We know what risks all landsmen run,
From noblemen to tailors;
Then Bill, let us thank Providence

That you and I are sailors!"

CHARLES DIBDIN.

THE LOVERS

SALLY SALTER, she was a young teacher who taught,
And her friend, Charley Church, was a preacher who praught,
Though his enemies called him a screecher who scraught.

His heart, when he saw her, kept sinking and sunk,
And his eye, meeting hers, began winking and wunk ;
While she, in her turn, kept thinking and thunk.
He hastened to woo her, and sweetly he wooed,
For his love grew until to a mountain it grewed,
And what he was longing to do then he doed.

In secret he wanted to speak, and he spoke,
To seek with his lips what his heart long had soke;
So he managed to let the truth leak, and it loke.

He asked her to ride to the church, and they rode;
They so sweetly did glide that they both thought they glode,
And they came to the place to be tied, and were toed.
Then homeward, he said, let us drive, and they drove,
And as soon as they wished to arrive, they arrove,
For whatever he couldn't contrive, she controve.

The kiss he was dying to steal, then he stole ;

At the feet where he wanted to kneel, then he knole;
And he said, "I feel better than ever I fole."

So they to each other kept clinging, and clung,
While Time his swift circuit was winging and wung;
And this was the thing he was bringing and brung:
The man Sally wanted to catch, and had caught;
That she wanted from others to snatch, and had snaught;
Was the one she now liked to scratch, and she scraught.
And Charley's warm love began freezing, and froze,
While he took to teasing, and cruelly toze

The girl he had wished to be squeezing and squoze.

"Wretch!" he cried, when she threatened to leave him, and left,

"How could you deceive me, as you have deceft ?"

And she answered, "I promised to cleave, and I've cleft."

PHOEBE CARY.

THE NANTUCKET SKIPPER

MANY a long, long year ago,

Nantucket skippers had a plan of finding out, though "lying low,"

How near New York their schooners ran.

They greased the lead before it fell,

And then by sounding, through the night,
Knowing the soil that stuck so well,
They always guessed their reckoning right.

A skipper gray, whose eyes were dim,
Could tell, by tasting, just the spot;
And so below he 'd “douse the glim,
After, of course, his "something hot.
Snug in his berth, at eight o'clock,

This ancient skipper might be found;
No matter how his craft would rock,
He slept,- for skippers' naps are sound.

The watch on deck would now and then
Run down and wake him, with the lead,
He 'd up, and taste, and tell the men
How many miles they went ahead.

One night 't was Jotham Marden's watch,
A curious wag the pedler's son ;

And so he mused (the wanton wretch!)
"To-night I'll have a grain of fun.

"We're all a set of stupid fools,

To think the skipper knows, by tasting,
What ground he 's on; Nantucket schools
Don't teach such stuff, with all their basting!"

And so he took the well-greased lead,
And rubbed it o'er a box of earth
That stood on deck -a parsnip-bed,
And then he sought the skipper's berth.

"Where are we now, sir? Please to taste. The skipper yawned, put out his tongue, Opened his eyes in wondrous haste,

And then upon the floor he sprung!

The skipper stormed, and tore his hair,
Hauled on his boots, and roared to Marden

"Nantucket 's sunk, and here we are

Right over old Marm Hackett's garden!"

JAMES THOMAS FIELDS.

JOHN DAVIDSON

JOHN DAVIDSON and Tib his wife
Sat toastin' their taes ae night,
When somethin' started on the fluir
An' blinked by their sight.

"Guidwife!" quo'John, "did ye see that mouse?

Whar sorra was the cat ?” "A mouse ?" "Ay, a mouse.

It wasna a mouse, 't was a rat.'

"Na, na, Guidman,

"Oh, oh! Guidwife, to think ye 've been

Sae lang about the house

An' no to ken a mouse frae a rat!

Yon wasna a rat, but a mouse !”

"I've seen mair mice than you, Guidman,
An' what think ye o' that?

Sae haud your tongue an' say nae mair
I tell ye 't was a rat.”

"Me haud my tongue for you, Guidwife!
I'll be maister o' the house

I saw it as plain as een could see,
An' I tell ye 't was a mouse!"
"If you 're the maister o' the house,
It's I'm the mistress o' 't;

An' I ken best what 's i' the house
Sae I tell ye 't was a rat."

