In Blarney Castle, on a crumbling tower, There lies a stone (above your ready reach), Which to the lips imparts, ’tis said, the power Of facile falsehood and persuasive speech; And hence, of one who talks in such a tone, The peasants say, “He’s kissed the Blarney Stone.” II. Thus, when I see some flippant tourist swell With secrets wrested from an emperor, And hear him vaunt his bravery, and tell How once he snubbed a marquis, I infer The man came back—if but the truth were known— By way of Cork, and kissed the Blarney Stone! III. So, when I hear a shallow dandy boast (In the long ear that marks a brother dunce) What precious favors ladies’ lips have lost, To his advantage, I suspect at once The fellow’s lying; that the dog alone (Enough for him!) has kissed the Blarney Stone! IV. When some fine lady—ready to defame An absent beauty, with as sweet a grace— With seeming rapture greets a hated name, And lauds her rival to her wondering face, E’en Charity herself must freely own Some women, too, have kissed the Blarney Stone! V. When sleek attorneys, whose seductive tongues, Smooth with the unction of a golden fee, “Breathe forth huge falsehoods from capacious lungs,” (The words are Juvenal’s,) ’tis plain to see A lawyer’s genius isn’t all his own: The specious rogue has kissed the Blarney Stone! VI. When the false pastor from his fainting flock Withholds the Bread of Life,—the Gospel news,— To give them dainty words, lest he should shock The fragile fabric of the paying pews, Who but must feel, the man, to grace unknown, Has kissed,—not Calvary,—but the Blarney Stone? SAXE. KISSING THE POPE’S TOE. Buckle, in his “History of Civilization in England,” says: