Every Girl's Library Part 26

"Confound it! Where are my spectacles?" the Monarch exclaimed.

"Angelica! Go up into my bedroom, look under my pillow, not your mamma's; there you'll see my keys. Bring them down to me, and--Well, well! what impetuous things these girls are!" Angelica was gone and had run up panting to the bedroom and found the keys, and was back again before the King had finished a m.u.f.fin. "Now, love," says he, "you must go all the way back for my desk, in which my spectacles are. If you _would_ but have heard me out.... Be hanged to her! There she is off again. Angelica! ANGELICA!" When his Majesty called in his _loud voice_, she knew she must obey and come back.

"My dear, when you go out of a room, how often have I told you, _shut the door_! That's a darling. That's all." At last the keys and the desk and the spectacles were got, and the King mended his pen, and signed his name to a reprieve, and Angelica ran with it as swift as the wind.

"You'd better stay, my love, and finish the m.u.f.fins. There's no use going. Be sure it's too late. Hand me over that raspberry jam, please,"

said the Monarch. "Bong! Bawong! There goes the half-hour. I knew it was."

Angelica ran, and ran, and ran, and ran. She ran up Fore street, and down High street and through the Marketplace and down to the left, and over the bridge and up the blind alley, and back again, and around by the Castle, and so along by the haberdasher's on the right, opposite the lamp-post, and around the square, and she came--she came to the _Execution place_, where she saw Bulbo laying his head on the block!!!!

The executioneer raised his axe, but at that moment the Princess came panting up and cried Reprieve. "Reprieve!" screamed the Princess.

"Reprieve!" shouted all the people. Up the scaffold stairs she sprang, with the agility of a lighter of lamps; and flinging herself in Bulbo's arms regardless of all ceremony, she cried out, "O my Prince! my lord!

my love! my Bulbo! Thine Angelica has been in time to save thy precious existence, sweet rosebud; to prevent thy being nipped in thy young bloom! Had aught befallen thee, Angelica too had died, and welcomed death that joined her to her Bulbo."

"H'm! there's no accounting for taste," said Bulbo, looking so very much puzzled and uncomfortable, that the Princess, in tones of tenderest strain, asked the cause of his disquiet.

"I tell you what it is, Angelica," said he: "since I came here yesterday, there has been such a row, and disturbance, and quarrelling, and fighting, and chopping of heads off, and the deuce to pay, that I am inclined to go back to Crim Tartary."

"But with me as thy bride, my Bulbo! Though wherever thou art is Crim Tartary to me, my bold, my beautiful, my Bulbo!"

"Well, well, I suppose we must be married," says Bulbo. "Doctor, you came to read the funeral service--read the marriage service, will you?

What must be, must. That will satisfy Angelica, and then in the name of peace and quietness, do let us go back to breakfast."

Bulbo had carried a rose in his mouth all the time of the dismal ceremony. It was a fairy rose, and he was told by his mother that he ought never to part with it. So he had kept it between his teeth, even when he laid his poor head upon the block, hoping vaguely that some chance would turn up in his favour. As he began to speak to Angelica, he forgot about the rose, and of course it dropped out of his mouth. The romantic Princess instantly stooped and seized it. "Sweet Rose!" she exclaimed, "that bloomed upon my Bulbo's lip, never, never will I part from thee!" and she placed it in her bosom. And you know Bulbo _couldn't_ ask her to give the rose back again. And they went to breakfast; and as they walked it seemed to Bulbo that Angelica became more exquisitely lovely every moment.

He was frantic until they were married; and now, strange to say, it was Angelica who didn't care about him! He knelt down, he kissed her hand, he prayed and begged; he cried with admiration; while she for her part said she really thought they might wait; it seemed to her that he was not handsome any more--no, not at all, quite the reverse; and not clever, no very stupid; and not well-bred, like Giglio; no, on the contrary, dreadfully vul----

What, I cannot say, for King Valoroso roared out "_Pooh_, stuff!" in a terrible voice. "We will have no more of this s.h.i.+lly-shallying! Call the Archbishop and let the Prince and Princess be married off-hand!"

So, married they were, and I am sure for my part I trust they will be happy.

