Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses

And snatch a tearful joy.

But tell me, Jakko, dost thou see

The same old sprightly crew
Disport with unembarrassed glee,

As we were wont to do?
What youth, in brazen armour cased,
With pliant arm the yielding waist

To arduous dalliance ensnares?
Who, foremost of his peers, exalts
The labours of the devious waltz

By sitting out the squares?

Does Prudence, gentle Matron, force

On Folly in her 'teens
The value of a stalking-horse

When hunting Rank and Means?
And is the Summer Widow's mind
Aggrieved and horrified to find

That, as her male acquaintance grows,
Her female circle pass her by
With Innuendo's outraged eye,

And Virtue's injured nose?

Lo, in the Vale of Tears beneath

A grilling troop is seen
Whom Failure gnaws with rankling teeth,

While Envy turns them green.
This racks the head, that scars the pelt,
These bore beneath the amp