He seem’d in love with chance--and chance repaid His ardent passion with her fondest smile, The sunshine of good luck, without a shade, He staked and won--and won and staked--the bile It stirr’d of many a man and many a maid, To see at every venture how that vile Small gambler snatch’d--and how he won them too-- A living Pam, omnipotent at loo! [Illustration: A TIDE-WAITER.] Miss Wiggins set her heart upon a box, ’Twas handsome, rosewood, and inlaid with brass, And dreamt three times she garnish’d it with stocks, Of needles, silks, and cottons--but alas! She lost it wide awake.--We thought Miss Cox Was lucky--but she saw three caddies pass To that small imp:--no living luck could loo him! Sir Stamford would have lost his Raffles to him! And so he climb’d--and rode, and won--and walk’d, The wondrous topic of the curious swarm That haunted the Parade. Many were balk’d Of notoriety by that small form Pacing it up and down:--some even talk’d Of ducking him--when lo! a dismal storm Stepp’d in--one Friday, at the close of day-- And every head was turn’d another way-- Watching the grander guest. It seem’d to rise Bulky and slow upon the southern brink Of the horizon--fann’d by sultry sighs-- So black and threatening, I cannot think Of any simile, except the skies Miss Wiggins sometime _shades_ in Indian ink-- _Miss_-shapen blotches of such heavy vapour, They seem a deal more solid than her paper. As for the sea, it did not fret, and rave, And tear its waves to tatters, and so dash on The stony-hearted beach;--some bards would have It always rampant, in that idle fashion,-- Whereas the waves roll’d in, subdued and grave, Like schoolboys, when the master’s in a passion, Who meekly settle in and take their places, With a very quiet awe on all their faces. Some love to draw the ocean with a head, Like troubled table-beer,--and make it bounce, And froth and roar, and fling--but this, I’ve said, Surged in scarce rougher than a lady’s flounce:-- But then, a grander contrast thus it bred With the wild welkin, seeming to pronounce Something more awful in the serious ear, As one would whisper that a lion’s near-- Who just begins to roar; so the hoarse thunder Growl’d long--but low--a prelude note of death, As if the stifling clouds yet kept it under, But still it mutter’d to the sea beneath Such a continued peal, as made us wonder It did not pause more oft to take its breath, Whilst we were panting with the sultry weather, And hardly cared to wed two words together,