Chapter 10
Sir Impycu Lackland, from over the sea, Has led to the altar Miss Bloatie Bondee. The wedding took place at the Church of St. Blare; The fashion, the rank and the wealth were all there-- No person was absent of all whom one meets. Lord Mammon himself bowed them into their seats, While good Sir John Satan attended the door And Sexton Beelzebub managed the floor, Respectfully keeping each dog to its rug, Preserving the peace between poodle and pug. Twelve bridesmaids escorted the bride up the aisle To blush in her blush and to smile in her smile; Twelve groomsmen supported the eminent groom To scowl in his scowl and to gloom in his gloom. The rites were performed by the hand and the lip Of his Grace the Diocesan, Billingham Pip, Assisted by three able-bodied divines. He prayed and they grunted, he read, they made signs. Such fashion, such beauty, such dressing, such grace Were ne'er before seen in that heavenly place! That night, full of gin, and all blazing inside, Sir Impycu blackened the eyes of his bride.
A BUBBLE.
Mrs. Mehitable Marcia Moore Was a dame of superior mind, With a gown which, modestly fitting before, Was greatly puffed up behind.
The bustle she wore was ingeniously planned With an inspiration bright: It magnified seven diameters and Was remarkably nice and light.
It was made of rubber and edged with lace And riveted all with brass, And the whole immense interior space Inflated with hydrogen gas.
The ladies all said when she hove in view Like the round and rising moon: "She's a stuck up thing!" which was partly true, And men called her the Captive Balloon.
To Manhattan Beach for a bath one day She went and she said: "O dear! If I leave off _this_ what will people say? I shall look so uncommonly queer!"
So a costume she had accordingly made To take it all nicely in, And when she appeared in that suit arrayed, She was greeted with many a grin.
Proudly and happily looking around, She waded out into the wet, But the water was very, very profound, And her feet and her forehead met!
As her bubble drifted away from the shore, On the glassy billows borne, All cried: "Why, where is Mehitable Moore? I saw her go in, I'll be sworn!"
Then the bulb it swelled as the sun grew hot, Till it burst with a sullen roar, And the sea like oil closed over the spot-- Farewell, O Mehitable Moore!
A RENDEZVOUS.
Nightly I put up this humble petition: "Forgive me, O Father of Glories, My sins of commission, my sins of omission, My sins of the Mission Dolores."
FRANCINE.
Did I believe the angels soon would call You, my beloved, to the other shore, And I should never see you any more, I love you so I know that I should fall Into dejection utterly, and all Love's pretty pageantry, wherein we bore Twin banners bravely in the tumult's fore, Would seem as shadows idling on a wall. So daintily I love you that my love Endures no rumor of the winter's breath, And only blossoms for it thinks the sky Forever gracious, and the stars above Forever friendly. Even the fear of death Were frost wherein its roses all would die.
AN EXAMPLE.
They were two deaf mutes, and they loved and they Resolved to be groom and bride; And they listened to nothing that any could say, Nor ever a word replied.
From wedlock when warned by the married men, Maintain an invincible mind: Be deaf and dumb until wedded--and then Be deaf and dumb and blind.
REVENGE.
A spitcat sate on a garden gate And a snapdog fared beneath; Careless and free was his mien, and he Held a fiddle-string in his teeth.
She marked his march, she wrought an arch Of her back and blew up her tail; And her eyes were green as ever were seen, And she uttered a woful wail.
The spitcat's plaint was as follows: "It ain't That I am to music a foe; For fiddle-strings bide in my own inside, And I twang them soft and low.
"But that dog has trifled with art and rifled A kitten of mine, ah me! That catgut slim was marauded from him: 'Tis the string that men call E."
Then she sounded high, in the key of Y, A note that cracked the tombs; And the missiles through the firmament flew From adjacent sleeping-rooms.
As her gruesome yell from the gate-post fell She followed it down to earth; And that snapdog wears a placard that bears The inscription: "Blind from birth."
THE GENESIS OF EMBARRASSMENT.
