I reckon that ye never knew,
That dandy slugger, Tom Carew,
He had a touch as light an’ free
As that of any honey-bee;
But where it lit there wasn’t much
To jestify another touch.
O, what a Sunday-school it was
To watch him puttin’ up his paws
An’ roominate upon their heft—
Particular his holy left!
Tom was my style—that’s
all I say;
Some others may be equal gay.
What’s come of him? Dunno,
I’m sure—
He’s dead—which make
his fate obscure.
I only started in to clear
One vital p’int in his career,
Which is to say—afore he died
He soiled his erming mighty snide.
Ye see he took to politics
And learnt them statesmen-fellers’
tricks;
Pulled wires, wore stovepipe hats, used
scent,
Just like he was the President;
Went to the Legislator; spoke
Right out agin the British yoke—
But that was right. He let his hair
Grow long to qualify for Mayor,
An’ once or twice he poked his snoot
In Congress like a low galoot!
It had to come—no gent can
hope
To wrastle God agin the rope.
Tom went from bad to wuss. Being
dead,
I s’pose it oughtn’t to be
said,
For sech inikities as flow
From politics ain’t fit to know;
But, if you think it’s actin’
white
To tell it—Thomas throwed a
fight!
INDUSTRIAL DISCONTENT.
As time rolled on the whole world came
to be
A desolation and a darksome
curse;
And some one said: “The changes
that you see
In the fair frame of things,
from bad to worse,
Are wrought by strikes. The sun withdrew
his glimmer
Because the moon assisted with her shimmer.
“Then, when poor Luna, straining
very hard,
Doubled her light to serve
a darkling world,
He called her ‘scab,’ and
meanly would retard
Her rising: and at last
the villain hurled
A heavy beam which knocked her o’er
the Lion
Into the nebula of great O’Ryan.
“The planets all had struck some
time before,
Demanding what they said were
equal rights:
Some pointing out that others had far
more
That a fair dividend of satellites.
So all went out—though those
the best provided,
If they had dared, would rather have abided.
“The stars struck too—I
think it was because
The comets had more liberty
than they,
And were not bound by any hampering laws,
While they were fixed;
and there are those who say
The comets’ tresses nettled poor
Altair,
An aged orb that hasn’t any hair.
“The earth’s the only one
that isn’t in
The movement—I
suppose because she’s watched
With horror and disgust how her fair skin
Her pranking parasites have
fouled and blotched
With blood and grease in every labor riot,
When seeing any purse or throat to fly
at.”
