Aeroplanes | Page 9

room,?The chambermaid's remorseless broom?In one sad moment that destroy'd,?To build which thousands were employ'd!?The shock was great; but as my life?I saved in the relentless strife,?I knew lamenting was in vain,?So patient went to work again.?By constant work, a day or more,?My little mansion did restore:?And if each tear which you have shed?Had been a needle-full of thread,?If every sigh of sad despair?Had been a stitch of proper care,?Closed would have been the luckless rent,?Nor thus the day have been misspent."
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THE REDBREAST AND THE?SPARROW.
Perch'd on a tree, hard by a rural cot,?A redbreast singing cheer'd the humble spot;?A sparrow on the thatch in critic spleen?Thus took occasion to reprove the strain:?"Dost thou," cried he, "thou dull dejected thing,?Presume to emulate the birds of spring??Can thy weak warbling dare approach the thrush?Or blackbird's accents in the hawthorn bush??Or with the lark dost thou poor mimic, vie,?Or nightingale's unequal'd melody??These other birds possessing twice thy fire?Have been content in silence to admire."?"With candor judge," the minstrel bird replied,?"Nor deem my efforts arrogance or pride;?Think not ambition makes me act this part,?I only sing because I love the art:?I envy not, indeed, but much revere?Those birds whose fame the test of skill will bear;?I feel no hope arising to surpass,?Nor with their charming songs my own to class;?Far other aims incite my humble strain.?Then surely I your pardon may obtain,?While I attempt the rural vale to move?By imitating of the lays I love."
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THE POET AND THE COBWEBS.
A bard, whose pen had brought him more?Of fame than of the precious ore,?In Grub Street garret oft reposed?With eyes contemplative half-closed.?Cobwebs around in antique glory,?Chief of his household inventory,?Suggested to his roving brains?Amazing multitude of scenes.
"This batch," said he, "of murder-spinners?Who toil their brains out for their dinners,?Though base, too long unsung has lain?By kindred brethren of Duck Lane,?Unknowing that its little plan?Holds all the cyclopedia of man.
"This one, whose radiant thread?Is every where from centre spread,?Like orbs in planetary skies,?Enclosed with rounds of various size,?This curious frame I aptly call?A cobweb mathematical.
"In secret holes, that dirty line,?Where never sun presumes to shine,?With straws, and filth, and time beset,?Where all is fish that comes to net,?That musty film, the Muse supposes?Figures the web of Virtuosos.
"You, where the gaudy insect sings,?Are cobwebs of the court of kings,?Where gilded threads conceal the gin.?And broider'd knaves are caught therein.
"That holly, fix'd 'mid mildew'd panes,?Of cheerless Christmas the remains?(I only dream and sing its cheer,?My Muse keeps Lent throughout the year)?That holly, labor'd o'er and o'er,?Is cobwebs of the lawyer's lore,?Where frisky flies, on gambols borne,?Find out the snare, when lost, undone.
"These dangling webs, with dirt and age,?Display their tatter'd equipage,?So like the antiquarian crew,?That those in every thread I view.
"Here death disseminated lies,?In shrunk anatomies of flies;?And amputated limbs declare?What vermin lie in ambush there:?A baited lure with drugg'd perdition,?A cobweb, not misnamed physician.
"Those plaited webs, long pendent there,?Of sable bards a subtle snare,?Of all-collective disposition,?Which holds like gout of inquisition,?May well denominated be,?The trap-webs of divinity."
But whilst our bard described the scene,?A bee stole through a broken pane;?Fraught with the sweets of every flower,?In taking his adventurous tour,?Is there entrapp'd. Exert thy sting,?Bold bee, and liberate thy wing!?The poet kindly dropp'd his pen,?And freed the captive from its den;?Then musing o'er his empty table,?Forgot the moral of his fable.
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THE EPICURE AND THE PHYSICIAN.
Two hundred years ago, or more,?An heir possess'd a miser's store;?Rejoiced to find his father dead,?Till then on thrifty viands fed;?Unnumber'd dishes crown'd his board,?With each unwholesome trifle stored.?He ate--and long'd to eat again,?But sigh'd for appetite in vain:?His food, though dress'd a thousand ways,?Had lost its late accustom'd praise;?He relish'd nothing--sickly grew--?Yet long'd to taste of something new.?It chanced in this disastrous case,?One morn betimes he join'd the chase:?Swift o'er the plain the hunters fly,?Each echoing out a joyous cry;?A forest next before them lay;?He, left behind, mistook his way,?And long alone bewildered rode,?He found a peasant's poor abode;?But fasting kept, from six to four,?Felt hunger, long unfelt before;?The friendly swain this want supplied,?And Joan some eggs and bacon fried.?Not dainty now, the squire in haste?Fell to, and praised their savory taste;?Nay, said his meal had such a _gout_?He ne'er in tarts and olios knew.?Rejoiced to think he'd found a dish,?That crown'd his long unanswer'd wish,?With gold his thankful host he paid,?Who guides him back from whence he stray'd;?But ere they part, so well he dined,?His rustic host the squire enjoin'd?To send him home next day a stock?Of those same eggs and charming hock.?He hoped this dish of savory meat?Would prove that still 'twas bliss to eat;?But, ah! he found, like all the rest,?These eggs were tasteless things at best;?The bacon not a dog would touch,?So rank--he never tasted such!?He sent express to fetch the clown,?And thus address'd him with a frown:?"These eggs, this bacon,