Classic Poem

He bested me last Wednesday was a week,
And night and day
I've turned it in my mind what I shall say
If he should pass me in the Fair and speak,
How well I'll know to answer him, the sneak.
“Good-day to you,” I'll say, “old Tim McCann!
You artful, scheming dealer of a man.
Grown lean and grey in villyainy and sin.
With that white whisker underneath your chin
You're just the spit of my old billy goat,
Barrin' you wear some scarecrow's cast-off coat.”

Ah! yes, I'll tantalise him if I can,
I've got such spleen and hatred to the man.
I'll say—
“The like of you has travelled a long way
You'd not leave sixpence underneath a stone,
Nor spare a sparrow picking from a bone.
You've far less nature in your withered heart
Than that poor mongrel dog behind your cart.
You'd rob your mother an' she lying dead
Of her own coffin's price beneath her head!”

All that and more I'll say to Tim McCann,
The next Fair day I come across the man.
And all the crowd
Shall hear me, too, I'll speak to him so loud
They'll gather round and drive their eyes through him
Until they see the naked soul of Tim
As black as any crow.
He'll turn and shake and wonder where he'll go
I'll fault him so.
The Hokey! that I will and not forget.

But yet
He passed me on the road to-day,
The mean, small man, the weazened, grey-haired butt.
“Good-day,” said he, “fine weather for the hay!”
I near fell from my standing with surprise.
It seemed that anger kept my mouth tight shut
And blinded my two eyes.
“You scut!” was all I said to him, just that—“you SCUT.”