“Oh! would I were a mermaid now, For then I’d follow him; But oh!--I’m not a fish-woman, And so I cannot swim. XI. “Alas! I was not born beneath The virgin and the scales, So I must curse my cruel stars, And walk about in Wales.” XII. Now Ben had sail’d to many a place That’s underneath the world; But in two years the ship came home And all her sails were furl’d. XIII. But when he call’d on Sally Brown, To see how she got on, He found she’d got another Ben, Whose Christian-name was John. XIV. “O Sally Brown, O Sally Brown, How could you serve me so? I’ve met with many a breeze before, But never such a blow!” XV. Then reading on his ‘bacco box, He heav’d a bitter sigh, And then began to eye his pipe, And then to pipe his eye. XVI. And then he tried to sing “All’s Well,” But could not though he tried; His head was turn’d and so he chew’d His pigtail till he died. XVII. His death, which happen’d in his birth, At forty-odd befell: They went and told the sexton, and The sexton toll’d the bell. LOVE. O Love! what art thou, Love? the ace of hearts, Trumping earth’s kings and queens, and all its suits; A player, masquerading many parts In life’s odd carnival;--a boy that shoots, From ladies’ eyes, such mortal woundy darts; A gardener pulling heart’s-ease up by the roots; The Puck of Passion--partly false--part real-- A marriageable maiden’s “beau ideal.” O Love! what art thou, Love? a wicked thing, Making green misses spoil their work at school; A melancholy man, cross-gartering? Grave ripe-fac’d wisdom made an April fool? A youngster, tilting at a wedding ring? A sinner, sitting on a cuttie stool? A Ferdinand de Something in a hovel, Helping Matilda Rose to make a novel? O Love! what art thou, Love? one that is bad With palpitations of the heart--like mine-- A poor bewilder’d maid, making so sad A necklace of her garters--fell design! A poet, gone unreasonably mad, Ending his sonnets with a hempen line? O Love!--but whither, now? forgive me, pray; I’m not the first that Love hath led astray. AS IT FELL UPON A DAY. Oh! what’s befallen Bessy Brown, She stands so squalling in the street; She’s let her pitcher tumble down, And all the water’s at her feet! The little school-boys stood about, And laughed to see her pumping, pumping; Now with a curtsey to the spout, And then upon her tiptoes jumping. Long time she waited for her neighbours, To have their turns:--but she must lose The watery wages of her labours,-- Except a little in her shoes! Without a voice to tell her tale, And ugly transport in her face; All like a jugless nightingale, She thinks of her bereaved case.