Whereat
He piled up chairs and tables for a town,
Set me a-top for Priam, called our cat
--Helen, enticed away from home (he said)
By wicked Paris, who couched somewhere close
Under the footstool, being cowardly,
But whom--since she was worth the pains, poor puss--
Towzer and Tray,--our dogs, the Atreidai,--sought
By taking Troy to get possession of
--Always when great Achilles ceased to sulk,
(My pony in the stable)--forth would prance
And put to flight Hector--our page-boy's self.
This taught me who was who and what was what:
So far I rightly understood the case
At five years old: a huge delight it proved
And still proves--thanks to that instructor sage
My Father, who knew better than turn straight
Learning's full flare on weak-eyed ignorance,
Or, worse yet, leave weak eyes to grow sand-blind,
Content with darkness and vacuity.

It happened, two or three years afterward,
That--I and playmates playing at Troy's Siege--
My Father came upon our make-believe.
"How would you like to read yourself the tale
Properly told, of which I gave you first
Merely such notion as a boy could bear?
Pope, now, would give you the precise account
Of what, some day, by dint of scholarship,
You'll hear--who knows?--from Homer's very mouth.
Learn Greek by all means, read the 'Blind Old Man,
Sweetest of Singers'--_tuphlos_ which means 'blind,'
_Hedistos_ which means 'sweetest.' Time enough!
Try, anyhow, to master him some day;
Until when, take what serves for substitute,
Read Pope, by all means!"
So I ran through Pope,
Enjoyed the tale--what history so true?
Also attacked my Primer, duly drudged,
Grew fitter thus for what was promised next--
The very thing itself, the actual words,
When I could turn--say, Buttmann to account.

Time passed, I ripened somewhat: one fine day,
"Quite ready for the Iliad, nothing less?
There's Heine, where the big books block the shelf:
Don't skip a word, thumb well the Lexicon!"

I thumbed well and skipped nowise till I learned
Who was who, what was what, from Homer's tongue,
And there an end of learning. Had you asked
The all-accomplished scholar, twelve years old,
"Who was it wrote the Iliad?"--what a laugh!
"Why, Homer, all th