!"
While thus I moralized, on they went,
Finding the fare most excellent:
And all so kindly, brother to brother,
Helping the tidbits to each other:
"A slice of Southey let me send you"--
"This cut of Campbell I recommend you"--
"And here, my friends, is a treat indeed,
"The immortal Wordsworth fricasseed!"
Thus having, the cormorants, fed some time,
Upon joints of poetry--all of the prime--
With also (as Type in a whisper averred it)
"Cold prose on the sideboard, for such as preferred it"--
They rested awhile, to recruit their force,
Then pounced, like kites, on the second course,
Which was singing-birds merely--Moore and others--
Who all went the way of their larger brothers;
And, numerous now tho' such songsters be,
'Twas really quite distressing to see
A whole dishful of Toms--Moore, Dibdin, Bayly,--
Bolted by Type and Co. so gayly!
Nor was this the worst--I shudder to think
What a scene was disclosed when they came to drink.
The warriors of Odin, as every one knows,
Used to drink out of skulls of slaughtered foes:
And Type's old port, to my horror I found,
Was in skulls of bards sent merrily round.
And still as each well-filled cranium came,
A health was pledged to its owner's name;
While Type said slyly, midst general laughter,
"We eat them up first, then drink to them after.
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