Never get in a Madman's reach: Ye wise men, listen to my speech. It's my advice--or right or wrong-- To flee from such crazed folk headlong; In courts you often see them stalk, The prince smiles at them in his walk; To rogue and fool, and the buffoon, They serve for jokes from morn to noon.-- A Madman once, in market-place, Said he sold Wisdom. The dolts race To buy the treasure. What fun is his, Watching the silly people's phizzes, When for their money they obtain A blow that gives their red ears pain, And forty yards of common thread. Some were indignant; they, instead Of pity, only mockery got. The best way was to bear one's lot, And walk off laughing; or else go Home, and not talk about the blow. To ask the meaning of all this Was to secure a wise man's hiss; There is no reason in such folks. 'Tis chance begets such crazy jokes, And yet the thread it was mysterious. One of the dupes who took it serious Went to consult a sage he knew, Who replied thus at the first view:-- "These hieroglyphics I can see; People of sense infallibly Between themselves and madmen place At least some fathoms of this lace; Or else they will a buffet gain, And never much redress obtain. You are not gulled; a crazy fool Has sold you wisdom from his school." FABLE CLXX. THE CAT AND THE RAT. Four animals, of natures various, Living lives the most precarious, Together dwelt, and yet apart, Close to, and e'en within the heart Of a most ancient pine. The one was Master Cat, who claws; Another, Master Rat, who gnaws; The Weasel third, with waist so fine, And of a very ancient line. The fourth was sapient Master Owl, Whose midnight hoot disturbs the ghoul. One night, a man about their tree A snare disposed with secresy; And Master Cat, at early dawn, From couch with hope of plunder drawn, Scarce half awake, fell plump within The cruelly-invented gin. Such caterwauling then arose, That Master Gnaw-cheese hurried round To see, in fetters safely bound, The deadliest of his special foes. Then Master Purrer softly cried, "Sir Rat, your true benevolence Is known in all the country wide; So pray, for pity, take me hence From this atrocious, strangling snare In which I've fallen, unaware; 'Tis strange, but true, that you alone, Of all the Rats I've ever known, Have won my heart, and, thank the skies! I've loved you more than both my eyes. [']Twas just as I was on my way, As all devout ones should, to pray, At early dawn, that I was pent Within this cursed instrument. My life is in your hands, my friend; Pray, with your tooth these, shackles rend." But curtly then replied the Rat, "Pray, say what I should gain by that?" "My friendship true, for evermore,"