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LINES SUGGESTED BY THE FOURTEENTH

OF FEBRUARY.

DARKNESS succeeds to twilight: Through lattice and through skylight The stars no doubt, if one looked out,

Might be observed to shine:

And sitting by the embers

I elevate my members

On a stray chair, and then and there

Commence a Valentine.

Yea! by St. Valentinus,

Emma shall not be minus

What all young ladies, whate'er their grade is,

Expect to-day no doubt:

Emma the fair, the stately

Whom I beheld so lately,

46 LINES SUGGESTED BY THE 14th FEBRUARY.

Smiling beneath the snow-white wreath

Which told that she was "out."

Wherefore fly to her, swallow,

And mention that I'd "follow,"

And "pipe and trill," et cetera, till

I died, had I but wings:

Say the North's "true and tender,"

The South an old offender;

And hint in fact, with your well-known tact,

All kinds of pretty things.

Say I grow hourly thinner,

Simply abhor my dinner

Tho' I do try and absorb some viand

Each day, for form's sake merely :

And ask her, when all's ended,

And I am found extended,

With vest blood-spotted and cut carotid,

To think on Her's sincerely.

“HIC VIR, HIC EST.”

OFTEN, when o'er tree and turret,

Eve a dying radiance flings,

By that ancient pile I linger

Known familiarly as "King's."

And the ghosts of days departed

Rise, and in my burning breast

All the undergraduate wakens,

And my spirit is at rest.

What, but a revolting fiction,
Seems the actual result

Of the Census's enquiries

Made upon the 15th ult.?

Still my soul is in its boyhood;

Nor of year or changes recks.

Though my scalp is almost hairless,

And my figure grows convex.

Backward moves the kindly dial;

And I'm numbered once again

With those noblest of their species
Called emphatically 'Men':

Loaf, as I have loafed aforetime,

Through the streets, with tranquil mind,

And a long-backed fancy-mongrel

Trailing casually behind:

Past the Senate-house I saunter,

Whistling with an easy grace;

Past the cabbage-stalks that carpet
Still the beefy market-place;

Poising evermore the eye-glass

In the light sarcastic eye,

Lest, by chance, some breezy nursemaid

Pass, without a tribute, by.

Once, an unassuming Freshman,

Thro' these wilds I wandered on,

Seeing in each house a College,

Under every cap a Don :

Each perambulating infant

Had a magic in its squall,

For my eager eye detected

Senior Wranglers in them all.

By degrees my education

Grew, and I became as others;

Learned to blunt my moral feelings

By the aid of Bacon Brothers;

Bought me tiny boots of Mortlock,
And colossal prints of Roe;

And ignored the proposition

That both time and money go.

Learned to work the wary dogcart

Artfully thro' King's Parade;

E

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