Though the world, for the present, lets them fall
Down! Down! to the twopenny box of the stall!
Thus they—But the marplot Time stands by,
With a knowing wink in his funny old eye.
He grasps by the top an immense fool's cap,
Which he calls a philosophaster-trap:
And rightly enough, for while these little men
Croak loud as a concert of frogs in a fen,
He first singles out one, and then another,
Down goes the cap—lo! a moment's pother,