Black Beetles in Amber

The chap that defended her said: 'It's our claim
That he loved us no longer and told us the same.
What else than we did could we decently do?—
Sing tooral, iooral, iooral ioo.'
The District Attorney, sarcastic, replied:
'We loved you no longer—that can't be denied.
Not having no eyes we may dote on you now—
Sing tooral, iooral, iooral iow.'
The prisoner wept to entoken her fears;
The sockets of Petrie were flooded with tears.
O heaven-born Sympathy, bully for you!—
Sing tooral, iooral, iooral ioo.
Four jurors considered the prisoner mad,
And four thought her victim uncommonly bad,
And four that the acid was all in his eye—
Sing rum tiddy iddity iddity hi.

COUPLETS

    Intended for Inscription on a Sword Presented to Colonel Cutting of the National Guard of California.

I am for Cutting. I'm a blade
Designed for use at dress parade.
My gleaming length, when I display
Peace rules the land with gentle sway;
But when the war-dogs bare their teeth
Go seek me in the modest sheath.
I am for Cutting. Not for me
The task of setting nations free.
Let soulless blades take human life,
My softer metal shuns the strife.
The annual review is mine,
When gorgeous shopmen sweat and shine,
And Biddy, tip-toe on the pave,
Adores the cobble-trotting brave.
I am for Cutting. 'Tis not mine
To hew amain the hostile line;
Not mine all pitiless to spread
The plain with tumuli of dead.
My grander duty lies afar
From haunts of the insane hussar,
Where charging horse and struggling foot
Are grimed alike with cannon-soot.
When Loveliness and Valor meet
Beneath the trees to dance, and eat,
And sing, and much beside, behold
My golden glories all unfold!
There formidably are displayed
The useful horrors of my blade
In time of feast and dance and ballad,
I am for cutting chicken salad.

A RETORT

As vicious women think all men are knaves,
And shrew-bound gentlemen discourse of slaves;
As reeling drunkards judge the world unsteady
And idlers swear employers ne'er get ready—
Thieves that the constable stole all they had,
The mad that all except themselves are mad;
So, in another's clear escutcheon shown,
Barnes rails at stains reflected from his own;
Prates of 'docility,' nor feels the dark
Ring round his neck—the Ralston collar mark.
Back, man, to studies interrupted once,
Ere yet the rogue had merged into the dunce.
Back, back to Yale! and, grown with years discreet,
The course a virgin's lust cut short, complete.
Go drink again at the Pierian pool,
And learn—at least to better play the fool.
No longer scorn the draught, although the font,
Unlike Pactolus, waters not Belmont.

A VISION OF RESURRECTION

I had a dream. The habitable earth—
Its continents and islands, all were bare
Of cities and of forests. Naught remained
Of its old aspect, and I only knew
(As men know things in dreams, unknowing how)
That this was earth and that all men were dead.
On every side I saw the barren land,