SMOKED OFF!

[The latest complaint of "the Ladies" is that they are being "smoked off" the tops of the omnibuses.]

The "knife-board," sacred once to broad male feet,

The "Happy Garden Seat,"

Invaded now by the non-smoking sex,

Virginal scruples vex,

And matronly anathemas assail.

Alas! and what avail

Man's immunities of time or place?

The sweet she-creatures chase

From all old coigns of vantage harried man.

In vain, how vain to ban

Beauty from billiard-room or—Morning Bus

What use to fume or fuss?

And yet, and yet indeed it is no joke!

Where shall one get a smoke

Without annoying Shes with our cheroots,

And being badged as "brutes"?

If a poor fellow may not snatch a whiff

(Without the feminine sniff)

Upon the "Bus-roof," where in thunder's name

Shall he draw that same!

The ladies, climb, sit, suffocate, and scoff,

Declare they are "smoked off,"

Is there no room inside? If smoke means Hades,

We, "to oblige the ladies,"

Have taken outside seats this many a year,

Cold, but with weeds to cheer

Our macintosh-enswathed umbrella'd bodies;

Now we are called churl-noddies

Because we puff the humble briar-root.

Is man indeed a "brute"

Because he may upon the knife-board's rack owe

Some solace to Tobacco?

If so it be, then man's last, only chance,

Is in the full advance

Of the "emancipated" sex. Sweet elves,

Pray learn to smoke yourselves!

Don't crowd us out, don't snub, and sneer, and sniff,

But—join us in a whiff!