Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/216

208 "I grant thy fame in former years,"
 * The linnet answer'd; but, as thou

Art never heard by modern ears,
 * Thy song is deem'd a fiction now,

And, like the music of the spheres,
 * A tale which moderns disallow.

But give me, sweet one, I beseech,
 * A sample of that olden lay."

The swan, too flatter'd by the speech,
 * To answer with a churlish nay,

Began to sing—but gave a screech:
 * The linnet laugh'd, and flew away.

Thus many a coxcomb, with a name
 * For talents which he ne'er possess'd

On turning author finds his fame
 * Unequal to the trying test,

And like the swan, exposed to shame,
 * Becomes a byword and a jest.

With a ravenous pack of dogs at his back,
 * A rabbit fled—or flew,

For his course was as fleet as if his four feet —Were wing'd, like Mercury's two.