THE CANE-BOTTOM'D CHAIR

In tattered old slippers that toast at the bars, And a ragged old jacket perfumed with cigars, Away from the world and its toils and its cares, I've a snug little kingdom up four pair of stairs.

To mount to this realm is a toil, to be sure, But the fire there is bright and the air rather pure; And the view I behold on a suns.h.i.+ny day Is grand through the chimney pots over the way.

This snug little chamber is cramm'd in all nooks With worthless old knickknacks and silly old books, And foolish old odds and foolish old ends, Crack'd bargains from brokers, cheap keep-sakes from friends.

Old armour, prints, pictures, pipes, china, (all crack'd,) Old rickety tables, and chairs broken-backed; A twopenny treasury, wondrous to see; What matters? 'tis pleasant to you, friend, and me.

No better divan need the Sultan require, Than the creaking old sofa that basks by the fire; And 'tis wonderful, surely, what music you get From the rickety, ramshackle, wheezy spinet.

That praying-rug came from a Turcoman's camp; By Tiber once twinkled that brazen old lamp; A mameluke fierce yonder dagger has drawn; 'Tis a murderous knife to toast m.u.f.fins upon.

Long, long through the hours, and the night and the chimes, Here we talk of old books, and old friends and old times As we sit in a fog made out of rich Letakie This chamber is pleasant to you, friend, and me.

But of all the cheap treasures that garnish my nest, There's one that I love and I cherish the best: For the finest of coaches that's padded with hair I never would change thee, my cane-bottom'd chair.

'Tis a bandy-legg'd, high-shoulder'd worm-eaten seat, With a creaking old back and twisted old feet; But since the fair morning when f.a.n.n.y sat there, I bless thee and love thee, old cane-bottom'd chair.

If chairs have but feeling, in holding such charms, A thrill must have pa.s.s'd through your wither'd old arms!

I look'd and I long'd and I wish'd in despair; I wish'd myself turn'd to a cane-bottom'd chair.

It was but a moment she sat in this place, She'd a scarf on her neck, and a smile on her face!

A smile on her face, and a rose in her hair, And she sat there and bloom'd in my cane-bottom'd chair.

And so I have valued my chair ever since, Like the shrine of a saint, or the throne of a prince; Saint f.a.n.n.y, my patroness sweet I declare, The queen of my heart and my cane-bottom'd chair.

When the candles burn low, and the company's gone, In the silence of night as I sit here alone-- I sit here alone, but we yet are a pair-- My f.a.n.n.y I see in my cane-bottom'd chair.

She comes from the past and revisits my room; She looked as she did, all beauty and bloom; So smiling and tender, so fresh and so fair, And yonder she sits in my cane-bottom'd chair.

A TRAGIC STORY

There lived a sage in days of yore And he a handsome pigtail wore; But wondered much and sorrowed more Because it hung behind him.

He mused upon this curious case, And swore he'd change the pigtail's place, And have it hanging at his face, Not dangling there behind him.

Says he, "The mystery I've found,-- I'll turn me round,"--he turned him round, But still it hung behind him.

Then round and round, and out and in, All day the puzzled sage did spin In vain--it mattered not a pin--, The pigtail hung behind him.

And right, and left, and round about, And up, and down, and in and out, He turned; but still the pigtail stout Hung steadily behind him.

And though his efforts never slack, And though he twist, and twirl, and tack, Alas! still faithful to his back The pigtail hangs behind him.

TO MARY

I seem, in the midst of the crowd, The lightest of all; My laughter rings cheery and loud, In banquet and ball.

My lip hath its smiles and its sneers, For all men to see; But my soul, and my truth, and my tears, Are for thee, are for thee!

Around me they flatter and fawn-- The young and the old.

The fairest are ready to p.a.w.n Their hearts for my gold.

They sue me--I laugh as I spurn The slaves at my knee; But in faith and in fondness I turn Unto thee, unto thee!

LITTLE BILLEE

AIR--"_Il y avait un pet.i.t navire._"

There were three sailors of Bristol city Who took a boat and went to sea.

But first with beef and captain's biscuits, And pickled pork they loaded she.

There was gorging Jack and guzzling Jimmy, And the youngest he was little Billee.