After Robert Browning
Home Truths From Abroad
I
“OH! to be in England
Now that April’s there.
And whoever wakes in England
Sees some morning” in despair;
There’s a horrible fog i’ the heart o’ the town,
And the greasy pavement is damp and brown,
While the rain-drop falls from the laden bough
In England——now!
II
“And after April when May follows,”
How foolish seem the returning swallows.
Hark! how the east wind sweeps along the street,
And how we give one universal sneeze!
The hapless lambs at thought of mint-sauce bleat,
And ducks are conscious of the coming peas.
Lest you should think the Spring is really present,
A biting frost will come to make things pleasant;
And though the reckless flowers begin to blow,
They’d better far have nestled down below;
An English Spring sets men and women frowning,
Despite the rhapsodies of Robert Browning.
Anonymous.
After Browning
NOT that I care for ceremonies—no;
But still there are occasions, as you see
(Observe the costumes—gallantly they show
To my poor judgment!) which, twixt you and me,
Not to come forth, one’s few remaining hairs,
Or wig,—it matters little,—bravely brushed
And oiled, dress-coated, sprucely-clad, the tears
And tweaks and wrenches, people overflushed
With—well, not wine—oh, no, we’ll rather say
Anticipation, the delight of seeing
No matter what! inflict upon you (pray
Remove your elbow, friend!) in spite of being
Not quite the man one used to be, and not
So young as once one was, would argue one
Churlish, indifferent, hipped, rheumatic, what
You please to say.
So, not to spoil the fun—
Comprenez-vous?—observe that lady there,
In native worth! Aha! you see the jest?
Not bad, I think. My own, too! Woman’s fair.
Or not—the odds so long as she is dressed?
They’re coming! Soh! Ha, Bennett’s Barcarole—
A poor thing, but mine own! That minor third
Is not so bad now! Mum, sirs! (Bless my soul,
I wonder what her veil cost!) Mum’s the word!
Anonymous.
The Cock and the Bull
YOU see this pebble-stone? It’s a thing I bought
Off a bit of a chit of a boy i’ the mid o’ the day.
I like to dock the smaller parts o’ speech,
As we curtail the already cur-tail’d cur—
(You catch the paronomasia, play ‘po’ words?)
Did, rather, i’ the pre-Landseerian days.
Well, to my muttons. I purchased the concern,
And clapt it i’ my poke, having given for same
By way o’ chop, swop, barter or exchange—
“Chop” was my snickering dandiprat’s own term—
One shilling and fourpence, current coin o’ the realm.
O-n-e one, and f-o-u-r four
Pence, one and fourpence—you are with me, sir?—
What hour it skills not: ten or eleven o’ the clock,
One day (and what a roaring day it was
Go shop or sight-see—bar a spit o’ rain!)
In February, eighteen sixty-nine,
Alexandria Victoria, Fidei—
Hm—hm—how runs the jargon? being on the throne.
Such, sir, are all the facts, succinctly put,
The basis or substratum—what you will will—
Of the impending eighty thousand lines.
“Not much in ’em either,” quoth perhaps simple Hodge.
But there’s a superstructure. Wait a bit.
Mark first the rationale of the thing:
Hear logic rivel and levigate the deed.
That shilling—and for matter o’ that, the pence—
I had o’ course upo’ me—wi’ me say—
(Mecum’s the Latin, make a note o’ that)
When I popp’d pen i’ stand, scratch’d ear, wiped snout,
(Let everybody wipe his own himself)
Sniff’d—tch!—at snuff-box; tumbled up, ne-heed,
Haw-haw’d (not hee-haw’d, that’s another guess thing),
Then fumbled at, and stumbled out of, door.
I shoved the timber ope wi’ my omoplat;
And in vestibulo, i’ the lobby to wit
(Iacobi Facciolati’s rendering, sir),
Donn’d galligaskins, antigropeloes,
And so forth; and, complete with hat and gloves,
One on and one a-dangle i’ my hand,
And ombrifuge (Lord love you!), case o’ rain,
I flopp’d forth, ‘sbuddikins! on my own ten toes
(I do assure you there be ten of them),
And went clump-clumping up hill and down dale
To find myself o’ the sudden i’ front o’ the boy.
But case I hadn’t ’em on me, could I ha’ bought
This sort-o’-kind-o’-what-you-might-call toy,
This pebble thing, o’ the boy-thing? Q. E. D.
