Poems, supressed poems | Page 3

exclaim--
"Hear our tale of wrong!
"Young ink-lickers swarm about
Our dear Helicon;
There they fight,
manoeuvre, shout,
Even to thy throne.
"On their steeds they galop hard
To the spring to drink,
Each one
calls himself a bard--
Minstrels--only think!
"There they--how the thing to name!
Would our persons treat--
This,
without a blush of shame,
We can ne'er repeat;
"One, in front of all, then cries,
'I the army lead!'
Both his fists he
wildly plies,
Like a bear indeed!
"Others wakes he in a trice
With his whistlings rude;
But none
follow, though he twice
Has those sounds renewed.
"He'll return, he threats, ere long,
And he'll come no doubt!
Father,
friend to lyric song,
Please to show him out!"
Father Phoebus laughing hears
The complaint they've brought;

"Don't be frightened, pray, my dears,
We'll soon cut them short!
"One must hasten to hell-fire,
Go, Melpomene!
Let a fury borrow
lyre,
Notes, and dress, of thee.
"Let her meet, in this array,
One of these vile crews,
As though she
had lost her way,
Soon as night ensues.

"Then with kisses dark, I trust,
They'll the dear child greet,

Satisfying their wild lust
Just as it is meet!"--
Said and done!--Then one from hell
Soon was dressed aright.

Scarcely had the prey, they tell,
Caught the fellow's sight,
Than, as kites a pigeon follow,
They attacked her straight--
Part, not
all, though, I can swallow
Of what folks relate.
If fair boys were 'mongst the band,
How came they to be--
This I
cannot understand,--
In such company?
. . . . .
The goddess a miscarriage had, good lack!
And was
delivered of an--Almanac!
THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL PLUTO.
A ROMANCE.
BOOK I.
The sullen mayor who reigns in hell,
By mortals Pluto hight,
Who
thrashes all his subjects well,
Both morn and eve, as stories tell,

And rules the realms of night,
All pleasure lost in cursing once,
All
joy in flogging, for the nonce.
The sedentary life he led
Upon his brazen chair
Made his
hindquarters very red,
While pricks, as from a nettle-bed,
He felt
both here and there:
A burning sun, too, chanced to shine,
And
boiled down all his blood to brine.
'Tis true he drank full many a draught
Of Phlegethon's black flood;

By cupping, leeches, doctor's craft,
And venesection, fore and aft,

They took from him much blood.
Full many a clyster was applied,

And purging, too, was also tried.

His doctor, versed in sciences,
With wig beneath his hat,
Argued
and showed with wondrous ease,
From Celsus and Hippocrates,

When he in judgment sat,--
"Right worshipful the mayor of hell,

The liver's wrong, I see full well."
"He's but a booby," Pluto said,
"With all his trash and pills!
A man
like me--pray where's his head?
A young man yet--his wits have fled!

While youth my veins yet fills!
Unless electuaries he'll bring,

Full in his face my club I'll fling!"
Or right or wrong,--'twas a hard case
To weather such a trial;
(Poor
men, who lose a king's good grace!)
He's straight saluted in the face

By every splint and phial.
He very wisely made no fuss;
This hint
he learnt of Cerberus.
"Go! fetch the barber of the skies,
Apollo, to me soon!"
An airy
courier straightway flies
Upon his beast, and onward hies,
And
skims past poles and moon;
As he went off, the clock struck four,

At five his charger reached the door.
Just then Apollo happened--"Heigh-ho!
A sonnet to have made?"

Oh, dear me, no!--upon Miss Io
(Such is the tale I heard from Clio)

The midwife to have played.
The boy, as if stamped out of wax,

Might Zeus as father fairly tax.
He read the letter half asleep,
Then started in dismay:
"The road is
long, and hell is deep,
Your rocks I know are rough and steep . . .

Yet like a king he'll pay!"
He dons his cap of mist and furs,
Then
through the air the charger spurs.
With locks all frizzled a la mode,
And ruffles smooth and nice,
In
gala dress, that brightly glowed
(A gift Aurora had bestowed),
With
watch-chains of high price,
With toes turned out, and chapeau bas,

He stood before hell's mighty czar.

BOOK II.
The grumbler, in his usual tone,
Received him with a curse:
"To
Pomerania straight begone!
Ugh! how he smells of eau de Cologne!

Why, brimstone isn't worse.
He'd best be off to heaven again,
Or
he'll infect hell's wide domain."
The god of pills, in sore surprise,
A spring then backwards took:
"Is
this his highness' usual guise?
'Tis in the brain, I see, that lies
The
mischief--what a look!
See how his eyes in frenzy roll!
The case is
bad, upon my soul!
"A journey to Elysium
The infectus would dissolve,
Making the
saps less tough become,
As through the Capitolium
And stomach
they revolve.
Provisionally be it so:
Let's start then--but incognito!"
"Ay, worthy sir, no doubt well meant!
If, in these regions hazy,
As
with you folk, so charged with scent,
You dapper ones who heaven
frequent,
'Twere proper to be lazy,
If hell a master needed not,

Why, then I'd follow on the spot!
"Ha! if the cat once turned her back,
Pray where would be the mice?

They'd sally forth from every crack,
My very mufti would attack,

Spoil all things in a trice!
Oddsbodikins! 'tis pretty cool!
I'll let
him see I'm no such fool!
"A pleasant uproar happened erst,
When they assailed my tower!

No fault of mine 'twas, at the worst,
That from their desks and chains
to