Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

The butler, who leads on the' assault,

Wheels round, and shouts in thunder, "Halt!"
While to the dread of each beholder,
Comes up his musquet to his shoulder.
He lays his finger on the trigger,

And mutters out--" By Jove--a Nigger!"
By butlers shall their blood be shed?
Slap went the window, down each head.
The menials to the lattice run---
The Butler points below his gun--
All look without--no Twins are there!
Like witches, have they turned to air!
"Run, John, the yard below explore---

66

You, Thomas, fly to the front door!"

They ran, they searched, they stared, they gaped In vain--our heroes have escaped.

Love stretched her cloud, my Twins, o'er ye, as
She stretched it once o'er good Æneas.

How scaped they thus from being shot there?
First sing, sweet Phoebus, how they got there!
Well then, this window, reader, know,
Looked on the unwatched yard below;
It was a corner house, and (bearing
Some few doors round) was one repairing,
A scaffold used whose walls in mending,
Had served our brothers for ascending;
Then creeping round the leads, they gain
The house which love will storm in vain,

And reach, by cords from roof suspended,
The window where the journey ended.
So when Fate bade them fly the foe,
Their course was upward, not below.
Trained from their earliest years to climb,
They seized the rope, and swung sublime,
While, unsuspicious of this soaring,
The foes beneath were all exploring.
'Twas thus the enemy they baffled,
Retracked the leads, regained the scaffold,
And, tarrying till the search was o'er,
Won terra firma as before.

You'll own that these the sort of fellows
That make old husbands devilish jealous.

Now, as they wander, Ching declares,
He has no notion of such airs;
That coyness may a maid be suiting,
But not when once it comes to shooting!
That that event hath sealed her sentence,
And he will leave her to repentance,
To wet with pining tears her pillow,
Recall his love, and wear the willow.
But Chang no answer gave-inurned
Within his breast a fever burned,
And all or light, or gay, or vain,
But reached the sense to rouse disdain.
And more than all it seemed to sting
When Ching's allusions served to bring

A closer, keener memory

Of the loathed nature of their tie.

Howbeit Ching, I've always heard,
Preserved his wrath and kept his word,
And sternly left to other chances

Of love and conquest, Lady Frances---
Wherefore beware, ye girls who charm us,
How you're alarmed, or how alarm us;
Nor if you wish for life to suit us,
Send men--you take the hint-to shoot us!
And now our brothers Bond Street enter ;-
Dear street of London's charms the centre !
Dear street!--where at a certain hour
Man's follies bud forth into flower!

Where the gay minor sighs for fashion;
Where majors live that minor's cash on;
Where each who wills may suit his wish,
Here choose a Guido-there his fish :--
Or where, if woman's love beguiles,
The ugliest dog is sure of smiles.
Dear street of noise, of crowds, of wealth,
Of all Earth's thousand joys, save health.
Of plate, of books--and (I incline a
Little that way) of old Sevres China.
Of all, in short, by which pursuing,
We glide entranced to our undoing;
Lounge through each mix'd and motley blessing
Of loving, dining, driving, dressing---

[graphic][subsumed][ocr errors][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
« AnteriorContinuar »