!
To woo the reluctant vote.
I would I were dead
And my say were said
And my song were sung to its ultimate note.

"Stab, stab, stab!
Ah! the weapon between my teeth--
I'm sick of the flash of it;
See how the slash of it
Misses the foeman to mangle the sheath!

"Boom, boom, boom!
I'm beating the mammoth drum.
My nethermost tripes
I blow into the pipes--
It's oh! for the honors that never come!"

'Twas the dolorous blab
Of a tramping "scab"--
'Twas the eloquent Swift
Of the marvelous gift--
The wild, weird, wonderful gift of gab!

IGNIS FATUUS

Weep, weep, each loyal partisan,
For Buckley, king of hearts;
A most accomplished man; a man
Of parts--of foreign parts.

Long years he ruled with gentle sway,
Nor grew his glory dim;
And he would be with us to-day
If we were but with him.

Men wondered at his going off
In such a sudden way;
'Twas thought, as he had come to scoff
He would remain to prey.

Since he is gone we're all agreed
That he is what men call
A crook: his very steps, indeed,
Are bent--to Montreal.

So let our tears unhindered flow,
Our sighs and groans have way:
It matters not how much we Oh!--
The devil is to pay.

FROM TOP TO BOTTOM

[Japan has 73,759 Buddhist priests, "most of whom," says a
Christian missionary, "are grossly ignorant, and many of them
lead scandalous lives."]

O Buddha, had you but foreknown
The vices of your priesthood
It would have made you twist and moan
As any wounded beast would.
You would have damned the entire lot
And turned a Christian, would you not?

There were no Christians, I'll allow,
In your day; that would only
Have brought distinction. Even now
A Christian might feel lonely.
All take the name, but facts are things
As stubborn as the will of kings.

The priests were ignorant and low
When ridiculed by Lucian;
The records, could we read, might show
The same of times Confucian.
And yet the fact I can't disguise
That Deacon Rankin's good and wise.

'Tis true he is not quite a priest,
Nor more than half a preacher;
But he exhorts as loud at least
As any living creature.
And when the plate is passed about
He never takes a penny out.

From Buddha down to Rankin! There,--
I never did intend to.
This pen's a buzzard's quill, I swear,
Such subjects to descend to.
When from the humming-bird I've wrung
A plume I'll write of Mike de Young