A Century of Parody and Imitation

by Unknown

And I were like the leaf.

[P. 286.] Salad. From The British Birds (1872):

Enter three Poets, all handsome. One hath redundant hair, a second redundant beard, a third redundant brow. They present a letter of introduction from an eminent London publisher, stating that they are candidates for the important post of Poet Laureate to the New Municipality which the Birds are about to create.

[P. 289.] I'm a Shrimp.

I'm afloat! I'm afloat! On the fierce rolling tide—

The ocean's my home and my bark is my bride.

Up, up, with my flag, let it wave o'er the sea,—

I'm afloat! I'm afloat! and the Rover is free.

[P. 290.] Dante Rossetti. These poems are taken, by permission, from The Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti—the single-volume edition of 1911. 'MacCracken' is a close parody of one of Tennyson's early poems, 'The Kraken':

Below the thunders of the upper deep;