THE LESSON OF THE SEASON.
The Season's over; for relief
You're off to scale the Alps;
Say, do you, like some Indian Chief,
Look back and count your scalps?
Does someone rue your broken vows,
And sigh he has to doubt you;
Yet felt withal the week at Cowes
Was quite a blank without you?
Are hearts still broken, as of old,
In this prosaic time,
When love is only given for gold,
And poverty's a crime.
Say, are you conscious of a heart,
And can you feel it beating;
And is it ever sad to part,
And finds a joy in meeting?
The Seasons come, the Seasons go,
With store of good and ill;
Do all men find you cold as snow,
And unresponsive still?
O beautiful enigma, say,
Will love's sublime persistence
Solve for you, in the usual way,
The riddle of existence?
Alas! love is not love to-day,
But just a bargain made,
In cold and calculating way;
And if the price be paid,
A man may win the fairest face,
A maiden tall and queenly,
The daughter of some ancient race,
Who sells herself serenely.
What wonder that the cynic sneers
At such a rule of life;
That, after but a few short years,
Dissension should be rife.
Ah! Lady, you'll avoid heart-ache,
And scorn of bard satiric,
If haply you should deign to take
A lesson from our lyric.
