PRESSIMISM.

The Bard to the schemer of newspaper placards.

Why, crystalliser of the world's diurnal

Experience, why plunge my soul in gloom

With tidings that are ghastly and infernal?

Why dim my morning eye with tales of doom,

Of flood and fire, of pestilence and drouth—

Leaving me down, distinctly, in the mouth?

Why stun me with: "Explosion in a Larder: