THE DRAMA OF THE DOCTOR'S WINDOW.

IN THREE ACTS, WITH A PROLOGUE.

"A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus,
And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth."

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.

Rendered severer by a bald

And skinless Gladiator,

Whose raw robustness first appalled

The entering spectator.

No one would call "The Lancet" gay,-
Few could avoid confessing

That Jones, "On Muscular Decay,"

Is, as a rule, depressing:

So, leaving both, to change the scene,
I turned toward the shutter,
And peered out vacantly between
A water-butt and gutter.

Below, the Doctor's garden lay,

If thus imagination
May dignify a square of clay

Unused to vegetation,

Filled with a dismal-looking swing— That brought to mind a gallows— An empty kennel, mouldering,

And two dyspeptic aloes.

No sparrow chirped, no daisy sprung,
About the place deserted;
Only across the swing-board hung
A battered doll, inverted,
Which sadly seemed to disconcert
The vagrant cat that scanned it,
Sniffed doubtfully around the skirt,
But failed to understand it.

A dreary spot! And yet, I own,
Half hoping that, perchance, it
Might, in some unknown way, atone

For Jones and for "The Lancet,"

I watched; and by especial grace,

Within this stage contracted, Saw presently before my face

A classic story acted.

Ah, World of ours, are you so gray
And weary, World, of spinning,
That you repeat the tales to-day

You told at the beginning?

For lo! the same old myths that made

The early "stage successes,

Still "hold the boards," and still are played, "With new effects and dresses."

Small, lonely "three-pair-backs " behold,

To-day, Alcestis dying;
To-day, in farthest Polar cold,
Ulysses' bones are lying;

دو

one reads

Still in one's morning "Times
How fell an Indian Hector;
Still clubs discuss Achilles' steeds,
Briseis' next protector ;—

Still Menelaus brings, we see,

His oft-remanded case on; Still somewhere sad Hypsipyle Bewails a faithless Jason;

G

And here, the Doctor's sill beside,

Do I not now discover

A Thisbe, whom the walls divide
From Pyramus, her lover?

ACT THE FIRST.

Act I. began. Some noise had scared
The cat, that like an arrow
Shot up the wall and disappeared;
And then, across the narrow,
Unweeded path, a small dark thing,
Hid by a garden-bonnet,

Passed wearily towards the swing,
Paused, turned, and climbed upon it.

A child of five, with eyes that were
At least a decade older,

A mournful mouth, and tangled hair
Flung careless round her shoulder,
Dressed in a stiff ill-fitting frock,
Whose black, uncomely rigour

Seemed to sardonically mock
The plaintive, slender figure.

What was it? Something in the dress That told the girl unmothered;

Or was it that the merciless

Black garb of mourning smothered
Life and all light:—but rocking so,
In the dull garden-corner,
The lonely swinger seemed to grow
More piteous and forlorner.

Then, as I looked, across the wall
Of "next-door's" garden, that is—
To speak correctly-through its tall
Surmounting fence of lattice,
Peeped a boy's face, with curling hair,
Ripe lips, half drawn asunder,

And round, bright eyes, that wore a stare
Of frankest childish wonder.

Rounder they grew by slow degrees,

Until the swinger, swerving,

Made, all at once, alive to these
Intentest orbs observing,

Gave just one brief, half-uttered cry,
And, as with gathered kirtle,
Nymphs fly from Pan's head suddenly
Thrust through the budding myrtle,—

Fled in dismay. A moment's space,
The eyes looked almost tragic;