To give Narcissus aid!
Then, all ye bucks who walk the street,
So spruce, so buxom, and so neat,
Learn this sad tale by reading,
To keep at home on rainy days
Lest you should meet with any drays—
For draymen have no breeding!
The Morning Chronicle. 1800.
A parody, entitled “Ode on the amputation of a Cat’s Tail,” was published by B. Flower, Cambridge, 1795, in a pamphlet entitled “Scraps and Essays, by a Cantab.”
There is no merit in the parody to atone for the choice of such a disgusting theme for an ode.