She was not very pretty, and yet in her smile
  There was something that charmed by its freedom from guile: 
  And tho’ lowly her lot, yet her natural grace
  Made her look like a lady in figure and face.

  A rose from the garden she wore on her breast,
  And John, as her fingers he tenderly press’d,
  Seemed to feel a sharp arrow (’twas Cupid’s first dart)
  Come straight from the rosebud and enter his heart.

  Now John and Eliza are husband and wife;
  Their quarrels are few, and contented their life;
  They eat and they drink and they dress in good taste,
  For their money they spend on their wants, not in waste.

  But I’m sorry to say that Miss Emily Jane
  Has still an aversion to dress that is plain;
  And the consequence is that she always has stayed,
  And is likely to stay, a disconsolate maid.

  MORAL.

  Young ladies, I hope you’ll attend to my moral,
  When you hear it, I’m sure you and I shall not quarrel: 
  If you’re pretty, fine dress is not needed to show it;
  If you’re ugly, fine dress will make all the world know it.

  Young men, if you wish, as I trust you all do,
  A partner for worse or for better to woo,
  Don’t marry a peacock dressed out in gay feathers,
  But a wife guaranteed to wear well in all weathers.

BEDFORDSHIRE BALLAD.—­II.

  “ONE GLASS OF BEER.”

  Ne quid nimis.

  Tom Smith was the son of a Bedfordshire man;
  (The Smiths, we all know, are a numerous clan)
  He was happy and healthy and handsome and strong,
  And could sing on occasion a capital song.

  His father had once been a labourer poor,
  But had always contrived to keep want from the door;
  And by work and by thrift had enough in his pocket
  To rent a small farm from his landlord, and stock it.

  He died:  Tom succeeded:  the ladies all said
  It was high time he went to the Church to be wed;
  And Sarah and Clara, and Fanny and Bess,
  Confessed if he “offer’d” perhaps they’d say “Yes.”

  But Tom fixed his eyes on the Miller’s young daughter,
  And was only awaiting the right time to court her;
  So one day as he saw her walk out from the mill,
  He set off in pursuit with a very good will.

  Now Tom, I must tell you, had one little fault,
  He was rather too fond of a mixture of malt;
  In fact, if my meaning is not very clear,
  I’m afraid he was rather too “partial to Beer.”

  Says Tom to himself as he followed the maid,
  “I should like just a glass, for I’m rather afraid”—­
  No doubt at such times men are nervous and queer,
  So he stopped at the Public for one glass of Beer.

  He had his one glass, and then two or three more,
  And when he set out from the Public-house door
  He saw a sad sight, and he saw it with groans—­
  Mary Anne on the arm of Theophilus Jones.