When Adam first saw Eve he said: "O lovely creature, share my bed." Before consenting, she her gaze Fixed on the greensward to appraise, As well as vision could avouch, The value of the proffered couch. And seeing that the grass was green And neatly clipped with a machine-- Observing that the flow'rs were rare Varieties, and some were fair, The posts of precious woods, besprent With fragrant balsams, diffluent, And all things suited to her worth, She raised her angel eyes from earth To his and, blushing to confess, Murmured: "I love you, Adam--yes." Since then her daughters, it is said, Look always down when asked to wed.
IN CONTUMACIAM.
Och! Father McGlynn, Ye appear to be in Fer a bit of a bout wid the Pope; An' there's divil a doubt But he's knockin' ye out While ye're hangin' onto the rope.
An' soon ye'll lave home To thravel to Rome, For its bound to Canossa ye are. Persistin' to shtay When ye're ordered away-- Bedad! that is goin' too far!
RE-EDIFIED.
Lord of the tempest, pray refrain From leveling this church again. Now in its doom, as so you've willed it, We acquiesce. But _you'll_ rebuild it.
A BULLETIN.
"Lothario is very low," So all the doctors tell. Nay, nay, not _so_--he will be, though, If ever he get well.
FROM THE MINUTES.
When, with the force of a ram that discharges its ponderous body Straight at the rear elevation of the luckless culler of simples, The foot of Herculean Kilgore--statesman of surname suggestive Or carnage unspeakable!--lit like a missile prodigious Upon the Congressional door with a monstrous and mighty momentum, Causing that vain ineffective bar to political freedom To fly from its hinges, effacing the nasal excrescence of Dingley, That luckless one, decently veiling the ruin with ready bandanna, Lamented the loss of his eminence, sadly with sobs as follows: "Ah, why was I ever elected to the halls of legislation, So soon to be shown the door with pitiless emphasis? Truly, I've leaned on a broken Reed, and the same has gone back on me meanly. Where now is my prominence, erstwhile in council conspicuous, patent? Alas, I did never before understand what I now see clearly, To wit, that Democracy tends to level all human distinctions!" His fate so untoward and sad the Pine-tree statesman, bewailing, Stood in the corridor there while Democrats freed from confinement Came trooping forth from the chamber, dissembling all, as they passed him, Hilarious sentiments painful indeed to observe, and remarking: "O friend and colleague of the Speaker, what ails the unjoyous proboscis?"
WOMAN IN POLITICS.
What, madam, run for School Director? You? And want my vote and influence? Well, well, That beats me! Gad! where _are_ we drifting to? In all my life I never have heard tell Of such sublime presumption, and I smell A nigger in the fence! Excuse me, madam; We statesmen sometimes speak like the old Adam.
But now you mention it--well, well, who knows? We might, that's certain, give the sex a show. I have a cousin--teacher. I suppose If I stand in and you 're elected--no? You'll make no bargains? That's a pretty go! But understand that school administration Belongs to Politics, not Education.
We'll pass the teacher deal; but it were wise To understand each other at the start. You know my business--books and school supplies; You'd hardly, if elected, have the heart Some small advantage to deny me--part Of all my profits to be yours. What? Stealing? Please don't express yourself with so much feeling.
You pain me, truly. Now one question more. Suppose a fair young man should ask a place As teacher--would you (pardon) shut the door Of the Department in his handsome face Until--I know not how to put the case-- Would you extort a kiss to pay your favor? Good Lord! you laugh? I thought the matter graver.
Well, well, we can't do business, I suspect: A woman has no head for useful tricks. My profitable offers you reject And will not promise anything to fix The opposition. That's not politics. Good morning. Stay--I'm chaffing you, conceitedly. Madam, I mean to vote for you--repeatedly.
TO AN ASPIRANT.
What! you a Senator--you, Mike de Young? Still reeking of the gutter whence you sprung? Sir, if all Senators were such as you, Their hands so crimson and so slender, too,-- (Shaped to the pocket for commercial work, For literary, fitted to the dirk)-- So black their hearts, so lily-white their livers, The toga's touch would give a man the shivers.
A BALLAD OF PIKEVILLE.
