I'd sent her little gifts of fruit;

I'd written lines to her as Venus;

I'd sworn unflinchingly to shoot

The man who dared to come between us:

And it was you, my Thomas, you,
The friend in whom my soul confided,
Who dared to gaze on her to do,

I may say, much the same as I did.

One night, I saw him squeeze her hand;
There was no doubt about the matter;
I said he must resign, or stand

My vengeance-and he chose the latter.

We met, we 'planted' blows on blows:
We fought as long as we were able:
My rival had a bottle-nose,

And both my speaking eyes were sable.

When the school-bell cut short our strife,
Miss P. gave both of us a plaster;
And in a week became the wife
Of Horace Nibbs, the writing-master.

I loved her then I'd love her still,

Only one must not love Another's:

But thou and I, my Tommy, will,

When we again meet, meet as brothers.

It may be that in age one seeks

Peace only that the blood is brisker In boys' veins, than in theirs whose cheeks Are partially obscured by whisker ;

Or that the growing ages steal

The memories of past wrongs from us.

But this is certain-that I feel

Most friendly unto thee, oh Thomas!

And whereso'er we meet again,
On this or that side the Equator,
If I've not turned teetotaller then,
And have wherewith to pay the waiter,

To thee I'll drain the modest cup,

Ignite with thee the mild Havannah ; And we will waft, while liquoring up, Forgiveness to the heartless ANNA.

WANDERERS.

As o'er the hill we roam'd at will,
My dog and I together,

We mark'd a chaise, by two bright bays
Slow-moved along the heather:

Two bays arch neck'd, with tails erect
And gold upon their blinkers;
And by their side an ass I spied;
It was a travelling tinker's.

The chaise went by, nor aught cared I;
Such things are not in my way:

I turn'd me to the tinker, who
Was loafing down a by-way:

I ask'd him where he lived-a stare
Was all I got in answer,

As on he trudged: I rightly judged
The stare said, 'Where I can, sir.'

I ask'd him if he'd take a whiff
Of 'bacco; he acceded;
He grew communicative too,
(A pipe was all he needed,)
Till of the tinker's life, I think,
I knew as much as he did.

'I loiter down by thorp and town;
For any job I'm willing;

Take here and there a dusty brown,
And here and there a shilling.

'I deal in every ware in turn,
I've rings for buddin' Sally

That sparkle like those eyes of her'n;
I've liquor for the valet.

'I steal from th' parson's strawberry-plots,
I hide by th' squire's covers;

I teach the sweet young housemaids what's
The art of trapping lovers.

The things I've done 'neath moon and stars
Have got me into messes:

I've seen the sky through prison bars,

f

I've torn up prison dresses:

I've sat, I've sigh'd, I've gloom'd, I've glanced

With envy at the swallows

That through the window slid, and danced

(Quite happy) round the gallows;

'But out again I come, and show

My face nor care a stiver,

For trades are brisk and trades are slow,
But mine goes on for ever.'

Thus on he prattled like a babbling brook.
Then I, 'The sun hath slipt behind the hill,
And my aunt Vivian dines at half-past six.'
So in all love we parted; I to the Hall,
They to the village. It was noised next noon
That chickens had been miss'd at Syllabub Farm.

(4.) J. K. STEPHEN.

[JAMES KENNETH STEPHEN, the second son of Sir James FitzJames Stephen, the Judge, was born in 1859 and educated at Eton and King's College, Cambridge, where he was elected a Fellow. His only published works were two small volumes of verse, Lapsus Calami and Quo Musa Tendis? (1891). He died in 1892, the ultimate cause of death being an accidental blow on the head some five years before.]

The resemblances between Calverley and 'J. K. S.' (James Kenneth Stephen) are so marked as to warrant a slight deviation from chronological order. Stephen was also a brilliant public school boy who had a distinguished academic career at Cambridge. He was, moreover, an avowed disciple and devoted admirer of Calverley, as may be gathered from the delightful stanzas To C. S. C. But though related by education and environment, the two men differed widely in temperament. Calverley was more freakish and irresponsible he had greater charm, elasticity, and geniality. He

was

never angry, and Stephen often was, though to excellent purpose, in his diatribes against those who desecrated the river, vulgar Cockney or oversea tourists, and pretentious politicians. Stephen was less of the amused onlooker, more of the castigator. But he, too, trod the beaten way he was neither a mystic nor a metaphysician, but a man of robust intelligence who hated cant, pretence, and sentimentality, but was capable of generous emotion and even tenderness. He called himself 'a man of prose', but there are lines in the stanzas To A. H. C., when he compares the futility of abstract speculation with the things that really count, which only a poet could have written; while as a parodist he fell little short of his master.

A PARODIST'S APOLOGY.

If I've dared to laugh at you, Robert Browning,
'Tis with eyes that with you have often wept :
You have oftener left me smiling or frowning,
Than any beside, one bard except.

But once you spoke to me, storm-tongued poet,
A trivial word in an idle hour;

But thrice I looked on your face and the glow it
Bore from the flame of the inward power.

But you'd many a friend you never knew of,il n'a
Your words lie hid in a hundred hearts,
And thousands of hands that you've grasped but few of
Would be raised to shield you from slander's darts.

For you lived in the sight of the land that owned you,
You faced the trial, and stood the test::

They have piled you a cairn that would fain have stoned you : You have spoken your message and earned your rest.

PARKER'S PIECE, MAY 19, 1891.

To see good Tennis! what diviner joy
Can fill our leisure, or our minds employ?
Not Sylvia's self is more supremely fair,

Than balls that hurtle through the conscious air.
Not Stella's form instinct with truer grace
Than Lambert's racket poised to win the chase.

Not Chloe's harp more native to the ear,

Than the tense strings which smite the flying sphere.
When Lambert boasts the superhuman force,"

Or

splits the echoing grille without remorse : When Harradine, as graceful as of yore,

When Alfred's ringing cheer proclaims success,
Or Saunders volleys in resistlessness;

When Heathcote's service makes the, dedans ring

bint With just applause, and own its honoured king; !! When Pettitt's prowess all our zeal awoke 'Till high Olympus shuddered at the stroke; Or, when, receiving thirty and the floor, The novice serves a dozen faults or more;

d! Or some plump don, perspiring and profane,

Assails the roof and breaks the exalted panely

1. When vantage, five games all, the door is called,

And Europe pauses, breathless and appalled,

Till lo! the ball by cunning hand caressed
Finds in the winning gallery a nest;

i