My Sandys, a real jewel!
My exquisite, 'Adamo!'
My Dean Donne's 'Death's Duel!'
My Behn (naughty madam O!);
Ephelia's! Orinda's!
Ma'am Pix and Ma'am Barker!—
The rhymsters you find, as
The morals grow darker!
I never upbraid these
Old periwigged sinners,
Their songs and light ladies,
Their dances and dinners;
My book-shelf's a haven
From storms puritanic,—
We sure may be gay when
Of death we've no panic!
My parlor is little,
And poor are its treasures;
All pleasures are brittle,
And so are my pleasures;
But though I shall never
Be Beckford or Locker,
While Fate does not sever
The door from the knocker,
No book shall tap vainly
At latch or at lattice
(If costumed urbanely,
And worth our care, that is):
My poets from slumber
Shall rise in morocco,
To shield the new comer
From storm or sirocco.
—————————
I might prate thus for pages,
The theme is so pleasant;
But the gloom of the ages
Lies on me at present;
All business and fear to
The cold world I banish.
Hush! like the Ameer, to
My harem I vanish!
OUR BOOK-SHELVES.
Thomas Gordon Hake. From the 'State' of April 17, 1886.
What solace would those books afford,
In gold and vellum cover,
Could men but say them word for word
Who never turn them over!