By C. P. Cranch.
I.
When swiftly in my first you glide along,
Naught ruffles up the temper of your mind;
All goes as smoothly as a summer song,
All objects flit beside you like the wind.
But if you should be stopped in your career,
And forced to linger when you fain would fly,
You’ll leave my first, and, very much I fear,
Will fall into my second speedily.
Till in some snug and comfortable room
Your friends receive you as a welcome guest,
You’ll own that Winter’s robbed of half his gloom,
When on my whole your feet in slippers rest.
II.
my first.
I sunder friends, yet give to laws
A place to stand and plead their cause.
Though justice and sobriety
Still find their safest ground in me,
I spread temptation in man’s way,
And rob and ruin every day.