That’s proven without aid from mumping Pope,
Sleek porporate or bloated Cardinal.
(Isn’t it, old Fatchaps? You’re in Euclid now.)
So, having the shilling—having i’ fact a lot—
And pence and halfpence, ever so many o’ them,
I purchased, as I think I said before,
The pebble (lapis, lapidis, -di, -dem, -de—
What nouns ‘crease short i’ the genitive, Fatchaps, eh?)
O’ the boy, a bare-legg’d beggarly son of a gun,
for one and fourpence. Here we are again.
Now Law steps in, bigwigg’d, voluminous-jaw’d;
Investigates and re-investigates.
Was the transaction illegal? Law shakes head
Perpend, sir, all the bearings of the case.
At first the coin was mine, the chattel his.
But now (by virtue of the said exchange
And barter) vice versa all the coin,
Per juris operationem, vests
I’ the boy and his assigns till ding o’ doom;
(In sæcula sæculo-o-o-rum;
I think I hear the Abate mouth out that.)
To have and hold the same to him and them.
Confer some idiot on Conveyancing.
Whereas the pebble and every part thereof,
And all that appertaineth thereunto,
Quodcunque pertinet ad eam rem
(I fancy, sir, my Latin’s rather pat),
Or shall, will, may, might, can, could, would or should
(Subaudi cætera—clap we to the close—
For what’s the good of Law in a case o’ the kind),
Is mine to all intents and purposes.
This settled, I resume the thread o’ the tale.
Now for a touch o’ the vendor’s quality.
He says a gen’lman bought a pebble of him
(This pebble i’ sooth, sir, which I hold i’ my hand),
And paid for’t, like a gen’lman, on the nail.
“Did I o’ercharge him a ha’penny? Devil a bit.
Fiddlepin’s end! Get out, you blazing ass!
Gabble o’ the goose. Don’t bugaboo-baby me!
Go double or quits? Yah! tittup! what’s the odds?”
There’s the transaction view’d i’ the vendor’s light.
Next ask that dumpled hag, stood snuffling by,
With her three frowsy blowsy brats o’ babes,
The scum o’ the kennel, cream o’ the filth-heap—Faugh!
Aie, aie, aie, aie! οτοτοτοτοτοἱ
(’Stead which we blurt out Hoighty toighty now),
And the baker and candlestickmaker, and Jack and Jill,
Blear’d Goody this and queasy Gaffer that.
Ask the schoolmaster. Take schoolmaster first.
He saw a gentleman purchase of a lad
A stone, and pay for it rite, on the square,
And carry it off per saltum, jauntily,
Propria quae maribus, gentleman’s property now
(Agreeably to the law explain’d above),
In proprium usum, for his private ends,
The boy he chuck’d a brown i’ the air, and bit
I’ the face the shilling; heaved a thumping stone
At a lean hen that ran cluck clucking by
(And hit her, dead as nail i’ post o’ door),
Then abiit—what’s the Ciceronian phrase?—
Excessit, evasit, erupit—off slogs boy;
Off like bird, avi similis—(you observed
The dative? Pretty i’ the Mantuan!)—Anglice
Off in three flea skips. Hactenus, so far,
So good, tam bene. Bene, satis, male,—
Where was I with my trope ’bout one in a quag?
I did once hitch the syntax into verse:
Verbum personale, a verb personal,
Concordat—ay, “agrees,” old Fatchaps—cum
Nominativo, with its nominative,
Genere, i’ point o’ gender, numero,
O’ number, et persona, and person. Ut,
Instance: Sol ruit, down flops sun, et, and,
Montes umbrantur, out flounce mountains. Pah!
Excuse me, sir, I think I’m going mad.
You see the trick on’t though, and can yourself
Continue the discourse ad libitum.
It takes up about eighty thousand lines,
A thing imagination boggles at;
And might, odds-bobs, sir! in judicious hands,
Extend from here to Mesopotamy.
Charles S. Calverley.
A Staccato to o le Lupe
O LE LUPE, Gelett Burgess, this is very sad to find;
In the Bookman for September, in a manner most unkind,
There appears a half-page picture, makes me think
I’ve lost my mind.
They have reproduced a window,—Doxey’s window (I dare say
In your rambles you have seen it, passed it twenty times a day),—
As “A Novel Exhibition of Examples of Decay.”
