XIX The Ape
There is an ape in Paris,
To which was given a wife:
Like many a one that marries,
This ape, in brutal strife,
Soon beat her out of life.
Their infant cries,—perhaps not fed,—
But cries, I ween, in vain;
The father laughs: his wife is dead,
And he has other loves again,
Which he will also beat, I think,—
Return’d from tavern drown’d in drink.
For aught that’s good, you need not look
Among the imitative tribe;
A monkey be it, or what makes a book—
The worse, I deem—the aping scribe.