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Lord! how the ponds and rivers boiled,
And how the shingles rattled!

And oaks were scattered on the ground,
As if the Titans battled;

And all above was in a howl,
And all below a clatter, -
The earth was like a frying-pan,
Or some such hissing matter.

It chanced to be our washing-day,
And all our things were drying:
The storm came roaring through the lines,
And set them all a flying;

I saw the shirts and petticoats
Go riding off like witches;

I lost, ah! bitterly I wept,

I lost my Sunday breeches !

I saw them straddling through the air,
Alas! too late to win them;

I saw them chase the clouds, as if
The devil had been in them;
They were my darlings and my pride,
My boyhood's only riches,

"Farewell, farewell," I faintly cried, -
My breeches! O my breeches!"

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That night I saw them in my dreams,

How changed from what I knew them! The dews had steeped their faded threads,

The winds had whistled through them! I saw the wide and ghastly rents

Where demon claws had torn them;

A hole was in their amplest part,
As if an imp had worn them.

I have had many happy years,

And tailors kind and clever,

But those young pantaloons have gone
Forever and forever!

And not till fate has cut the last

Of all my earthly stitches,

This aching heart shall cease to mourn
My loved, my long-lost breeches!

THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS.

WROTE some lines once on a time
In wondrous merry mood,

And thought, as usual, men would say
They were exceeding good.

They were so queer, so very queer,
I laughed as I would die;

Albeit, in the general way,
A sober man am I.

I called my servant, and he came;
How kind it was of him,

To mind a slender man like me,
He of the mighty limb!

"These to the printer," I exclaimed,
And, in my humorous way,

I added, (as a trifling jest,)

"There 'll be the devil to pay."

He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within;

At the first line he read, his face
Was all upon the grin.

He read the next; the grin grew broad,
And shot from ear to ear;

He read the third; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.

The fourth; he broke into a roar;
The fifth; his waistband split;
The sixth; he burst five buttons off,
And tumbled in a fit.

Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,
I watched that wretched man,
And since, I never dare to write
As funny as I can.

THE HOT SEASON.

HE folks, that on the first of May
Wore winter-coats and hose,
Began to say, the first of June,

"Good Lord! how hot it grows!

At last two Fahrenheits blew up,
And killed two children small,

And one barometer shot dead
A tutor with its ball!

Now all day long the locusts sang
Among the leafless trees.;

Three new hotels warped inside out,
The pumps could only wheeze;
And ripe old wine, that twenty years
Had cobwebbed o'er in vain,
Came spouting through the rotten corks,
Like Joly's best Champagne!

The Worcester locomotives did
Their trip in half an hour;
The Lowell cars ran forty miles
Before they checked the power;
Roll brimstone soon became a drug,
And loco-focos fell;
All asked for ice, but everywhere
Saltpetre was to sell.

Plump men of mornings ordered tights,
But, ere the scorching noons,

Their candle-moulds had grown as loose
As Cossack pantaloons!

The dogs ran mad, men could not try
If water they would choose;
A horse fell dead, - he only left
Four red-hot, rusty shoes!

But soon the people could not bear
The slightest hint of fire;

Allusions to caloric drew

A flood of savage ire;

The leaves on heat were all torn out
From every book at school,

And many blackguards kicked and caned,
Because they said, "Keep cool!"

The gas-light companies were mobbed,
The bakers all were shot,

The penny press began to talk

Of Lynching Doctor Nott;

And all about the warehouse steps
Were angry men in droves,
Crashing and splintering through the doors
To smash the patent stoves!

The abolition men and maids

Were tanned to such a hue,

You scarce could tell them from their friends, Unless their eyes were blue;

And, when I left, society

Had burst its ancient guards,

And Brattle Street and Temple Place
Were interchanging cards!

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DEPARTED DAYS.

|ES, dear departed, cherished days, Could Memory's hand restore Your morning light, your evening rays From Time's gray urn once more, — Then might this restless heart be still, This straining eye might close, And Hope her fainting pinions fold, While the fair phantoms rose.

But, like a child in ocean's arms,

We strive against the stream,

Each moment farther from the shore

Where life's young fountains gleam;

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