Classic Poem

Thrice-lov'd Nimmo! are thou still, in spite of Fate,
Footing those cold pavements; void of meal and mutton;
To and from that everlasting College-gate;
With thy blue hook-nose, and ink-horn hung on button?

Always have I noted that long simple nose of thine
How it droops most meekly over shallowest chin,
Ever-smiling lips with scarcely-squinting eyes does join:
Fittest bush for the " mild penny-wheep " is sold within!

Soot-brown coat, I know, is button'd, and thy motion
To all class-rooms is a short, half-hurried trudge:
Peter! is there, was there, any fact or notion
In that porous head of thine one night will lodge?

No one! Simplest Peter, wilt thou never know
That thy brain is made of substance adipose?
Whilst thou beat'st and heat'st it, all to oil does go:
Cease, fond struggling man, what bootless toils are those!

Canst thou t?┬Á? yet decline, or know the gender
(On thy oath) of a neuter from a feminine?
Peter, no! Thou know'st it not, thou vain pretender:
Met the Sun's eye ever so strange a case as thine?

For 'tis twenty years and five since thou art seen
In all Class-rooms, Lectures, thou unweari'd biped,
List'ning, prying, jotting, with an eye so mildly keen:
And what boots it? Vain were ev'n the Delphic Tripod

Danaus' Daughters had a water-sieve to fill;
Fate like thine poor Nimmo, yet in other guise:
Thee no Fear doth urge, but Hope and readiest will;
Hope that springs eternal, Hope of being wise!