The curious style of some versifiers has been well imitated in the following
Ballad of the Period.
“An auld wife sat at her ivied door
(Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese);
A thing she had frequently done before;
And her knitting reposed on her aproned knees.
The piper he piped on the hill-top high
(Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese);
Till the cow said, ‘I die,’ and the goose said, ‘Why?’
And the dog said nothing but searched for fleas.
The farmer’s daughter hath soft brown hair
(Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese);
And I’ve met a ballad, I can’t tell where,
Which mainly consisted of lines like these.” |
W. S. Gilbert has some verses which are true nonsense, of which this is one:
“Sing for the garish eye,
When moonless brandlings cling!
Let the froddering crooner cry,
And the braddled sapster sing.
For never and never again,
Will the tottering beechlings play,
For bratticed wrackers are singing aloud,
And the throngers croon in May!” |
Mr. Lewis Carroll’s “Hunting of the Snark”[10] is a very curious little book, full of the most delicate fun and queer nonsense, with delightful illustrations. It gives an account of how a Bellman, Boots, Barrister, Broker, Billiard-marker, Banker, Beaver, Baker, and Butcher go a-hunting after a mythical Beast called a “Snark.” It is difficult to detach a passage for quotation, but the following few lines will show how the “Quest of the Snark” was purposed to be carried on:
“To seek it with thimbles, to seek it with care:
To pursue it with forks and hope;
To threaten its life with a railway share;
To charm it with smiles and soap!
For the Snark’s a peculiar creature, that won’t
Be caught in a commonplace way;
Do all that you know, and try all that you don’t:
Not a chance must be wasted to-day!” |
The verses which follow are from the “Comic Latin Grammar,” and if they are not nonsense they show at least how thin the partition line is between true nonsense verse and many of those pieces which were wont to be known by the name of Album Verses:
Lines by a Fond Lover.
“Lovely maid, with rapture swelling,
Should these pages meet thine eye,
Clouds of absence soft dispelling;—
Vacant memory heaves a sigh.
As the rose, with fragrance weeping,
Trembles to the tuneful wave,
So my heart shall twine unsleeping,
Till it canopies the grave.
Though another’s smile’s requited,
Envious fate my doom should be;
Joy for ever disunited,
Think, ah! think, at times on me!
Oft, amid the spicy gloaming,
Where the brakes their songs instil,
Fond affection silent roaming,
Loves to linger by the rill—
There, when echo’s voice consoling,
Hears the nightingale complain,
Gentle sighs my lips controlling,
Bind my soul in beauty’s chain.
Oft in slumber’s deep recesses,
I thy mirror’d image see;
Fancy mocks the vain caresses
I would lavish like a bee!
But how vain is glittering sadness!
Hark, I hear distraction’s knell!
Torture gilds my heart with madness!
Now for ever fare thee well!” |