Classic Poem

'Twas in the town of Lubeck,
A hundred years ago,
An old man walked into the church,
With beard as white as snow;
Yet were his cheeks not wrinkled,
Nor dim his eagle eye:
There's many a knight that steps the street,
Might wonder, should he chance to meet
That man erect and high!

When silenced was the organ,
And hushed the vespers loud,
The Sacristan approached the sire,
And drew him from the crowd —
" There's something in thy visage,
On which I dare not look;
And when I rang the passing bell,
A tremor that I may not tell,
My very vitals shook.

" Who art thou, awful stranger?
Our ancient annals say,
That twice two hundred years ago
Another passed this way,
Like thee in face and feature;
And, if the tale be true,
'Tis writ, that in this very year
Again the stranger shall appear.
Art thou the Wandering Jew? "
" The Wandering Jew, thou dotard! "

The wondrous phantom cried —
" 'Tis several centuries ago
Since that poor stripling died.
He would not use my nostrums —
See, shaveling, here they are!
These put to flight all human ills,
These conquer death — unfailing pills,
And I'm the inventor, Parr ! "