The chapel bell is calling, thankless friend, Balls you may not, but church you _shall_, attend. Some recognition cannot be denied To the great mercy that has turned aside The sword of death from us and let it fall Upon the people's necks in Montreal; That spared our city, steeple, roof and dome, And drowned the Texans out of house and home; Blessed all our continent with peace, to flood The Balkan with a cataclysm of blood. Compared with blessings of so high degree, Your private woes look mighty small--to me. L'AUDACE. Daughter of God! Audacity divine-- Of clowns the terror and of brains the sign-- Not thou the inspirer of the rushing fool, Not thine of idiots the vocal drool: Thy bastard sister of the brow of brass, Presumption, actuates the charging ass. Sky-born Audacity! of thee who sings Should strike with freer hand than mine the strings; The notes should mount on pinions true and strong, For thou, the subject shouldst sustain the song, Till angels lean from Heaven, a breathless throng! Alas! with reeling heads and wavering tails, They (notes, not angels) drop and the hymn fails; The minstrel's tender fingers and his thumbs Are torn to rags upon the lyre he strums. Have done! the lofty thesis makes demand For stronger voices and a harder hand: Night-howling apes to make the notes aspire, And Poet Riley's fist to slug the rebel wire! THE GOD'S VIEW-POINT. Cheeta Raibama Chunder Sen, The wisest and the best of men, Betook him to the place where sat With folded feet upon a mat Of precious stones beneath a palm, In sweet and everlasting calm, That ancient and immortal gent, The God of Rational Content. As tranquil and unmoved as Fate, The deity reposed in state, With palm to palm and sole to sole, And beaded breast and beetling jowl, And belly spread upon his thighs, And costly diamonds for eyes. As Chunder Sen approached and knelt To show the reverence he felt; Then beat his head upon the sod To prove his fealty to the god; And then by gestures signified The other sentiments inside; The god's right eye (as Chunder Sen, The wisest and the best of men, Half-fancied) grew by just a thought More narrow than it truly ought. Yet still that prince of devotees, Persistent upon bended knees And elbows bored into the earth, Declared the god's exceeding worth, And begged his favor. Then at last, Within that cavernous and vast Thoracic space was heard a sound Like that of water underground-- A gurgling note that found a vent At mouth of that Immortal Gent In such a chuckle as no ear Had e'er been privileged to hear!