Black Beetles in Amber

Caught in a storm of his native snows,
With a purple ear and an azure nose.
The Smith continued: 'I never pursue
Immoral readin'.' And that is true:
He's a saint of remarkably high degree,
With a mind as chaste as a mind can be;
But read!—the devil a word can he!

A MILITARY INCIDENT

Dawn heralded the coming sun—
  Fort Douglas was computing
The minutes—and the sunrise gun
  Was manned for his saluting.
The gunner at that firearm stood,
  The which he slowly loaded,
When, bang!—I know not how it could,
  But sure the charge exploded!
Yes, to that veteran's surprise
  The gun went off sublimely,
And both his busy arms likewise
Went off with it, untimely.
Then said that gunner to his mate
  (He was from Ballyshannon):
'Bedad, the sun's a minute late,
  Accardin' to this cannon!'

SUBSTANCE VERSUS SHADOW

So, gentle critics, you would have me tilt,
Not at the guilty, only just at Guilt!—
Spare the offender and condemn Offense,
And make life miserable to Pretense!
'Whip Vice and Folly—that is satire's use—
But be not personal, for that's abuse;
Nor e'er forget what, 'like a razor keen,
Wounds with a touch that's neither felt nor seen.''
Well, friends, I venture, destitute of awe,
To think that razor but an old, old saw,
A trifle rusty; and a wound, I'm sure,
That's felt not, seen not, one can well endure.
Go to! go to!—you're as unfitted quite
To give advice to writers as to write.
I find in Folly and in Vice a lack
Of head to hit, and for the lash no back;
Whilst Pixley has a pow that's easy struck,
And though good Deacon Fitch (a Fitch for luck!)
Has none, yet, lest he go entirely free,
God gave to him a corn, a heel to me.
He, also, sets his face (so like a flint
The wonder grows that Pickering doesn't skin't)
With cold austerity, against these wars
On scamps—'tis Scampery that he abhors!
Behold advance in dignity and state—
Grave, smug, serene, indubitably great—
Stanford, philanthropist! One hand bestows
In alms what t'other one as justice owes.
Rascality attends him like a shade,
But closes, woundless, o'er my baffled blade,
Its limbs unsevered, spirit undismayed.
Faith! I'm for something can be made to feel,
If, like Pelides, only in the heel.
The fellow's self invites assault; his crimes
Will each bear killing twenty thousand times!
Anon Creed Haymond—but the list is long
Of names to point the moral of my song.
Rogues, fools, impostors, sycophants, they rise,
They foul the earth and horrify the skies—
With Mr. Huntington (sole honest man
In all the reek of that rapscallion clan)
Denouncing Theft as hard as e'er he can!

THE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC MORALS

The Senate met in Sacramento city;
On public morals it had no committee
Though greatly these abounded. Soon the quiet
Was broken by the Senators in riot.
Now, at the end of their contagious quarrels,
There's a committee but no public morals.