Whereon is sinful fantasy to work? 
  The Dove, the wing’d Columbus of man’s haven? 
The tender Love-Bird—­or the filial Stork? 
  The punctual Crane—­the providential Raven? 
The Pelican whose bosom feeds her young? 
  Nay, must we cut from Saturday till Monday
That feather’d marvel with a human tongue,
  Because she does not preach upon a Sunday—­
  But what is your opinion, Mrs. Grundy?

The busy Beaver—­that sagacious beast! 
  The Sheep that own’d an Oriental Shepherd—­
That Desert-ship the Camel of the East,
  The horn’d Rhinoceros—­the spotted Leopard—­
The creatures of the Great Creator’s hand
  Are surely sights for better days than Monday—­
The elephant, although he wears no band,
  Has he no sermon in his trunk for Sunday—­
  But what is your opinion, Mrs. Grundy?

What harm if men who burn the midnight-oil,
  Weary of frame, and worn and wan in feature,
Seek once a-week their spirits to assoil,
  And snatch a glimpse of “Animated Nature”? 
Better it were if, in his best of suits,
  The artisan, who goes to work on Monday,
Should spend a leisure hour among the brutes,
  Than make a beast of his own self on Sunday—­
  But what is your opinion, Mrs. Grundy?

Why, zounds! what raised so Protestant a fuss
  (Omit the zounds! for which I make apology)
But that the Papists, like some fellows, thus
  Had somehow mixed up Dens with their theology? 
Is Brahma’s Bull—­a Hindoo god at home—­
  A papal bull to be tied up till Monday—­
Or Leo, like his namesake, Pope of Rome,
  That there is such a dread of them on Sunday—­
  But what is your opinion, Mrs. Grundy?

Spirit of Kant! have we not had enough
  To make religion sad, and sour, and snubbish,
But Saints Zoological must cant their stuff,
  As vessels cant their ballast—­rattling rubbish! 
Once let the sect, triumphant to their text,
  Shut Nero up from Saturday till Monday,
And sure as fate they will deny us next
  To see the Dandelions on a Sunday—­
  But what is your opinion, Mrs. Grundy?

A BLACK JOB.

   “No doubt the pleasure is as great,
   Of being cheated as to cheat.”—­HUDIBRAS.

The history of human-kind to trace,
  Since Eve—­the first of dupes—­our doom unriddled,
A certain portion of the human race
  Has certainly a taste for being diddled.

Witness the famous Mississippi dreams! 
  A rage that time seems only to redouble—­
The Banks, Joint-Stocks, and all the flimsy schemes,
      For rolling in Pactolian streams,
That cost our modern rogues so little trouble. 
No matter what,—­to pasture cows on stubble,
  To twist sea-sand into a solid rope,
To make French bricks and fancy bread of rubble,
  Or light with gas the whole celestial cope—­
      Only propose to blow a bubble,
  And Lord! what hundreds will subscribe for soap!