English

You only asked me when you know
I've asked another man to dine.
And, as to-day I eat at home,
Your invitation I decline.

Your share of Marius' estate
Is just four pounds of battered plate.
You thought you'd cornered him: l' feg,
The boot is on the other leg.

A LION wont to cower beneath the whip,
Within whose jaws the trainer oft would slip
His hand unharmed, forgot its gentle ways
And showed the fury of its Libyan days.
Two boys belonging to the youthful band,
Who with their rakes smooth out the bloody sand,
The savage beast with fangs accursed slew —
A greater crime the circus never knew.
Well might we cry — " Thou cruel thief, forbear.
Learn from our Roman wolf young lives to spare."

Call it not pride, no longer I
Can greet you as your thrall.
I've won the cap of liberty,
Although it cost mine all.

The man whose mean desires accord
With all that masters crave
Must cringe; but he shall need no lord
Who doth not need a slave.

Whenever I meet you, wherever I go,
Ten times in one hour it is — " How do you do?"
That " How do you do?" is your first word each day:
It is plain that there is not much doing your way.

Because one curl had come unbound
I hear you took your glass
And called your maid, and to the ground
Struck down the hapless lass.

Cease, madam, pray, your hair to tire
And fill your girls with terror.
A razor is what you require
To make you like your mirror.

Why should they your caprice obey,
And to your fancies pander.
Cut all those cruel locks away,
Or touch a salamander.

" WHY does friend Johnson wear that gloomy look?"
" Good cause," you say, " this very morn I took
My wife's corpse to the grave." " Oh dear, oh dear,
Your rich old wife, no more we'll see her here.
And all her money now is yours to spend!
I am indeed distressed, my worthy friend."

My lad, it's a captain's good lady you're meeting,
Though you think if you're caught you'll get off with a beating.
He's a sword and he'll use it. " Not legal" — you say.
Well, are they quite legal, your goings-on, pray?

Those Libyan rogues accuse your wife of greed,
And call her avaricious; yes, indeed!
But such a charge of rankest falsehood savours;
She rather is too generous with her favours.

Your wife is not lacking in prudence or spite,
And that she has shown very plain;
She has bidden an eunuch to watch you at night,
And thinks then you chaste will remain.