Greybeards at Play/Dangers

Of the Dangers Attending Alturism on the High Seas
Observe these Pirates bold and gay,
 * That sail a gory sea:

Notice their bright expression:--
 * The handsome one is me.

We plundered ships and harbours,
 * We spoiled the Spanish main;

But Nemesis watched over us,
 * For it began to rain.

Oh all well-meaning folk take heed!
 * Our Captain's fate was sore;

A more well-meaning Pirate,
 * Had never dripped with gore.

The rain was pouring long and loud,
 * The sea was drear and dim;

A little fish was floating there:
 * Our Captain pitied him.

"How sad," he said, and dropped a tear
 * Splash on the cabin roof,

"That we are dry, while he is there
 * Without a waterproof.

"We'll get him up on board at once;
 * For Science teaches me,

He will be wet if he remains
 * Much longer in the sea."

They fished him out; the First Mate wept,
 * And came with rugs and ale:

The Boatswain brought him one golosh,
 * And fixed it on his tail.

But yet he never loved the ship;
 * Against the mast he'd lean;

If spoken to, he coughed and smiled,
 * And blushed a pallid green.

Though plied with hardbake, beef and beer,
 * He showed no wish to sup:

The neatest riddles they could ask,
 * He always gave them up.

They seized him and court-martialled him,
 * In some excess of spleen,

For lack of social sympathy,
 * (Victoria xii. 18).

They gathered every evidence
 * That might remove a doubt:

They wrote a postcard in his name,
 * And partly scratched it out.

Till, when his guilt was clear as day,
 * With all formality

They doomed the traitor to be drowned,
 * And threw him in the sea.

The flashing sunset, as he sank,
 * Made every scale a gem;

And, turning with a graceful bow,
 * He kissed his fin to them.

MORAL.

I am, I think I have remarked,
 * Terrifically old,

(The second Ice-age was a farce,
 * The first was rather cold.)

A friend of mine, a trilobite
 * Had gathered in his youth,

When trilobites _were_ trilobites,
 * This all-important truth.

We aged ones play solemn parts--
 * Sire--guardian--uncle--king.

Affection is the salt of life,
 * Kindness a noble thing.

The old alone may comprehend
 * A sense in my decree;

But--if you find a fish on land,
 * Oh throw it in the sea.