Tyrant _Vandyne, Mary E._ 720 Barney McGee _Richard Hovey_ 721 Address to the Toothache _Robert Burns_ 724 A Farewell to Tobacco _Charles Lamb_ 726 John Barleycorn _Robert Burns_ 730 Stanzas to Pale Ale _Unknown_ 732 Ode to Tobacco _Charles Stuart Calverley_ 732 Sonnet to a Clam _John G. Saxe_ 734 To a Fly _John Wolcot_ 734 Ode to a Bobtailed Cat _Unknown_ 737

XII: WHIMSEY

An Elegy _Oliver Goldsmith_ 740 Parson Gray _Oliver Goldsmith_ 741 The Irishman and the Lady _William Maginn_ 742 The Cataract of Lodore _Robert Southey_ 743 Lay of the Deserted Influenzaed _H. Cholmondeley-Pennell_ 746 Bellagcholly Days _Unknown_ 747 Rhyme of the Rail _John G. Saxe_ 748 Echo _John G. Saxe_ 750 Song _Joseph Addison_ 751 A Gentle Echo on Woman _Dean Swift_ 752 Lay of Ancient Rome _Thomas R. Ybarra_ 753 A New Song _John Gay_ 754 The American Traveller _Robert H. Newell_ 757 The Zealless Xylographer _Mary Mapes Dodge_ 759 The Old Line Fence _A. W. Bellaw_ 760 O-U-G-H _Charles Battell Loomis_ 761 Enigma on the Letter H _Catherine M. Fanshawe_ 762 Travesty of Miss Fanshawe's Enigma _Horace Mayhew_ 763 An Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog _Oliver Goldsmith_ 764 An Epitaph _Matthew Prior_ 765 Old Grimes _Albert Gorton Greene_ 766 The Endless Song _Ruth McEnery Stuart_ 768 The Hundred Best Books _Mostyn T. Pigott_ 769 The Cosmic Egg _Unknown_ 771 Five Wines _Robert Herrick_ 772 A Rhyme for Musicians _E. Lemke_ 772 My Madeline _Walter Parke_ 773 Susan Simpson _Unknown_ 774 The March to Moscow _Robert Southey_ 775 Half Hours with the Classics _H. J. DeBurgh_ 779 On the Oxford Carrier _John Milton_ 780 Ninety-Nine in the Shade _Rossiter Johnson_ 781 The Triolet _William Ernest Henley_ 782 The Rondeau _Austin Dobson_ 782 Life _Unknown_ 783 Ode to the Human Heart _Laman Blanchard_ 784 A Strike Among the Poets _Unknown_ 785 Whatever Is, Is Right _Laman Blanchard_ 786 Nothing _Richard Porson_ 786 Dirge _Unknown_ 787 O D V _Unknown_ 788 A Man of Words _Unknown_ 790 Similes _Unknown_ 791 No! _Thomas Hood_ 792 Faithless Sally Brown _Thomas Hood_ 792 Tim Turpin _Thomas Hood_ 795 Faithless Nelly Gray _Thomas Hood_ 797 Sally Simpkin's Lament _Thomas Hood_ 800 Death's Ramble _Thomas Hood_ 801 Panegyric on the Ladies _Unknown_ 803 Ambiguous Lines _Unknown_ 804 Surnames _James Smith_ 804 A Ternary of Littles, Upon a Pipkin of Jelly Sent to a Lady _Robert Herrick_ 806 A Carman's Account of a Law Suit _Sir David Lindesay_ 807 Out of Sight, Out of Mind _Barnaby Googe_ 807 Nongtongpaw _Charles Dibdin_ 808 Logical English _Unknown_ 809 Logic _Unknown_ 809 The Careful Penman _Unknown_ 810 Questions with Answers _Unknown_ 810 Conjugal Conjugations _A. W. Bellaw_ 810 Love's Moods and Senses _Unknown_ 812 The Siege of Belgrade _Unknown_ 813 The Happy Man _Gilles Ménage_ 814 The Bells _Unknown_ 816 Takings _Thomas Hood, Jr._ 817 A Bachelor's Mono-Rhyme _Charles Mackay_ 817 The Art of Bookkeeping An Invitation to the Zoological _Laman Blanchard_ 818 Gardens _Unknown_ 822 A Nocturnal Sketch _Thomas Hood_ 823 Lovelilts _Marion Hill_ 824 Jocosa Lyra _Austin Dobson_ 824 To a Thesaurus _Franklin P. Adams_ 825 The Future of the Classics _Unknown_ 826 Cautionary Verses _Theodore Hook_ 828 The War: A-Z _John R. Edwards_ 829 Lines to Miss Florence Huntingdon _Unknown_ 830 To My Nose _Alfred A. Forrester_ 832 A Polka Lyric _Barclay Philips_ 832 A Catalectic Monody _Unknown_ 833 Ode for a Social Meeting _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 833 The Jovial Priest's Confession _Leigh Hunt_ 834 Limericks _Carolyn Wells_ 835

