The Poems of Winthrop Mackworth Praed With a Memoir by the Rev. Derwent Coleridge. Fourth Edition. In Two Volumes |
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 | The Poems of Winthrop Mackworth Praed |  |
427
XXXI. CAMBRIDGE
![illustration](https://iiif.lib.virginia.edu/iiif/uva-lib:466464/full/!1600,1600/0/default.jpg")
My First in its usual quiet way
Was creeping along on a wintry day,
When a minstrel came to its muddy bed,
With a harp on his shoulder, a wreath on his head;
And “How shall I cross,” the poor bard cried,
“To the cloisters and courts on the other side?”
Was creeping along on a wintry day,
When a minstrel came to its muddy bed,
With a harp on his shoulder, a wreath on his head;
And “How shall I cross,” the poor bard cried,
“To the cloisters and courts on the other side?”
Old Euclid came; he frowned a frown;
He flung the harp and the green wreath down;
And he led the boy with a stately march
To my Second's neat and narrow Arch;
And “See,” quoth the sage, “how every ass
Over the sacred stream must pass.”
He flung the harp and the green wreath down;
And he led the boy with a stately march
To my Second's neat and narrow Arch;
And “See,” quoth the sage, “how every ass
Over the sacred stream must pass.”
428
The youth was mournful, the youth was mute;
He sighed for his laurel, and sobbed for his lute;
The youth took courage, the youth took snuff;
He followed in faith his teacher gruff;
And he sits ever since on my Whole's kind lap
In a silken gown, and a trencher cap.
He sighed for his laurel, and sobbed for his lute;
The youth took courage, the youth took snuff;
He followed in faith his teacher gruff;
And he sits ever since on my Whole's kind lap
In a silken gown, and a trencher cap.
| The Poems of Winthrop Mackworth Praed | |