Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/212

204 A spider cried, from its darksome nook— "Look at my web, sweet sister, look! I began it at dawn—'tis hardly noon, And yet my task will be ended soon; For while thou spinnest thy life away, I weave a web in a single day. Examine it well—each airy line Is as fine and fair as the best of thine."— "True," said the silkworm, with a smile, "But will they endure for half the while?"

A bear, whose dancing help'd to gain
 * His own and owner's livelihood,

And whose success had made him vain
 * As any petit-maitre, stood

Upon his hinder legs to try
 * The figure of a new quadrille,

When, seeing that an ape was nigh,
 * He stump'd about with all his skill;

And "Tell me how you like," he cried,
 * "My dancing, for I'm always glad

To hear the truth." The ape replied,
 * "I really think it very bad."

Tis plain enough," rejoin'd the bear,
 * "That envy makes you censure so;

For have I not a graceful air,
 * A slender shape and limber toe?"

But here a tasteless pig began
 * To grunt applause, and said, "I vow

I never met, in brute or man,
 * With one who danced so well as thou."

The bear, on hearing this, became
 * Sedate and pensive for a while;

And then, as if abash'd with shame,
 * He answer'd in submissive style;

The agile ape's rebuke might be,
 * Perhaps, imputed to his spleen,

But, since the pig commends, I see
 * How bad my dancing must have been."

Let every author think on this,
 * And hold the maxim for a rule

The worst that can befall him is,
 * The approbation of a fool.

Good father Joltered, who lost his brains
 * By overstudying of natural history—

For authors often take the greatest pains'
 * To turn the plainest matter to a mystery—

Who wrote a score of volumes to describe
 * Some score of beasts that Adam never saw,

Of phoenix, unicorn, or griffin tribe,
 * And gave their very likeness to a claw;

In short, who rummaged continent and cape For creatures of the strangest size and shape:
 * This reverend writer tells, in pond'rous prose,
 * A certain story, which I'll re-compose

In light and careless verse, about an ape.

According to his kind, this ape possess'd
 * The faculty of imitation strongly,

(A faculty that's dangerous at the best,
 * For apes are very apt to use it wrongly,)

And being bound apprentice—by a chain— Unto a juggler, had contrived to gain A smattering of a trick or two, which made
 * The creature think himself beyond all doubt

A perfect master of the mystic trade;
 * So one day, when his master had gone out,

He seized the opportunity with glee
 * To get up a performance of his own,

And ask'd the neighbouring beasts to come and see
 * How great a conjurer he had really grown.

They came—and, first a chequer'd harlequin
 * He moved his magic wand; and then a clown