Verses and Translations | Page 4

on towards home, or home-brewed liquor.
It is (in fact) the evening--that pure and pleasant time,
When stars
break into splendour, and poets into rhyme;
When in the glass of

Memory the forms of loved ones shine - And when, of course, Miss
Goodchild's is prominent in mine.
Miss Goodchild!--Julia Goodchild!--how graciously you smiled Upon
my childish passion once, yourself a fair-haired child: When I was (no
doubt) profiting by Dr. Crabb's instruction, And sent those streaky
lollipops home for your fairy suction!
"She wore" her natural "roses, the night when first we met" - Her
golden hair was gleaming 'neath the coercive net:
"Her brow was like
the snawdrift," her step was like Queen Mab's, And gone was instantly
the heart of every boy at Crabb's.
The parlour-boarder chasseed tow'rds her on graceful limb;
The onyx
decked his bosom--but her smiles were not for him: With ME she
danced--till drowsily her eyes "began to blink," And _I_ brought raisin
wine, and said, "Drink, pretty creature, drink!"
And evermore, when winter comes in his garb of snows,
And the
returning schoolboy is told how fast he grows;
Shall I--with that soft
hand in mine--enact ideal Lancers,
And dream I hear demure remarks,
and make impassioned answers:-
I know that never, never may her love for me return -
At night I muse
upon the fact with undisguised concern -
But ever shall I bless that
day: (I don't bless, as a rule, The days I spent at "Dr. Crabb's
Preparatory School.")
And yet--we two MAY meet again--(Be still, my throbbing heart!) -
Now rolling years have weaned us from jam and raspberry tart:- One
night I saw a vision--'Twas when musk-roses bloom
I stood--WE
stood--upon a rug, in a sumptuous dining-room:
One hand clasped hers--one easily reposed upon my hip -
And
"BLESS YE!" burst abruptly from Mr. Goodchild's lip:
I raised my
brimming eye, and saw in hers an answering gleam - My heart beat
wildly--and I woke, and lo! it was a dream.

GEMINI AND VIRGO.
Some vast amount of years ago,
Ere all my youth had vanished from me,
A boy it was my lot to know,
Whom his familiar friends called Tommy.
I love to gaze upon a child;
A young bud bursting into blossom;
Artless, as Eve yet unbeguiled,
And agile as a young opossum:
And such was he. A calm-browed lad,
Yet mad, at moments, as a hatter:
Why hatters as a race are mad
I never knew, nor does it matter.
He was what nurses call a 'limb;'
One of those small misguided creatures,
Who, though their intellects
are dim,
Are one too many for their teachers:
And, if you asked of him to say
What twice 10 was, or 3 times 7,
He'd glance (in quite a placid way)
From heaven to earth, from earth to heaven:
And smile, and look politely round,
To catch a casual suggestion;
But make no effort to propound
Any solution of the question.

And so not much esteemed was he
Of the authorities: and therefore
He fraternized by chance with me,
Needing a somebody to care for:
And three fair summers did we twain
Live (as they say) and love together;
And bore by turns the
wholesome cane
Till our young skins became as leather:
And carved our names on every desk,
And tore our clothes, and inked our collars;
And looked unique and
picturesque,
But not, it may be, model scholars.
We did much as we chose to do;
We'd never heard of Mrs. Grundy;
All the theology we knew
Was that we mightn't play on Sunday;
And all the general truths, that cakes
Were to be bought at four a-penny,
And that excruciating aches
Resulted if we ate too many:
And seeing ignorance is bliss,
And wisdom consequently folly,
The obvious result is this -
That our two lives were very jolly.
At last the separation came.

Real love, at that time, was the fashion;
And by a horrid chance, the
same
Young thing was, to us both, a passion.
Old POSER snorted like a horse:
His feet were large, his hands were pimply,
His manner, when excited,
coarse:-
But Miss P. was an angel simply.
She was a blushing gushing thing;
All--more than all--my fancy painted;
Once--when she helped me to a
wing
Of goose--I thought I should have fainted.
The people said that she was blue:
But I was green, and loved her dearly.
She was approaching
thirty-two;
And I was then eleven, nearly.
I did not love as others do;
(None ever did that I've heard tell of;)
My passion was a byword
through
The town she was, of course, the belle of.
Oh sweet--as to the toilworn man
The far-off sound of rippling river;
As to cadets in Hindostan
The fleeting remnant of their liver -

To me was ANNA; dear as gold
That fills the miser's sunless coffers;
As to the spinster, growing old,
The thought--the dream--that she had offers.
I'd sent her little gifts