Page:Carroll - Rhyme and Reason.djvu/219

Rh I asked the cause: the aged man grew sad:
 * They pointed to a building gray and tall,

And hoarsely answered “Step inside, my lad,
 * And then you'll see it all.”

Yet what are all such gaieties to me
 * Whose thoughts are full of indices and surds?

x2 + 7x + 53

But something whispered “It will soon be done:
 * Bands cannot always play, nor ladies smile:

Endure with patience the distasteful fun
 * For just a little while!”

A change came o’er my Vision–it was night:
 * We clove a pathway through a frantic throng:

The steeds, wild-plunging, filled us with affright:
 * The chariots whirled along.

Within a marble hall a river ran–
 * A living tide, half muslin and half cloth:

And here one mourned a broken wreath or fan,
 * Yet swallowed down her wrath;