There is Nordau we all sneer at, and Verlaine we all adore,
And a little book of verses with its betters by the score,
With three faces on the cover I believe I’ve seen before.
Well, here’s matter for reflection, makes me wonder where I am.
Here is Ibsen the gray lion, linked to Beardsley the black lamb.
I was never out of Boston; all that I can say is, “Damn!”
Who could think, in two short summers we should cause so much remark,
With no purpose but our pastime, and to make the public hark,
When I soloed on THE CHAP-BOOK, and you answered with THE LARK!
Do young people take much pleasure when they read that sort of thing?
“Well, they buy it,” answered Doxey, “and I take what it will bring.
Publishers may dread extinction—not with such fads on the string.
“There is always sale for something, and demand for what is new.
These young people who are restless, and have nothing else to do,
Like to think there is ‘a movement,’ just to keep themselves in view.
“There is nothing in Decadence but the magic of a name.
People talk and papers drivel, scent a vice, and hint a shame;
And all that is good for business, helps to boom my little game.”
But when I sit down to reason, think to stand upon my nerve,
Meditate on portly leisure with a balance in reserve,
In he comes with his “Decadence!” like a fly in my preserve.
I can see myself, O Burgess, half a century from now,
Laid to rest among the ghostly, like a broken toy somehow;
All my lovely songs and ballads vanished with your “Purple Cow.”
But I will return some morning, though I know it will be hard,
To Cornhill among the bookstalls, and surprise some minor bard;
Turning over their old rubbish for the treasures we discard.
I shall warn him like a critic, creeping when his back is turned:
“Ink and paper, dead and done with; Doxey spent what Doxey earned;
Poems doubtless are immortal where a poem can be discerned!”
How his face will go to ashes, when he feels his empty purse!
How he’ll wish his vogue were greater,—plume himself it is no worse;
Then go bother the dear public with his puny little verse!
Don’t I know how he will pose it, patronize our larger time:
“Poor old Browning; little Kipling; what attempts they made to rhyme!”
Just let me have half an hour with that nincompoop sublime!
I will haunt him like a purpose, I will ghost him like a fear;
When he least expects my presence, I’ll be mumbling in his ear:
“O Le Lupe lived in Frisco, and I lived in Boston here.
“Never heard of us? Good heavens, can you never have been told
Of the Larks we used to publish, and the Chap-Books that we sold?
Where are all our first editions?” I feel damp and full of mould.
Bliss Carman.
By the Sea
Mutatis Mutandis
IS it life or is it death?
A whiff of the cool salt scum,
As the whole sea puffed its breath
Against you,—blind and dumb:
This way it answereth.
Nearer the sands it shows
Spotted and leprous tints;
But stay! yon fisher knows
Rock-tokens, which evince
How high the tide arose.
How high? In you and me
’Twas falling then, I think;
Open your heart’s eyes, see
From just so slight a chink
The chasm that now must be.
You sighed and shivered then.
Blue ecstasies of June
Around you, shouts of fishermen,
Sharp wings of sea gulls, soon
To dip—the clock struck ten!
Was it the cup too full,
To carry it you grew
Too faint, the wine’s hue dull
(Dulness, misjudged untrue!),
Love’s flower unfit to cull?
You should have held me fast
One moment, stopped my pace.
Crushed down the feeble, vast
Suggestions of embrace,
And so be crowned at last.
But now! Bare-legged and brown
Bait-diggers delve the sand,
Tramp i’ the sunshine down
Burnt-ochre vestured land,
And yonder stares the town.
A heron screams! I shut
This book of scurf and scum,
Its final pages uncut;
The sea-beast, blind and dumb,
Done with his bellowing? All but!
Bayard Taylor.
Angelo Orders His Dinner
I, ANGELO, obese, black-garmented,
Respectable, much in demand, well fed
With mine own larder’s dainties, where, indeed,
Such cakes of myrrh or fine alyssum seed,
Thin as a mallow-leaf, embrowned o’ the top.
Which, cracking, lets the ropy, trickling drop
Of sweetness touch your tongue, or potted nests
Which my recondite recipe invests
With cold conglomerate tidbits—ah, the bill!