XIII: NONSENSE

Lunar Stanzas _Henry Coggswell Knight_ 841 The Whango Tree _Unknown_ 842 Three Children _Unknown_ 843 'Tis Midnight _Unknown_ 843 Cossimbazar _Henry S. Leigh_ 843 An Unexpected Fact _Edward Cannon_ 844 The Cumberbunce _Paul West_ 844 Mr. Finney's Turnip _Unknown_ 847 Nonsense Verses _Charles Lamb_ 848 Like to the Thundering Tone _Bishop Corbet_ 848 Aestivation _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 849 Uncle Simon and Uncle Jim _Charles Farrar Browne_ 849 ["_Artemus Ward_"] A Tragic Story _W. M. Thackeray_ 850 Sonnet Found in a Deserted Mad House _Unknown_ 851 The Jim-Jam King of the Jou-Jous _Alaric Bertrand Stuart_ 851 To Marie _John Bennett_ 852 My Dream _Unknown_ 853 The Rollicking Mastodon _Arthur Macy_ 853 The Invisible Bridge _Gelett Burgess_ 855 The Lazy Roof _Gelett Burgess_ 855 My Feet _Gelett Burgess_ 855 Spirk Troll-Derisive _James Whitcomb Riley_ 855 The Man in the Moon _James Whitcomb Riley_ 856 The Lugubrious Whing-Whang _James Whitcomb Riley_ 858 The Yonghy-Bonghy-Bo _Edward Lear_ 859 The Jumbles _Edward Lear_ 862 The Pobble Who Has no Toes _Edward Lear_ 865 The New Vestments _Edward Lear_ 866 The Two Old Bachelors _Edward Lear_ 868 Jabberwocky _Lewis Carroll_ 869 Ways and Means _Lewis Carroll_ 870 Humpty Dumpty's Recitation _Lewis Carroll_ 872 Some Hallucinations _Lewis Carroll_ 874 Sing for the Garish Eye _W. S. Gilbert_ 875 The Shipwreck _E. H. Palmer_ 876 Uffia _Harriet R. White_ 877 'Tis Sweet to Roam _Unknown_ 878 Three Jovial Huntsmen _Unknown_ 878 King Arthur _Unknown_ 879 Hyder Iddle _Unknown_ 879 The Ocean Wanderer _Unknown_ 879 Scientific Proof _J. W. Foley_ 880 The Thingumbob _Unknown_ 882 Wonders of Nature _Unknown_ 882 Lines by an Old Fogy _Unknown_ 882 A Country Summer Pastoral _Unknown_ 883 Turvey Top _William Sawyer_ 884 A Ballad of Bedlam _Unknown_ 886

