Aeroplanes | Page 9

THE RATS AND THE CHEESE.
If bees a government maintain,
Why may not rats of stronger brain

And greater power, as well bethought
By Machiavelian axioms
taught?
And so they are, for thus of late
It happened in the rats' free
state.
Their prince (his subjects more to please)
Had got a mighty
Cheshire cheese,
In which his ministers of state
Might live in plenty
and grow great.
A powerful party straight combined,
And their
united forces join'd,
To bring their measures into play,
For none so
loyal were as they;
And none such patriots, to support
As well the
country as the court.
No sooner were those Dons admitted
But (all
those wondrous virtues quitted)
They all the speediest means devise

To raise themselves and families.
Another party well observing

These pamper'd were, while they were starving,
Their ministry
brought in disgrace,
Expelled them and supplied their place;
These
on just principles were known
The true supporters of the throne,

And for the subjects liberty
They'd (marry would they) freely die;


But being well fix'd in their station,
Regardless of their prince and
nation,
Just like the others, all their skill
Was how they might their
paunches fill.
On this a rat, not quite so blind
In state intrigues as
human kind,
But of more honor, thus replied:
"Confound ye all on
either side;
All your contentions are but these,
Whose arts shall best
secure the cheese."
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
AURELIA AND THE SPIDER.
The muslin torn, from tears of grief
In vain Aurelia sought relief;
In
sighs and plaints she pass'd the day;
The tatter'd frock neglected lay:

While busied at the weaving trade,
A spider heard the sighing maid

And kindly stopping in a trice,
Thus offer'd (gratis) her advice:

"Turn, little girl! behold in me
A stimulus to industry
Compare your
woes, my dear, with mine,
Then tell me who should most repine:

This morning, ere you left your 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."
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
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."
[Illustration]
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