AT THE CHURCH GATE. ALTHOUGH I enter not, And near the sacred gate, The minster bell tolls out Above the city's rout, And noise and humming; They've hushed the minster bell: The organ 'gins to swell; She's coming, she's coming! My lady comes at last, And hastening hither, With modest eyes downcast: She comes she's here, she's past May Heaven go with her! Kneel undisturbed, fair saint! Pour out your praise or plaint I will not enter there, To sully your pure prayer But suffer me to pace Round the forbidden place, Lingering a minute Like outcast spirits who wait And.see through Heaven's gate Angels within it. THE AGE OF WISDOM. Ho, pretty page, with the dimpled chin, That never has known the barber's shear, your wish is woman to win, All This is the way that boys begin, Wait till you come to Forty Year. Curly gold locks cover foolish brains, Billing and cooing is all your cheer; Sighing and singing of midnight strains, Under Bonnybell's window panes,— Wait till you come to Forty Year! Forty times over let Michaelmas pass, Then you know a boy is an ass, Pledge me round, I bid ye declare, All good fellows whose beards are gray, Did not the fairest of the fair Common grow and wearisome ere The reddest lips that ever have kissed, The brightest eyes that ever have shone, May pray and whisper, and we not list, Or look away, and never be missed, Ere yet ever a month is gone. Gillian's dead, God rest her bier; Marian's married, but I sit here Alone and merry at Forty Year, Dipping my nose in the Gascon wine. SORROWS OF WERTHER. WERTHER had a love for Charlotte Such as words could never utter; Would you know how first he met her? She was cutting bread and butter. Charlotte was a married lady, And a moral man was Werther, And for all the wealth of Indies, Would do nothing for to hurt her. So he sighed and pined and ogled, And his passion boiled and bubbled, Till he blew his silly brains out, And no more was by it troubled. |