MY DOG.
e is a trifling, homely beast,
Of no use, or the very least;
To shake imaginary rat
Or bark for hours at china cat;
To lie at head of stairs and start,
Like animated, woolly dart,
Upon a non-existent foe;
Or on hind legs like monkey go,
To beg for sugar or for bone;
Never content to be alone;
To bask for hours in the sun.
Rolled up till head and tail are one;
Usurping all the softest places
And keeping them with doggish graces;
To sneak between the housemaid’s feet
And scour unnoticed on the street;
Wag indefatigable tail;
Cajole with piteous human wail;
To dance with dainty dandy air
When nicely parted is his hair,
And look most ancient and dejected
When it has been too long neglected;
To sleep upon my book-den rug
And dream of battle with a pug;
To growl with counterfeited rabies;
To be more trouble than twin babies;—
These are the qualities and tricks
That in my heart his image fix;
And so in cursory, doggerel rhyme
I celebrate him in his time,
Nor wait his virtues to rehearse
In cold obituary verse.
here is one other speaking companion that I would tolerate in my library, and that is a clock. I have a number of clocks in mine, and if it were not for their unanimous and warning voice I might forget to go to bed. Perhaps my reader would like to hear an account of
MY CLOCKS.
ive clocks adorn my domicile
And give me occupation,
For moments else inane I fill
With their due regulation.
Four of these clocks, on each Lord’s Day,
As regular as preaching,
I wind and set, so that they may
The flight of time be teaching.
My grandfather’s old clock is chief,
With foolish moon-faced dial;
Procrastination is a thief
It always brings to trial.
Its height is as the tallest men,
Its pendulum beats slow,
And when its awful bell booms ten,
Young men get up and go.
Another clock is bronze and gilt,
Penelope sits on it,
And in her fingers holds a quilt—
How strange ’tis not a bonnet!
Memorial of those weary years
When she the web unravelled,
While Ithacus choked down his fears
And slow from Ilium travelled.
Ceres upon the third, with spray
Of grain, in classic gown,
Seems sadly to recall the day
Proserpine sank down,
With scarcely time to say good-bye,
Unto the world of Dis;
And keeps account, with many a sigh,
Of harvest time in this.
Another clock is rococo,
Of Louis Sept or Seize,
With many a dreadful furbelow
An artist’s hair to raise,
Suggestions of a giddy court,
With fan and boufflant bustle,
When silken trains made gallant sport
And o’er the floor did rustle.
The fourth was brought, in foolish trust
From Alpland far away,
A baby clock, and so it must
Be tended every day.
Importunate and trivial thing!
Thou katydid of clocks!
Defying all my skill to bring
Right time from out thy box.
With works of wood and face of brass
On which queer cherubs play,
The tedious hours thou well dost pass,
And none thy chirp gainsay.