XIV: NATURAL HISTORY

The Fastidious Serpent _Henry Johnstone_ 887 The Legend of the First Cam-u-el _Arthur Guiterman_ 888 Unsatisfied Yearning _R. K. Munkittrick_ 889 Kindly Advice _Unknown_ 890 Kindness to Animals _J. Ashby-Sterry_ 891 To Be or Not To Be _Unknown_ 891 The Hen _Matthew Claudius_ 892 Of Baiting the Lion _Owen Seaman_ 893 The Flamingo _Lewis Gaylord Clark_ 894 Why Doth a Pussy Cat? _Burges Johnson_ 895 The Walrus and the Carpenter _Lewis Carroll_ 896 Nirvana _Unknown_ 900 The Catfish _Oliver Herford_ 900 War Relief _Oliver Herford_ 901 The Owl and the Pussy-Cat _Edward Lear_ 901 Mexican Serenade _Arthur Guiterman_ 902 Orphan Born _Robert J. Burdette_ 903 Divided Destinies _Rudyard Kipling_ 904 The Viper _Hilaire Belloc_ 906 The Llama _Hilaire Belloc_ 906 The Yak _Hilaire Belloc_ 906 The Frog _Hilaire Belloc_ 907 The Microbe _Hilaire Belloc_ 907 The Great Black Crow _Philip James Bailey_ 907 The Colubriad _William Cowper_ 909 The Retired Cat _William Cowper_ 910 A Darwinian Ballad _Unknown_ 913 The Pig _Robert Southey_ 914 A Fish Story _Henry A. Beers_ 916 The Cameronian Cat _Unknown_ 917 The Young Gazelle _Walter Parke_ 918 The Ballad of the Emeu _Bret Harte_ 921 The Turtle and Flamingo _James Thomas Fields_ 923

XV: JUNIORS

Prior to Miss Belle's Appearance _James Whitcomb Riley_ 925 There Was a Little Girl _Unknown_ 926 The Naughty Darkey Boy _Unknown_ 927 Dutch Lullaby _Eugene Field_ 928 The Dinkey-Bird _Eugene Field_ 929 The Little Peach _Eugene Field_ 931 Counsel to Those that Eat _Unknown_ 932 Home and Mother _Mary Mapes Dodge_ 932 Little Orphant Annie _James Whitcomb Riley_ 934 A Visit From St. Nicholas _Clement Clarke Moore_ 935 A Nursery Legend _Henry S. Leigh_ 937 A Little Goose _Eliza Sproat Turner_ 938 Leedle Yawcob Strauss _Charles Follen Adams_ 940 A Parental Ode to My Son, Aged Three Years and Five Months _Thomas Hood_ 941 Little Mamma _Charles Henry Webb_ 943 The Comical Girl _M. Pelham_ 946 Bunches of Grapes _Walter Ramal_ 947

XVI: IMMORTAL STANZAS

The Purple Cow _Gelett Burgess_ 948 The Young Lady of Niger _Unknown_ 948 The Laughing Willow _Oliver Herford_ 948 Said Opie Reed _Julian Street_ and _James_ _Montgomery Flagg_ 948 Manila _Eugene F. Ware_ 949 On the Aristocracy of Harvard _Dr. Samuel G. Bushnell_ 949 On the Democracy of Yale _Dean Jones_ 949 The Herring _Sir Walter Scott_ 949 If the Man _Samuel Johnson_ 949 The Kilkenny Cats _Unknown_ 950 Poor Dear Grandpapa _D'Arcy W. Thompson_ 950 More Walks _Richard Harris Barham_ 950 ["_Thomas Ingoldsby_"] Indifference _Unknown_ 950 Madame Sans Souci _Unknown_ 950 A Riddle _Unknown_ 951 If _Unknown_ 951

THE BOOK OF

HUMOROUS VERSE

I

BANTER

THE PLAYED-OUT HUMOURIST

Quixotic is his enterprise and hopeless his adventure is,
Who seeks for jocularities that haven't yet been said;
The world has joked incessantly for over fifty centuries,
And every joke that's possible has long ago been made.
I started as a humourist with lots of mental fizziness,
But humour is a drug which it's the fashion to abuse;
For my stock-in-trade, my fixtures and the good-will of the business
No reasonable offer I am likely to refuse.
And if anybody choose
He may circulate the news
That no reasonable offer I am likely to refuse.

