The same irresistible cut in their jibs,
The same little jokes, and the same little fibs-
That I thought the best way to get out of my pain
Was by-heads for Maria, and woman for Jane;
For hang me if it seemed it could matter a straw,
Which dear became wife, and which sister-in-law.
But now, I will own, I feel rather inclined
To suspect I've some reason to alter my mind;
And the doubt in my breast daily grows a more strong one, That they're not quite alike, and I've taken the wrong one. Jane is always so gentle, obliging, and cool;
Never calls me a monster-not even a fool;
All our little contentions, 'tis she makes them up,
And she knows how much sugar to put in my cup :-
Yes, I sometimes have wished—Heav'n forgive me the flaw!— That my very dear wife was my sister-in-law.
Oh, your sister-in-law, is a dangerous thing!
The daily comparisons, too, she will bring!
Wife-curl-papered, slip-shod, unwashed and undressed;
She-ringleted, booted, and "fixed in her best;"
Wife-sulky, or storming, or preaching, or prating;
She merrily singing, or laughing, or chatting:
Then the innocent freedom her friendship allows
To the happy half-way between mother and spouse.
In short, if the Devil e'er needs a cat's-paw,
He can't find one more sure than a sister-in-law.
That no good upon earth can be had undiluted
Is a maxim experience has seldom refuted;
And preachers and poets have proved it is so
With abundance of tropes, more or less apropos.
Every light has its shade, every rose has its thorn,
The cup has its head-ache, its poppy the corn;
There's a fly in the ointment, a spot on the sun-
In short, they 've used all illustrations-but one;
And have left it to me the most striking to draw-
Viz.: that none, without wives, can have sisters-in-law.
As a young Lobster roamed about,
Itself and mother being out,
Their eyes at the same moment fell
On a boiled lobster's scarlet shell.
"Look," said the younger; "is it true
That we might wear so bright a hue?
No coral, if I trust mine eye,
Can with its startling brilliance vie;
While you and I must be content
A dingy aspect to present."
"Proud heedless fool," the parent cried;
"Know'st thou the penalty of pride?
The tawdry finery you wish,
Has ruined this unhappy fish.
The hue so much by you desired
By his destruction was acquired-
So be contented with your lot,
Nor seek to change by going to pot."
TO SONG-BIRDS ON A SUNDAY.
SILENCE, all! ye winged choir;
Let not yon right reverend sire
Hear your happy symphony:
'Tis too good for such as he.
On the day of rest divine,
He poor townsfolk would confine
In their crowded streets and lanes,
Where they can not hear your strains.
All the week they drudge away,
Having but one holiday;
No more time for you, than that-
Unlike bishops, rich and fat.
Appeared at the time of the Anti-popery excitement, produced by the titles
of Cardinal Wiseman, etc.
Utter not your cheerful sounds,
Therefore, in the bishop's grounds;
Make him melody no more,
Who denies you to the poor.
Linnet, hist! and blackbird, hush!
Throstle, be a songless thrush;
Nightingale and lark, be mute;
Never sing to such a brute.
Robin, at the twilight dim,
Never let thine evening hymn,
Bird of red and ruthful breast,
Lend the bishop's Port a zest.
Soothe not, birds, his lonesome hours,
Keeping us from fields and flowers,
Who to pen us tries, instead,
'Mong the intramural dead.
Only let the raven croak
At him from the rotten oak;
Let the magpie and the jay
Chatter at him on his way.
And when he to rest has laid him,
Let his ears the screech-owl harry;
And the night-jar serenade him
With a proper charivari.
THE FIRST SENSIBLE VALENTINE.
(ONE OF THE MOST ASTONISHING FRUITS OF THE EMIGRATION MANIA.)
LET other swains, upon the best cream-laid
Or wire-wove note, their amorous strains indite;
Or, in despair, invoke the limner's aid
To paint the sufferings they can not write:
Upon their page, transfixed with numerous darts,
Let slender youths in agony expire;
Or, on one spit, let two pale pink calves' hearts
Roast at some fierce imaginary fire.
Let ANGELINA there, as in a bower
Of shrubs, unknown to LINDLEY, she reposes,
See her own ALFRED to the old church tower
Led on by CUPID, in a chain of roses;
Or let the wreath, when raised, a cage reveal,
Wherein two doves their little bills entwine;
(A vile device, which always makes me feel
Marriage would only add your bills to mine.)
For arts like these I've neither skill nor time;
But if you'll seek the Diggings, dearest maid,
And share my fortune in that happier clime,
Your berth is taken, and your passage paid.
For reading, lately, in my list of things,
"Twelve dozen shirts! twelve dozen collars," too! The horrid host of buttons and of strings
Flashed on my spirit, and I thought—of you.
"Surely," I said, as in my chest I dived
That vast receptacle of all things known-
"To teach this truth my outfit was contrived,
It is not good for man to be alone!"
Then fly with me! My bark is on the shore
(Her mark A 1, her size eight hundred tons), And though she 's nearly full, can take some more Dry goods, by measurement-say GREEN and SONS.
Yes, fly with me! Had all our friends been blind, We might have married, and been happy here; But since young married folks the means must find The eyes of stern society to cheer,
And satisfy its numerous demands,
I think 'twill save us many a vain expense,
If on our wedding cards this Notice stands,
"At Home, at Ballarat, just three months hence !"
A SCENE ON THE AUSTRIAN FRONTIER.
"DEY must not pass !" was the warning cry of the Austrian sen
To one whose little knapsack bore the books he loved so well. "They must not pass? Now, wherefore not?" the wond'ring tourist cried;
"No English book can pass mit me;" the sentinel replied.
The tourist laughed a scornful laugh; quoth he, "Indeed, I hope There are few English books would please a Kaiser or a Pope; But these are books in common use: plain truths and facts they
"Der Teufel! Den dey most not pass !" said the startled sentinel.
"This Handbook to North Germany, by worthy Mr. MURRAY,
Need scarcely put your government in such a mighty flurry;
If tourists' handbooks be proscribed, pray have you ever tried
To find a treasonable page in Bradshaw's Railway Guide?
This map, again, of Switzerland-nay, man, you need n't start or
Look black at such a little map, as if 't were Magna Charta;
I know it is the land of TELL, but, curb your idle fury——
We've not the slightest hope, to-day, to find a TELL in your eye
(Uri)."
"Sturmwetter!" said the sentinel, "Come! cease dis idle babbles!
Was ist dis oder book I see? Das Haus mit sieben Gabbles?
I nevvare heard of him bifor, ver mosh I wish I had,
For now Ich kann nicht let him pass, for fear he should be bad.
Das Haus of Commons it must be; Ja wohl! 'tis so, and den
Die Sieben Gabbles are de talk of your chief public men;
Potzmiekchen! it is dreadful books. Ja! Ja! I know him well;
Hoch Himmel! here he most not pass:" said the learned sen-
"Dis PLATO, too, I ver mosh fear, he will corrupt the land, He has soch many long big words, Ich kann nicht onderstand." "My friend," the tourist said, "I fear you're really in the way to Quite change the proverb, and be friends with neither Truth nor PLATO.
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