Classic Poem

Here's to thee, my boy,
My darling, my joy,
For a toper I love as my life;
Who ne'er baulks his glass,
Nor cries like an ass
To go home to his children and wife.

But heartily quaffs,
Sings, eats, dies, and laughs,
All the night he looks jovial and gay;
When morning appears,
Then homeward he steers,
To snore out the rest of the day.

He feels not the cares,
The griefs nor the fears
That the sober too often attend;
Nor knows he a loss,
Disturbance or cross,
Save the want of his bottle and friend.