Oh, happy was that humourist--the first that made a pun at all--
Who when a joke occurred to him, however poor and mean,
Was absolutely certain that it never had been done at all--
How popular at dinners must that humourist have been!
Oh, the days when some step-father for a query held a handle out,--
The door-mat from the scraper, is it distant very far?
And when no one knew where Moses was when Aaron put the candle out,
And no one had discovered that a door could be a-jar!
But your modern hearers are
In their tastes particular,
And they sneer if you inform them that a door can be a jar!

In search of quip and quiddity I've sat all day alone, apart--
And all that I could hit on as a problem was--to find
Analogy between a scrag of mutton and a Bony-part,
Which offers slight employment to the speculative mind.
For you cannot call it very good, however great your charity--
It's not the sort of humour that is greeted with a shout--
And I've come to the conclusion that my mine of jocularity,
In present Anno Domini is worked completely out!
Though the notion you may scout,
I can prove beyond a doubt
That my mine of jocularity is worked completely out!

_W. S. Gilbert._

THE PRACTICAL JOKER

Oh, what a fund of joy jocund lies hid in harmless hoaxes!
What keen enjoyment springs
From cheap and simple things!
What deep delight from sources trite inventive humour coaxes,
That pain and trouble brew
For every one but you!

Gunpowder placed inside its waist improves a mild Havana,
Its unexpected flash
Burns eyebrows and moustache.
When people dine no kind of wine beats ipecacuanha,
But common sense suggests
You keep it for your guests--

Then naught annoys the organ boys like throwing red hot coppers.
And much amusement bides
In common butter slides;
And stringy snares across the stairs cause unexpected croppers.

Coal scuttles, recollect,
Produce the same effect.

A man possessed
Of common sense
Need not invest
At great expense

It does not call
For pocket deep,
These jokes are all
Extremely cheap.

If you commence with eighteenpence--it's all you'll have to pay; You may command a pleasant and a most instructive day.

A good spring gun breeds endless fun, and makes men jump like rockets--

And turnip heads on posts
Make very decent ghosts.

Then hornets sting like anything, when placed in waistcoat pockets--

Burnt cork and walnut juice
Are not without their use.

No fun compares with easy chairs whose seats are stuffed with needles--

Live shrimps their patience tax
When put down people's backs.

Surprising, too, what one can do with a pint of fat black beetles--

And treacle on a chair
Will make a Quaker swear!

Then sharp tin tacks
And pocket squirts--
And cobbler's wax
For ladies' skirts--

And slimy slugs
On bedroom floors--
And water jugs
On open doors--

Prepared with these cheap properties, amusing tricks to play Upon a friend a man may spend a most delightful day.

_W. S. Gilbert._

TO PH[OE]BE

"Gentle, modest little flower,
Sweet epitome of May,
Love me but for half an hour,
Love me, love me, little fay."
Sentences so fiercely flaming
In your tiny, shell-like ear,
I should always be exclaiming
If I loved you, Ph[oe]be dear.

"Smiles that thrill from any distance
Shed upon me while I sing!
Please ecstaticize existence,
Love me, oh, thou fairy thing!"
Words like these, outpouring sadly,
You'd perpetually hear,
If I loved you fondly, madly;--
But I do not, Ph[oe]be dear.

_W. S. Gilbert._

MALBROUCK

Malbrouck, the prince of commanders, Is gone to the war in Flanders; His fame is like Alexander's; But when will he come home?

Perhaps at Trinity Feast, or Perhaps he may come at Easter. Egad! he had better make haste, or We fear he may never come.

For Trinity Feast is over, And has brought no news from Dover; And Easter is past, moreover, And Malbrouck still delays.

