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I know a land where it is afternoon
 * Sometimes, but mostly evening; where the sun

Shines not at all, but where a pasteboard moon
 * With incandescent eye winks feebly on

Monarch & bandit, dashing gay dragoon,
 * Maid in distress, gay Frenchman, stately Don,
 * Rage, humour, greed,
 * tears sandwiched into laughter
 * Estrangement first
 * & reconcilement after.

There have I met the Melancholy Dane,
 * Striving to fight unconquerable ill,

There have I seen the noble Moor in vain
 * Combat, the wild tormenting thirst to kill

What he loved best; and there amid a train
 * Of sprites & fairies, seen a sight that still
 * In a more real world is seen alas!
 * A fairy queen enamoured of an Ass.

There enter we on scenes of revelry
 * By potent aid of that magician’s wand
 * The blythe conductors baton waved

Tempering the wind of instrumental band on high,
 * To the stage lambs, whose shepherds cheerily

Threading the dance, with damsels hand in hand
 * Sooth the distracted heroine’s anxiety
 * With jödelling choruses of Lurlurliety.

There we may see the villain pause to think
 * On happier times, ere he had fallen so low,

And watch his arm arrested on the brink
 * Of dealing out the deadly coward’s blow

Full in the hero’s midriff
 * ere he drink

The fiery beaker
 * of best (stage) Bordeaux,

By hearing—Mercy! Can it be?
 * Just Heaven,

It is!—the village clock
 * striking eleven.