Down in Southern Arizona where the Gila monster thrives, And the "Mescalero," gifted with a hundred thousand lives, Every hour renounces one of them by drinking liquid flame-- The assassinating wassail that has given him his name; Where the enterprising dealer in Caucasian hair is seen To hold his harvest festival upon his village-green, While the late lamented tenderfoot upon the plain is spread With a sanguinary circle on the summit of his head; Where the cactuses (or cacti) lift their lances in the sun, And incautious jackass-rabbits come to sorrow as they run, Lived a colony of settlers--old Missouri was the State Where they formerly resided at a prehistoric date.
Now, the spot that had been chosen for this colonizing scheme Was as waterless, believe me, as an Arizona stream.
The soil was naught but ashes, by the breezes driven free, And an acre and a quarter were required to sprout a pea. So agriculture languished, for the land would not produce, And for lack of water, whisky was the beverage in use-- Costly whisky, hauled in wagons many a weary, weary day, Mostly needed by the drivers to sustain them on their way. Wicked whisky! King of Evils! Why, O, why did God create Such a curse and thrust it on us in our inoffensive state?
Once a parson came among them, and a holy man was he; With his ailing stomach whisky wouldn't anywise agree; So he knelt upon the _mesa_ and he prayed with all his chin That the Lord would send them water or incline their hearts to gin.
Scarcely was the prayer concluded ere an earthquake shook the land, And with copious effusion springs burst out on every hand! Merrily the waters gurgled, and the shock which gave them birth Fitly was by some declared a temperance movement of the earth. Astounded by the miracle, the people met that night To celebrate it properly by some religious rite; And 'tis truthfully recorded that before the moon had sunk Every man and every woman was devotionally drunk. A half a standard gallon (says history) per head Of the best Kentucky prime was at that ceremony shed. O, the glory of that country! O, the happy, happy folk. By the might of prayer delivered from Nature's broken yoke! Lo! the plains to the horizon all are yellowing with rye, And the corn upon the hill-top lifts its banners to the sky! Gone the wagons, gone the drivers, and the road is grown to grass, Over which the incalescent Bourbon did aforetime pass. Pikeville (that's the name they've given, in their wild, romantic way, To that irrigation district) now distills, statistics say, Something like a hundred gallons, out of each recurrent crop, To the head of population--and consumes it, every drop!
A BUILDER.
I saw the devil--he was working free: A customs-house he builded by the sea. "Why do you this?" The devil raised his head; "Churches and courts I've built enough," he said.
AN AUGURY.
Upon my desk a single spray, With starry blossoms fraught. I write in many an idle way, Thinking one serious thought.
"O flowers, a fine Greek name ye bear, And with a fine Greek grace." Be still, O heart, that turns to share The sunshine of a face.
"Have ye no messages--no brief, Still sign: 'Despair', or 'Hope'?" A sudden stir of stem and leaf-- A breath of heliotrope!
LUSUS POLITICUS.
Come in, old gentleman. How do you do? Delighted, I'm sure, that you've called. I'm a sociable sort of a chap and you Are a pleasant-appearing person, too, With a head agreeably bald. That's right--sit down in the scuttle of coal And put up your feet in a chair. It is better to have them there: And I've always said that a hat of lead, Such as I see you wear, Was a better hat than a hat of glass. And your boots of brass Are a natural kind of boots, I swear. "May you blow your nose on a paper of pins?" Why, certainly, man, why not? I rather expected you'd do it before, When I saw you poking it in at the door. It's dev'lish hot-- The weather, I mean. "You are twins"? Why, that was evident at the start, From the way that you paint your head In stripes of purple and red, With dots of yellow. That proves you a fellow With a love of legitimate art. "You've bitten a snake and are feeling bad"? That's very sad, But Longfellow's words I beg to recall: Your lot is the common lot of all. "Horses are trees and the moon is a sneeze"? That, I fancy, is just as you please. Some think that way and others hold The opposite view; I never quite knew, For the matter o' that, When everything's been said-- May I offer this mat If you _will_ stand on your head? I suppose I look to be upside down From your present point of view. It's a giddy old world, from king to clown, And a topsy-turvy, too. But, worthy and now uninverted old man, _You're_ built, at least, on a normal plan If ever a truth I spoke. Smoke? Your air and conversation Are a liberal education, And your clothes, including the metal hat And the brazen boots--what's that?
