THE COMET.

Ah! well may regal orbs burn blue,
And satellites turn pale,

Ten million cubic miles of head,

Ten billion leagues of tail!

And what would happen to the land,
And how would look the sea,

If in the bearded devil's path

Our earth should chance to be?
Full hot and high the sea would boil,
Full red the forests gleam;
Methought I saw and heard it all
In a dyspeptic dream!

I saw a tutor take his tube

The Comet's course to spy;
I heard a scream,-the gathered rays
Had stewed the tutor's eye;

I saw a fort, the soldiers all

Were armed with goggles green;
Pop cracked the guns! whiz flew the balls!
Bang went the magazine!

I saw a poet dip a scroll

Each moment in a tub,

I read upon the warping back,
"The Dream of Beelzebub;"
He could not see his verses burn,
Although his brain was fried,

And ever and anon he bent

To wet them as they dried.

I saw the scalding pitch roll down
The crackling, sweating pines,
And streams of smoke, like water-spouts,
Burst through the rumbling mines;

I asked the firemen why they made
Such noise about the town;

They answered not,-but all the while
The brakes went up and down.

I saw a roasting pullet sit

Upon a baking egg;

I saw a cripple scorch his hand

Extinguishing his leg;

TIRRAR

OF TEZ

UNIVERSITY

SE CALIFORNIA

51.

I saw nine geese upon the wing
Towards the frozen pole,
And every mother's gosling fell
Crisped to a crackling coal.

I saw the ox that browsed the grass
Writhe in the blistering rays,
The herbage in his shrinking jaws
Was all a fiery blaze;

I saw huge fishes, boiled to rags,

Bob through the bubbling brine;

And thoughts of supper crossed my soul;
I had been rash at mine.

Strange sights! strange sounds! O fearful dream!
Its memory haunts me still,
The steaming sea, the crimson glare,
That wreathed each wooded hill;
Stranger! if through thy reeling brain
Such midnight visions sweep,

Spare, spare, O spare thine evening meal,
And sweet shall be thy sleep!

RHYME OF THE RAIL.-JOHN G. SAXE.

SINGING through the forests,

Rattling over ridges,

Shooting under arches,

Rumbling over bridges;

Whizzing through the mountains,

Buzzing o'er the vale,
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Riding on the rail!

Men of different stations
In the eye of fame,

Here are very quickly

Coming to the same;

RHYME OF THE RAIL.

High and lowly people,
Birds of every feather,
On a common level,

Traveling together.

Gentlemen in shorts,

Looming very tall; Gentlemen at large, Talking very small; Gentlemen in tights,

With a loose-ish mien; Gentlemen in gray,

Looking rather green;

Gentlemen quite old,

Asking for the news;
Gentlemen in black,
In a fit of blues;
Gentlemen in claret,
Sober as a vicar;
Gentlemen in tweed,

Dreadfully in liquor!

Stranger on the right

Looking very sunny,

Obviously reading

Something rather funny.

Now the smiles are thicker

Wonder what they mean?

Faith, he's got the Knicker

bocker Magazine!

Stranger on the left

Closing up his peepers; Now he snores amain,

Like the seven sleepers;

At his feet a volume

Gives the explanation,

How the man grew stupid

From "association !"

Ancient maiden lady

Anxiously remarks, That there must be peril

'Mong so many sparks:

63

Roguish-looking fellow,

Turning to the stranger,

Says it's his opinion,
She is out of danger!

Woman with her baby,
Sitting vis-a-vis ;
Baby keeps a-squalling,
Woman looks at me;
Asks about the distance,

Says it's tiresome talking,
Noises of the cars

Are so very shocking!

Market woman, careful

Of the precious casket,

Knowing eggs are eggs,
Tightly holds her basket;
Feeling that a smash,

If it came, would surely
Send her eggs to pot,

Rather prematurely.

Singing through the forests,

Rattling over ridges,

Shooting under arches,
Rumbling over bridges;

Whizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o'er the vale-
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Riding on the rail!

FRENCH AND ENGLISH.-THOMAS HOOD.

I.

NEVER go to France

Unless you know the lingo,

If you do, like me,

You'll repent, by jingo.