MARY.

A RECANTATION.

THERE is a point of time when men begin

To feel that they are turning round a corner; And, as the serpent casts aside its skin-

The insect the chrysalis it had worn-or E'en as the reprobate forsakes his sin,

And loves the truth of which so late a scornerJust so a man, towards thirty when he verges, From many a dream of twenty-five emerges!

He learns to look on things with different eyes,
Or learns to open those he has much wider;
Becomes of dogmas, creeds, and mysteries,
Received before, a doubter, or derider;

Finds men he'd honoured once, as learned and wise,
Flat as stale beer, insipid as new cider:

And finds--still more to show he is but human-

That he has erred most in that thing called WOMAN!

A few short years ago I was a youth,

Who had, perhaps, some eighteen summers seen; A dreamy, visionary age, in sooth,

When man is not quite yet, and boy hath been; I might have also been, to tell the truth, A little-doubtless just a little--green ;— And I was ever dreaming of a fairy, My own ideal, loved and christened MARY!

And for the love I bore this ideal

My inconnue bright, beauteous, visionary--
Born and baptised in dream-land—I must fall
At once in love with each terrestrial fairy
I met--and so invest her straight with all
The charms and graces of th' ideal MARY:
(And if the fair one really bore the name,
Or if some other, it was much the same.)

And thus it came, that many an idle rhyme

I penned, beguiling many an idle minute; There are who hold such idling for a crime, Which if it be, why sometimes still I sin it; And so it chanced that, "once upon a time," -it

A youthful ditty I contrived to spin :— Told how one BYRON liked "the name of MARY”-

I did so too!-ergo, the name was fairy!

MARY. -A RECANTATION.

It said, amongst much other nonsense-that
Which I were most unwilling now to utter-
That "I had never known one yet, but what

Had ever a sweet, winning way about her-
With kindness, gentleness, and all that ought
Adorn and ornament EvE's every daughter:"
It said much more, I then had staked a name on,
Which now I know to be the veriest gammon !

Exempli gratia :—I think I said

That I had never known a MARY yet But she was sweet and gentle :—I'm afraid

I may provoke some "gentle" MARY'S hate,—— (The risk is dire, and has been duly weighed !) But the worst vixens that I ever met,

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Were some dear angels, sweet and charming fairies, Of that same very "gentle" race of MARY'S!

Yet one there is who bears that "gentle" name,
And well ennobles name and sex together;--
I have had visions wild of wealth and fame,
(God knows it's little else I've had of either!)
And yet I doubt much, in my wildest dream

Of future fame, or wealth, or fortune, whether
Bright fancy e'er assumed a shape so airy,
As when of thee I loved to dream, sweet MARY!

MARY!--the fair embodiment of all

My wildest dreams of angel loveliness ;—— Impersonation of my ideal!

Bright incarnation of each heavenly grace!—— Oh! if to all thy name it might but fall

One half thy" gentle" virtues to possess, Earth were a Paradise-each land were fairy, And "Angel" were but synonime for MARY!

WOMAN'S PRIVILEGES.

AN EPIGRAM.

THREE things to womankind belong,
This universe of ours all over;
And from their use, or right or wrong,
Not all the universe may move her:-

The first, to tease her faithful lover;
The second, to coquette; the third-

And that which oftenest we discover,-

To argue points the most absurd,

And, right or wrong, to have the latest word!

BACHELOR PHILOSOPHY.

"Quand on n'a pas ce que l'on aime, il faut aimer ce que l'on a." FRENCH PROVERB.

"Ay! such is man's philosophy-when woman is untrue,

The loss of one but teaches him to make another do!"

HOLMES.

I'm fairly sick of it!—to hear and read,

In trashy novels and insipid plays,

Of true love cross'd-hearts broken-stuff indeed,
May well a man of common sense amaze !——
To break one's heart! the thing is most absurd!
It never has been done by mortal man—-
By mortal woman, an' you'll take my word,
Not only never has, but never can:
Such childish nonsense is but fit for fools,

Or (quite the same) young girls at boarding-schools!

A broken heart!-Ay! 'tis methinks the word, And yet 'tis more than "passing strange" to me,