AFTER T—— B—— A——

I lay i' the bosom of the sun,
Under the roses dappled and dun.
I thought of the Sultan Gingerbeer,
In his palace beside the Bendemeer,
With his Afghan guards and his eunuchs blind,
And the harem that stretched for a league behind.

The tulips bent i' the summer breeze,
Under the broad chrysanthemum-trees,
And the minstrel, playing his culverin,
Made for mine ears a merry din,
If I were the Sultan, and he were I,
Here i' the grass he should loafing lie,
And I should bestride my zebra steed,
And ride to the hunt of the centipede:
While the pet of the harem, Dandeline,
Should fill me a crystal bucket of wine,
And the kislar aga, Up-to-Snuff,
Should wipe my mouth when I sighed, "Enough!"
And the gay court poet, Fearfulbore,
Should sit in the hall when the hunt was o'er,
And chant me songs of silvery tone,
Not from Hafiz, but—mine own!
Ah, wee sweet love, beside me here,
I am not the Sultan Gingerbeer,
Nor you the odalisque Dandeline,
Yet I am yourn, and you are mine!
Bayard Taylor.

A LOVE PLAYNT—1370

To yow, my Purse, and to noon other wighte,
Complayne I, for ye be my lady dere!
I am so sorry now that ye been lyghte,
For, certes, yf ye make me hevy chere,
Me were as leef be layde upon my beere.
For whiche unto your mercie thus I crye,
Beethe hevy ageyne, or elles mote I die!
Now voucheth sauf this day, or hyt be nighte,
That I of yow the blissful soun may here,
Or see your colour lyke the sunnè brighte,
That of yellòwnesse haddè never pere.
Ye be my lyf! ye be myn herty's stere!
Quenè of comfort and good companye!
Beethe hevy ageyne, or elles mote I die!

Now, Purse! that ben to me my lyve's lyghte,
And surety as doune in this world here,
Out of this toune helpè me through your myghte,
Syn that you wole not bene my tresorere;
For I am shave as nigh as is a frere.
But I pray unto your curtesye,
Beethe hevy ageyne, or elles mote I die!
Godfrey Turner.

DARWINITY

Power to thine elbow, thou newest of sciences,
All the old landmarks are ripe for decay;
Wars are but shadows, and so are alliances,
Darwin the great is the man of the day.
All other 'ologies want an apology;
Bread's a mistake—Science offers a stone;
Nothing is true but Anthropobiology—
Darwin the great understands it alone.
Mighty the great evolutionist teacher is
Licking Morphology clean into shape;
Lord! what an ape the Professor or Preacher is
Ever to doubt his descent from an ape.
Man's an Anthropoid—he cannot help that, you know—
First evoluted from Pongos of old;
He's but a branch of the catarrhine cat, you know—
Monkey I mean—that's an ape with a cold.
Fast dying out are man's later Appearances,
Cataclysmitic Geologies gone;
Now of Creation completed the clearance is,
Darwin alone you must anchor upon.
Primitive Life—Organisms were chemical,
Busting spontaneous under the sea;
Purely subaqueous, panaquademical,
Was the original Crystal of Me.

I'm the Apostle of mighty Darwinity,
Stands for Divinity—sounds much the same—
Apo-theistico-Pan-Asininity
Only can doubt whence the lot of us came.
Down on your knees, Superstition and Flunkeydom!
Won't you accept such plain doctrines instead?
What is so simple as primitive Monkeydom
Born in the sea with a cold in its head?
Herman C. Merivale.

SELECT PASSAGES FROM A COMING PORT