LONG METER.
All human joys are swift of wing
For heaven doth so allot it
That when you get an easy thing
You find you haven't got it.
Man never yet has loved a maid,
But they were sure to part, sir;
Nor never lacked a paltry spade
But that he drew a heart, sir!
Go, Chauncey! it is plain as day
You much prefer a dinner
To walking straight in wisdom's way—
Go to, thou babbling sinner.
The froward part that you have played
To me this lesson teaches:
To trust no man whose stock in trade
Is after-dinner speeches.
TO DE WITT MILLER.
Dear Miller: You and I despise
The cad who gathers books to sell 'em,
Be they but sixteen-mos in cloth
Or stately folios garbed in vellum.
But when one fellow has a prize
Another bibliophile is needing,
Why, then, a satisfactory trade
Is quite a laudable proceeding.
There's precedent in Bristol's case
The great collector—preacher-farmer;
And in the case of that divine
Who shrives the soul of P.D. Armour.
When from their sapient, saintly lips
The words of wisdom are not dropping,
They turn to trade—that is to say,
When they're not preaching they are swapping!