Milady in her watch-tower Spends many a pensive hour, Not well knowing why or how her Dear lord from England stays.

While sitting quite forlorn in That tower, she spies returning A page clad in deep mourning, With fainting steps and slow.

"O page, prithee, come faster! What news do you bring of your master? I fear there is some disaster, Your looks are so full of woe."

"The news I bring, fair lady," With sorrowful accent said he, "Is one you are not ready So soon, alas! to hear.

"But since to speak I'm hurried," Added this page, quite flurried, "Malbrouck is dead and buried!" (And here he shed a tear.)

"He's dead! he's dead as a herring! For I beheld his 'berring,' And four officers transferring His corpse away from the field.

"One officer carried his sabre, And he carried it not without labour, Much envying his next neighbour, Who only bore a shield.

"The third was helmet-bearer-- That helmet which on its wearer Filled all who saw with terror, And covered a hero's brains.

"Now, having got so far, I Find that (by the Lord Harry!) The fourth is left nothing to carry; So there the thing remains."

Translated by _Father Prout._

MARK TWAIN: A PIPE DREAM

Well I recall how first I met
Mark Twain--an infant barely three
Rolling a tiny cigarette
While cooing on his nurse's knee.

Since then in every sort of place
I've met with Mark and heard him joke,
Yet how can I describe his face?
I never saw it for the smoke.

At school he won a _smokership_,
At Harvard College (Cambridge, Mass.)
His name was soon on every lip,
They made him "smoker" of his class.

Who will forget his smoking bout
With Mount Vesuvius--our cheers--
When Mount Vesuvius went out
And didn't smoke again for years?

The news was flashed to England's King,
Who begged Mark Twain to come and stay,
Offered him dukedoms--anything
To smoke the London fog away.

But Mark was firm. "I bow," said he,
"To no imperial command,
No ducal coronet for me,
My smoke is for my native land!"
For Mark there waits a brighter crown!
When Peter comes his card to read--
He'll take the sign "No Smoking" down,
Then Heaven will be Heaven indeed.

_Oliver Herford._

FROM A FULL HEART

In days of peace my fellow-men
Rightly regarded me as more like
A Bishop than a Major-Gen.,
And nothing since has made me warlike;
But when this age-long struggle ends
And I have seen the Allies dish up
The goose of Hindenburg--oh, friends!
I shall out-bish the mildest Bishop.

_When the War is over and the Kaiser's out of print I'm going to buy some tortoises and watch the beggars sprint; When the War is over and the sword at last we sheathe I'm going to keep a jelly-fish and listen to it breathe._

I never really longed for gore,
And any taste for red corpuscles
That lingered with me left before
The German troops had entered Brussels.
In early days the Colonel's "'Shun!"
Froze me; and as the war grew older
The noise of some one else's gun
Left me considerably colder.

_When the War is over and the battle has been won I'm going to buy a barnacle and take it for a run; When the War is over and the German fleet we sink I'm going to keep a silkworm's egg and listen to it think._

The Captains and the Kings depart--
It may be so, but not lieutenants;
Dawn after weary dawn I start
The never ending round of penance;
One rock amid the welter stands
On which my gaze is fixed intently:
An after-life in quiet lands
Lived very lazily and gently.

_When the War is over and we've done the Belgians proud I'm going to keep a chrysalis and read to it aloud; When the War is over and we've finished up the show I'm going to plant a lemon pip and listen to it grow_.

Oh, I'm tired of the noise and turmoil of battle, And I'm even upset by the lowing of cattle, And the clang of the bluebells is death to my liver, And the roar of the dandelion gives me a shiver, And a glacier, in movement, is much too exciting, And I'm nervous, when standing on one, of alighting-- Give me Peace; that is all, that is all that I seek.... Say, starting on Saturday week.

