A TALE OF A TUB.
NOT a cackle was heard, or matitudinal crow,
As the cask to the orchard they barrowed;
And gently and tenderly laid him below,
Where some ground had been recently harrowed.
The tears trickled slowly down Emma's fair check,
While Ned sobbed aloud in his fustian,
And Marian's feelings forbade her to speak
For fear of spontaneous combustion.
They gazed on his coat of cerulean blue,
Ana silently gauged his dimensions,
Then covered him up with a hurdle or two
To balk the sly foxes' intentions.
Then slowly and sadly they turned them away,
With their hearts overladen with sorrow:
Said Emma, "Bedad! he is safe for to-day."
Said Ned, "We must tap him to-morrow."
Alas! Ere the dawn of another to-day,
There only was weeping and wailing;
That beautiful tub had been carried away,
Or had leaked through a gap in the pailing.
And the Beaks, when applied to, just wagged their old heads,
And said, "Since for advice you must ask us,"
Don't bury your casks in your strawberry beds,
Lest men take them by Habeas Caskus!"
JOHN E. ALLEN.
(The touching incident described in these affecting lines occurred to some friends who, for fear of an explosion, buried a cask of paraffine oil in their garden; a midnight robber despoiled them of their spirit, and they could not make light of it.)
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