If love is a thorn, they show no wit
  Who foolishly hug and foster it. 
  If love is a weed, how simple they
  Who gather and gather it, day by day! 
  If love is a nettle that makes you smart,
  Why do you wear it next your heart? 
  And if it be neither of these, say I,
  Why do you sit and sob and sigh?

THE BRITISH TAR.

  A British tar is a soaring soul,
    As free as a mountain bird,
  His energetic fist should be ready to resist
    A dictatorial word
  His nose should pant and his lips should curl,
  His cheeks should flame and his brow should furl,
  His bosom should heave and his heart should glow,
  And his fist be ever ready for a knock-down blow.

  His eyes should flash with an inborn fire,
    His brow with scorn be rung;
  He never should bow down to a domineering frown,
    Or the tang of a tyrant tongue. 
  His foot should stamp and his throat should growl,
  His hair should twirl and his face should scowl: 
  His eyes should flash and his breast protrude,
  And this should be his customary attitude!

[Illustration]

THE COMING BYE AND BYE.

  Sad is that woman’s lot who, year by year,
  Sees, one by one, her beauties disappear;
  As Time, grown weary of her heart-drawn sighs,
  Impatiently begins to “dim her eyes!”
  Herself compelled, in life’s uncertain gloamings,
  To wreathe her wrinkled brow with well saved “combings”—­
  Reduced, with rouge, lipsalve, and pearly grey,
  To “make up” for lost time, as best she may!

    Silvered is the raven hair,
      Spreading is the parting straight,
    Mottled the complexion fair,
      Halting is the youthful gait. 
    Hollow is the laughter free,
      Spectacled the limpid eye,
    Little will be left of me,
      In the coming bye and bye!

    Fading is the taper waist—­
      Shapeless grows the shapely limb,
    And although securely laced,
      Spreading is the figure trim! 
    Stouter than I used to be,
      Still more corpulent grow I—­
    There will be too much of me
      In the coming bye and bye!

THE SORCERER’S SONG.

  Oh! my name is John Wellington Wells—­
  I’m a dealer in magic and spells,
        In blessings and curses,
        And ever filled purses,
  In prophecies, witches and knells! 
  If you want a proud foe to “make tracks”—­
  If you’d melt a rich uncle in wax—­
        You’ve but to look in
        On our resident Djinn,
  Number seventy, Simmery Axe.