Is there a way to forget to think? At your age, Sir, home, fortune, friends, A dear girl's love,--but I took to drink;-- The same old story; you know how it ends. If you could have seen these classic features,-- You needn't laugh, Sir; I was not then Such a burning libel on God's creatures; I was one of your handsome men--
If you had seen her, so fair, so young, Whose head was happy on this breast; If you could have heard the songs I sung When the wine went round, you wouldn't have guess'd That ever I, Sir, should be straying From door to door, with fiddle and dog, Ragged and penniless, and playing To you to-night for a glass of grog.
She's married since,--a parson's wife, 'Twas better for her that we should part; Better the soberest, prosiest life Than a blasted home and a broken heart. I have seen her--once; I was weak and spent On the dusty road; a carriage stopped, But little she dreamed as on she went, Who kissed the coin that her fingers dropped.
You've set me talking, Sir; I'm sorry; It makes me wild to think of the change! What do you care for a beggar's story? Is it amusing? you find it strange? I had a mother so proud of me! 'Twas well she died before--Do you know If the happy spirits in heaven can see The ruin and wretchedness here below?
Another glass, and strong, to deaden This pain; then Roger and I will start. I wonder, has he such a lumpish, leaden, Aching thing, in place of a heart? He is sad sometimes, and would weep, if he could, No doubt, remembering things that were,-- A virtuous kennel, with plenty of food, And himself a sober, respectable cur.
I'm better now; that glass was warming-- You rascal! limber your lazy feet! We must be fiddling and performing For supper and bed, or starve in the street.-- Not a very gay life to lead, you think. But soon we shall go where lodgings are free, And the sleepers need neither victuals nor drink;-- The sooner, the better for Roger and me.
Oh, a wonderful stream is the river of Time, As it runs through the realm of tears, With a faultless rhythm and a musical rhyme, And a boundless sweep and a surge sublime, As it blends with the ocean of Years.
How the winters are drifting, like flakes of snow, And the summers, like buds between; And the year in the sheaf--so they come and they go, On the river's breast, with its ebb and flow, As it glides in the shadow and sheen.