Classic Poem

" FAIR daughter, it puzzles me much, "
Quoth Jove to Idalia's Queen,
" Why you married a god on a crutch,
Who never looks fit to he seen.
With Mars, and with Bacchus, and with
Apollo to woo you in songs,
Oh! how could you marry a smith
Who furnishes pokers and tongs! "

" Dread sire, " said the Queen of the Loves,
" While Vulcan is beating hot shoes
All day, I can harness my doves,
And call on what people I choose:
You made him a smith from his birth,
His forge on Mount Ætna he plies:
Let him mind his shop upon earth,
And me manage mine in the skies.

The Thunderer nodded assent,
Ere long, with his viue-circled rod,
On no honest embassy bent,
Came Bacchus, the ivy-crown'd god.
He drove the dame out in his car;
Anacreon call'd up the Nine,
And thrumm'd his eternal guitar
In praise of the myrtle and vine.

With Vulcan employ'd all the day,
The lovers felt doubly secure;
We know, when Grimalkin's away,
The mice are not over-demure.
Thus flitted unclouded the scene,
Till Dian nine circuits had run:
When, lo! the parturient Queen
Of Paphos gave birth to a son.

In flannels Jove swaddled the imp,
As broad as his mother's blue zone,
And prudently gave him a limp,
To pass for lame Mulciber's own.
The Bacchus and Venus-born child
Grew, otherwise, healthy and stout.
Hippocrates nursed him, and styled
The big-footed libertine — Gout!