"You never could stomach a Democrat Since General Jackson ran? You're another sort, but you predict That your party'll get consummately licked?" Good God! what a queer old man!
BEREAVEMENT.
A Countess (so they tell the tale) Who dwelt of old in Arno's vale, Where ladies, even of high degree, Know more of love than of A.B.C, Came once with a prodigious bribe Unto the learned village scribe, That most discreet and honest man Who wrote for all the lover clan, Nor e'er a secret had betrayed-- Save when inadequately paid. "Write me," she sobbed--"I pray thee do-- A book about the Prince di Giu-- A book of poetry in praise Of all his works and all his ways; The godlike grace of his address, His more than woman's tenderness, His courage stern and lack of guile, The loves that wantoned in his smile. So great he was, so rich and kind, I'll not within a fortnight find His equal as a lover. O, My God! I shall be drowned in woe!"
"What! Prince di Giu has died!" exclaimed The honest man for letters famed, The while he pocketed her gold; "Of what'?--if I may be so bold." Fresh storms of tears the lady shed: "I stabbed him fifty times," she said.
AN INSCRIPTION
FOR A STATUE OF NAPOLEON, AT WEST POINT.
A famous conqueror, in battle brave, Who robbed the cradle to supply the grave. His reign laid quantities of human dust: He fell upon the just and the unjust.
A PICKBRAIN.
What! imitate me, friend? Suppose that you With agony and difficulty do What I do easily--what then? You've got A style I heartily wish _I_ had not. If I from lack of sense and you from choice Grieve the judicious and the unwise rejoice, No equal censure our deserts will suit-- We both are fools, but you're an ape to boot!
CONVALESCENT.
"By good men's prayers see Grant restored!" Shouts Talmage, pious creature! Yes, God, by supplication bored From every droning preacher, Exclaimed: "So be it, tiresome crew-- But I've a crow to pick with _you_."
THE NAVAL CONSTRUCTOR.
He looked upon the ships as they All idly lay at anchor, Their sides with gorgeous workmen gay-- The riveter and planker--
Republicans and Democrats, Statesmen and politicians. He saw the swarm of prudent rats Swimming for land positions.
He marked each "belted cruiser" fine, Her poddy life-belts floating In tether where the hungry brine Impinged upon her coating.
He noted with a proud regard, As any of his class would, The poplar mast and poplar yard Above the hull of bass-wood.
He saw the Eastlake frigate tall, With quaintly carven gable, Hip-roof and dormer-window--all With ivy formidable.
In short, he saw our country's hope In best of all conditions-- Equipped, to the last spar and rope, By working politicians.
He boarded then the noblest ship And from the harbor glided. "Adieu, adieu!" fell from his lip. Verdict: "He suicided."
1881.
DETECTED.
In Congress once great Mowther shone, Debating weighty matters; Now into an asylum thrown, He vacuously chatters.
If in that legislative hall His wisdom still he 'd vented, It never had been known at all That Mowther was demented.
BIMETALISM.
Ben Bulger was a silver man, Though not a mine had he: He thought it were a noble plan To make the coinage free.
"There hain't for years been sech a time," Said Ben to his bull pup, "For biz--the country's broke and I'm The hardest kind of up.
"The paper says that that's because The silver coins is sea'ce, And that the chaps which makes the laws Puts gold ones in their place.
"They says them nations always be Most prosperatin' where The wolume of the currency Ain't so disgustin' rare."
His dog, which hadn't breakfasted, Dissented from his view, And wished that he could swell, instead, The volume of cold stew.
"Nobody'd put me up," said Ben, "With patriot galoots Which benefits their feller men By playin' warious roots;
"But havin' all the tools about, I'm goin' to commence A-turnin' silver dollars out Wuth eighty-seven cents.
"The feller takin' 'em can't whine: (No more, likewise, can I): They're better than the genooine, Which mostly satisfy.
"It's only makin' coinage free, And mebby might augment The wolume of the currency A noomerous per cent."
I don't quite see his error nor Malevolence prepense, But fifteen years they gave him for That technical offense.
THE RICH TESTATOR.
He lay on his bed and solemnly "signed," Gasping--perhaps 'twas a jest he meant: "This of a sound and disposing mind Is the last ill-will and contestament."
