'For when a person takes and dies,
On Monday though it be,
They never hold his obsequies
Till Sunday after three.
'And thus it fares through their delay,
That I may not begin
To dig the grave till Saturday,—
On Sunday fill it in.
'My Sabbath ease is broken through,
My Saturdays destroyed;
Many employ me; very few
Have left me unemployed!'
Again did Adam murmur 'Drat!'
And smote the old-churchyard,
And said, as on his hands he spat,
'It's werry, werry hard!'
And as I rose, the path to take
That led me home again,
My head was in my wideawake,
His words were in my brain.
ELEGY ON A RHINOCEROS
RECENTLY DECEASED
Come, let us weep for Begum; he is dead.
Dead; and afar, where Thamis' waters lave
The busy marge, he lies unvisited,
Unsung; above no cypress branches wave,
Nor tributary blossoms fringe his grave;
Only would these poor numbers advertise
His copious charms, and mourn for his demise.