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In point of fact, good Captain Reece Beatified"The Mantelpiece."

One summer eve, at half-past ten,

He said (addressing all his men):

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'Come, tell me, please, what I can do To please and gratify my crew.

"By any reasonable plan

I'll make you happy if I can;
My own convenience count as nil:
It is my duty, and I will."

Then up and answered William Lee
(The kindly captain's coxswain he,
A nervous, shy, low-spoken man),
He cleared his throat and thus began:

"You have a daughter, Captain Reece,
Ten female cousins and a niece,
A ma, if what I'm told is true,
Six sisters, and an aunt or two.

"Now, somehow, sir, it seems to me,
More friendly-like we all should be,
If you united of 'em to
Unmarried members of the crew.

"If you'd ameliorate our life,
Let each select for them a wife;
And as for nervous me, old pal,
Give me your own enchanting gal!"

Good Captain Reece, that worthy man,
Debated on his coxswain's plan:
"I quite agree," he said, "O Bill;
It is my duty, and I will.

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"But what are dukes and viscounts to
The happiness of all my crew?
The word I give you I'll fulfill;
It is my duty, and I will.

"As you desire it shall befall,

I'll settle thousands on you all,
And I shall be, despite my hoard,
The only bachelor on board."

The boatswain of "The Mantelpiece," He blushed and spoke to Captain Reece: "I beg your honor's leave," he said; "If you would wish to go and wed,

"I have a widowed mother who

Would be the very thing for you-She long has loved you from afar: She washes for you, Captain R."

The captain saw the dame that dayAddressed her in his playful way"And did it want a wedding ring? It was a tempting ickle sing!

"Well, well, the chaplain I will seek,
We'll all be married this day week
At yonder church upon the hill;
It is my duty, and I will!"

The sisters, cousins, aunts, and niece,
And widowed ma of Captain Reece,
Attended there as they were bid:
It was their duty, and they did.

FERDINANDO AND ELVIRA; OR, THE GENTLE PIEMAN.

PART I.

Ar a pleasant evening party I had taken down to supper

One whom I will call Elvira, and we talked of love and Tupper.

Mr. Tupper and the Poets, very lightly with them dealing,

For I've always been distinguished for a strong poetic feeling.

Then we let off paper crackers, each of which contained a motto,

And she listened while I read them, till her mother told her not to.

Then she whispered: "To the ball-room we had better, dear, be walking;

If we stop down here much longer, really people will be talking."

There were noblemen in coronets, and military cousins,

There were captains by the hundred, there were baronets by dozens.

Yet she heeded not their offers, but dismissed them with a blessing,

Then she let down all her back hair, which had taken long in dressing.

Then she had convulsive sobbings in her agitated throttle,

Then she wiped her pretty eyes and smelt her pretty smelling-bottle.

So I whispered: "Dear Elvira, say-what can the matter be with you? Does anything you've eaten, darling Popsy, disagree with you?"

But spite of all I said, her sobs grew more | There were fuchsias and geraniums, and and more distressing,

And she tore her pretty back hair, which had taken long in dressing.

Then she gazed upon the carpet, at the ceiling, then above me, And she whispered: "Ferdinando, do you really, really love me?"

"Love you?" said I, then I sighed, and then I gazed upon her sweetly—

For I think I do this sort of thing particularly neatly.

"Send me to the Arctic regions, or illimitable

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daffodils and myrtle,

So I entered, and I ordered half a basin of mock turtle.

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THE BISHOP OF RUM-TO-FOO.
FROM east and south the holy clan
Of bishops gathered to a man;
To Synod, called Pan-Anglican,

In flocking crowds they came.
Among them was a bishop, who
Had lately been appointed to
The balmy isle of Rum-ti-Foo,

And Peter was his name.

His people-twenty-three in sum-
They played the eloquent tum-tum,
And lived on scalps served up in rum-

The only sauce they knew.
When first good Bishop Peter came
(For Peter was that bishop's name).
To humor them he did the same

As they of Rum-ti-Foo.

