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, Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound, This dog and man at first were friends; But when a pique began, The dog, to gain his private ends, Around from all the neighboring streets 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, The man recovered of the bite, ELEGY ON MADAM BLAIZE BY OLIVER GOLDSMITH Good people all, with one accord, The needy seldom passed her door, She strove the neighborhood to please, At church, in silk and satins new, Her love was sought, I do aver, But now, her wealth and finery fled, Her hangers-on cut short all, Her doctors found, when she was dead - Let us lament, in sorrow sore; For Kent Street well may say, That, had she lived a twelvemonth more → THE PHILOSOPHIC BEGGAR BY BLAKENEY GRAY In a city stamped with plenty, 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. But the thought has just now flashed across my mind For to be a worried banker Who must find the cash he gives his womenkind. "I don't have to buy rich sables, For to keep my wife a-smiling all the while; 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, 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 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, For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn 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; The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, |