Each one's his faults, to which he still holds fast,
And neither shame nor fear can cure the man;
'Tis apropos of this (my usual plan),
I give a story, for example, from the past.
A follower of Bacchus hurt his purse,
His health, his mind, and still grew each day worse;
Such people, ere they've run one-half their course,
Drain all their fortune for their mad expenses.
One day this fellow, by the wine o'erthrown,
Had in a bottle left his senses;
His shrewd wife shut him all alone
In a dark tomb, till the dull fume
Might from his brains evaporate.
He woke and found the place all gloom,
A shroud upon him cold and damp,
Upon the pall a funeral lamp.
"What's this?" said he; "my wife's a widow, then!"
On that the wife, dressed like a Fury, came,
Mask'd, and with voice disguised, into the den,
And brought the wretched sot, in hopes to tame,
Some boiling gruel fit for Lucifer.
The sot no longer doubted he was dead—
A citizen of Pluto's—could he err?
"And who are you?" unto the ghost he said.
"I'm Satan's steward," said the wife, "and serve the food
For those within this black and dismal place."
The sot replied, with comical grimace,
Not taking any time to think,
"And don't you also bring the drink?"
KING GASTER AND THE MEMBERS.
Had I but shown a proper loyalty,
I had begun my book with royalty.
The Belly is a king, it's true,
And in a certain point of view
His wants the other members share.
Well, once to work for him they weary were;
Each one discussed a better plan,—
To live an idle gentleman,
Like Monsieur Gaster,
Their lord and master.
"Without us he must feed on air;
We sweat and toil, and groan with care,
For whom? for him alone; we get no good,
And all our thought's to find him food:
We'll strike, and try his idle trade."
'Twas done as soon as said.
The hands refused to grasp, the legs to walk,
The eyes to open, and the tongue to talk;
Gaster might do whate'er he could.—
'Twas a mistake they soon repent
With one consent.
The heart made no more blood, and so
The other members ceased to glow;
All wanted strength,
And thus the working men at length
Saw that their idle monarch, in his way,
Toiled for the common weal as well as they.
And this applies to royalty,
It takes and gives with fair equality;
All draw from it their nourishment:
It feeds the artisan, and pays the magistrate,
Gives labourers food, and soldiers subsidies,
Distributes in a thousand places
Its sovereign graces;
In fact, supports the State.
Menenius told the story well,
When discord in the senate fell,
And discontented Commons taunted it
For having power and treasure, honour, dignity,
While all the care and pain was theirs,
Taxes and imposts, all the toils of war,
The blood, the sorrow, brand and scar.
Without the walls already do they band,
Resolved to seek another land.
Menenius was able,
By this most precious fable,
To bring them safely back
To the old, honest track.
