Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 102.djvu/433

Rh vous? Sir Archibald can show cause for smiling disdainfully at snappish strictures once in a way, when he can point to the number of his editions, which approach the teens, and to the hosts of his readers, whose tale who can tell? He can afford to be indulgent, or indifferent, to here-and-there a yelping cur: "let dogs delight to bark and bite, for 'tis their nature to"—(as saith, in not quite divine diction, the Divine Song of Dr. Watts): and naturally he will impute to an ill-conditioned incompetency any disposition to overhaul his weak points, and will set down the culprit as some straggler in the rear-guard of those criticasters, mere dyspeptic detractors, who

If our peroration be too pert, be our proem accepted in mitigation of damages. {{nop {{dhr}} {{rule|11em}} {{rule|11em}} {{dhr}} {{c|{{larger|CAN YOU SO SOON FORGET ME?}}

{{smaller|BY J. E. CARPENTER.}}}}

{{center block|{{sc|Can}} you so soon forget me,

{{em|1}}Now I am far away,

As though you ne'er had met me,

{{em|1}}And mingle with the gay?

The first words kindly spoken,

{{em|1}}Could they thy love dispel,

And bear to thee no token

{{em|1}}That told our last farewell?

{{em|5}}To think you never loved me

{{em|6}}'Twere better far, and yet

{{em|5}}How short a time has proved thee {{em|6}}How soon you can forget!

Perchance you still dissemble,

{{em|1}}Still play the traitor's part,

Your lips with accents tremble,

{{em|1}}That spring not from the heart;

His dream, like mine, will vanish,

{{em|1}}For false you still may be!

Though I vainly strive to banish

{{em|1}}The memory of thee.

They tell me that the stranger

{{em|1}}Now lives but in thy smile,—

He heeds not of the danger

{{em|1}}That lurks beneath its wile;

I deemed that falsehood never

{{em|1}}Could mar so fair a shrine;

Yet though we part for ever,

{{em|1}}May happiness be thine! }} {{nop}}