O memory! that which I gave thee
To guard in thy garner yestreen—
Little deeming thou e’er could’st behave thee
Thus basely—hath gone from thee clean!
Gone, fled, as ere autumn is ended
The yellow leaves flee from the oak—
I have lost it for ever, my splendid
Original joke.

What was it? I know I was brushing
My hair when the notion occurred:
I know that I felt myself blushing
As I thought, “How supremely absurd!
“How they’ll hammer on floor and on table
“As its drollery dawns on them—how
They will quote it”—I wish I were able
To quote it just now.

I had thought to lead up conversation
To the subject—it’s easily done—
Then let off, as an airy creation
Of the moment, that masterly pun.
Let it off, with a flash like a rocket’s;
In the midst of a dazzled conclave,
Where I sat, with my hands in my pockets,
The only one grave.

I had fancied young Titterton’s chuckles,
And old Bottleby’s hearty guffaws
As he drove at my ribs with his knuckles,
His mode of expressing applause:
While Jean Bottleby—queenly Miss Janet—
Drew her handkerchief hastily out,
In fits at my slyness—what can it
Have all been about?

I know ’twas the happiest, quaintest
Combination of pathos and fun:
But I’ve got no idea—the faintest—
Of what was the actual pun.
I think it was somehow connected
With something I’d recently read—
Or heard—or perhaps recollected
On going to bed.

What had I been reading? The Standard:
“Double Bigamy;” “Speech of the Mayor.”
And later—eh? yes! I meandered
Through some chapters of Vanity Fair.
How it fuses the grave with the festive!
Yet e’en there, there is nothing so fine—
So playfully, subtly suggestive—
As that joke of mine.

Did it hinge upon “parting asunder?”
No, I don’t part my hair with my brush.
Was the point of it “hair?” Now I wonder!
Stop a bit—I shall think of it—hush!
There’s hare, a wild animal—Stuff!
It was something a deal more recondite:
Of that I am certain enough;
And of nothing beyond it.

Hair—locks! There are probably many
Good things to be said about those.
Give me time—that’s the best guess of any—
“Lock” has several meanings, one knows.
Iron locks—iron-gray locks—a “deadlock”—
That would set up an everyday wit:
Then of course there’s the obvious “wedlock;”
But that wasn’t it.

No! mine was a joke for the ages;
Full of intricate meaning and pith;
A feast for your scholars and sages—
How it would have rejoiced Sidney Smith!
’Tis such thoughts that ennoble a mortal;
And, singing him out from the herd,
Fling wide immortality’s portal—
But what was the word?

Ah me! ’tis a bootless endeavour.
As the flight of a bird of the air
Is the flight of a joke—you will never
See the same one again, you may swear.
’Twas my firstborn, and O how I prized it!
My darling, my treasure, my own!
This brain and none other devised it—
And now it has flown.