The Book of Humorous Verse Part 74

A REMEDY WORSE THAN THE DISEASE

I sent for Ratcliffe; was so ill, That other doctors gave me over: He felt my pulse, prescribed his pill, And I was likely to recover.

But when the wit began to wheeze, And wine had warm'd the politician, Cured yesterday of my disease, I died last night of my physician.

_Matthew Prior._

A WIFE

Lord Erskine, at women presuming to rail, Calls a wife "a tin canister tied to one's tail"; And fair Lady Anne, while the subject he carries on, Seems hurt at his Lords.h.i.+p's degrading comparison.

But wherefore degrading? consider'd aright, A canister's useful, and polish'd, and bright: And should dirt its original purity hide, That's the fault of the puppy to whom it is tied.

_Richard Brinsley Sheridan._

THE HONEY-MOON

The honey-moon is very strange.

Unlike all other moons the change She regularly undergoes.

She rises at the full; then loses Much of her brightness; then reposes Faintly; and then ... has naught to lose.

_Walter Savage Landor._

DIDO

IMPROMPTU EPIGRAM ON THE LATIN GERUNDS

When Dido found aeneas would not come, She mourn'd in silence, and was _Di-do-dum(b)_.

_Richard Parson._

AN EPITAPH

A lovely young lady I mourn in my rhymes: She was pleasant, good-natured, and civil sometimes.

Her figure was good: she had very fine eyes, And her talk was a mixture of foolish and wise.

Her adorers were many, and one of them said, "She waltzed rather well! It's a pity she's dead!"

_George John Cayley._

ON TAKING A WIFE

"Come, come," said Tom's father, "at your time of life, There's no longer excuse for thus playing the rake.-- It is time you should think, boy, of taking a wife."-- "Why, so it is, father,--whose wife shall I take?"

_Thomas Moore._

UPON BEING OBLIGED TO LEAVE A PLEASANT PARTY FROM THE WANT OF A PAIR OF BREECHES TO DRESS FOR DINNER IN

Between Adam and me the great difference is, Though a paradise each has been forced to resign, That he never wore breeches till turn'd out of his, While, for want of my breeches, I'm banish'd from mine.

_Thomas Moore._

SOME LADIES

Some ladies now make pretty songs, And some make pretty nurses; Some men are great at righting wrongs And some at writing verses.

_Frederick Locker-Lampson._

ON A SENSE OF HUMOUR

He cannot be complete in aught Who is not humorously p.r.o.ne; A man without a merry thought Can hardly have a funny-bone.

_Frederick Locker-Lampson._