Gone are the days of chivalry,
And the proud steed must hungry be;
But L——, the ass, I boldly say,
Will never want his oats and hay.
THE ASS-ELECTION.
Being tired of freedom for some time past
The beasts’ republic decided
To be with a single ruler at last
As its absolute head provided.
Each kind of beast prepared for the strife,
Electoral billets were written;
Intrigues on every side were rife,
With party zeal all were bitten.
By long-ear’d gentry at its head
The asses’ committee was aided;
Cockades, whose colours were black, gold, and red,[94]
They boastfully paraded.
A small party there was of friends of the horse,
Who yet were afraid of voting,
So greatly they dreaded the outcry coarse
The long-ear’d party denoting.
But when one of them ventured the horse to name
As a candidate, greater and greater
Wax’d the noise, and an old long-ear, to his shame,
Shouted out “Thou art only a traitor.
“A traitor art thou, in thy veins doth not flow
“One drop of asses’ blood proper;
“No ass art thou, and I almost know
“That a foreign mare was thy dropper!
“From the zebra perchance thou art sprung; thy striped hide
“Quite answers the zebra’s description;
“The nasal twang of thy voice is allied
“To the Hebrew as well as Egyptian.
“And if not a stranger, thou art, thou must own,
“A dull ass, of an intellect paltry;
“The depths of ass-nature to thee are unknown
“Thou hear’st not its mystical psalt’ry.