THE WEDDING DRESS.
In picturesque confusion lies
Her scattered finery on the floor,
And here and there her handmaid flies
With parcels to increase the store.
But dolefully she paced the room,
Although it was her wedding morn,
And often spoke in tones of scorn,
And brow of ever-deepening gloom.
She only said, "The morn is dreary;"
"It cometh not," she said.
She said, "The milliner is weary,
Or stayed too late in bed."
She hears the sound of pipe and drum,
And from the window looketh she:
Nodding their heads before her come
The merry Teuton minstrelsy,
Who wait to play "The Wedding March."
A member of the "force" stalks by,
And little urchins mocking cry,
"Oh, ain't he swallowed lots o' starch?"
She laughed not, for she heard a chime:
"Eleven o'clock!" she said.
"I wonder if 'twill be in time?
I would that I were wed."
How swiftly now the minutes pass.
With ribbons, laces, pins, and thread—
With peeps into the looking-glass,
And tossings of the pretty head.
Full half an hour of anxious strife;
But still no wedding dress is there
To decorate the form so fair
Of her who would be made a wife.
"Three quarters!" cried she weeping—weary.
"It cometh now!" they said.
The maiden looked no longer dreary,
But hastened to be wed.
From Funny Folks.
In the Bon Gaultier Ballads is a parody of Lilian entitled:—