_A. A. Milne._

THE ULTIMATE JOY

I have felt the thrill of passion in the poet's mystic book And I've lingered in delight to catch the rhythm of the brook; I've felt the ecstasy that comes when prima donnas reach For upper C and hold it in a long, melodious screech. And yet the charm of all these blissful memories fades away As I think upon the fortune that befell the other day, As I bring to recollection, with a joyous, wistful sigh, That I woke and felt the need of extra covers in July.

Oh, eerie hour of drowsiness--'twas like a fairy spell, That respite from the terrors we have known, alas, so well, The malevolent mosquito, with a limp and idle bill, Hung supinely from the ceiling, all exhausted by his chill. And the early morning sunbeam lost his customary leer And brought a gracious greeting and a prophecy of cheer; A generous affability reached up from earth to sky, When I woke and felt the need of extra covers in July.

In every life there comes a time of happiness supreme, When joy becomes reality and not a glittering dream. 'Tis less appreciated, but it's worth a great deal more Than tides which taken at their flood lead on to fortune's shore. How vain is Art's illusion, and how potent Nature's sway When once in kindly mood she deigns to waft our woes away! And the memory will cheer me, though all other pleasures fly, Of how I woke and needed extra covers in July.

_Unknown._

OLD FASHIONED FUN

When that old joke was new,
It was not hard to joke,
And puns we now pooh-pooh,
Great laughter would provoke.

True wit was seldom heard,
And humor shown by few,
When reign'd King George the Third,
And that old joke was new.

It passed indeed for wit,
Did this achievement rare,
When down your friend would sit,
To steal away his chair.

You brought him to the floor,
You bruised him black and blue,
And this would cause a roar,
When your old joke was new.

_W. M. Thackeray._

WHEN MOONLIKE ORE THE HAZURE SEAS

When moonlike ore the hazure seas
In soft effulgence swells,
When silver jews and balmy breaze
Bend down the Lily's bells;
When calm and deap, the rosy sleap
Has lapt your soal in dreems,
R Hangeline! R lady mine!
Dost thou remember Jeames?

I mark thee in the Marble all,
Where England's loveliest shine--
I say the fairest of them hall
Is Lady Hangeline.
My soul, in desolate eclipse,
With recollection teems--
And then I hask, with weeping lips,
Dost thou remember Jeames?

Away! I may not tell thee hall
This soughring heart endures--
There is a lonely sperrit-call
That Sorrow never cures;
There is a little, little Star,
That still above me beams;
It is the Star of Hope--but ar!
Dost thou remember Jeames?

_W. M. Thackeray._

WHEN THE FROST IS ON THE PUNKIN

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock, And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock, And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens, And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence; O it's then's the times a feller is a-feelin' at his best, With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest, As he leaves the house, bare-headed, and goes out to feed the stock, When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

They's something kindo' hearty-like about the atmosphere, When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here-- Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees, And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees; But the air's so appetisin'; and the landscape through the haze Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days Is a pictur that no painter has the colorin' to mock-- When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

The husky, rusty rustle of the tossels of the corn, And the raspin' of the tangled leaves, as golden as the morn; The stubble in the furries--kindo' lonesome-like, but still A-preachin' sermons to us of the barns they growed to fill; The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed; The hosses in theyr stalls below--the clover overhead!-- O, it sets my heart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock, When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock!

_James Whitcomb Riley._

TWO MEN

There be two men of all mankind
That I should like to know about;
But search and question where I will,
I cannot ever find them out.

Melchizedek he praised the Lord,
And gave some wine to Abraham;
But who can tell what else he did
Must be more learned than I am.

Ucalegon he lost his house
When Agamemnon came to Troy;
But who can tell me who he was--
I'll pray the gods to give him joy.

There be two men of all mankind
That I'm forever thinking on;
They chase me everywhere I go,--
Melchizedek, Ucalegon.

_Edwin Arlington Robinson._

A FAMILIAR LETTER TO SEVERAL CORRESPONDENTS

Yes, write if you want to--there's nothing like trying;
Who knows what a treasure your casket may hold?
I'll show you that rhyming's as easy as lying,
If you'll listen to me while the art I unfold.

