A body weighing by the pound Inside of half a score, In case and cordage safely bound, Was landed at my door.
What could it be? for friends are slack, And give, I rather trow, When they are sure of getting back As much as they bestow.
My hair, at thought of dark design, Or dynamitish fate, Stood up like quills of porcupine, But more than twice as straight.
Anon, I mused on something rare, Like duck or terrapin, But dreamed not, of the parcel, there Might be a pullet-in.
A mighty jerk,--the string that broke The fowl affair revealed, The victim of a cruel choke, Its neck completely peeled.
The biped in its paper cof- Fin, cramped and plump and neat, Had scratched its very toenails off In making both ends meat.
The only part I always ate, That never made me ill, Had gone away decapitate And carried off the bill.
I pondered o'er the sacrifice, The merry-thought, the wings, On giblet gravy, salad nice, And chicken-pie-ous things.
In heat of Fahrenheit degree Two hundred twelve or more, Where its grandsire, defying me, Had crowed the year before,
I thrust it with a hope forlorn,-- I knew what toughness meant, And sighed that ever I was born To die of roasting scent.
But presto! what _dénouement_ grand Of cookery sublime! 'Twas done as by the second hand, The drumsticks beating thyme.
And now the moral--he who buys Will comprehend its worth,-- Look not so much to weight and size As to the date of birth.
In fowls there is a difference; "The good die young," they say, And for the death of innocence To make us meat, we pray.
Of all the sweet visions that come unto me Of happy refreshment by land or by sea, Like oases where in life's desert I roam, Is nothing so pleasant as Holiday Home.
I climb to the top of the highest of hills And look to the west with affectionate thrills, And fancy I stand by the emerald side Of charming Geneva, like Switzerland's pride.
In distant perspective unruffled it lies, Except for the packet that paddles and plies, And puffing its way like a pioneer makes Its daily go-round o'er this pearl of the lakes.
Untroubled except for the urchins that come From many a haunt that is never a home, Instinctive as ducklings to swim and to wade, Scarce knowing aforetime why water was made.