"Weel, weel, Guidwife, gae mak the brose,
An' ca' it what ye please."

Sae up she gat an' made the brose,

While John sat toastin' his taes.

They suppit, an' suppit, an' suppit the brose,
An' aye their lips played smack;

They suppit, an' suppit, an' suppit the brose
Till their lugs began to crack.

"Sic fules we were to fa' out, Guidwife,
About a mouse. "A what?

It's a lee you tell, an' I say again

It was na a mouse, 't was a rat."

"Wad ye ca' me a leear to my very face?

My faith, but ye craw crouse!

I tell ye, Tib, I never will bear 't,

--

'T was a mouse. ""T was a rat. """Twas a mouse."

Wi' that she struck him o'er the pow:

"Ye dour auld doit, tak' that!

Gae to your bed, ye cankered sumph!

"T was a rat."""T was a mouse!"""T was a rat!"

She sent the brose-cup at his heels

As he hirpled ben the house;

But he shoved out his head as he steekit the door,

An' cried, ""T was a mouse, 't was a mouse!"

Yet when the auld carle fell asleep,

She paid him back for that,

An' roared into his sleepin' lug,

"'T was a rat, 't was a rat, 't was a rat!"

The deil be wi' me, if I think

It was a beast at all;

Next mornin' when she swept the floor,

She found wee Johnnie's ball.

ANONYMOUS.

AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG

GOOD people all, of every sort,

Give ear unto my song;
And if you find it wondrous short,
It cannot hold you long.

In Islington there was a man

Of whom the world might say,
That still a godly race he ran,
Whene'er he went to pray.

A kind and gentle heart he had,
To comfort friends and foes:
The naked every day he clad,
When he put on his clothes.

And in that town a dog was found,

As many dogs there be,

Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,

And curs of low degree.

This dog and man at first were friends;

But when a pique began,

The dog, to gain his private ends,

Went mad and bit the man.

Around from all the neighboring streets

The wondering neighbors ran,

And swore the dog had lost his wits,

To bite so good a man.

The wound it seemed both sore and sad

Το

every Christian eye;

And while they swore the dog was mad,
They swore the man would die.

But soon a wonder came to light,
That showed the rogues they lied ·

The man recovered of the bite;

The dog it was that died.

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

THE POWER OF PRAYER

[THE FIRST STEAMBOAT UP THE ALABAMA.]

You, Dinah! Come and set me whar de ribber-roads does meet.

De Lord, He made dese black-jack roots to twis' into a seat. Umph, dar! De Lord have mussy on dis blin' ole nigger's feet.

It pear to me dis mornin' I kin smell de fust o' June,

I 'clar, I b'lieve dat mockin'-bird could play de fiddle soon!
Dem yonder town-bells sounds like dey was ringin' in de moon.
Well, ef dis nigger is been blin' for fo'ty year or mo',
Dese ears dey sees de world, like th'u'de cracks dat's in de do';
For de Lord has built dis cabin wid de winders hind and 'fo'.

I know my front ones is stopped up, and things is sort o' dim;
But den, th'u' dem temptations vain won't leak in on ole Jim'!
De back ones shows me earth enough, aldo' dey 's mons'ous
slim.

And as for Hebben - bless de Lord, and praise His holy name!
Dat shines in all de co'ners o' dis cabin jes' de same
As ef dat cabin had n't nar a plank upon de frame!.

Who call me? Listen down the ribber, Dinah! Don't you hyar

Somebody holl'in' "Hoo, Jim, hoo?" My Sarah died las'

y'ar;

Is dat black angel done come back to call ole Jim from hyar?
My stars! dat can't be Sarah - shuh, jes' listen, Dinah, now!
What kin be comin' up dat bend, a-makin' sich a row ?
Fus' bellerin', like a pawin' bull, den squealin' like a sow!
De Lord 'a' massy sakes alive! jes' hear - Ker-woof! Ker-
woof!

De Debble's comin' round dat bend — he 's comin', shuh

enuff,

A-splashin' up de water wid his tail and wid his hoof!

I 'se pow'ful skeered; but neversomeless I ain't gwine run

away;