(You say), but given it were mine to fill
My chests, the case so put were yours, we’ll say
(This counter, here, your post, as mine to-day),
And you’ve an eye to luxuries, what harm
In smoothing down your palate with the charm
Yourself concocted? There we issue take;
And see! as thus across the rim I break
This puffy paunch of glazed embroidered cake,
So breaks, through use, the lust of watering chaps
And craveth plainness: do I so? Perhaps;
But that’s my secret. Find me such a man
As Lippo yonder, built upon the plan
Of heavy storage, double-navelled, fat
From his own giblet’s oils, an Ararat
Uplift o’er water, sucking rosy draughts
From Noah’s vineyard,—crisp, enticing wafts
Yon kitchen now emits, which to your sense
Somewhat abate the fear of old events,
Qualms to the stomach,—I, you see, am slow
Unnecessary duties to forego,—
You understand? A venison haunch, haut gout.
Ducks that in Cimbrian olives mildly stew.
And sprigs of anise, might one’s teeth provoke
To taste, and so we wear the complex yoke
Just as it suits,—my liking, I confess,
More to receive, and to partake no less,
Still more obese, while through thick adipose
Sensation shoots, from testing tongue to toes
Far off, dim-conscious, at the body’s verge,
Where the froth-whispers of its waves emerge
On the untasting sand. Stay, now! a seat
Is bare: I, Angelo, will sit and eat.
Bayard Taylor.
The Flight of the Bucket
PRE-ADMONISHETH the writer:
H’m, for a subject it is well enough!
Who wrote “Sordello” finds no subject tough.
Well, Jack and Jill—God knows the life they led
(The poet never told us, more’s the pity)
Pent up in some damp kennel of their own,
Beneath the hillside; but it once befell
That Jack and Jill, niece, cousin, uncle, aunt
(Some one of all the brood), would wash and scour,
Rinse out a cess-pit, swab the kennel floor,
And water (liquor vitae, Lawson calls,
But I—I hold by whisky. Never mind;
I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, sir,
And missed the scrap o’ blue at buttonhole),
Spring water was the needful at the time,
So they must climb the hill for ’t. Well and good.
We all climb hills, I take it, on some quest,
Maybe for less than stinking (I forgot!
I mean than wholesome) water.... Ferret out
The rotten bucket from the lumber shed,
Weave ropes and splice the handle—off they go
To where the cold spring bubbles up i’ the cleft,
And sink the bucket brimful in the spate.
Then downwards—hanging back? (You bet your life
The girl’s share fell upon Jack’s shoulders.) Down,
Down to the bottom—all but—trip, slip, squelch!
And guggle-guggle goes the bucketful
Back to the earth, and Jack’s a broken head,
And swears amid the heather does our Jack.
(A man would swear who watched both blood and bucket,
One dripping down his forehead, t’ other fled
Clinkety-tinkle, to the stones below,
A good half-hour’s trudge to get it back.)
Jack, therefore, as I said, exploded straight
In brimstone-flavored language. You, of course,
Maintain he bore it calmly—not a bit.
A good bucolic curse that rent the cliffs
And frightened for a moment quaking Jill
Out of the limp, unmeaning girl’s tee-hee
That womankind delight in.... Here we end
The first verse—there’s a deal to study in ’t.
So much for Jack—but here’s a fate above,
A cosmic force that blunders into right,
Just when the strained sense hints at revolution
Because the world’s great fly-wheel runs aslant—
And up go Jill’s red kibes. (You think I’m wrong;
And Fate was napping at the time; perhaps
You’re right.) We’ll call it Devil’s agency
That sent the shrieking sister on her head,
And knocked the tangled locks against the stones.
Well, down went Jill, but wasn’t hurt. Oh, no!
The Devil pads the world to suit his own,
And packs the cards according. Down went Jill
Unhurt. And Jack trots off to bed, poor brute,
Fist welted into eyeball, mouth agape
For yelling,—your bucolic always yells,
And out of his domestic pharmacy
Rips forth the cruet-stand, upsets the cat,
And ravages the store-room for his balm.
Eureka!—but he didn’t use that word—
A pound of candles, corpse-like, side by side,
Wrapped up in his medicament. Out, knife!
Cut string, and strip the shrouding from the lot!
Steep swift and jam it on the gaping cut;
Then bedward—cursing man and friends alike.
Now back to Jill. She wasn’t hurt, I said,
And all the woman’s spite was up in arms.
