A kind and gentle heart he had,

To comfort friends and foes: The naked every day he clad When he put on his clothes.

And in that town a dog was found,
As many dogs there be,

Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,
And curs of low degree.

This dog and man at first were friends;

But when a pique began,

The dog, to gain his private ends,
Went mad, and bit the man.

Around from all the neighboring streets
The wondering neighbors ran,
And swore the dog had lost his wits,
To bite so good a man!

The wound it seemed both sore and sad

To every Christian eye:

And while they swore the dog was mad, They swore the man would die.

But soon a wonder came to light,
That showed the rogues they lied:

The man recovered of the bite,
The dog it was that died!

ELEGY ON MADAM BLAIZE

BY OLIVER GOLDSMITH

Good people all, with one accord,
Lament for Madam Blaize;
Who never wanted a good word ·
From those who spoke her praise.

The needy seldom passed her door,
And always found her kind;
She freely lent to all the poor-
Who left a pledge behind.

She strove the neighborhood to please,
With manner wondrous winning;
She never followed wicked ways
Unless when she was sinning.

At church, in silk and satins new,
With hoop of monstrous size,
She never slumbered in her pew
But when she shut her eyes.

Her love was sought, I do aver,
By twenty beaux, or more;
The king himself has followed her
When she has walked before.

But now, her wealth and finery fled, Her hangers-on cut short all,

Her doctors found, when she was dead -
Her last disorder mortal.

Let us lament, in sorrow sore;

For Kent Street well may say,

That, had she lived a twelvemonth more →
She had not died to-day.

THE PHILOSOPHIC BEGGAR

BY BLAKENEY GRAY

In a city stamped with plenty,
Full of dolce far niente,

I observed a beggarman upon the way;

And, by Jove, the chap was smiling

In a fashion most beguiling,

And he seemed the happiest man I'd seen that day.

I had little time for chinning,

But I asked him: "Why this grinning? Are your rags and tatters then a merry joke? Is this hunger you've been vaunting,

And these pennies you've been wanting, Just a sort of passing whim that ends in smoke?"

"Not a bit!" he said, instanter.
"My hard luck is far from banter;

But the thought has just now flashed across my mind
That I really should not hanker

For to be a worried banker

Who must find the cash he gives his womenkind.

"I don't have to buy rich sables,
Motor-cars, and pearls in cables,

For to keep my wife a-smiling all the while;
And I do not have to worry,

Nor to hurry, or to scurry,

For the cash to dress my daughters up in style.

'I can win a smiling dimple With a present that is simple,

And a dollar's all I need to meet the call,

So I think upon the whole, sir

Yes, I do, upon my soul, sir

That I'm better off than others, after all!"

And that is how it came to be

He got a dollar out of me!

ELEGY

WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD

BY THOMAS GRAY

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds,

Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire's return,

Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their forrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield! How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,