Your sins, though scarlet once, are now as wool: You've made atonement for all past offenses, And conjugated--'twas an awful pull!-- The verb "to pay" in all its moods and tenses. You were a dreadful criminal--by Heaven, I think there never was a man so sinful! We've all a pinch or two of Satan's leaven, But you appeared to have an even skinful. Earth shuddered with aversion at your name; Rivers fled backward, gravitation scorning; The sea and sky, from thinking on your shame, Grew lobster-red at eve and in the morning. But still red-handed at your horrid trade You wrought, to reason deaf, and to compassion. But now with gods and men your peace is made I beg you to be good and in the fashion. What's that?--you "ne'er again will rob a stage"? What! did you do so? Faith, I didn't know it. Was _that_ what threw poor Themis in a rage? I thought you were convicted as a poet! I own it was a comfort to my soul, And soothed it better than the deepest curses, To think they'd got one poet in a hole Where, though he wrote, he could not print, his verses. I thought that Welcker, Plunkett, Brooks, and all The ghastly crew who always are begriming With villain couplets every page and wall, Might be arrested and "run in" for rhyming. And then Parnassus would be left to me, And Pegasus should bear me up it gaily, Nor down a steep place run into the sea, As now he must be tempted to do daily. Well, grab the lyre-strings, hearties, and begin: Bawl your harsh souls all out upon the gravel. I must endure you, for you'll never sin By robbing coaches, until dead men travel. A "SCION OF NOBILITY" Come, sisters, weep!--our Baron dear, Alas! has run away. If always we had kept him here He had not gone astray. Painter and grainer it were vain To say he was, before; And if he were, yet ne'er again He'll darken here a door. We mourn each matrimonial plan-- Even tradesmen join the cry: He was so promising a man Whenever he did buy. He was a fascinating lad, Deny it all who may; Even moneyed men confess he had A very taking way. So from our tables he is gone-- Our tears descend in showers; We loved the very fat upon. His kidneys, for 'twas ours. To women he was all respect To duns as cold as ice; No lady could his suit reject, No tailor get its price. He raised our hope above the sky; Alas! alack! and O! That one who worked it up so high Should play it down so low! THE NIGHT OF ELECTION "O venerable patriot, I pray Stand not here coatless; at the break of day We'll know the grand result--and even now The eastern sky is faintly touched with gray. "It ill befits thine age's hoary crown-- This rude environment of rogue and clown, Who, as the lying bulletins appear, With drunken cries incarnadine the town. "But if with noble zeal you stay to note The outcome of your patriotic vote For Blaine, or Cleveland, and your native land, Take--and God bless you!--take my overcoat."