So Jack’s abed. She slips, peeks through the door,
And sees the split head like a luggage-label,
Halved, quartered, on the pillow. “Ee-ki-ree,
Tee-hee-hee-hee,” she giggles through the crack,
Much as the Roman ladies grinned—don’t smile—
To see the dabbled bodies in the sand,
Appealing to their benches for a sign.
Down thumbs, and giggle louder—so did Jill.
But mark now! Comes the mother round the door,
Red-hot from climbing up the hill herself,
And caught the graceless giggler. Whack! flack! whack!
Here’s Nemesis whichever way you like!
She didn’t stop to argue. Given a head
Broken, a woman chuckling at the door,
And here’s your circumstantial evidence complete.
Whack! while Jack sniffs and sniggers from the bed.
I like that horny-handed mother o’ Jill.
The world’s best women died, sir, long ago.
Well, Jack’s avenged; as for the other, gr-r-r-r!
Rudyard Kipling.
The Jam-Pot
THE Jam-pot—tender thought!
I grabbed it—so did you.
“What wonder while we fought
Together that it flew
In shivers?” you retort.
You should have loosed your hold
One moment—checked your fist.
But, as it was, too bold
You grappled and you missed.
More plainly—you were sold.
“Well, neither of us shared
The dainty.” That your plea?
“Well, neither of us cared,”
I answer.... “Let me see.
How have your trousers fared?”
Rudyard Kipling.
Imitation of Robert Browning
BIRTHDAYS? yes, in a general way;
For the most if not for the best of men.
You were born (I suppose) on a certain day,
So was I; or perhaps in the night, what then?
Only this: or at least, if more
You must know, not think it, and learn, not speak;
There is truth to be found on the unknown shore,
And many will find where few will seek.
For many are called and few are chosen,
And the few grow many as ages lapse.
But when will the many grow few; what dozen
Is fused into one by Time’s hammer-taps?
A bare brown stone in a babbling brook,—
It was wanton to hurl it there, you say,—
And the moss, which clung in the sheltered nook
(Yet the stream runs cooler) is washed away.
That begs the question; many a prater
Thinks such a suggestion a sound “stop thief!”
Which, may I ask, do you think the greater,
Sergeant-at-arms or a Robber Chief?
And if it were not so? Still you doubt?
Ah! yours is a birthday indeed, if so.
That were something to write a poem about,
If one thought a little. I only know.
P. S.
There’s a Me Society down at Cambridge,
Where my works, cum notis variorum,
Are talked about; well, I require the same bridge
That Euclid took toll at as Asinorum.
And, as they have got through several ditties
I thought were as stiff as a brick-built wall,
I’ve composed the above, and a stiff one it is,
A bridge to stop asses at, once for all.
J. K. Stephen.
The Last Ride Together
(From her Point of View)
WHEN I had firmly answered “No,”
And he allowed that that was so,
I really thought I should be free
For good and all from Mr. B.,
And that he would soberly acquiesce.
I said that it would be discreet
That for awhile we should not meet;
I promised that I would always feel
A kindly interest in his weal;
I thanked him for his amorous zeal;
In short, I said all I could but “yes.”
I said what I’m accustomed to;
I acted as I always do.
I promised he should find in me
A friend,—a sister, if that might be;
But he was still dissatisfied.
He certainly was most polite;
He said exactly what was right,
He acted very properly,
Except indeed for this, that he
insisted on inviting me
To come with him for “one more last ride.”
A little while in doubt I stood:
A ride, no doubt, would do me good;
I had a habit and a hat
Extremely well worth looking at;
The weather was distinctly fine.
My horse, too, wanted exercise,
And time, when one is riding, flies;
Besides, it really seemed, you see,
The only way of ridding me
Of pertinacious Mr. B.;
So my head I graciously incline.
I won’t say much of what happened next;
I own I was extremely vexed.
Indeed I should have been aghast
If any one had seen what passed;
But nobody need ever know
That, as I leaned forward to stir the fire,
He advanced before I could well retire;
And I suddenly felt, to my great alarm,
The grasp of a warm, unlicensed arm,
An embrace in which I found no charm;
I was awfully glad when he let me go.
Then we began to ride; my steed
Was rather fresh, too fresh indeed,
And at first I thought of little, save
The way to escape an early grave,
As the dust rose up on either side.
My stern companion jogged along
On a brown old cob both broad and strong.
He looked as he does when he’s writing verse,
Or endeavoring not to swear and curse,
Or wondering where he has left his purse;
Indeed it was a sombre ride.
