Classic Poem

Chancing a Nightingale to meet,
Thus did an Ass the songstress greet: —
" Whither in such a hurry winging?
I 'm told, my dear, you 're famed for singing.
My curiosity I fain would satisfy,
So if you 'll condescend to gratify, —
Come! for a specimen of your rare skill,
And let me hear how featly you can trill! "
Forthwith the Nightingale began,
And through her cadences she ran,
Now tender and most soft,
Anon her voice she raised aloft;
While all around in silence hushed
Listened to her melting strain,
As its music sweetly gushed,
And floated over dale and plain;
Hardly breathed the enraptured swain
As drank his ear of sound the stream,
And as he mused on the varying theme.
Ceased the songstress, the critic Ass
His sentence thus began to pass: —
" Upon my word, 't is not amiss!
Yet you should hear
Friend Chanticleer.
From him some lessons you 'd do well to take.
His mode of singing well I know,
Nor can there finer be, I trow.
Yes! He is clever;
And you, my dear, should by all means endeavour
Like him to crow!
He has a voice — a shake —
That really keeps folks quite awake.
Yet after all you do not sing amiss. "
On hearing this,
Far away the song-bird flew.