There is no torment like to thee,
Thou pneumogastric nerve!

This subtle, envious nerve appears
To be a patient foe,--
It waited nearly forty years
Its chance to lay me low;
Then, like some blithering blast of hell,
It struck this guileless bard,
And in that evil hour I fell
Prodigious far and hard.
Alas! what things I dearly love--
Pies, puddings, and preserves--
Are sure to rouse the vengeance of
All pneumogastric nerves!

Oh that I could remodel man!
I'd end these cruel pains
By hitting on a different plan
From that which now obtains.
The stomach, greatly amplified,
Anon should occupy
The all of that domain inside
Where heart and lungs now lie.
But, first of all, I should depose
That diabolic curve
And author of my thousand woes,
The pneumogastric nerve!

TEENY-WEENY.

EVERY evening, after tea,
Teeny-Weeny comes to me,
And, astride my willing knee,
Plies his lash and rides away;
Though that palfrey, all too spare,
Finds his burden hard to bear,
Teeny-Weeny doesn't care,--
He commands, and I obey!

First it's trot; and gallop then,--
Now it's back to trot again;
Teeny-Weeny likes it when
He is riding fierce and fast!
Then his dark eyes brighter grow
And his cheeks are all aglow,--
"More!" he cries, and never "Whoa!"
Till the horse breaks down at last!

Oh, the strange and lovely sights
Teeny-Weeny sees of nights,
As he makes those famous flights
On that wondrous horse of his!
Oftentimes, before he knows,
Wearylike his eyelids close,
And, still smiling, off he goes
Where the land of By-low is.

There he sees the folk of fay
Hard at ring-a-rosie play,
And he hears those fairies say,
"Come, let's chase him to and fro!"
But, with a defiant shout,
Teeny puts that host to rout,--
Of this tale I make no doubt,--
Every night he tells it so!

So I feel a tender pride