You never your friends, sir, to dinner invite
Except when you have some bad verse to recite.
We have scarcely sat down when on our weary ears
Comes the sound of " Book One," ere the hors-d'aeuvre appears.
You read through Book Two while the entree we wait;
Book Three makes dessert and the savoury late.
Then comes Number Four and at last Number Five:
Even dainties so frequent a surfeit would give.
If you won't to the waste-paper merchant consign
Your poems, in future alone you must dine.