Mrs. Merdle, having “Nibbled a Little” for two Hours at Dinner, retireth from the Table unsatisfied.
“Impatient—oh yes—just the way with you men!
I never have time to half finish my eating
Ere Merdle is done; such a fidget is then,
He'd starve me I think rather 'n miss of a meeting
Where brokers preside o'er the fate of the stocks,
As Pales presided o'er shepherds and flocks.
Now while you are smoking—what nonsense and folly—
I'll go to my room.—don't say No, for I must—
Put on a new dress, with assistance of Molly,
And then with a little strong tea and a crust,
My strength I may hope for a walk will be able
As far as the gate, and a very short ride,
To give me a relish again for the table—
What else do we live for in this world beside?”
The Poet Moralizeth—He Discourseth to those who Gorge and Complain.
Oh! Kitty Malone—Mrs. Merdle 'tis now—
Was there ever on earth than this, greater folly?
Still gorging, while groaning, and swearing a vow,
That yours is a case of most sad melancholy.
With table that Croesus never had but might covet,
You live but to eat and to eat 'cause you love it;
And yet while you swallow great sirloins of meat
Complain like a beggar of nothing to eat.
He Discourseth of the Wherefore of Bachelorism.
“What else do we live for in this world beside?”
Alas! 't is the question of ten times a day,
That comes on the wind, or that floats on the tide,
And creeps in the houses where men go to pray.
What else do we live for than get such a wife
As this of the banker of our faint description?
What else is the end of our fashionable life
From which men escape as they would from conscription?
What else is the reason so few natives marry,
Than this, that extravagance leads on to ruin?
It is because few men are able to carry
The load of this baking and roasting and stewing,
Of buying and wasting extravagant meat,
Where women are dying of “nothing to eat;”
Where men in corruption so rapidly tending,
In morals and wealth in bankruptcy ending.
That forging and stealing and breaches of trust,
And ten thousand arts of the confidence game,
And follies uncounted of men “on a bust,”
Are follies and crimes of this age to our shame,
Till angels who witness the folly so wide
Extended from palace to farm-house and cot,
Might wonder if mortals life's objects forgot,
Or Merdle's position is man's common lot?