Nonsense Books
Nonsense Books “How Pleasant to Know Mr. Lear” Introduction I. A Book of Nonsense.
Dedication
Nonsense Rhymes and Pictures II. Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany, and Alphabets.
Nonsense Songs
Nonsense Stories
Nonsense Botany
Nonsense Alphabets III. More Nonsense Pictures, Rhymes, Botany, etc.
Introduction
Nonsense Botany
One Hundred Nonsense Pictures and Rhymes
Twenty-six Nonsense Rhymes and Pictures IV. Laughable Lyrics: A Fresh Book of Nonsense Poems, Songs, Botany, etc.
Laughable Lyrics.
Nonsense Botany
Nonsense Alphabets
Index (added 2004)
By First Lines
Nonsense Alphabets
Nonsense Botanies
Nonsense Songs and Stories
Surely the most beneficent and innocent of all books yet produced is the “Book of Nonsense,” with its corollary carols, inimitable and refreshing, and perfect in rhythm. I really don’t know any author to whom I am half so grateful for my idle self as Edward Lear. I shall put him first of my hundred authors.
—JOHN RUSKIN,
In the “List of the Best Hundred Authors.”
EDWARD LEAR
Engraved by Andrew From a Photograph Taken In San Remo, by Roncarolo.
The following lines by Mr. Lear were written for a young lady of his acquaintance, who had quoted to him the words of a young lady not of his acquaintance,
“HOW PLEASANT TO KNOW MR. LEAR!”
“How pleasant to know Mr. Lear!”
Who has written such volumes of stuff! Some think him ill-tempered and queer,
But a few think him pleasant enough.
His mind is concrete and fastidious,
His nose is remarkably big; His visage is more or less hideous,
His beard it resembles a wig.
He has ears, and two eyes, and ten fingers,
Leastways if you reckon two thumbs; Long ago he was one of the singers,
But now he is one of the dumbs.
He sits in a beautiful parlor,
With hundreds of books on the wall; He drinks a great deal of Marsala,
But never gets tipsy at all.
He has many friends, lay men and clerical,
Old Foss is the name of his cat; His body is perfectly spherical,
He weareth a runcible hat.
When he walks in waterproof white,
The children run after him so! Calling out, “He’s come out in his night-
Gown, that crazy old Englishman, oh!”
He weeps by the side of the ocean,
He weeps on the top of the hill; He purchases pancakes and lotion,
And chocolate shrimps from the mill.
He reads, but he cannot speak, Spanish,
He cannot abide ginger beer: Ere the days of his pilgrimage vanish,
How pleasant to know Mr. Lear!