"BRAG!" HE throng unpoetic may cock up their noses, Mind, But the life of the bard is a pathway of roses; My career was a solitude fit for a hermit Till Poesy brought me success and renown; And at present—I mildly but proudly affirm itI know all the authors and actors in town. T'other day-and the day I shall fondly remember- And—a singular fact !—in the month of September, And I recently wrote an epistle to Tupper, A relation of mine, whom I love pretty dearly, I'd walk with alacrity two or three miles. At the Albion I mix with your drinkers and smokers, For wags of the maddest are there to be met; There are Hollingshead, Byron, and such merry jokers, And Gilbert, Burnand, and the cream of the set. Such wit, and such humour! Say, where can you match them ?— Their quips and the cranks are the best of the day; Only somehow I never can properly catch them, From sitting some two or three boxes away. So I drink to my Muse and my patron Apollo, Who taught me to thread the recesses of rhyme ; For the bard's is a princely profession to followParnassus a rosy excrescence to climb. I see in my visions Calliope flying To bear my renown to posterity down; I can hear her exalting my merits, and crying "He knew all the authors and actors in town!" ALL ABROAD. 'VE journeyed over many seas, And wandered under many skies; I've hoarded knowledge by degrees, Some useful and some otherwise. My Fatherland I fondly call The dearest corner of the earth; And yet I scarcely know at all The British Isles that gave me birth. All mountain-peaks to me are fair; Like wigs upon their snowy scalps! And scaled their very highest height; Helvellyn I have never seen, While Snowdon is a stranger quite. 78 ALL ABROAD. Still treasured for their own sweet sakes, Italia, too, hath blessed my sight On Derwent or on Windermere. I've watched with awe thine angry strife, To view thy cataract, Lodore. The diligence has dragged me far; I cannot fancy how it feels To traverse Dublin on a car. My cosmopolitan career At last is drawing to a close: To things beneath my very nose. As master of so many styles, I may complete before I die A "Guide-Book to the British Isles." MY OLD ARM-CHAIR. LOATHE it-I loathe it-and who shall dare Into the dreams that I dream by night. I loved with a love of the noblest kind ;- But she spurned my love and betrayed her vow, I cannot forget though I might forgive ;— |