THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR

WAR harms all ranks, all arts, all crafts appal;
At Mars’ harsh blast arch, rampart, altar fall!
Ah! hard as adamant a braggart Czar
Arms vassal-swarms, and fans a fatal war!
Rampant at that bad call, a Vandal band
Harass, and harm, and ransack Wallach-land.
A Tartar phalanx Balkan’s scarp hath past,
And Allah’s standard falls, alas! at last.

THE FALL OF EVE

EVE, Eden’s empress, needs defended be;
The Serpent greets her when she seeks the tree.
Serene she sees the speckled tempter creep;
Gentle he seems — perverted schemer deep —
Yet endless pretexts, ever fresh, prefers,
Vervetts her senses, revers when she errs.
Sneers when she weeps, regrets, repents she fell,
Then, deep-revenged, reseeks the nether Hell!

THE APPROACH OF EVENING

IDLING I sit in this mild twilight dim.
Whilst birds, in wild swift vigils, circling skim.
Light wings in sighing sink, till, rising bright.
Night’s Virgin Pilgrim swims in vivid light.

INCONTROVERTIBLE FACTS

NO monk too good to rob, or cog, or plot.
No fool so gross to bolt Scotch collops hot.
From Donjon tops no Oronooko rolls.
Logwood, not lotos, floods Oporto’s bowls.
Troops of old tosspots oft to sot consort.
Box tops our schoolboys, too, do flog for sport.
No cool monsoons blow oft on Oxford dons,
Orthodox, jog-trot, book-worm Solomons!
Bold Ostrogoths of ghosts no horror show.
On London shop-fronts no hop-blossoms grow.
To crocks of gold no Dodo looks for food.
On soft cloth footstools no old fox doth brood.
Long storm-tost sloops forlorn do work to port.
Rooks do not roost on spoons, nor woodcocks snort.
Nor dog on snowdrop or on coltsfoot rolls.
Nor common frog concocts long protocols.

PHILOSOPHY

DULL humdrum murmurs lull, but hubbub stuns.
Lucullus snuffs up musk, mundungus shuns.
Puss purrs, buds burst, bucks butt, luck turns up trumps;
But full cups, hurtful, spur up unjust thumps.

• from Literary Frivolities, Fancies, Follies and Frolics compiled by by William T. Dobson (1880)