“And are you sure you took no more, My little maid?” quoth I. “Oh! please, sir, mother gave me four, But _they_ were in a pie!” “If that’s the case,” I stammer’d out, “Of course you’ve had eleven;” The maiden answer’d, with a pout, “I ain’t had more nor seven!” I wonder’d hugely what she meant, And said, “I’m bad at riddles, But I know where little girls are sent For telling taradiddles.” “Now, if you don’t reform,” said I, “You’ll never go to heaven.” But all in vain; each time I try, That little idiot makes reply, “I ain’t had more nor seven.” POSTSCRIPT. To borrow WORDSWORTH’S name was wrong, Or slightly misapplied; And so I’d better call my song, “Lines after ACHE-INSIDE.” From _Carols of Cockayne_, by Henry. S. Leigh. London: Chatto & Windus, 1874. (This originally appeared in _Fun_. November 11, 1865.) ―――― THEY ARE THREE. ――――A simple youth That sits and smokes with fools, And looks a fop in face and mien, What should he know of Schools? I met an undergraduate boy: He was three times ploughed, I heard; His head was like a pretty toy, His language was absurd. He had a town-bred London air, And he was sprucely clad; His face was soft, so was his hair; His ‘side’ it made me sad. “Of lectures, undergraduate sir, How many may you keep?” “How many? Three,” he did aver. And cunning looked and deep. “And what are they? I’d gladly know.” He answered, “Three are they; To one of them I never go, And one I cut each day. “But one of them is given by My Tutor and my Dean, So in the early morning I Must go to that I ween.” “You say that one you cut alway, To one you do not go, Yet you have three! Explain, I pray, Sweet youth, how this is so.” The wily youth thus answered me, “Three lectures――three in all The list of lectures you may see Upon the board in hall.” “You wander in your talk, I wot, Or else you are in fun, If one you cut, to one go not, Then you have only one.” “The list is there, that can I swear,” The wily youth replied; “In the second row of the letter O, The three are side by side. “I oft do paper work in hall, My letters there I write; And, though the dons are cutish all, I sit and crib outright. “And often, when the sun is down, Beneath the gaslight’s glare, I take my tattered cap and gown, And eat my dinner there. “The first I cut was Latin Prose; In bed one morn I lay Till ten had struck, and then I rose, But ’twas too late that day. “So in my room I sat and smoked, And when my pipe was out, To Russell’s lazily we walked, I and my terrier, Snout. “And when the clock eleven had struck, I scarce had chalked my cue; And though perhaps the schools I’ll muck, I cut my Mods, Books too.”