The Poetical Works of Andrew Lang Edited by Mrs. Lang |
 | I. |
 | I. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
Ballade of Neglected Merit
|
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
 | The Poetical Works of Andrew Lang |  |
207
Ballade of Neglected Merit
I have scribbled in verse and in prose,
I have painted ‘arrangements in greens’,
And my name is familiar to those
Who take in the high-class magazines.
I compose; I've invented machines;
I have written an ‘Essay on rhyme’;
For my county I played, in my teens,
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
I have painted ‘arrangements in greens’,
And my name is familiar to those
Who take in the high-class magazines.
I compose; I've invented machines;
I have written an ‘Essay on rhyme’;
For my county I played, in my teens,
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
I have lived, as a chief, with the Crows;
I have ‘interviewed’ princes and queens;
I have climbed the Caucasian snows;
I abstain, like the ancients, from beans—
I've a guess what Pythagoras means
When he says that to eat them's a crime—
I have lectured upon the Essenes,
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
I have ‘interviewed’ princes and queens;
I have climbed the Caucasian snows;
I abstain, like the ancients, from beans—
I've a guess what Pythagoras means
When he says that to eat them's a crime—
I have lectured upon the Essenes,
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
208
I've a fancy as morbid as Poe's,
I can tell what is meant by ‘shebeens’,
I have breasted the river that flows
Through the land of the wild Gadarenes;
I can gossip with Burton on skenes,
I can imitate Irving (the Mime),
And my sketches are quainter than Keene's;
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
I can tell what is meant by ‘shebeens’,
I have breasted the river that flows
Through the land of the wild Gadarenes;
I can gossip with Burton on skenes,
I can imitate Irving (the Mime),
And my sketches are quainter than Keene's;
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
Envoy
So the tower of mine eminence leansLike the Pisan, and mud is its lime;
I'm acquainted with dukes and with deans—
But—I am not in ‘Men of the Time!’
| The Poetical Works of Andrew Lang | |