"Compel me not to long for your reply; Suspense makes havoc with the mind"-(and muscles); "Winged Hope takes flight,”—(which means that I must fly, Default of funds, to Paris or to Brussels); "I cannot wait! My own, my queen-Priscilla ! Write by return." And now for a Manilla ! "Miss Blank," at "Blank." Jemima, let it go; And I, meanwhile, will idle with "Sir Walter;" Stay, let me keep the first rough copy, though— 'Twill serve again. There's but the name to alter, And Love, that starves,-must knock at every portal, In forma pauperis. We are but mortal! THE MISOGYNIST. "Il était un jeune homme d'un bien beau passé." WHEN HEN first he sought our haunts, he wore His brow with thought was "sicklied o'er,”— We rarely saw him smile; And, e'en when none were looking on, His air was always woe-begone. He kept, I think, his bosom bare To imitate Jean Paul; His solitary topics were Esthetics, Fate, and Soul ;Although at times, but not for long, He bowed his Intellect to song. He served, he said, a Muse of Tears: A fine funereal air of biers, And objects cypress-wreathed ;- In these light moods, I call to mind, To some dread sorrow undefined,- He railed at women's faith as Cant; Alas, not e'en the great go free His lot, he oft would gravely urge, The Billows of Despair. We dreamed it true. We never knew What gentler ears he told it to. We, bound with him in common care, One-minded, celibate, Resolved to Thought and Diet spare Our lives to dedicate ; We, truly, in no common sense Deserved his closest confidence! But soon, and yet, though soon, too late, We, sorrowing, sighed to find A gradual softness enervate That all superior mind, Until,-in full assembly met, He dared to speak of Etiquette. The verse that we severe had known, A fond effeminate monotone Of eyebrows, lips, and hair; Nay worse. He, once sublime to chaff, Grew whimsically sore If we but named a photograph We found him simpering o'er ; Then worse again. He tried to dress; He trimmed his tragic mane; Announced at length (to our distress) He had not "lived in vain";— Thenceforth his one prevailing mood Became a base beatitude. |