THE COQUETTE OF THE PERIOD.
You vowed you loved me, but your eyes
Said just the same to dozens,
The music of your low replies,
Was heard by several cousins.
Forgive me if I could not cope,
With charms so comprehensive;
And scarce believed a love whose scope,
Was really too extensive.
The fashion of the age you'll say,
But I've a predilection
For girls who in the olden way
Retain one man's affection.
You favoured me with witching smiles,
You gave me frequent dances;
But other men that I wished miles
Away, enjoyed your glances.
Man loves as men loved in old times,
And as in legends hoary,
We celebrate a maid in rhymes,
Is that too old a story?
But still man loves one girl alone,
And flies when he discovers—
That she he thought was all his own,
Has half a dozen lovers.
You sighed and said that you felt hurt,
And prettily you pouted,
When anybody called you flirt,
A fact I never doubted.
And yet such wheedling ways you had,
Man yielded willy-nilly;
And half your swains were nearly mad,
And all of us were silly.
Youth's first illusions fly apace,
And now one man confesses
He scarcely can recal your face,
Or colour of your dresses.
And whether you were false or true,
Or what fate followed after,
Remembrance only keeps of you
The echo of your laughter.
PROVERBIAL PRAYER FOR A PAUPER-HATING BUMBLE.—Give me neither poverty nor Ritchies!