Four love in a cottage is hungry, Your vine is a nest for flies-- Your milkmaid shocks the Graces, And simplicity talks of pies! You lie down to your shady slumber And wake with a bug in your ear, And your damsel that walks in the morning Is shod like a mountaineer. True love is at home on a carpet, And mightily likes his ease-- And true love has an eye for a dinner, And starves beneath shady trees. His wing is the fan of a lady, His foot's an invisible thing, And his arrow is tipp'd with a jewel, And shot from a silver string. TO HELEN IN A HUFF. N. P. WILLIS Nay, lady, one frown is enough In a life as soon over as this-- And though minutes seem long in a huff, They're minutes 'tis pity to miss! The smiles you imprison so lightly Are reckon'd, like days in eclipse; And though you may smile again brightly, You've lost so much light from your lips! Pray, lady, smile! The cup that is longest untasted May be with our bliss running o'er, And, love when we will, we have wasted An age in not loving before! Perchance Cupid's forging a fetter To tie us together some day, And, just for the chance, we had better Be laying up love, I should say! Nay, lady, smile! THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. I wrote some lines, once on a time, In wondrous merry mood, And thought, as usual, men would say They were exceeding good. They were so queer, so very queer, I laughed as I would die; Albeit, in the general way, A sober man am I. I called my servant, and he came; How kind it was of him, To mind a slender man like me, He of the mighty limb! "These to the printer," I exclaimed. And, in my humorous way, I added (as a trifling jest), "There'll be the devil to pay." He took the paper, and I watched, And saw him peep within; At the first line he read, his face Was all upon the grin. He read the next; the grin grew broad. And shot from ear to ear; He read the third; a chuckling noise I now began to hear. The fourth; he broke into a roar; The fifth; his waistband split; The sixth; he burst five buttons off, And tumbled in a fit. Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye, I watched that wretched man, And since, I never dare to write As funny as I can. THE BRIEFLESS BARRISTER. A BALLAD. JOHN G. SAXE. An Attorney was taking a turn, In shabby habiliments drest; His coat it was shockingly worn, And the rust had invested his vest. His breeches had suffered a breach, His linen and worsted were worse; He had scarce a whole crown in his hat, And not half-a-crown in his purse. And thus as he wandered along, A cheerless and comfortless elf, He sought for relief in a song, Or complainingly talked to himself: "Unfortunate man that I am! I've never a client but grief; The case is, I've no case at all, And in brief, I've ne'er had a brief!