Smoke is sweetness, done in earnest, Power possessing to console, If ’tis healthy weed thou burnest In the clay or meerschaum bowl. Not to aid expectoration Doth the smoker burn the weed, But to woo sweet meditation, And also digest his “feed.” “Shag” is strong, “Returns” is milder, “Cavendish” but suits the brave; Though our pulses beat the wilder, Still for ’bacca do we crave. In this world so full of brawling, If in years your manhood’s ripe, Heed ye not the antis’ calling―― Be a man and smoke a pipe. Pipes of great men all remind us (Tho’ of clay the bowl and stem), Wheresoever fate may find us, We can colour pipes like them. Dhudeens, that perhaps another On the wheel of fortune broke, Some forlorn and bankrupt brother, Seeing, may take heart, and smoke. Let us, then, take weeds and matches, And a pipe――that is enough; Tho’ it only be by snatches, Spared from toil, we still will puff! From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. March, 1876. ―――― MEERSCHAUM. Come to me, O! my meerschaum, For the vile street organs play; And the torture they’re inflicting Will vanish quite away. I open my study window And into the twilight peer, And my anxious eyes are watching For the man with my evening beer. In one hand is the shining pewter, All amber the ale doth glow; In t’other are long “churchwardens,” As spotless and pure as snow. Ah! what would the world be to us Tobaccoless?――Fearful bore! We should dread the day after to-morrow Worse than the day before. As the elephant’s trunk to the creature, Is the pipe to the man, I trow; Useful and meditative As the cud to the peaceful cow. So to the world is smoking; Through that we feel, with bliss, That, whatever worlds come after, A jolly old world is this. Come to me, O! my meerschaum, And whisper to me here, If you like me better with coffee Than grog, or the bitter beer. Oh! what are our biggest winnings If peaceful content we miss? Though fortune may give us an innings, She seldoms conveys us bliss. You’re better than all the fortunes That ever were made or broke; For a penny will always fill you, And buy me content with a smoke. WRONGFELLOW. ―――― THE PIPE AND THE QUID. _An imitation of Longfellow’s “The Arrow and the Song.”_ I flung a pipe into the air, And it fell down, I knew not where; For many folks were near to me, And so I did not stay to see. I spun a quid up in the air, And that fell down, I knew not where; For ’twould require the strongest sight To follow a quid in its erring flight. Shortly I found my pipe again, On the head of my uncle broke in twain; And the quid I had not seen descend, I found in the eye of my dearest friend.