And picked up wisdom in my way,
And cared not what I had to pay;
Smiling and weeping all the while,
As other people weep and smile;
And I have learned that Love is not
Confined to any hour or spot;
He lights the smile and fires the frown
Alike in country and in town.
I own fair faces not more fair
In Ettrick, than in Portman Square,
And silly danglers just as silly
In Sherwood, as in Piccadilly.
Soft tones are not the worse, no doubt,
For having harps to help them out;
And smiles are not a ray more bright
By moonbeams, than by candle-light;
I know much magic oft reposes
On wreaths of artificial roses,
And snowy necks,-I never found them
Quite spoilt by having cameos round them.
In short, I'm very sure that all
Who seek or sigh for Beauty's thrall
May breathe their vows, and feed their passion,
Though whist and waltzing keep in fashion,
And make the most delicious sonnets,
In spite of diamonds, and French bonnets!
ONE day, as Bacchus wandered out
From his own gay and glorious heaven,
To see what mortals were about
Below, 'twixt six o'clock and seven,
And laugh at all the toils and tears,
The endless hopes, the causeless fears,
The midnight songs, the morning smarts,
The aching heads, the breaking hearts,
Which he and his fair crony Venus
Within the month had sown between us,
He lighted by chance on a fiddling fellow
Who never was known to be less than mellow,
A wandering poet, who thought it his duty
To feed upon nothing but bowls and beauty,
Who worshipped a rhyme, and detested a quarrel,
And cared not a single straw for laurel,
Holding that grief was sobriety's daughter,
And loathing critics, and cold water.
Ere day on the Gog-Magog hills had fainted,
The god and the minstrel were quite acquainted;
Beneath a tree, in the sunny weather,
They sat them down, and drank together:
They drank of all fluids that ever were poured
By an English lout, or a German lord,
Rum and shrub and brandy and gin,
One after another, they stowed them in,
Claret of Carbonell, porter of Meux,
Champagne which would waken a wit in dukes,
Humble Port, and proud Tokay,
Persico, and Crême de Thé, .
The blundering Irishman's Usquebangh,
The fiery Welshman's Cwrw da;
And after toasting various names
Of mortal and immortal flames,
And whispering more than I or you know
Of Mistress Poll, and Mistress Juno,
The god departed, scarcely knowing
A zephyr's from a nose's blowing,
A frigate from a pewter flagon,
Or Thespis from his own stage wagon;
And rolling about like a barrel of grog,
He went up to heaven as drunk as a hog!
"Now may I," he lisped, "forever sit In Lethe's darkest and deepest pit,
Where dulness everlasting reigns
O'er the quiet pulse and the drowsy brains,
Where ladies jest, and lovers laugh,
And noble lords are bound in calf,
And Zoilus for his sins rehearses
Old Bentham's prose, old Wordsworth's verses,
If I have not found a richer draught
Than ever yet Olympus quaffed,
Better and brighter and dearer far
Than the golden sands of Pactolus are!”
And then he filled in triumph up,
To the highest top-sparkle, Jove's beaming cup, And pulling up his silver hose,
And turning in his tottering toes
(While Hebe, as usual, the mischievous gypsy,
Was laughing to see her brother tipsy),
He said "May it please your high Divinity,
This nectar is--Milk Punch at Trinity !"
THIS morning, as in bed I lay,
Half waking and half sleeping
A score of Loves, immensely gay,
Were round my chamber creeping;
I could not move my hand or head
To ask them what the stir meant;
And "Ah," they cried, "our friend is dead;
Prepare for his interment !"
All whose hearts with mine were blended,
Weep for me! my days are ended!
One drinks my brightest Burgundy,
Without a blush, before me;
One brings a little rosary,
And breathes a blessing o'er me;
One finds my pretty chambermaid,
And courts her in dumb crambo;
Another sees the mutes arrayed
With fife by way of flambenu :
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