Here's a book full of words: one can choose as he fancies,
As a painter his tint, as a workman his tool;
Just think! all the poems and plays and romances
Were drawn out of this, like the fish from a pool!

You can wander at will through its syllabled mazes,
And take all you want--not a copper they cost;
What is there to hinder your picking out phrases
For an epic as clever as "Paradise Lost"?

Don't mind if the index of sense is at zero;
Use words that run smoothly, whatever they mean;
Leander and Lillian and Lillibullero
Are much the same thing in the rhyming machine.

There are words so delicious their sweetness will smother
That boarding-school flavour of which we're afraid;
There is "lush" is a good one and "swirl" is another;
Put both in one stanza, its fortune is made.

With musical murmurs and rhythmical closes
You can cheat us of smiles when you've nothing to tell;
You hand us a nosegay of milliner's roses,
And we cry with delight, "Oh, how sweet they do smell!"

Perhaps you will answer all needful conditions
For winning the laurels to which you aspire,
By docking the tails of the two prepositions
I' the style o' the bards you so greatly admire.

As for subjects of verse, they are only too plenty
For ringing the changes on metrical chimes;
A maiden, a moonbeam, a lover of twenty,
Have filled that great basket with bushels of rhymes.

Let me show you a picture--'tis far from irrelevant--
By a famous old hand in the arts of design;
'Tis only a photographed sketch of an elephant;
The name of the draughtsman was Rembrandt of Rhine.

How easy! no troublesome colours to lay on;
It can't have fatigued him, no, not in the least;
A dash here and there with a haphazard crayon,
And there stands the wrinkled-skinned, baggy-limbed beast.

Just so with your verse--'tis as easy as sketching;
You can reel off a song without knitting your brow,
As lightly as Rembrandt a drawing or etching;
It is nothing at all, if you only know how.

Well, imagine you've printed your volume of verses;
Your forehead is wreathed with the garland of fame;
Your poem the eloquent school-boy rehearses;
Her album the school-girl presents for your name.

Each morning the post brings you autograph letters;
You'll answer them promptly--an hour isn't much
For the honour of sharing a page with your betters,
With magistrates, members of Congress, and such.

Of course you're delighted to serve the committees
That come with requests from the country all round;
You would grace the occasion with poems and ditties
When they've got a new school-house, or poor-house, or pound.

With a hymn for the saints, and a song for the sinners,
You go and are welcome wherever you please;
You're a privileged guest at all manner of dinners;
You've a seat on the platform among the grandees.

At length your mere presence becomes a sensation;
Your cup of enjoyment is filled to its brim
With the pleasure Horatian of digitmonstration,
As the whisper runs round of "That's he!" or "That's him!"

But, remember, O dealer in phrases sonorous,
So daintily chosen, so tunefully matched,
Though you soar with the wings of the cherubim o'er us,
The ovum was human from which you were hatched.

No will of your own, with its puny compulsion,
Can summon the spirit that quickens the lyre;
It comes, if at all, like the sibyl's convulsion,
And touches the brain with a finger of fire.

So, perhaps, after all, it's as well to be quiet,
If you've nothing you think is worth saying in prose,
As to furnish a meal of their cannibal diet
To the critics, by publishing, as you propose.

But it's all of no use, and I'm sorry I've written;
I shall see your thin volume some day on my shelf;
For the rhyming tarantula surely has bitten,
And music must cure you, so pipe it yourself.

_Oliver Wendell Holmes._

THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS

I wrote some lines once on a time
In wondrous merry mood,
And thought, as usual, men would say
They were exceeding good.

They were so queer, so very queer,
I laughed as I would die;
Albeit, in the general way,
A sober man am I.

I called my servant, and he came;
How kind it was of him,
To mind a slender man like me,
He of the mighty limb!