Who needs the jumping-powder ere he start;
Like the dread toothache’s victim, ere he try
The artist who can draw on ivory;
Like waking men who find, that over-night
They’ve lost a sum, ’tis not convenient quite
To pay; or those by whose bed-side doth stand
The punctual Second, pistol-case in hand!
Like—Soft, she comes, I must feign mad a-while;
If the cook flirts, the goose is sure to spile.
From Hamlet Travestie, a clever Burlesque in two acts, written by a son of the late Serjeant Talfourd, and published by J. Vincent, of Oxford, in 1849.