Here walks forlorn the Damsel crowned with rue,
Lactiferous spoils from vaccine dugs who drew,
Of that corniculate beast whose tortuous horn
Tossed to the clouds, in fierce, vindictive scorn,
The harrying hound whose braggart bark and stir
Arched the lithe spine and reared the indignant fur
Of Puss, that with verminicidal claw,
Struck the weird Rat, in whose insatiate maw
Lay reeking malt, that erst in Ivan’s courts we saw.
Robed in senescent garb that seems, in sooth,