A DEMAND.
You promised to paint me a picture,
Dear
Mat,
And I was to pay you in rhyme.
Although I am loth to inflict your
Most easy of consciences,
I’m
Of opinion that fibbing is awful,
And breaking a contract unlawful,
Indictable, too, as a crime,
A
slight and all that.
If, Lady Unbountiful, any
Of
that
By mortals called pity has
part
In your obdurate soul—if a
penny
You care for the health of
my heart,
By performing your undertaking
You’ll succor that organ from breaking—
And spare it for some new
smart,
As
puss does a rat.
Do you think it is very becoming,
Dear
Mat,
To deny me my rights evermore
And—bless you! if I begin summing
Your sins they will make a
long score!
You never were generous, madam,
If you had been Eve and I Adam
You’d have given me
naught but the core,
And
little of that.
Had I been content with a Titian,
A
cat
By Landseer, a meadow by Claude,
No doubt I’d have had your permission
To take it—by purchase
abroad.
But why should I sail o’er the ocean
For Landseers and Claudes? I’ve
a notion
All’s bad that the critics
belaud.
I
wanted a Mat.
Presumption’s a sin, and I suffer
For
that:
But still you did say
that sometime,
If I’d pay you enough (here’s
enougher—
That’s more than enough)
of rhyme
You’d paint me a picture. I
pay you
Hereby in advance; and I pray you
Condone, while you can, your
crime,
And
send me a Mat.
But if you don’t do it I warn you,
Dear
Mat,
I’ll raise such a clamor
and cry
On Parnassus the Muses will scorn you
As mocker of poets and fly
With bitter complaints to Apollo:
“Her spirit is proud,
her heart hollow,
Her beauty”—they’ll
hardly deny,
On
second thought, that!
THE WEATHER WIGHT.
The way was long, the hill was steep,
My footing scarcely I could keep.
The night enshrouded me in gloom,
I heard the ocean’s distant boom—
The trampling of the surges vast
Was borne upon the rising blast.
“God help the mariner,” I
cried,
“Whose ship to-morrow braves the
tide!”
Then from the impenetrable dark
A solemn voice made this remark:
“For this locality—warm,
bright;
Barometer unchanged; breeze light.”
“Unseen consoler-man,” I cried,
“Whoe’er you are, where’er
abide,
“Thanks—but my care is
somewhat less
For Jack’s, than for my own, distress.
“Could I but find a friendly roof,
Small odds what weather were aloof.