The foot of the hunter shall press her grave, And the prairie's sweet wild flowers In their odorous beauty around it wave Through all the sunny hours,— The still, bright summer hours; And the birds shall sing in the tufted grass And the nectar-laden bee, With his dreamy hum, on his gauze wings pass,— She wakes no more to me; Ah, nevermore to me! Though the wild birds sing and the wild flowers spring, She wakes no more to me.
Yet oft in the hush of the dim, still night, A vision of beauty I see Gliding soft to my bedside,—a phantom of light, Dear, beautiful Deborah Lee,— My bride that was to be; And I wake to mourn that the doctor, and death, And the cold March wind, should stop the breath Of my darling Deborah Lee,— Adorable Deborah Lee,— That angels should want her up in heaven Before they wanted me.
WILLIAM H. BURLEIGH.
THE COCK AND THE BULL. [10]
You see this pebble-stone? It's a thing I bought Of a bit of a chit of a boy i' the mid o' the day— I like to dock the smaller parts-o'-speech, As we curtail the already cur-tailed cur (You catch the paronomasia, play o' words?)— Did, rather, i' the pre-Landseerian days. Well, to my muttons. I purchased the concern, And clapt it i' my poke, and gave for same By way, to-wit, of barter or exchange— "Chop" was my snickering dandiprat's own term— One shilling and fourpence, current coin o' the realm. O-n-e one and f-o-u-r four Pence, one and fourpence—you are with me, sir?— What hour it skills not: ten or eleven o' the clock, One day (and what a roaring day it was!) In February, eighteen sixty-nine, Alexandrina Victoria, Fidei Hm—hm—how runs the jargon?—being on throne.
Such, sir, are all the facts, succinctly put, The basis or substratum—what you will— Of the impending eighty thousand lines. "Not much in 'em either," quoth perhaps simple Hodge. But there's a superstructure. Wait a bit.
Mark first the rationale of the thing: Hear logic rival and levigate the deed. That shilling—and for matter o' that, the pence— I had o' course upo' me—wi' me, say— (Mecum 's the Latin, make a note o' that) When I popped pen i' stand, blew snout, scratched ear, Sniffed—tch!—at snuff-box; tumbled up, he-heed, Haw-hawed (not hee-hawed, that's another guess thing:) Then fumbled at, and stumbled out of, door, I shoved the door ope wi' my omoplat; And in vestibulo, i' the entrance-hall, Donned galligaskins, antigropelos, And so forth; and, complete with hat and gloves, One on and one a-dangle i' my hand. And ombrifuge, (Lord love you!) case o' rain, I flopped forth, 's buddikins! on my own ten toes, (I do assure you there be ten of them.) And went clump-clumping up hill and down dale To find myself o' the sudden i' front o' the boy. Put case I hadn't 'em on me, could I ha' bought This sort-o'-kind-o'-what-you-might-call toy, This pebble-thing, o' the boy-thing? Q. E. D. That's proven without aid from mumping Pope, Sleek porporate or bloated Cardinal. (Isn't it, old Fatchaps? You 're in Euclid now.) So, having the shilling—having i' fact a lot— And pence and halfpence, ever so many o' them, I purchased, as I think I said before, The pebble (lapis, lapidis,—di,—dem.—de,— What nouns 'crease short i' the genitive, Fatchaps, eh?) O' the boy, a bare-legged beggarly son of a gun, For one and fourpence. Here we are again. Now Law steps in, big-wigged, voluminous-jawed; Investigates and re-investigates. Was the transaction illegal? Law shakes head. Perpend, sir, all the bearings of the case.
At first the coin was mine, the chattel his. But now (by virtue of the said exchange And barter) vice versa all the coin, Per juris operationem, vests I' the boy and his assigns till ding o' doom; (In sæcula sæculo-o-o-orum; I think I hear the Abbate mouth out that.) To have and hold the same to him and them ... Confer some idiot on Conveyancing, Whereas the pebble and every part thereof, And all that appertaineth thereunto, Or shall, will, may, might, can, could, would, or should, (Subandi cætera—clap me to the close— For what's the good of law in a case o' the kind?) Is mine to all intents and purposes. This settled, I resume the thread o' the tale.
Now for a touch o' the vendor's quality. He says a gen'lman bought a pebble of him, (This pebble i' sooth, sir, which I hold i' my hand)— And paid for 't, like a gen'lman, on the nail. "Did I o'ercharge him a ha'penny? Devil a bit. Fiddlestick's end! Get out, you blazing ass! Gabble o' the goose. Don't bugaboo-baby me! Go double or quits? Yah! tittup! what's the odds?" —There's the transaction viewed, i' the vendor's light.
Next ask that dumpled hag, stood snuffling by, With her three frowsy-browsy brats o' babes, The scum o' the kennel, cream o' the filth-heap—Faugh? Aie, aie, aie, aie! ὁτοτοτοτοτοἱ, ('Stead which we blurt out Hoighty-toighty now)— And the baker and candlestick-maker, and Jack and Gill, Bleared Goody this and queasy Gaffer that. Ask the schoolmaster. Take schoolmaster first.