TWO METHODS.
To bucks and ewes by the Good Shepherd fed The Priest delivers masses for the dead, And even from estrays outside the fold Death for the masses he would not withhold. The Parson, loth alike to free or kill, Forsakes the souls already on the grill, And, God's prerogative of mercy shamming, Spares living sinners for a harder damning.
FOUNDATIONS OF THE STATE
Observe, dear Lord, what lively pranks Are played by sentimental cranks! First this one mounts his hinder hoofs And brays the chimneys off the roofs; Then that one, with exalted voice, Expounds the thesis of his choice, Our understandings to bombard, Till all the window panes are starred! A third augments the vocal shock Till steeples to their bases rock, Confessing, as they humbly nod, They hear and mark the will of God. A fourth in oral thunder vents His awful penury of sense Till dogs with sympathetic howls, And lowing cows, and cackling fowls, Hens, geese, and all domestic birds, Attest the wisdom of his words. Cranks thus their intellects deflate Of theories about the State. This one avers 'tis built on Truth, And that on Temperance. This youth Declares that Science bears the pile; That graybeard, with a holy smile, Says Faith is the supporting stone; While women swear that Love alone Could so unflinchingly endure The heavy load. And some are sure The solemn vow of Christian Wedlock Is the indubitable bedrock.
Physicians once about the bed Of one whose life was nearly sped Blew up a disputatious breeze About the cause of his disease: This, that and t' other thing they blamed. "Tut, tut!" the dying man exclaimed, "What made me ill I do not care; You've not an ounce of it, I'll swear. And if you had the skill to make it I'd see you hanged before I'd take it!"
AN IMPOSTER.
Must you, Carnegie, evermore explain Your worth, and all the reasons give again Why black and red are similarly white, And you and God identically right? Still must our ears without redress submit To hear you play the solemn hypocrite Walking in spirit some high moral level, Raising at once his eye-balls and the devil? Great King of Cant! if Nature had but made Your mouth without a tongue I ne'er had prayed To have an earless head. Since she did not, Bear me, ye whirlwinds, to some favored spot-- Some mountain pinnacle that sleeps in air So delicately, mercifully rare That when the fellow climbs that giddy hill, As, for my sins, I know at last he will, To utter twaddle in that void inane His soundless organ he will play in vain.
UNEXPOUNDED.
On Evidence, on Deeds, on Bills, On Copyhold, on Loans, on Wills, Lawyers great books indite; The creaking of their busy quills I've never heard on Right.
FRANCE.
Unhappy State! with horrors still to strive: Thy Hugo dead, thy Boulanger alive; A Prince who'd govern where he dares not dwell, And who for power would his birthright sell-- Who, anxious o'er his enemies to reign, Grabs at the scepter and conceals the chain; While pugnant factions mutually strive By cutting throats to keep the land alive. Perverse in passion, as in pride perverse-- To all a mistress, to thyself a curse; Sweetheart of Europe! every sun's embrace Matures the charm and poison of thy grace. Yet time to thee nor peace nor wisdom brings: In blood of citizens and blood of kings The stones of thy stability are set, And the fair fabric trembles at a threat.
THE EASTERN QUESTION.
Looking across the line, the Grecian said: "This border I will stain a Turkey red." The Moslem smiled securely and replied: "No Greek has ever for his country dyed." While thus each patriot guarded his frontier, The Powers stole all the country in his rear.
A GUEST.
Death, are you well? I trust you have no cough That's painful or in any way annoying-- No kidney trouble that may carry you off, Or heart disease to keep you from enjoying Your meals--and ours. 'T were very sad indeed To have to quit the busy life you lead.
You've been quite active lately for so old A person, and not very strong-appearing. I'm apprehensive, somehow, that my bold, Bad brother gave you trouble in the spearing. And my two friends--I fear, sir, that you ran Quite hard for them, especially the man.
I crave your pardon: 'twas no fault of mine; If you are overworked I'm sorry, very. Come in, old man, and have a glass of wine. What shall it be--Marsala, Port or Sherry? What! just a mug of blood? That's funny grog To ask a friend for, eh? Well, take it, hog!
A FALSE PROPHECY.