His flock, I've often heard him tell, (His name was Peter) loved him well, And, summoned by the sound of bell,

In crowds together came. "Oh, massa, why you go away? Oh, Massa Peter, please to stay." (They called him Peter, people say,

Because it was his name.)

He told them all good boys to be,
And sailed away across the sea,
At London Bridge that bishop he

Arrived one Tuesday night:
And as that night he homeward strode
To his Pan-Anglican abode,
He passed along the Borough road,
And saw a gruesome sight.

He saw a crowd assembled round
A person dancing on the ground,
Who straight began to leap and bound
With all his might and main.

To see that dancing man he stopped,
Who twirled and wriggled, skipped and
hopped,

Then down incontinently dropped,

And then sprang up again.

The bishop chuckled at the sight. "This style of dancing would delight A simple Rum-ti-Foozleite.

I'll learn it if I can,

To please the tribe when I get back." He begged the man to teach his knack, "Right Reverend Sir, in half a crack!"

Replied that dancing man,

The dancing man he worked away, And taught the bishop every dayThe dancer skipped like any fayGood Peter did the same.

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"We now proceed to something new-
Dance as the Paynes and Lauris do,
Like this-one, two-one, two-one, two."
The bishop, never proud,

But in an overwhelming heat
His name was Peter, I repeat,
Performed the Payne and Lauri feat)

And puffed his thanks aloud.

Another game the dancer planned"Just take your ankle in your hand, And try, my lord, if you can standYour body stiff and stark.

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If, when revisiting your see,
You learnt to hop on shore-like me-
The novelty would striking be,

And must attract remark."

No," said the worthy bishop, "no:
That is a length to which, I trow,
Colonial bishops cannot go.

You may express surprise
At finding bishops deal in pride-
But if that trick I ever tried,
I should appear undignified
In Rum-ti-Foozle's eyes.

"The islanders of Rum-ti-Foo
Are well-conducted persons, who
Approve a joke as much as you,

And laugh at it as such;
But if they saw their bishop land,
His leg supported in his hand,
The joke they wouldn't understand-
'Twould pain them very much!"

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She was only eighteen, and as fair as could be, The name of his father he'd couple and pair

With her tempting smiles

And maidenly wiles,

And he was a trifle past seventy-three.

Now what she could see

Is a puzzle to me

In a prophet of seventy-seventy-three.

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A dear little lad

Who drove 'em half mad,

For he turned out a horribly fast little cad.

For when he was born he astonished all by, With their "Law, dear me !" "Did ever you see?"

(With his ill-bred laugh,
And insolent chaff.)

With those of the nursery heroines rare

Virginia the fair,

Or Good Goldenhair,

Till the nuisance was more than a prophet could bear.

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He'd a pipe in his mouth and a glass in his eye, He early determined to marry and wive,

A hat all awry

An octagon tie

For better or worse With his elderly nurse

And a miniature-miniature glass in his eye. Which the poor little boy didn't live to con

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trive:

His health didn't thrive--
No longer alive,

He died an enfeebled old dotard at five!

MORAL.

Now, elderly men of the bachelor crew, With wrinkled hose

And spectacled nose,

He'd chuck his nurse under the chin, and Don't marry at all-you may take it as true

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If ever you do

The step you will rue,

For your babies will be elderly-elderly too.

BAINES CAREW, GENTLEMAN.

Or all the good attorneys who

Have placed their names upon the roll, But few could equal Baines Carew For tender-heartedness and soul. Whene'er he heard a tale of woe From client A or client B, His grief would overcome him so

He'd scarce have strength to take his fee.

It laid him up for many days,
When duty led him to distrain,
And serving writs, although it pays,
Gave him excruciating pain.

He made out costs, distrained for rent,
Foreclosed and sued, with moistened

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