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    A line-o'-verse or two
    A line-o'-verse or two
    A line-o'-verse or two
    Ebook114 pages58 minutes

    A line-o'-verse or two

    By Bert Leston Taylor

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    Read preview
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateNov 25, 2013
    A line-o'-verse or two

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      Book preview

      A line-o'-verse or two - Bert Leston Taylor

      The Project Gutenberg EBook of A line-o'-verse or two, by Bert Leston Taylor

      This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

      almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or

      re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

      with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

      Title: A line-o'-verse or two

      Author: Bert Leston Taylor

      Release Date: September 20, 2009 [EBook #30038]

      Language: English

      *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A LINE-O'-VERSE OR TWO ***

      Produced by Bryan Ness, Anne Storer and the Online

      Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This

      file was produced from images generously made available

      by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)

      A Line-o’-Verse or Two

      By

      Bert Leston Taylor

      The Reilly & Britton Co.

      Chicago

      Copyright, 1911

      by

      The Reilly & Britton Co.

      NOTE

      For the privilege of reprinting the rimes gathered here I am indebted to the courtesy of the Chicago Tribune and Puck, in whose pages most of them first appeared. The Lay of St. Ambrose is new.

      One reason for rounding up this fugitive verse and prisoning it between covers was this: Frequently—more or less—I receive a request for a copy of this jingle or that, and it is easier to mention a publishing house than to search through ancient and dusty files.

      The other reason was that I wanted to.

      B. L. T.

      TO MY READERS

      Not merely of this book,—but a larger company, with whom, through the medium of the Chicago Tribune, I have been on very pleasant terms for several years,—this handful of rime is joyously dedicated.

      THE LAY OF ST. AMBROSE

      "And hard by doth dwell, in St. Catherine’s cell,

      Ambrose, the anchorite old and grey. "

      —The Lay of St. Nicholas.

      Ambrose the anchorite old and grey

      Larruped himself in his lonely cell,

      And many a welt on his pious pelt

      The scourge evoked as it rose and fell.

      For hours together the flagellant leather

      Went whacketty-whack with his groans of pain;

      And the lay-brothers said, with a wag of the head,

      Ambrose has been at the bottle again.

      And such, in sooth, was the sober truth;

      For the single fault of this saintly soul

      Was a desert thirst for the cup accurst,—

      A quenchless love for the Flowing Bowl.

      When he woke at morn with a head forlorn

      And a taste like a last-year swallow’s nest,

      He would kneel and pray, then rise and flay

      His sinful body like all possessed.

      Frequently tempted, he fell from grace,

      And as often he found the devil to pay;

      But by diligent scourging and diligent purging

      He managed to keep Old Nick at bay.

      This was the plight of our anchorite,—

      An endless penance condemned to dree,—

      When it chanced one day there came his way

      A Mystical Book with a golden Key.

      This Mystical Book was a guide to health,

      That none might follow and go astray;

      While a turn of the Key unlocked the wealth

      That all unknown in the Scriptures lay.

      Disease is sin, the Book defined;

      Sickness is error to which men cling;

      Pain is merely a state of mind,

      And matter a non-existent thing.

      If a tooth should ache, or a leg should break,

      You simply affirm and it’s sound again.

      Cut and contusion are only delusion,

      And indigestion a fancied pain.

      For pain is naught if you hold a thought,

      Fevers fly at your simple say;

      You have but to affirm, and every germ

      Will fold up its tent and steal away.

      From matin gong to even-song

      Ambrose pondered this mystic lore,

      Till what had seemed fiction took on a conviction

      That words had never possessed before.

      If pain, quoth he, "is a state of mind,

      If a rough hair shirt to silk is kin,—

      If these things are error, pray where’s the terror

      In scourging and purging oneself of sin?

      "It certainly seemeth good to me,

      By and large, in part and in whole.

      I’ll put it in practice and find if it fact is,

      Or only a mystical rigmarole."

      The very next night our anchorite

      Of the Flowing Bowl drank long and deep.

      He argued this wise: "New Thought applies

      No fitter to lamb than it does to sheep."

      When he woke at morn with a head forlorn

      And a taste akin to a parrot’s cage,

      He knelt and prayed, then up and flayed

      His sinful flesh in a righteous rage.

      Whacketty-whack on breast and back,

      Whacketty-whack, before, behind;

      But he held the thought as he laid it on,

      Pain is merely a state of mind.

      Whacketty-whack on breast and back,

      Whacketty-whack on calf and shin;

      And the lay-brothers said, with a wag of the head,

      " Ain’t he the glutton for discipline!"

      Now every night our anchorite

      Was exceedingly tight when he went to bed.

      The scourge

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