Lady Clara Vere de Vere, They say--and really p'rhaps they're right-- That I had better give you up, And marry pretty Sally White; You are a swell--_she_ loves me well, And then her cooking is so good-- Jam tarts are more than coronets, And elder wine than Norman blood! SPHINX, CHRIST'S COLL., CAMBRIDGE. _College Rhymes_, 1868. * * * * * LADY CLARA IN THE SOUTH. "Lady Clara Vere de Vere, You whom the Laureate makes attacks on, If your papa were not a peer, If you were not an Anglo-Saxon, In short, if 'twere not too absurd, To think of _you_ where aught of trade is, I'd almost say, upon my word, I'm looking at you now in Cadiz." Here follow five other verses descriptive of a Spanish coquette, concluding:-- "Lady Clara Vere de Vere, I don't believe _femme souvent varie_, Your sex are all the same, I fear, From Timbuctoo to Tipperary." MAXWELL REILLY. _Kottabos_, Dublin 1870. * * * * * Another parody of "Lady Clara Vere de Vere" appeared in _Funny Folks_, April 10, 1875, entitled "The Vicar's Surplice." It was addressed to a Rev. Mr. Mucklestone, who had declined to pay the charges of his laundress, a lady rejoicing in the euphonious name of Gubbins, who resided at Haseley, in Warwickshire. The subject is somewhat wanting in dignity for poetical treatment. The following is the first of six verses:-- "Reverend Mr. Mucklestone, Of me you shall not win renown; You thought to have your surplice washed For nothing, but it won't go down. At me you smiled, but unbeguiled, Each time your surplice had a 'rense,' I charged, and felt quite justified, The modest sum of eighteenpence." * * * * * A MAY DREAM OF THE FEMALE EXAMINATION. If you're waking, call me early, call me early, mother dear, For to-morrow in the senate-house at nine I must appear: To-morrow for all womankind will be a glorious day, And I'm to be top o' the list, mother, top o' the list, they say. There's many a blue, blue stocking, but none so blue as I; There's not a girl amongst them all with me can hope to vie: There's none so sharp as little Alice, not by a long, long way, And I'm to be top o' the list, mother, top o' the list, they say, I lie awake all night, mother, but in the morn I sleep, And dream of Virgil, Euclid, Dons, all jumbled in a heap, And the letters in the Euclid dance about like lambs at play: O, I'm to be top o' the list, mother, top o' the list, they say. As I came by King's Chapel, whom do you think I saw, But Andrew Jones de Mandeville Fitzherbert Aspenshaw! He thought of that hard problem I gave him yesterday; For I'm to be top o' the list, mother, top o' the list, they say.