nd, instead of Dearest Miss,
Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
And those forms of old admiring,
Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
Basilisk, and all that's evil,
Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamore,
Monkey, Ape, and twenty more,
Friendly Trait'ress, loving Foe,--
Not that she is truly so,
But no other way they know
A contentment to express,
Borders so upon excess
That they do not rightly wot
Whether it be pain or not.

Or as men, constrain'd to part
With what's nearest to their heart.
While their sorrow's at the height
Lose discrimination quite,
And their hasty wrath let fall,
To appease their frantic gall,
On the darling thing whatever
Whence they feel it death to sever,
Though it be, as they, perforce,
Guiltless of the sad divorce.

For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee.
For thy sake, TOBACCO, I
Would do anything but die,
And but seek to extend my days
Long enough to sing thy praise.
But as she who once hath been
A king's consort is a queen
Ever after, nor will bate
Any tittle of her state,
Though a widow or divorced,
So I, from thy converse forced,
The old name and style retain,
A right Katherine of Spain;
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys
Of the blest Tobacco Boys,
Where, though I by sour physician
Am debarr'd the full fruition
Of thy favors, I may catch
Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Sidelong odors, that give life
Like glances from a neighbor's wife,
And still live in the by-places
And the suburbs of thy graces,
And in thy borders take delight,
An unconquer'd Canaanite.

CHARLES LAMB.

A WINTER EVENING HYMN TO MY FIRE.

Nicotia, dearer to the Muse
Than all the grape's bewildering juice,
We worship, unforbid of thee;
And as her incense floats and curls
In airy spires and wayward whirls,
Or poises on its tremulous stalk
A flower of frailest reverie,
So winds and loiters, idly free,
The current of unguided talk,
Now laughter-rippled, and now caught
In smooth dark pools of deeper thought
Meanwhile thou mellowest every word,
A sweetly unobtrusive third;
For thou hast magic beyond wine
To unlock natures each to each;
The unspoken thought thou canst divine;
Thou fill'st the pauses of the speech
With whispers that to dreamland reach,
And frozen fancy-springs unchain
I