"You can plot, exploit, and sneak, and trick, And cram your wallet, with wares, And earthly stocks, as you boom the run, On the New Jerusalem shares, You can rob the widow, and orphan child; But reputably go to church, And if, by the clogging of circumstance, Your pinched, in the doomdock lurch, The greater the pile of swag, you've made, The fewer the blanks, you'll draw, From the lottery wheel, of the English bench, In the name, of the English law. It's merely a mode, of paying yourself, In advance, a liberal wage, For the government work, you'll have to do, In the broad-arrow-branded stage. Say thirty thousands of pounds, you filch, Five years, is the time you'll do, Six thousand a year, in advance, you see, To enjoy, when you've pulled it thro'. Or, seizing your pile, by a dextrous coup, Before they have time, to look down, From the castles, in the air, You have built for them there, You can take a foreign ticket from town. "And tho' you are lagged, at the ends of the earth, You'll still find a breach, or a flaw, Whereby you can slip, thro' the quips, that confuse, Extradition--international law. "Now that is how I teach, the quickest way to cure, Your impecuniosity complaint, You must collar the swag, as a Devil yourself, In the garb, of a modern saint. There's another way to pinch, whereby you may keep, Your character, apparently sound, Go pray, and exhort, teach the vanity of wealth, And pay, half-a-crown in the pound! "Now bear it in mind, if you're wanting to make, Let this, be your measureless plaint, The misery of wealth, get a halo, and preach, In the garb, of a modern Saint." Again he lifted his silk top hat, And bowing an adieu to me, He vanished away, with a lordly crawl, In the trunk, of the nearest tree, And thus, were my mediæval hopes Of wealth, by a caustic blow, Dispersed, and a lesson of evil taught, By the Devil, who touched me so. [Illustration: Saved!] I PICTURED out my passion, In florid fretwork fashion, Expostulating! Waiting! Stating, Mating we must be, And subtle thought, relating, To scheme, of emigrating, With bride, to land of Bashan, Was exercising me; When, peering like a picket, Or a cricket, From a thicket, Thro' the wicket, Came another, on the scene, And we were three! 'Twas the spinster, in a hurried Fit of minorhood, I married, She succoured me From bigamy, Said she, "Come home to tea!" I went, and drank it boiling,-- A mug of strong Bohea!-- I drank it, without sugar, A tannic dose, for me! [Illustration: A Most Remarkable Case]