“Oh, sir,” the suitor uttered sadly,
“Don’t give your indignation vent;
I fear you think I’m acting madly,
Perhaps you think me insolent?”
The kindly Earl repelled the notion;
His noble bosom heaved a sigh,
His fingers trembled with emotion,
A tear stood in his mild blue eye:
For, oh! the scene recalled too plainly
The half-forgotten time when he,
A boy of nine, had worshipped vainly
A governess of forty-three!
“My boy,” he said, in tone consoling,
“Give up this idle fancy—do—
The song you heard my daughter trolling
Did not, indeed, refer to you.
“I feel for you, poor boy, acutely;
I would not wish to give you pain;
Your pangs I estimate minutely,—
I, too, have loved, and loved in vain.
“But still your humble rank and station
For Minnie surely are not meet”—
He said much more in conversation
Which it were needless to repeat.
Now I’m prepared to bet a guinea,
Were this a mere dramatic case,
The page would have eloped with Minnie,
But, no—he only left his place.
The simple Truth is my detective,
With me Sensation can’t abide;
The Likely beats the mere Effective,
And Nature is my only guide.
MISTER WILLIAM
Oh, listen to the tale of Mister William, if you please,
Whom naughty, naughty judges sent away beyond the seas.
He forged a party’s will, which caused anxiety and strife,
Resulting in his getting penal servitude for life.