For once, when swinging on a gate,
With hands that doubtless daubed it jammily,
I saw a lion, sure as fate,
And fled indoors to tell the family.
But when I told them, all agog,
My aunt, a lean and acid spinster,
Snapped out "the doctor's yellow dog";
And nothing I could say convinced her.
"'Twas ever thus from childhood's hour—"
Since HOMER, HANNIBAL or STRONGBOW,