Black Beetles in Amber

Your spongy passion for the blood of age?'
Death with a clattering convulsion, drew
  His coat on, hatted his unmeated pow,
Unbarred the door and, stepping partly through,
  Turned and made answer: 'I will show you how.
I'm going to the Bench you call Supreme
And tap the old women who sit there and dream.'

THE SHAFTER SHAFTED

Well, James McMillan Shafter, you're a Judge—
  At least you were when last I knew of you;
And if the people since have made you budge
  I did not notice it. I've much to do
  Without endeavoring to follow, through
The miserable squabbles, dust and smudge,
The fate of even the veteran contenders
Who fight with flying colors and suspenders.
Being a Judge, 'tis natural and wrong
  That you should villify the public press—
Save while you are a candidate. That song
  Is easy quite to sing, and I confess
  It wins applause from hearers who have less
Of spiritual graces than belong
To audiences of another kidney—
Men, for example, like Sir Philip Sidney.
Newspapers, so you say, don't always treat
  The Judges with respect. That may be so
And still no harm done, for I swear I'll eat
  My legs and in the long hereafter go,
  Snake-like, upon my belly if you'll show
All Judges are respectable and sweet.
For some of them are rogues and the world's laughter's
Directed at some others, for they're Shafters.

THE MUMMERY

THE TWO CAVEES

DRAMATIS PERSON?.

FITCH a Pelter of Railrogues
PICKERING his Partner, an Enemy to Sin
OLD NICK a General Blackwasher
DEAD CAT a Missile
ANTIQUE EGG Another
RAILROGUES, DUMP-CARTERS. NAVVIES and Unassorted SHOVELRY in the Lower Distance
Scene—The Brink of a Railway Cut, a Mile Deep.
Time—1875.

FITCH:

Gods! what a steep declivity! Below
I see the lazy dump-carts come and go,
Creeping like beetles and about as big.
The delving Paddies—

PICKERING:

Case of infra dig.

FITCH:

Loring, light-minded and unmeaning quips
Come with but scant propriety from lips
Fringed with the blue-black evidence of age.
'Twere well to cultivate a style more sage,
For men will fancy, hearing how you pun,
Our foulest missiles are but thrown in fun.
(Enter Dead Cat.)
Here's one that thoughtfully has come to hand; Slant your fine eye below and see it land. (Seizes Dead Cat by the tail and swings it in act to throw.)
DEAD CAT (singing):
Merrily, merrily, round I go—
  Over and under and at.
Swing wide and free, swing high and low
  The anti-monopoly cat!
O, who wouldn't be in the place of me,
  The anti-monopoly cat?
    Designed to admonish,