And stately dames that bring
Their daughters there to see,
Pronounce the "dancing thing"
No better than she should be.
With her skirt at her shameful knee,
And her painted, tainted phiz:
Ah, matron, which of us is?
(And, in sooth, it oft occurs
That while these matrons sigh,
Their dresses are lower than hers,
And sometimes half as high;
And their hair is hair they buy,
And they use their glasses, too,
In a way she'd blush to do.)
But change her gold and green
For a coarse merino gown,
And see her upon the scene
Of her home, when coaxing down
Her drunken father's frown,
In his squalid, cheerless den:
She's a fairy truly, then!
THE SENSATION CAPTAIN.
No nobler captain ever trod
Than Captain Parklebury Todd,
So good--so wise--so brave, he!
But still, as all his friends would own,
He had one folly--one alone--
This Captain in the Navy.
I do not think I ever knew
A man so wholly given to
Creating a sensation;
Or p'r'aps I should in justice say--
To what in an Adelphi play
Is known as "Situation.
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