Old Mother Hubbard.

See this old woman, feeble and outworn?
Her withered brow, her countenance forlorn?
Whose weary eyes, too spiritless for tears,
Reflect the dismal burden of her years?
Whose faltering footsteps seem to tread the way
That leads to obsolescence and decay?
A woman old and destitute, and yet
Not too much so to keep a household pet.
Observe the scene more closely, and you see
A member of the canine family,
His tail between his miserable legs
And in his eye a mute appeal, that begs
So humbly, as to some faint hope it clings—
A look that seems to say so many things.
And as he crouches meekly at her feet,
Pathetically asks “When do we eat?”
His mistress' eyebrow quivers with remorse
And croaks she, inarticulate and hoarse,
How now there, sweet my Fido, what's to do?
What is it that so sorely troubles you?
The creature's face lights up, and then with care
Assuming his expression of despair,
Endeavours with comparative success
To register nutritional distress.
Ah. who to such entreaty could be blind?
His pleading message penetrates her mind,
That weary frame he drags along the floor
And follows her towards the pantry door.
Alas! How many castles in the air,
Transparent hopes, ephemerally fair.
When sweetest and most exquisite they seem
Turn out as but a broken, shattered dream?
The darkest hour is just before the dawn
(A statement as absurd as it is worn):
So might we not untruthfully remark,
The brightest hour is just before the dark.
'Tis thus our Fido signals in his joy
The prospect of a tasty saveloy,
'Tis thus his mistress, pity in her heart,
Promises him a wealth of apple tart.
Imagine then the feelings of the pair
On finding that the larder shelf is bare.
“O Hunger,” sighs the dog, “here is thy sting,
No saveloy nor tart nor anything.
If music is the Food of Love, play on—
All traces of material food arc gone.
O Fate, how would thy cruelty to-day
Provoke the wrath of our S.P.C.A.?”

—R.G.P.