Beyond all things a baby Is to the schoolgirl dear; Next to herself the nursemaid loves Her dashing grenadier; Only with life the sailor Parts from the British flag; While one hope lingers, the cracksman's fingers Drop not his hard-earned 'swag.' But, as hares do my second Thro' green Calabria's copses, As females vanish at the sight So, dropping forks and teaspoons, They gave him-did the judges As much as was his due. And, Saxon, should'st thou e'er be led To deem this tale untrue; Then-any night in winter, When the cold north wind blows, And bairns are told to keep out cold By tallowing the nose: When round the fire the elders Are gathered in a bunch, And the girls are doing crochet, And the boys are reading Punch :— Go thou and look in Leech's book; There haply shalt thou spy A stout man on a staircase stand, With aspect anything but bland, And rub his right shin with his hand, To witness if I lie. PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY. Introductory. ART thou beautiful, O my daughter, as the budding rose of April? Are all thy motions music, and is poetry throned in thine eye? Then hearken unto me; and I will make the bud a fair flower, I will plant it upon the bank of Elegance, and water it with the water of Cologne; And in the season it shall "come out," yea bloom, the pride of the parterre; Ladies shall marvel at its beauty, and a Lord shall pluck it at the last. H Of Propriety. Study first Propriety: for she is indeed the Pole star Which shall guide the artless maiden through the mazes of Vanity Fair; Nay, she is the golden chain which holdeth to gether Society; The lamp by whose light young Psyche shall ap proach unblamed her Eros. Verily Truth is as Eve, which was ashamed being naked; Wherefore doth Propriety dress her with the fair foliage of artifice : And when she is drest, behold! she knoweth not herself again. I walked in the Forest; and above me stood the Yew, Stood like a slumbering giant, shrouded in im penetrable shade; Then I pass'd into the citizen's garden, and marked a tree clipt into shape, (The giant's locks had been shorn by the Dalilahshears of Decorum ;) And I said, "Surely nature is goodly; but how much goodlier is Art!" I heard the wild notes of the lark floating far over the blue sky, And my foolish heart went after him, and, lo! I blessed him as he rose; Foolish! for far better is the trained boudoir bulfinch, Which pipeth the semblance of a tune, and me chanically draweth up water: And the reinless steed of the desert, though his neck be clothed with thunder, |