Another difficult task,—­to judge
  If the coming king would bear a grudge
      For some old breach of concord,
  And take the earliest chance to send
  A trusty line by a trusty friend
  To give his compliments at the end
      Of a disagreeable strong cord.

  And whoever would have must seize his own. 
  Thus a dying king was left alone,
      With a sad neglect of manners;
  Ere his breath was out, the courtiers ran,
  With fear or zeal for “the coming man,”
  In time to escape from under his ban,
      Or hurry under his banners.

  So Richard was left in a shabby way
  To Marcadee, with an abbot to pray
      And pother with “consolation,”
  Reminding ’twas never too late to search
  For mercy, and hinting that Mother Church
  Was never known to leave in the lurch
      A king with a fat donation. 
  But the abbot was known to Richard well,
  As one who would smoothen the road to hell,
      And quite as willing to revel
  As preach; and he always preached to “soothe,”
  With a mild regard for “the follies of youth,”—­
  Himself, in epitome, proving the truth
      Of the world, the flesh, and the Devil.

  This was the will that Richard made:—­
  “My body at father’s feet be laid;
      And to Rouen (it loved me most)
  My heart I give; and I give my ins-
  Ides to the rascally Poitevins;
  To the abbot I give my darling—­sins;
      And I give “—­He gave up the ghost.

  The abbot looked grave, but never spoke. 
  The captain laughed, gave the abbot a poke,
      And, without ado or lingering,
  “Conveyed” the personals, jewels, and gold,
  Omitting the formal To Have and to Hold
  From the royal finger, before it was cold,
      He slipped the royal finger-ring.

  There might have been in the eye of the law
  A something which lawyers would call a flaw
      Of title in such a conversion: 
  But if weak in the law, he was strong in the hand,
  And had the “nine points.”—­He summoned his band,
  And ordered before him the archer Bertrand,
      Intending a little diversion.

  He called the cutter,—­no cutter of clothes,
  But such as royalty kept for those
      Who happened to need correcting,—­
  And told him that Richard, before he died,
  Desired to have a scalpel applied
  To the traitor there.  With professional pride,
      The cutter began dissecting.

  Now Bones was born with a genius to flay: 
  He might have ranked, had he lived to-day,
      As a capital taxidermist: 
  And yet, as he tugged, they heard him say,
  Of all the backs that ever lay
  Before him in a professional way,
      That was of all backs the firmest.

  Kind reader, allow me to drop a veil
  In pity; I cannot pursue the tale
      In the heartless tone of the last strophe. 
  ’Tis done, and again I’ll be the same. 
  They triumphed not, if they felt no shame: 
  No muscle quivered, no murmur came,
      Until the final catastrophe.