But the camel kept on drinking and he filled his hold with water,
And the more he had inside him yet the more he seemed to need;
For he drank it by the gallon, and his girths grew taut and tauter,
And the miners muttered softly, "Yes, he's very dry indeed!
But he's cheap, very cheap, as the dromedaries go."

So he drank up twenty buckets--it was weird to watch him suck it,
(And the market price for water was per bucket half-a-crown)
Till the speculator stopped him, saying, "Not another bucket--
If I give him any more there'll be a famine in the town.
Take him back to old Mahomet, and I'll tramp it through the town."
He was cheap, very cheap, as the speculators go.

There's a moral to this story--in your hat you ought to paste it,
Be careful whom you shout for when a camel is about,
And there's plenty human camels who, before they'll see you waste it,
Will drink up all you pay for if you're fool enough to shout;
If you chance to strike a camel when you're fool enough to shout,
You'll be cheap, very cheap, as the speculators go.

The Lost Drink

I had spent the night in the watch-house--
My head was the size of three--
So I went and asked the chemist
To fix up a drink for me;
And he brewed it from various bottles
With soda and plenty of ice,
With something that smelt like lemon,
And something that seemed like spice.

It fell on my parching palate
Like the dew on a sun-baked plain,
And my system began to flourish
Like the grass in a soft spring rain;
It wandered throughout my being,
Suffusing my soul with rest,
And I felt as I "scoffed" that liquid
That life had a new-found zest.

I have been on the razzle-dazzle
Full many a time since then
But I never could get the chemist
To brew me that drink again.
He says he's forgotten the notion--
'Twas only by chance it came--
He's tried me with various liquids
But oh! they are not the same.

We have sought, but we sought it vainly,
That one lost drink divine;
We have sampled his various bottles,
But somehow they don't combine:
Yet I know when I cross the River
And stand on the Golden Shore
I shall meet with an angel-chemist
Who'll brew me that drink once more.

Mulligan's Mare

Oh, Mulligan's bar was the deuce of a place
To drink and to fight, and to gamble and race;
The height of choice spirits from near and fr