IN THE GLOAMING.

85

To be photographed together-cased in pretty Russia leather

Hear her gravely doubting whether they have spoilt

your honest phiz!

Then to bring your plighted fair one first a ring—a rich and rare one

Next a bracelet, if she'll wear one, and a heap of

things beside;

And serenely bending o'er her, to inquire if it would bore her

To say when her own adorer may aspire to call her

bride?

Then, the days of courtship over, with your wife to start for Dover

Or Dieppe-and live in clover evermore, whate'er

befalls:

For I've read in many a novel that, unless they've souls that grovel,

Folks prefer, in fact, a hovel to your dreary marble

halls.

UNDER THE TREES.

C. S. C.

66

NDER the trees!" who but agrees

That there is magic in words such as these?

Promptly one sees shake in the breeze

Stately lime avenues haunted of bees:

Where, looking far over buttercupped leas,
Lads and "fair shes" (that is Byron's, and he's
An authority) lie very much at their ease;
Taking their teas, or their duck and green peas,
Or, if they prefer it, their plain bread and cheese :
Not objecting at all, though its rather a squeeze,
And the glass is, I daresay, at eighty degrees.
Some get up glees, and are mad about Ries,
And Sainton, and Tamberlik's thrilling high C's;

UNDER THE TREES.

87

Or, if painter, hold forth upon Hunt and Maclise,
And the breadth of that landscape of Lee's;

Or, if learned, on nodes and the moon's apogees,
Or, if serious, on something of A. K. H. B.'s,

Or the latest attempt to convert the Chaldees;

Or, in short, about all things, from earthquakes to

fleas.

Some sit in twos or (less frequently) threes,

With their innocent lambswool or book on their

knees,

And talk and enact any nonsense you please,

As they gaze into eyes that are blue as the seas;
And you hear an occasional, "Harry, don't tease,"
From the sweetest of lips in the softest of keys,
And other remarks, which to me are Chinese.
And fast the time flees, till a lady-like sneeze,
Or a portly papa's more elaborate wheeze,

Makes Miss Tabitha seize on her brown muffatees,
And announce as a fact that it's going to freeze,
And that young people ought to attend to their P's
And their Q's, and not court every form of disease;
Then Tommy eats up the three last ratifias,

888

UNDER THE TREES.

And pretty Louise wraps her robe de cerise
Round a bosom as tender as Widow Machree's,
And (in spite of the pleas of her lorn vis-à-vis)
Goes and wraps up her uncle—a patient of Skey's,
Who is prone to catch chills, like all old Bengalese :-
But at bedtime I trust he'll remember to grease
The bridge of his nose, and preserve his rupees
From the premature clutch of his fond legatees;
Or at least have no fees to pay any M.D.'s

For the cold his niece caught sitting under the trees.

THE ROMANCE OF A GLOVE.

ERE

H. SAVILLE CLARKE.

ERE on my desk it lies,

Here as the daylight dies,

One small glove just her size

Six and a quarter;

Pearl-gray, a colour neat,

Deux boutons all complete,

Faint-scented, soft and sweet;

Could glove be smarter?

Can I the day forget,

Years ago, when the pet

Gave it me?-where we met

Still I remember;