THE ONE-LEGGED GOOSE. 273 When, lo, attracted by the luscious gale, And somewhat elevated with strong ale, What, cookee, got a goose! Well, come, that's nice: And apple-sauce, too! There's a darling Peg! "Cut off a leg! that would be pretty fun; What, serve it up to squire with only one?" 66 Aye, to be sure; why, master dursn't kill you; I'll cut it off." "Have done with you now, will you?" But Love, whose sceptre's all-commanding sway At this unlooked-for sad disaster, She was not quite so much perplex'd As you may think; she had been used to gull They who could do a goose so well Would not be troubled much to cheat her master Home came the squire, to the moment true, And rang for dinner in a hurry ; She browned the mutilated side anew, And put it on the table in a flurry. Soon as it met his eye, the squire 66 A number of the farmer's geese Which, like this bird, have only one a-piece." 274 MAN'S THREE GUESTS. And grumbled most terribly about it. The place was brown'd, like all the rest, he saw ; They draw up one leg close beneath their wing, “There, sir,” cries Peg, "now pray, sir, cease your pother; There, sir, there's one; and there, sir, is another!" “Pooh, nonsense, stuff!” exclaims the squire. “Now look ye: St, st-there, now, they've got two legs, cookee.” “Aye, sir,” cried Peg, “had you said that at home, Nor you, nor I, had e'er had cause to roam; But recollect, sir, ere you think I'm beaten, You didn't say st, st, to the one you've eaten.” Anon. MAN'S THREE GUESTS. A KNOCKING at the castle gate, A jocund lady waited there, Gay was her robe, of colours rare, Her tresses bright to the zephyr streamed, And the car on its silver axle gleamed, Like the gorgeous barge of that queen of yore Sparkling Cydnus proudly bore. Welcomed her in, with all her train, He knelt, and paid her homage sweet. MAN'S THREE GUESTS. She decked his halls with garlands gay, Day turned to night and night to day, Bowed to Pleasure as its queen. And so that syren guest, of mirthful mien, Lingered till the vernal ray, 275 And summer's latest rose had sighed itself away. A knocking at the gate! And the lordling of the hall, A strong and bearded man withal, And then the warder's horn was blown, A burden at his back he bare, Or Wealth, or wild Ambition's claim, But dark with dregs was the cup he quaff'd, The mocking tare looked up and laugh'd And wrinkles on his forehead hung, and o'er his path a cloud. Again, a knocking at the gate At the wintry eventide; And querulous was the voice that cried, "Who cometh here so late?" "Ho! rouse the sentinel from his sleep, Strict guard at every loop-hole keep! And " man the towers!" he would have said, 276 THE TIME I'VE LOST IN WOOING. But that thundering at the gate And a boding cry of fate, Yet he raised the palsied hand, In their armour old and tried, But the tottering bulwarks their trust betray'd, And a fleshless hand to a shaft was put, And he was clay. Mrs. Sigourney. THE TIME I'VE LOST IN WOOING. THE time I've lost in wooing, The light that lies In woman's eyes, Has been my heart's undoing. Tho' Wisdom oft has sought me, Were woman's looks, And folly's all they've taught me. Oft meet in the glen that's haunted. No stir in the air, no stir in the sea, Without either sign or sound of their shock, The good Abbot of Aberbrothok Had placed that bell on the Inchcape Rock When the rock was hid by the surge's swell, |