Part 518 (1/2)
”One must hasten to h.e.l.l-fire, Go, Melpomene!
Let a fury borrow lyre, Notes, and dress, of thee.
”Let her meet, in this array, One of these vile crews, As though she had lost her way, Soon as night ensues.
”Then with kisses dark, I trust, They'll the dear child greet, Satisfying their wild l.u.s.t Just as it is meet!”--
Said and done!--Then one from h.e.l.l Soon was dressed aright.
Scarcely had the prey, they tell, Caught the fellow's sight,
Than, as kites a pigeon follow, They attacked her straight-- Part, not all, though, I can swallow Of what folks relate.
If fair boys were 'mongst the band, How came they to be-- This I cannot understand,-- In such company?
The G.o.ddess a miscarriage had, good lack!
And was delivered of an--Almanac!
THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL PLUTO.
A ROMANCE.
BOOK I.
The sullen mayor who reigns in h.e.l.l, By mortals Pluto hight, Who thrashes all his subjects well, Both morn and eve, as stories tell, And rules the realms of night, All pleasure lost in cursing once, All joy in flogging, for the nonce.
The sedentary life he led Upon his brazen chair Made his hindquarters very red, While p.r.i.c.ks, as from a nettle-bed, He felt both here and there: A burning sun, too, chanced to s.h.i.+ne, And boiled down all his blood to brine.
'Tis true he drank full many a draught Of Phlegethon's black flood; By cupping, leeches, doctor's craft, And venesection, fore and aft, They took from him much blood.
Full many a clyster was applied, And purging, too, was also tried.
His doctor, versed in sciences, With wig beneath his hat, Argued and showed with wondrous ease, From Celsus and Hippocrates, When he in judgment sat,-- ”Right wors.h.i.+pful the mayor of h.e.l.l, The liver's wrong, I see full well.”
”He's but a b.o.o.by,” Pluto said, ”With all his trash and pills!
A man like me--pray where's his head?
A young man yet--his wits have fled!
While youth my veins yet fills!
Unless electuaries he'll bring, Full in his face my club I'll fling!”
Or right or wrong,--'twas a hard case To weather such a trial; (Poor men, who lose a king's good grace!) He's straight saluted in the face By every splint and phial.
He very wisely made no fuss; This hint he learnt of Cerberus.
”Go! fetch the barber of the skies, Apollo, to me soon!”
An airy courier straightway flies Upon his beast, and onward hies, And skims past poles and moon; As he went off, the clock struck four, At five his charger reached the door.
Just then Apollo happened--”Heigh-ho!
A sonnet to have made?”
Oh, dear me, no!--upon Miss Io (Such is the tale I heard from Clio) The midwife to have played.
The boy, as if stamped out of wax, Might Zeus as father fairly tax.
He read the letter half asleep, Then started in dismay: ”The road is long, and h.e.l.l is deep, Your rocks I know are rough and steep . . .
Yet like a king he'll pay!”
He dons his cap of mist and furs, Then through the air the charger spurs.