I spoke of the weather to Mr. B.,
But he neither listened nor spoke to me.
I praised his horse, and I smiled the smile
Which was wont to move him once in a while.
I said I was wearing his favorite flowers,
But I wasted my words on the desert air,
For he rode with a fixed and gloomy stare.
I wonder what he was thinking about.
As I don’t read verse, I shan’t find out.
It was something subtle and deep, no doubt,
A theme to detain a man for hours.
Ah! there was the corner where Mr. S.
So nearly induced me to whisper “yes;”
And here it was that the next but one
Proposed on horseback, or would have done,
Had his horse not most opportunely shied;
Which perhaps was due to the unseen flick
He received from my whip; ’t was a scurvy trick,
But I never could do with that young man,—
I hope his present young woman can.
Well, I must say, never, since time began,
Did I go for a duller or longer ride.
He never smiles and he never speaks;
He might go on like this for weeks;
He rolls a slightly frenzied eye
Towards the blue and burning sky,
And the cob bounds on with tireless stride.
If we aren’t home for lunch at two
I don’t know what papa will do;
But I know full well he will say to me,
“I never approved of Mr. B.;
It’s the very devil that you and he
Ride, ride together, forever ride.”
J. K. Stephen.
Up the Spout
I
HI! Just you drop that! Stop, I say!
Shirk work, think slink off, twist friend’s wrist?
Where that spined sand’s lined band’s the bay—
Lined blind with true sea’s blue, as due—
Promising—not to pay?
II
For the sea’s debt leaves wet the sand;
Burst worst fate’s weight’s in one burst gun?
A man’s own yacht, blown—What? off land?
Tack back, or veer round here, then—queer!
Reef points, though—understand?
III
I’m blest if I do. Sigh? be blowed!
Love’s doves make break life’s ropes, eh? Tropes!
Faith’s brig, baulked, sides caulked, rides at road;
Hope’s gropes befogged, storm-dogged and bogged—
Clogged, water-logged, her load!
IV
Stowed, by Jove, right and tight, away.
No show now how best plough sea’s brow,
Wrinkling—breeze quick, tease thick, ere day,
Clear sheer wave’s sheen of green, I mean,
With twinkling wrinkles—eh?
V
Sea sprinkles wrinkles, tinkles light
Shells’ bells—boy’s joys that hap to snap!
It’s just sea’s fun, breeze done, to spite
God’s rods that scourge her surge, I’d urge—
Not proper, is it—quite?
VI
See, fore and aft, life’s craft undone!
Crank plank, split spritsail—mark, sea’s lark!
That gray cold sea’s old sprees, begun
When men lay dark i’ the ark, no spark,
All water—just God’s fun!
VII
Not bright, at best, his jest to these
Seemed—screamed, shrieked, wreaked on kin for sin!
When for mirth’s yell earth’s knell seemed please
Some dumb new grim great whim in him
Made Jews take chalk for cheese.
VIII
Could God’s rods bruise God’s Jews? Their jowls
Bobbed, sobbed, gaped, aped, the plaice in face!
None heard, ’tis odds, his—God’s—folk’s howls.
Now, how must I apply, to try
This hookiest-beaked of owls?
IX
Well, I suppose God knows—I don’t.
Time’s crimes mark dark men’s types, in stripes
Broad as fen’s lands men’s hands were wont
Leave grieve unploughed, though proud and loud
With birds’ words—No! he won’t!
X
One never should think good impossible.
Eh? say I’d hide this Jew’s oil’s cruse—
His shop might hold bright gold, engrossible
By spy—spring’s air takes there no care
To wave the heath-flower’s glossy bell!
XI
But gold bells chime in time there, coined—
Gold! Old Sphinx winks there—‘Read my screed!’
Doctrine Jews learn, use, burn for, joined
(Through new craft’s stealth) with health and wealth—
At once all three purloined!
XII
I rose with dawn, to pawn, no doubt,
(Miss this chance, glance untried aside?)
John’s shirt, my—no! Ay, so—the lout!
Let yet the door gape, store on floor
And not a soul about?
XIII
Such men lay traps, perhaps—and I’m
Weak—meek—mild—child of woe, you know!
But theft, I doubt, my lout calls crime.
Shrink? Think! Love’s dawn in pawn—you spawn
Of Jewry! Just in time!
Algernon Charles Swinburne.