O Fame! on thy pillar so steady, Some dupes watch beneath thee in vain: How many have done it already! How many will do it again!
Two wayward imps, all smiles or tears, With large round eyes of ceaseless wonder, Small pitchers with extensive ears, And fingers prone to urchin plunder.
Two whisp’ring lovers—blissful pair! Is _he_ the rogue? or hath she trick’d him? Unless he dupes his mistress there, The chances are, he’ll fall a victim.
Two toiling ones of sober age (Their bet with Care a losing wager); They own, though now so very sage, They might have been a trifle sager!
Two frail old wretches, sick and sad, Yet sore dismayed lest Death should take them, —Come, hang it, things, though passing bad, Are not so bad as some would make them:
For, like yon clock, when twelve shall sound, The call these poor old souls obeying, Together shall _their_ hands be found, An earnest they are humbly praying!
He met her with her milking-cans, Too fast the moments speeded, For while they chat on this and that My _first_ may low unheeded. And was she call’d a forward jade, And was he graceless reckon’d, Because he stopt the dairy-maid, Enchanted by my _second_?
Though stars in thousands stud the pole, The fields own stars as yellow, And when I gave that last my _whole_, She thank’d a happy fellow. But she was call’d a forward jade, And I was graceless reckon’d;— I only kiss’d that dairy-maid, Enraptur’d by my _second_.
Toll, toll the bell, its iron tongue Is weighty as my _second_, Dig, dig the grave, to life he clung, But now his days are reckon’d.
Old man, who’ll ring a knell for thee, Or dress thy couch of clay? Why didst not thou thy death foresee, And dig it for to-day?
King Death his journeyman demands, On all he works his worst: His dart he’s flung at old and young,— Death heedeth not my _first_.
Old man, thou’st dug some scores of graves, Who’ll turn the mould for thine? And when this spade thy bed hath made, Who’ll lift a spade at mine?
Small imp of blackness, off at once, Expend thy mirth as likes thee best: Thy toil is over for the nonce; Yes, “opus operatum est.” When dreary authors vex thee sore, Thy Mentor’s old, and would remind thee That if thy griefs are all before, Thy pleasures are not all behind thee.