His tail waggled more

Even than before;

But no longer it wagged with an impudent air,
No longer he perched on the Cardinal's chair,
He hopped now about

With a gait devout;

At matins, at vespers, he never was out;
And, so far from any more pilfering deeds,
He always seemed telling the Confessor's beads.

If any one lied, or if any one swore,

Or slumbered in prayer-time and happened to snore,
That good Jackdaw

Would give a great "Caw!"

As much as to say, "Don't do so any more!"
While many remarked, as his manners they saw,
That they "never had known such a pious Jackdaw!"
He long lived the pride

Of that country side,

And at last in the odour of sanctity died;

When, as words were too faint

His merits to paint,

The Conclave determined to make him a Saint;
And on newly-made Saints and Popes, as you know,
It's the custom, at Rome, new names to bestow,
So they canonised him by the name of Jim Crow!
Richard Harris Barham.

THE KNIGHT AND THE LADY

THE Lady Jane was tall and slim,

The Lady Jane was fair

And Sir Thomas, her lord, was stout of limb,
And his cough was short, and his eyes were dim,
And he wore green 66 specs
"with a tortoise shell rim,

And his hat was remarkably broad in the brim,
And she was uncommonly fond of him-

And they were a loving pair!

And wherever they went, or wherever they came,
Every one hailed them with loudest acclaim;

The Knight and the Lady

Far and wide,

The people cried,

All sorts of pleasure, and no sort of pain,

To Sir Thomas the good, and the fair Lady Jane!

Now Sir Thomas the good, be it well understood,
Was a man of very contemplative mood-

He would pour by the hour, o'er a weed or a flower,
Or the slugs, that came crawling out after a shower;
Black beetles, bumble-bees, blue-bottle flies,

And moths, were of no small account in his eyes;
An "industrious flea," he'd by no means despise,

591

While an "old daddy long-legs," whose long legs and thighs
Passed the common in shape, or in color, or size,

He was wont to consider an absolute prize.
Giving up, in short, both business and sport, he
Abandoned himself, tout entier, to philosophy.

Now as Lady Jane was tall and slim,

And Lady Jane was fair.

And a good many years the junior of him,

There are some might be found entertaining a notion,
That such an entire, and exclusive devotion,
To that part of science, folks style entomology,
Was a positive shame,

And, to such a fair dame,

Really demanded some sort of apology;

Ever poking his nose into this, and to that

At a gnat, or a bat, or a cat, or a rat,

At great ugly things, all legs and wings,

With nasty long tails, armed with nasty long stings
And eternally thinking, and blinking, and winking,
At grubs-when he ought of her to be thinking.
But no! ah no! 'twas by no means so
With the fair Lady Jane,

Tout au contraire, no lady so fair,

Was e'er known to wear more contented an air;
And-let who would call-every day she was there
Propounding receipts for some delicate fare,
Some toothsome conserve, of quince, apple or pear
Or distilling strong waters-or potting a hare-

Or counting her spoons, and her crockery ware;
Enough to make less gifted visitors stare.

Nay more; don't suppose

With such doings as those

This account of her merits must come to a close;
No!-examine her conduct more closely, you'll find
She by no means neglected improving her mind;
For there all the while, with an air quite bewitching
She sat herring-boning, tambouring, or stitching,
Or having an eye to affairs of the kitchen.
Close by her side,

Sat her kinsman, MacBride

Captain Dugald MacBride, Royal Scots Fusiliers;—
And I doubt if you'd find, in the whole of his clan,
A more highly intelligent, worthy young man;

And there he'd be sitting,

While she was a-knitting,

Reading aloud, with a very grave look,

Some very

wise saw," from some very good bookNo matter who came,

It was always the same,

The Captain was reading aloud to the dame,

Till, from having gone through half the books on the shelf, They were almost as wise as Sir Thomas himself.

Well it happened one day

I really can't say

The particular month;-but I think 'twas in May, 'Twas I know in the spring-time, when "nature looks gay," As the poet observes-and on tree-top and spray,

The dear little dickey birds carol away,

That the whole of the house was thrown into affright,

For no soul could conceive what was gone with the Knight.

It seems he had taken

A light breakfast-bacon,

An egg, a little broiled haddock-at most

A round and a half of some hot buttered toast,
With a slice of cold sirloin from yesterday's roast.

The Knight and the Lady

593

And then, let me see,

He had two,-perhaps three

Cups, with sugar and cream, of strong gunpowder tea,— But no matter for that

He had called for his hat,

With the brim that I've said was so broad and so flat,
And his "specs" with the tortoise-shell rim, and his cane.
With the crutch-handled top, which he used to sustain
IIis steps in his walk, or to poke in the shrubs

Or the grass, when unearthing his worms or his grubs;
Thus armed he set out on a ramble-a-lack!

He set out, poor dear soul!-but he never came back!
66 'First dinner bell" rang

Out its euphonous clang

At five-folks kept early hours then-and the "last"
Ding-donged, as it ever was wont, at half-past.
Still the master was absent—the cook came and said, he
Feared dinner would spoil, having been so long ready,
That the puddings her ladyship thought such a treat
He was morally sure, would be scarce fit to eat!
Said the lady, "Dish up! Let the meal be served straight,
And let two or three slices be put on a plate,

And kept hot for Sir Thomas."-Captain Dugald said grace,
Then set himself down in Sir Thomas' place.

Wearily, wearily, all that night,

That live-long night did the hours go by;

And the Lady Jane,

In grief and pain,

She sat herself down to cry!

And Captain MacBride,

Who sat by her side,

Though I really can't say that he actually cried,
At least had a tear in his eye!

As much as can well be expected, perhaps,

From "very young fellows," for very

And if he had said

What he'd got in his head,

"old chaps."

"Twould have been, "Poor old Duffer, he's certainly dead!"

The morning dawned-and the next-and the next
And all in the mansion were still perplexed;

No knocker fell,

His approach to tell;

Not so much as a runaway ring at the bell.

Yet the sun shone bright upon tower and tree,
And the meads smiled green as green may be,
And the dear little dickey birds caroled with glee,
And the lambs in the park skipped merry and free.—
Without, all was joy and harmony!

And thus 'twill be-nor long the day-
Ere we, like him, shall pass away!
Yon sun that now our bosoms warms,
Shall shine-but shine on other forms;
Yon grove, whose choir so sweetly cheers
Us now, shall sound on other ears;
The joyous lambs, as now, shall play,
But other eyes its sports survey;
The stream we loved shall roll as fair,
The flowery sweets, the trim parterre,
Shall scent, as now, the ambient air;
The tree whose bending branches bear
The one loved name-shall yet be there-

But where the hand that carved it? Where?

These were hinted to me as the very ideas

Which passed through the mind of the fair Lady Jane, As she walked on the esplanade to and again,

With Captain MacBride,

Of course at her side,

Who could not look quite so forlorn-though he tried,
An "idea" in fact, had got into his head,

That if "poor dear Sir Thomas" should really be dead,
It might be no bad "spec" to be there in his stead,
And by simply contriving, in due time, to wed

A lady who was young and fair,

A lady slim and tall,

To set himself down in comfort there,

The lord of Tapton Hall.