Classic Poem

By Lord T — — n.

So bluff Sir Leolin gave the bride away;
And when they married her, the little church
Had seldom seen a costlier ritual.
The coach and pair alone were two-pound-ten,
And two-pound-ten apiece the wedding-cakes, —
Three wedding-cakes. A Cupid poised a-top
Of each hung shivering to the frosted loves
Of two fond cushats on a field of ice,
As who should say " I see you! " — Such the joy
When English-hearted Edwin swore his faith
With Mariana of the Moated Grange.
For Edwin, plump head-waiter at The Cock,

Grown sick of custom, spoilt of plenitude,
Lacking the finer wit that saith, " I wait,
They come; and if I make them wait, they go, "
Fell in a jaundiced humour, petulant-green,
Watched the dull clerk slow-rounding to his cheese,
Flicked a full dozen flies that flecked the pane —
All crystal-cheated of the fuller air,
Blurted a free " Good day t'ye, " left and right,
And shaped his gathering choler to this end: —

" Custom! And yet what profit of it at all?
The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
To me small change, and this the counter-change
Of custom beating on the self-same bar —
Change out of chop! Ah me! the talk, the tip,
The would-be-evening, should-be-mourning suit,
The forged solicitude for petty wants
More petty still than they, — all these I loathe,
Learning they lie who feign that all things come
To him that waiteth. I have waited long,
And now I go, to mate me with a bride
Who is a-weary waiting, even as I! "

But when the amorous moon of honeycomb
Was over, ere the matron-flower of Love —
Step-sister of to-morrow's marmalade —
Swooned scentless, Mariana found her lord
Did something jar the nicer feminine sense
With usage, being all too fine and large,
Instinct of warmth and colour, with a trick
Of blunting " Mariana's " keener edge
To " Mary Ann " — the same, yet not the same:
Whereat she girded, tore her crisped hair,
Called him " Sir Churl, " and ever calling " Churl! "
Drave him to Science, then to Alcohol,
To forge a thousand theories of the rocks,
Then somewhat else for thousands dewy-cool
Wherewith he sought a more Pacific isle,
And there found love, a darker love than hers.